July 11, 2025 • 39 mins
Morgan White Fills In On NightSide
Some of you may recall the hilarious Mort Walker comic strip of the 1950s called “Beetle Bailey.” Set on a fictional U.S. Army post, Private Bailey was known for his laziness and aversion to work. Tonight, Morgan shared some laughs with Bill Janocha, cartoonist assistant on the Beetle Bailey comic strip and storyboard supervisor of the 1989 Beetle Bailey TV film.
Some of you may recall the hilarious Mort Walker comic strip of the 1950s called “Beetle Bailey.” Set on a fictional U.S. Army post, Private Bailey was known for his laziness and aversion to work. Tonight, Morgan shared some laughs with Bill Janocha, cartoonist assistant on the Beetle Bailey comic strip and storyboard supervisor of the 1989 Beetle Bailey TV film.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
It's Night Side with Dan Ray on WBS Boston's.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
News radiol Thank you. My listeners are going to hear
names that are legendary in the world of illustrating comics strips,
newspaper strips. We're going to be talking primarily about Beatle Bailey,
(00:29):
that forever private who had his own way of doing things,
much to the consternation of Sergeant Snorkel. And he had
Killer Diller and Otto the Dog and other personnel from
(00:51):
Camp Swampy that made it a LoveFest with the American
public for decades. And guest Bill Jenoka and did I
pronounce your last name properly? Bill?
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Perfectly? Thank you?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Okay, well, thank my third grade teacher who was a
stickler for phonetics, and I want to know why mort
Walker was an attraction for you.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Well, first, thank you very much for having me on.
It's an honor and a pleasure, and I hope to
keep this informative and exciting for you all. Okay, Well,
I was born in Westchester, Pennsylvania, and that was another
one of many cities back then that had multiple major newspapers,
(01:45):
and we got the Philadelphia Bulletin during the day when
I was growing up which had Beatle Bailey and Peanuts
and BC and all these other strips that I instantly
was naturally drawn to, and so I was a fan
early on, but Beetle was not my absolute favorite at
the time. I was drawn to Peanuts and BC by
(02:05):
Johnny Harp from Earily and Wizard of ID. I was
drawn to the way it was mort Drew. I didn't
at that time as a young child, was drawn to
the army aspect of the strip, but I enjoyed the
the way it was presented and certainly was fun and
easy to read, so I actually grew into it later on.
(02:28):
But I attended Syracuse University, where several of his children
happened to go, and I remember one funny thing was
I learned that his daughter, Margie, actually was there, and
that she was at one of the dorms that I
was familiar with.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
And I was like.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Thinking, Oh, my gosh, did mort Walker come and pick
up his Someone said, oh, you're into cartoons. Mort Walker
was here picking his daughter up like Mort Walker Beetle Bailey,
you know, And I just thought that was the closest
I'd ever come to, you know, meeting or get Little
did I know at the beginning of a thirty five
year association with him in my future. But so it
(03:11):
just Beatle was one of the many strips that I
just was naturally drawn to.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
No pun intended. Yeah, when you say drawn to no
pun intended.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
Absolutely I get it. And so it just worked into that.
But I can describe more about my association with how
I got with him, but that's up to you. You
tell me what you want to hear.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Well, I want to hear when you and I first
spoke a couple of Saturdays ago, we were on the
phone for like forty five minutes. Yeah, and you didn't
realize the names you were dropping, legends from the newspaper
strip world, like Ted Key for Hazel, illustrationist Jack Davis,
(03:58):
who did tv I covers and Mad magazine covers.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
And yes, he was, yes, and he was a yeah
I say, a dear friend. He was a deer man
that I met and knew, and actually he hosted me
at his home overnight. And uh, he was in fact
when mort asked for when he asked me to work
with him, Uh, he asked for letters of recommendation that
(04:24):
I was able to bring out some At that point,
I had been in the business for a few years.
And Jack Davis was one of those letters with a
little caricature self caricature in it. Uh, so that that
was brought some definitely some panache that he may not
have expected. But yeah, I missed Jack Davis. My wife
Mary here knew him too, and his wife Dina a
(04:47):
great talent and even greater person. So God bless you.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
And the name train doesn't stop there. And you mentioned
Dick Brown. A lot of people listening right now do
not know. You know that in the world of comic strips,
Beetle Bailey's sister was Lois from High.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
And Lois that is correct.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
And more was like ghosting behind that. But Dick Brown,
he's the one who penned his name, got the credit
for it.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
Yes, how that came about was mort was. First off,
he could write ten oh gosh, he could have written
ten comic strips simultaneously. He was an excellent gag writer
and an idea machine and he just was to the
last days. And I observed that. So when he was
(05:42):
doing Beatle Bailey. The one thing that I do mention
that already plugging my book, which is a deep dive
into the creation of Beatle and Spider the character that
predated Beetle and whatnot. But anyway, he was very very
concerned about when World War I too. There were such
popular strips at the time, sad Sack, there were, did
(06:08):
he not He created it, yes, and he did an
excellent job of it. And Hubert, which was done was
a diminutive character that was turned out to be done
by Dick Wingert. I never met him, just missed him,
but he was a friend of Connecticut, friend of Mortz.
