Gasoline Alley by Jim Scancarelli for April 11, 2010

I love when they go there.

What memories. :-))

I’d just rather that was where Walt went to stay, one day very soon. No “sadness of farewells,” just a cheery wave and walking through the door.

Ravenswing, I agree wholeheartedly. You realize that the GA Sunday strip rarely coordinates with the weekly as well as this one does. I think Jim is setting us up for just exactly what you suggested. That way Skeezix and the rest of us can visit him from now on, and Walt becomes truly permanant.

Notary sojac

I thought Ignatz only threw bricks!

Here’s the problem with Walt retiring to the Old Comics Home, though–Phyllis isn’t there, and neither are his old friends, who had large enough roles in the strip that they should be. If he goes there, he never gets to see them again. I think allowing him to spend eternity with the love of his life would be better than sending him off to be Smokey Stover’s roommate.

ink on paper, it’s just ink on paper

What I think is a “Comics Nursing Home” is actually a place in Walt’s imagination. He may have saved old comic sheets and remenices about the good old days and the lost “comics”as he reads them again. In actuality Gasoline Alley is a reflection of real life and unfortunately Phyllis really did “die” so to speak and she wouldn’t be in the Comic Rest Home unless Jim takes a fantasy route and have her miracuously be there when Walt himself arrives. Jim is aware about the age of his character perhaps Frank King left a will forbidding the death of Walt for as long as it is drawn, we don’t know.

axe-grinder The “bat” in question is a “brickbat”–a brick or piece of one thrown as a missile.

Krazy rarely ducked the bricks–they were gifts of love from his”Lil’ Anjil”, or so he interpreted them. He’d often burst into a chorus of “There’s a Heppy Land Furfur Awa-a-a-aY” after contact.

Ignatz sometimes threw whatever was handy and dense if none of Kollin Kelley’s fine products were at hand.

Lots of late great toons aren’t at the OCH. I can only assume they all went to “the other place.”

@axe-grinder An old term for bricks is brickbat. Not sure of the origin, but it was commonly used in the southern USA, particularly South Georgia.

Strictly speaking a brickbat is a piece of broken brick, often one that is thrown as a weapon.

I was confused– I thought Offisa Pup’s nightstick was a bat that had been thrown by Ignatz. I didn’t see the brick on the back of Pup’s head!

I remember Terry and the Pirates; also Steve Canyon; was there a Smilin’ Jack?

I’m a bit too young to know Krazy Kat or Harold Teen except from comic histories, but it was with a blast of recognition that I suddenly remembered reading Penny when I was a kid. I got a double shock when I found this and suddenly remembered Penny’s father.

http://lambiek.net/artists/h/haenigsen_harry.htm

How about “The Teeny Weenies”, “The Yellow Kid”, “The Katzenjammer Kids”, “Maggie and Jiggs”, “The Captain and the Kids”. I read all those in the Chicago Tribune back in the ’40s and ’50s.