He's mentioned in the book and others. But after the
war and even number of superheroes and that were just
(06:31):
fighting the Nazis and fighting the Japanese, et cetera. And
they were an even male call by Milton Keniff that
was just so hot at the time, so were the
ladies that he drew. But once the war ended, people
just said, hey, we're done with this. And what was
popular as heck in nineteen forty five, by nineteen forty
(06:53):
seven was yesterday's newspaper literally, So he was just in
fear of eating an army comic strip that would be
like taciturn interest in the strip that would would change
after you know, he saw an eventual hopeful end to
the Korean conflict, and he was beginning to have children
(07:14):
at that time, and he just you know, he was
able to write gags about kids. So he had experimented
with an idea of bringing Beatle home. It was originally
a college strip and there was a home base for it,
and he had a girlfriend named Buzz and so we
brought him home for a couple of weeks, thinking well,
let's see how this goes if I ever have to
(07:35):
bring him home again after this war ends. And the
readers apparently didn't like it.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
But Phil, I want to stop you here only because
I have a break to take and we can pick
up from that point right after a couple of commercials.
Promise absolutely, this is night Side, Dan Ray. We'll be
back on Monday. I'm Morgan White Junior filling in and
we will continue with the scars. Say what Walker and
(08:02):
his loved character Beetle Bailey after a few messages here
in WBZ time and temperature nine fifteen seventy.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Degrees night Side with Dan Ray on w BZ, Boston's
news radio.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
He's a military hero alternations, though he doesn't always follow regulations.
At the Sun of Remedy. He is here for you
to see. Let me know you're not the private pople.
That's the General, Colonel Major and the Cabins, Sargeant Walk.
(09:10):
I haven't heard that theme in occades, and you want
to know it. You don't know what goes on behind
the scenes during the commercials. I communicate with my producer,
so I'm sending a message to him telling him that
it was a cartoon from the early sixties called Beatle Bailey,
(09:31):
and he sent back to me. I've already got a
queued up. His name is Rob Brooks, and he is
the best we have here Bs and that proved it.
He and I were in the same wavelength without even
knowing it. Mm hmmm. Do you remember that cartoon?
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Yes, not first run, but I certainly do. And what's interesting,
just to quick aside, there is no corporal never was
to my knowledge in the strip. It's in the song,
but you know, so if I parts there but more, Yeah,
mort really was not involved with those His kids remember
(10:12):
watching it on Saturday morning. It was the trilogy with
two others. I'd love to see the original titles to
that whole sequence. I don't think they exist anymore, what
you know, but anyway, they were Crazy Cat and Snuffy
Smith and Beatle them. Yeah, and they did fifty of
those and that was a great period of marketing. There
were some toys and games and things, so that was
(10:35):
really a peak period with you know, with King features
in that strip, and that was a great move that.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
H I find that great bulls of fire goodness. Gracious,
I'm doing the Snuffy Smith's theme. Clearly, I watched them.
If it was a cartoon in the day, I watched it.
I loved cartoons.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
Fortunately, they are all available in a rather inexpensive that
of all fifty of them, there were videotapes when they
came out. Videotapes came out. I remember collecting them for
more and putting them in his collection and whatnot. This
was back in the late eighties and nineties. And now
that they're all together along with as I know, you
(11:15):
want to discuss this the the nineteen eighty nine unaired
TV special.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
There was a Bild Billy TV special.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
Yes, Now, did you want to go back to hind
Lois or did you want to move on to TV special?
Speaker 2 (11:30):
I want to hear about the TV special Hi and Lowish.
You know, they were a typical suburban family they had
three kids. I think the oldest son was called Chip,
and the twins, a boy and a girl, were called
Dot and Ditto. I thought that was cute.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
And the fourth child is the most endearing is tricks.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
To the seed yep, tricks.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
A side on that was that. So More was getting
ideas for you know, a domestic strip. Certainly could write it,
but he decided that he did not also have time
to draw it, because he had by this point had
the Sunday page, so he had a seven day a
week of strip, plus the comic book had come out
and he was drawing some of the first ones and
(12:17):
doing all the covers and such. So, and he had
the family to take care of anyway they wanted.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
So.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
But how the idea came about was Whatt was approached
by actually a former assistant of Bob kine on Batman
in the nineteen fifty late forties and nineteen fifties called
Lou Sayer Schwartz who lived up in actually Cape cod
and I remember speaking and meeting with him Lou. But
(12:44):
Lou had an idea. He approached Mort and said, hey,
you know, how about an idea for a family strip?
And he wanted to he saw, you know, to his benefit,
he saw mortis a rising star and wanted to work
with him him. So he suggested this family strip idea,
and I guess you know he would draw it and
(13:05):
Mort would write it. That kind of thing. Mort went
to King Feature Sylvan Bike, the editor, and suggested this partnership,
and Bike immediately said, if you have an idea for
another comic strip, the heck with cooperating with anyone else.
We want you totally. We'll we'll find a writer. We
want to have all control because this would have been
with another syndicate. So Lou was asked aside, and so
(13:31):
Sylvan Bike and Mort said, hey, let's meet next week.
Come back in a week to make a list of
possible artists, and I'll do the same. They both came
back with number one on their list was Richard Dick
Brown who history Yeah. Stam Drake, who was a great
(13:53):
illustrator and friend of theirs, had suggested they Stan and
Dick worked at either probably think was young and Rubacam
because Dick was doing so many of the Sunday Supplement
artworks and he was doing the Tracy Twins which was
had just in nineteen fifty four, started in Boys Life magazine,
this beautifully drawn strip, and somehow Mort had seen that
(14:17):
along with Sylvan was aware of it, and they saw
that artwork and immediately asked Dick. Dick got a call
at the studio at his workplace, thought it was a joke,
hung up the phone and yelled outside the cubicle. Okay,
who's pulling my leg here? You know? Suppose who's the
person saying there? King Feature Syndicate. Sylvan Bike called again
(14:40):
and said, you know, do we have Dick Brown? Then
he only then did he realize it was a real deal,
and that he was asked to work on the comic strip.
And he lived at New Jersey at the time, and
the rest is history. Oh yeah, there you go, out there,
you go.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
I want to make sure people here the exact time
the book. You've said it a couple of times. But
spell your last name. Bill is easy to spell. But
tell your last spell your last name, and give the
exact title of the book on Mort Walker.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
All right, My name is Bill. Last name Janoka j
A no C h A. And the title of the
book is the Life and Art of Mort Walker, with
a subtitle of a survey of his cartoon indeed it is.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
And I will say this, it might be a few
pennies more than you're used to when you buy a
commercial book, but it's worth it if you're at all
into the comic strips we read when we were a kid.
I was a boy Scout. I used to have a
subscription The Boy's Life, Pee Wee Harris, etc. The twins
(15:52):
and the names that you've heard mentioned, they're all going
to be in across referenced in this book. I mentioned
Ted Key, who did Hazelt. We talked pretty much at
length about Jack Davis, Charles Schultz. There was an interesting
interaction between Charles Schultz and Mort Walker. And we'll get
(16:15):
into that. We've got news coming up in roughly ninety seconds,
so we'll talk more about that after the news. And
you know Dick, Dick Brown, Johnny Hart, yes, Johnny Hart,
had BC and the Wizard of ID. So these names,
(16:37):
these people all will appear in this book about Mort Walker.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
Each one of them I was blessed to know personally.
Thumbs up to all of them.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
God bless them, God bless all right, And if you
want to call in six one, seven, two, five, four, ten,
thirty or eight eight nine to nineteen thirty. I know
a lot of you are just sitting back and enjoying
the conversation. That's fine too, But if you want to
participate with your voice, those are the phone numbers you
(17:07):
need to do it. And you did spell your name,
did you not, Bill? Yes, I could do it do
it again?
Speaker 3 (17:17):
Yes, j A Nocha Dejanoka Janoka.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Bill Chenoka is here and he's litting you know that
he wrote a book about the cartoonist known as mort Walker.
I'm going to take a break here, maybe a commercial,
maybe to quick get the news, and we Bill and
I will be back. Time and temperature here on night
(17:46):
Side nine nine, I'm guessing it's still holding its seventy degrees.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
You're on Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ, Boston's
news radio.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Welcome back, everybody. We're talking about a certain Cormic strip
one named Beatle Bailly, where there were these soldiers. The
name of their camp was Camp Swampy. I like the
name of the chaplain. His name was Chaplain Stained Glass
inside joke there, And my guess Bill Janoka has written
(18:22):
a book about what Walker and we are talking about
that book. You can go out and buy it right now.
What bookstores carry it.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Oh, I don't know if this publisher really caters to bookstores.
That's what makes it more rarer, makes it more difficult
to find. It's a niche publisher. So I encourage you
actually to purchase it from me if you're interested, I
can directly get it to you, and anyone that does
(18:55):
purchase it from me will I'm more than happy to
inscribe it with a drawing and some added materials that
were edited out of the book.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
So give your web information.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
I'm sorry repeat that, give your.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Information so people know how to reach you and buy
a book.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
Yes, I guess my email would be great. Let's start
with that. Well, I'm giving my email address to all
of Boston, but here.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
We go all of the country. We're hurting thirty eight
states and parts of Canada. Oh boy, I'm better a
big audience. Bill.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Well, it's easy. My email address is Bill Comic as
it sounds b I L. L Comic at aol dot
com and I live in Stamford, Connecticut, and I'm more
than happy to share the book with you.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
Okay, let's talk about how the American public view of
the military changed. We were all gung ho and World
War Two, beat the access powers, yay America, and were
still that gung ho for the Korean skirmish or whatever
(20:14):
term you want to use. But by Vietnam, America's psyche
had changed a little bit. And I'm assuming what Walker
took that into consideration as he drew the strip. Am
I right or wrong?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
Uh? Yes? And no, Mort was definitely uh prescribed to
He was no Jewel Sfiffer. With all due respect, we
just lost him great satirist.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
J oh, yeah, forgive me.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
And then you have Gary Trudeau, who Gary was nice
enough to write a testimonial that's in the book. Okay, oh,
I appreciate, Thank you, Gary. But Mort was definitely wanted
to avoid topical humor throughout the entire of his career,
and miraculously he created a comic strip that really transcended
(21:05):
the military. I mean it was a military setting and
if you read the if you have the ability to
read the comic strip in the nineteen fifties, which his
work was great throughout, but I love it in the
fifties and there was definitely more of reference to terms
in the military. The illustrations were more rich and they
(21:26):
had all of those type of things. But he simplified
his style as the years went on and it became
more of a strip that was based in the military,
but you had the delineation of power, the revolt against authority.
That could be your boss against your boss. It could
be for God forbid, your wife or a neighbor or something.
(21:49):
So characters like Sergeant Snorkel, who I believe was his
most important character he created, because when he created that character,
that was the polar opposite of Beetle, and you had
that more. It was always challenging authority. In his own life,
he lived that way and wanted to have fun and
wanted to get around details and such and create his
(22:11):
own independent world. And he lived that through Beetle Bailey
and through his characters. So the strip really transcended the military.
And so by the time were excuse me, Vietnam had
come around. I'm sure that he realized which really was
coming through the fifties. It wasn't like it suddenly happened
(22:32):
in nineteen sixty.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
Five or anymore.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
But he did a series of and I don't have
the date in front of me, but they were really cool.
He created this character name Rocky, and that was that fifties,
and Rocky really was like a James Dean, a Marlon
Brando type rebellious character, and he had actually the long
calic and the hair in the back, he smoked a cigarette.
(22:56):
He came from the rough side of town, kind of
a beat nick kind of character. So by the sixties,
the way he wanted to comment on the protests that
were going on, the pitch, the signage and stuff, he
had Rocky, who kind of that character sided with the rebellion,
(23:16):
and so he based him during a week or more
of strips talking directly to these beat neck type characters.
I want to use that term because they didn't have
the long woodstock era hare at that point. They were
more like post beat neck fifties characters. But it was
that sensitivity that he sensed the reaction against ban the
(23:38):
war and ban the bomb and that kind of thing,
and he did put that in the strip to humorous effect.
I wish I had more that was in front of
me right now, but they're easy enough to research, but
more was able to Other than that, he really was
able to skirt that period or that because the strip
(23:58):
was so iconic at that point, you know, we just
played the theme for the TV cartoons that I don't
believe he had too much blowback about it, too much
challenge Morgan that there's a particular strip that I'm unaware
of that he directly dealt with Vietnam, but so I'm
sure he did, but so more kind of got around it.
(24:21):
His problems came up as the seventies started. When he
created Lieutenant Flapp, the first African American character, he actually
lost papers in the South. He was banned for the
second time from Stars and Stripes, albeit briefly, and then
the next year when he created Miss Bucksley, the Secretary
(24:42):
to the General. It was cute and fun at the beginning,
but it definitely was misogynistic and you know, hey, baby,
that kind of humor which was being dated already and
women's lib if you want to use that term, and
that's what it was. Then throughout the seventies and definitely
into the early eighties he had trouble with that. So
(25:04):
that was rather anachronistic already at that time. So his
conflicts were self generated, you could say that occurred in
the seventies and into the eighties, but the Vietnam era
he really was able to breeze through it. And not
have any problem with that conflict.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Oh, I told you I have one of these weird memories.
It locks things in. And I had a number of
the Beetle Bailey paperback books, which were the reprinting of
the newspaper strips.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Yeah, they were great.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
There was a strip in this paperback book, my Beetle
Billy paperback book that showed uh, Sergeant Sergeant Snorkel teaching
a self defense class and Beetle, who always had this
nonchalant look about him, didn't want to be there, and
(26:00):
Sergeant Snuckle saying all right, come at me, Beetle, and
Beetle looked at the sergeant and just said kaibala to
juice in lee. I memorized that phrase because I thought,
maybe one day if I was drafted, because I'm reading
this at age fifteen or sixteen, and the draft was
(26:21):
around the corner from me. Fortunately I never got drafted.
But that phrase meant your shoelace is untied in Vietnamese. Now,
I thought that that embodied everything. It would make you
laugh a little bit, but make you think, thank you.
And if you if you were about to be face
(26:42):
to face with the enemy and you said that he's
not expecting an American to say that in his language,
so he'll look down advantage beetle. And I thought that
I'm remembering this literally from fifty five years ago, but
(27:02):
that those set of words are emblazoned in the back
of my mind. And I told Bill about this. Yeah,
and you weren't aware of it, but you knew I
was telling you the truth. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
No, that's fascinating. That really is that in that way?
It is topical. So yeah, well, hey, I'm surprised I'm
learning something here that's really really cool. Thank you for
sharing that with all of us.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Well, no problem, and tell you what. I'm going to
tell the story about mort Walker versus Child Sholtz, and
then we'll take our break.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Sergeant Snuckle had a dog Otto and periodically the dog
would do comic strip like things, but the dog began
to do more snoopy like things, and Child Schultz felt,
uh huh, don't do that the world of a dog
(28:03):
kind of being human? Now, were you aware of their
discussion about this?
Speaker 3 (28:10):
This would have occurred long before I started working with
more than nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
Yeah, before in the seventies.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Yes, And and there was a sudden change where Otto
was on all fours and then kind of the next week.
And I believe it was Mort's good friend and writer
Jerry Dumas that suggested that he humanize him a bit
and give him a uniform, a miniature one stand on
two legs. That changed the dynamic of this of the character.
(28:41):
But moret admittedly was in competition with Sparky for years
actually throughout their life, and so he you know, but
they were and Sparky had he was someone who was
very aware of other cartoonists and whatnot, and was competitive Nate, and.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
I'm going to use the twenty first century word, they
were frenemies. They were in competition with each other, but
they knew each other, liked each other, and they wanted
to be one up over the other guy whenever possible.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
They worked independently, and certainly Sparky needed no help. I
mean when he created Snoopy and went forward heat and
was the first to get a book deal and whatnot,
And so yes, I admit there was a competition there.
I mean, both gentlemen were extremely successful with their their
comic strips, and they both went for humor, but in
(29:41):
very different ways. And so you know, I'll admit that,
but there was some crossover more than one point. Definitely
did want to increase Auto's prominence in the strip when
he put them on two legs and there's a famous
episode where we all can't be Snoopy was what autos?
(30:02):
And that was you know, that kind of a thing
because I think I forget the gag, but it was
a three panel gag and sargers yelche, he says. So
that was a direct And there were a number of
times where he would have dream sequences of Sergeant the
Sunday Page, and there was one where he definitely mentioned
peanuts and he had all these bags of peanuts. It
was kind of a silly joke, but it had Snoopy
(30:25):
on the soop with camel and whatnot. So he did mention.
He mentioned Charlie Brown in his short lived comic strip
Genius Strip Sam Strip that was a comic strip about
comic strips. It was ahead of its time. He worked
with Jerry Dumas on it, and that ran from nineteen
sixty one to sixty three, and he definitely put Charlie
(30:47):
Brown in that. I don't know about Snoopy, but he
directly drew. It's Jerry actually drew that strip.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
But let me stop you here because into my break time,
we'll come right back. I promise you.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
Any who else we keep going, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
Go ahead if you want to hear the phone number
six one, seven, five, four, ten thirty eight eight eight,
nine to nine, ten thirty, give a call if you
want time here on Nightside nine forty six temperature. I'm
gonna stick with seventy, but it may change.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
It's Nightside with Dan Ray on wb Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
Dan. We'll be back on Monday. I promise eight pm
sharp he will return to doing Nightside. He's taking a vacation.
I hope he's enjoyed himself. Bill Jenooka is my guest.
We're talking about mort Walker, the artist who created Beatle Bailey.
And I was speaking to my producer while the commercials
(31:48):
were playing. And I don't know if you know this, Bill,
but there is a Charles Shultz Peanuts Museum in Santa Rosa, California,
which makes me think, does Walker have a museum?
Speaker 3 (32:06):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (32:07):
And no.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
First off, I know the Schultz Museum very well. The
National Cartoon Society hosted us there. Oh short about a
few years after Sparky died and it was a fabulous facility.
I'm sorry I haven't been out there since we were
guests and watched Snoopy at the ice rink. And the
(32:29):
actual woman who actually spoiler alert Snoopy has performed with
as a costume character with a real person inside. She
actually lives in this area and I have a pleasure
of calling her a friend so that I said, Wow,
I saw you ice dance years earlier. So yeah, that's
a great museum. Jean Schultz is a dear friend, and
(32:51):
I encourage anyone to go out see the museum and
the ice rink. Out in Santa Rosa, Moret created a
museum of He loved comics so much that he got
the idea over fifty years ago to create a museum
of cartoon art, which started in Greenwich, Connecticut, at a
(33:11):
rented home that nineteen eight seventy four. By nineteen seventy seven,
it had moved to a new facility in Portchester, New York,
a castle actually, and it was there until nineteen ninety
two or something to that effect, I believe. Then they
moved it down to boker Raton, Florida, a great facility,
(33:35):
but then it lasted until two thousand and one or
two thousand and two or so, and currently all of
that artwork has been donated to the Ohio State University.
So there's the Mortwalker Gallery. So the museum lives on
in a different way at Ohio State. And I had
the pleasure of being very involved with That's where I
(33:55):
met Moret at his museum in New York, and there
you go. We could talk all night about his museums.
But no, he created a museum for to benefit all
of cartooning. Okay, so you know, the Schultz Museum definitely
showcases other certainly Sparky's work. That's was Schultz's pet name
(34:17):
to his friends and whatnot. But there's so many regional
and new cartoonists in that area and guest speakers that
come and showcase. So it's a great facility for all
of cartooning, and certainly the Ohio State Facility is definitely
one also, So I urge anyone to go to Columbus,
Ohio and see that one.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
Also, what do you know about Mort Walker that the
public doesn't know? He was an eagle Boy scout. I'm
just throwing out silly examples.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
I'm an eagle scout, so hello, fellow scout.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
I was the first class scout. But life ele looked
like a huge mountain to climb, so I just said.
Speaker 3 (35:01):
Yes, it was. But it definitely, you know, as long
as you enjoyed yourself in a safe, fun environment, that's
what count. And idea, it's true with everything more. Just
was very, very committed to the day he died. Really
of cartooning, writing. He worked harder as towards the end
of his life, which I write about actually in the book.
(35:24):
The book showcases his actually predates him. His parents both
work artists, writers, poets, and he was influenced by that.
It goes through his whole career, his childhood in the twenties,
throughout the depression years of World War two, college and whatnot.
(35:45):
But then I jump after nineteen fifty four when his
last magazine cartoons containing Spider, the pre Beatle character. I
know I'm carrying. I've got a lot of information. I'm
trying to get out quickly here, so bear with me.
I jump ahead three decades or so four maybe through
the later years that I witnessed. Compare what I write about,
(36:09):
you know, as a youth, and how he was towards
the end of his life. I was with him for
thirty five years, so but I jumped towards the very end,
and his commitment was unyielding. I mean he was so
driven and really beatle Bailey was his eighth child. He
had seven, and beatle Bailly was certainly the eighth. And
(36:30):
I fit in there somewhere in a way. But and
so you know that part. He was committed to it,
as was Schultz with his trip. They worked it, they
were their comic strips were their life, and it really
was and it was he did fine art too, and
early on, and so that was something that he was
(36:50):
very interested. He was not really into music. He loved
golf and the athletics in that way. Committed to his family,
certainly to his wife. And he lived in a great home.
That was the home the studio of guts In Borglam,
who was the Mount Rushmore sculptor. Y was a great
for me. I was going to this historic Not only
(37:11):
was I working with an iconic cartoon creator, but I
was in the home of an iconic American sculptor. And
he collected original and excuse me, cartoon art, but illustration art.
So I'm looking at Norman Rockwell's on the wall and
see Wyath and Dean Cornwell and we could get into
(37:32):
that discussion too. So the aesthetics were just brimming, you know.
It was like wallpaper to me. I Norman Rockwell painting.
So what people paid, they paid money to go to
museums to stuff that I saw hanging over his pool table, right.
But it just it helped though creatively the juices to
(37:52):
just the aesthetics. It just it was such a thrilling thing.
He worked on a musical witnessing that he was the museum,
and we had any books that I worked on with him,
So there really never was a dull moment, you know.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
I was, I am almost out of time, but I've
saved thirty seconds for you to give your address, the
title of the book and the spelling of your name,
so anybody who wants it can get it. You've got
thirty seconds.
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Go okay again, it's Bill Jinoka. I've spelled it j
A N O c Cha. My personal address is twenty
three Skyline Lane in stam with an M. Stamford, Connecticut,
six nine three. And the cost of the book it
(38:41):
has retails for sixty dollars if I'm shipping it out,
I'm going to have to ask for sixty five. I
have to pay half price when I buy it, so
and I have to ship it. So I'm adding some
extras to it. But you and tell me how you
want it inscribed. I promise you it's a book filled
with information and the rarest of rarities. The faults were open.
(39:04):
There's material in this book you would never heard, and
it's I believe that you will really enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
Bill. Thank you very very much. Good luck with the book,
and stay in touch.
Speaker 3 (39:16):
Okay, okay. I love talking to you all, and certainly
we could keep doing another time. So thank you all
and enjoy the rest of your summer.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
Good night, Bill, take care. Time nine fifty eight temperature
pending seventy degrees
It's Night Side with Dan Ray on WBS Boston's.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
News radiol Thank you. My listeners are going to hear
names that are legendary in the world of illustrating comics strips,
newspaper strips. We're going to be talking primarily about Beatle Bailey,
(00:29):
that forever private who had his own way of doing things,
much to the consternation of Sergeant Snorkel. And he had
Killer Diller and Otto the Dog and other personnel from
(00:51):
Camp Swampy that made it a LoveFest with the American
public for decades. And guest Bill Jenoka and did I
pronounce your last name properly? Bill?
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Perfectly? Thank you?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Okay, well, thank my third grade teacher who was a
stickler for phonetics, and I want to know why mort
Walker was an attraction for you.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Well, first, thank you very much for having me on.
It's an honor and a pleasure, and I hope to
keep this informative and exciting for you all. Okay, Well,
I was born in Westchester, Pennsylvania, and that was another
one of many cities back then that had multiple major newspapers,
(01:45):
and we got the Philadelphia Bulletin during the day when
I was growing up which had Beatle Bailey and Peanuts
and BC and all these other strips that I instantly
was naturally drawn to, and so I was a fan
early on, but Beetle was not my absolute favorite at
the time. I was drawn to Peanuts and BC by
(02:05):
Johnny Harp from Earily and Wizard of ID. I was
drawn to the way it was mort Drew. I didn't
at that time as a young child, was drawn to
the army aspect of the strip, but I enjoyed the
the way it was presented and certainly was fun and
easy to read, so I actually grew into it later on.
(02:28):
But I attended Syracuse University, where several of his children
happened to go, and I remember one funny thing was
I learned that his daughter, Margie, actually was there, and
that she was at one of the dorms that I
was familiar with.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
And I was like.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Thinking, Oh, my gosh, did mort Walker come and pick
up his Someone said, oh, you're into cartoons. Mort Walker
was here picking his daughter up like Mort Walker Beetle Bailey,
you know, And I just thought that was the closest
I'd ever come to, you know, meeting or get Little
did I know at the beginning of a thirty five
year association with him in my future. But so it
(03:11):
just Beatle was one of the many strips that I
just was naturally drawn to.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
No pun intended. Yeah, when you say drawn to no
pun intended.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
Absolutely I get it. And so it just worked into that.
But I can describe more about my association with how
I got with him, but that's up to you. You
tell me what you want to hear.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Well, I want to hear when you and I first
spoke a couple of Saturdays ago, we were on the
phone for like forty five minutes. Yeah, and you didn't
realize the names you were dropping, legends from the newspaper
strip world, like Ted Key for Hazel, illustrationist Jack Davis,
(03:58):
who did tv I covers and Mad magazine covers.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
And yes, he was, yes, and he was a yeah
I say, a dear friend. He was a deer man
that I met and knew, and actually he hosted me
at his home overnight. And uh, he was in fact
when mort asked for when he asked me to work
with him, Uh, he asked for letters of recommendation that
(04:24):
I was able to bring out some At that point,
I had been in the business for a few years.
And Jack Davis was one of those letters with a
little caricature self caricature in it. Uh, so that that
was brought some definitely some panache that he may not
have expected. But yeah, I missed Jack Davis. My wife
Mary here knew him too, and his wife Dina a
(04:47):
great talent and even greater person. So God bless you.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
And the name train doesn't stop there. And you mentioned
Dick Brown. A lot of people listening right now do
not know. You know that in the world of comic strips,
Beetle Bailey's sister was Lois from High.
Speaker 3 (05:06):
And Lois that is correct.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
And more was like ghosting behind that. But Dick Brown,
he's the one who penned his name, got the credit
for it.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
Yes, how that came about was mort was. First off,
he could write ten oh gosh, he could have written
ten comic strips simultaneously. He was an excellent gag writer
and an idea machine and he just was to the
last days. And I observed that. So when he was
(05:42):
doing Beatle Bailey. The one thing that I do mention
that already plugging my book, which is a deep dive
into the creation of Beatle and Spider the character that
predated Beetle and whatnot. But anyway, he was very very
concerned about when World War I too. There were such
popular strips at the time, sad Sack, there were, did
(06:08):
he not He created it, yes, and he did an
excellent job of it. And Hubert, which was done was
a diminutive character that was turned out to be done
by Dick Wingert. I never met him, just missed him,
but he was a friend of Connecticut, friend of Mortz.
He's mentioned in the book and others. But after the
war and even number of superheroes and that were just
(06:31):
fighting the Nazis and fighting the Japanese, et cetera. And
they were an even male call by Milton Keniff that
was just so hot at the time, so were the
ladies that he drew. But once the war ended, people
just said, hey, we're done with this. And what was
popular as heck in nineteen forty five, by nineteen forty
(06:53):
seven was yesterday's newspaper literally, So he was just in
fear of eating an army comic strip that would be
like taciturn interest in the strip that would would change
after you know, he saw an eventual hopeful end to
the Korean conflict, and he was beginning to have children
(07:14):
at that time, and he just you know, he was
able to write gags about kids. So he had experimented
with an idea of bringing Beatle home. It was originally
a college strip and there was a home base for it,
and he had a girlfriend named Buzz and so we
brought him home for a couple of weeks, thinking well,
let's see how this goes if I ever have to
(07:35):
bring him home again after this war ends. And the
readers apparently didn't like it.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
But Phil, I want to stop you here only because
I have a break to take and we can pick
up from that point right after a couple of commercials.
Promise absolutely, this is night Side, Dan Ray. We'll be
back on Monday. I'm Morgan White Junior filling in and
we will continue with the scars. Say what Walker and
(08:02):
his loved character Beetle Bailey after a few messages here
in WBZ time and temperature nine fifteen seventy.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Degrees night Side with Dan Ray on w BZ, Boston's
news radio.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
He's a military hero alternations, though he doesn't always follow regulations.
At the Sun of Remedy. He is here for you
to see. Let me know you're not the private pople.
That's the General, Colonel Major and the Cabins, Sargeant Walk.
(09:10):
I haven't heard that theme in occades, and you want
to know it. You don't know what goes on behind
the scenes during the commercials. I communicate with my producer,
so I'm sending a message to him telling him that
it was a cartoon from the early sixties called Beatle Bailey,
(09:31):
and he sent back to me. I've already got a
queued up. His name is Rob Brooks, and he is
the best we have here Bs and that proved it.
He and I were in the same wavelength without even
knowing it. Mm hmmm. Do you remember that cartoon?
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Yes, not first run, but I certainly do. And what's interesting,
just to quick aside, there is no corporal never was
to my knowledge in the strip. It's in the song,
but you know, so if I parts there but more, Yeah,
mort really was not involved with those His kids remember
(10:12):
watching it on Saturday morning. It was the trilogy with
two others. I'd love to see the original titles to
that whole sequence. I don't think they exist anymore, what
you know, but anyway, they were Crazy Cat and Snuffy
Smith and Beatle them. Yeah, and they did fifty of
those and that was a great period of marketing. There
were some toys and games and things, so that was
(10:35):
really a peak period with you know, with King features
in that strip, and that was a great move that.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
H I find that great bulls of fire goodness. Gracious,
I'm doing the Snuffy Smith's theme. Clearly, I watched them.
If it was a cartoon in the day, I watched it.
I loved cartoons.
Speaker 3 (10:55):
Fortunately, they are all available in a rather inexpensive that
of all fifty of them, there were videotapes when they
came out. Videotapes came out. I remember collecting them for
more and putting them in his collection and whatnot. This
was back in the late eighties and nineties. And now
that they're all together along with as I know, you
(11:15):
want to discuss this the the nineteen eighty nine unaired
TV special.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
There was a Bild Billy TV special.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
Yes, Now, did you want to go back to hind
Lois or did you want to move on to TV special?
Speaker 2 (11:30):
I want to hear about the TV special Hi and Lowish.
You know, they were a typical suburban family they had
three kids. I think the oldest son was called Chip,
and the twins, a boy and a girl, were called
Dot and Ditto. I thought that was cute.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
And the fourth child is the most endearing is tricks.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
To the seed yep, tricks.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
A side on that was that. So More was getting
ideas for you know, a domestic strip. Certainly could write it,
but he decided that he did not also have time
to draw it, because he had by this point had
the Sunday page, so he had a seven day a
week of strip, plus the comic book had come out
and he was drawing some of the first ones and
(12:17):
doing all the covers and such. So, and he had
the family to take care of anyway they wanted.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
So.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
But how the idea came about was Whatt was approached
by actually a former assistant of Bob kine on Batman
in the nineteen fifty late forties and nineteen fifties called
Lou Sayer Schwartz who lived up in actually Cape cod
and I remember speaking and meeting with him Lou. But
(12:44):
Lou had an idea. He approached Mort and said, hey,
you know, how about an idea for a family strip?
And he wanted to he saw, you know, to his benefit,
he saw mortis a rising star and wanted to work
with him him. So he suggested this family strip idea,
and I guess you know he would draw it and
(13:05):
Mort would write it. That kind of thing. Mort went
to King Feature Sylvan Bike, the editor, and suggested this partnership,
and Bike immediately said, if you have an idea for
another comic strip, the heck with cooperating with anyone else.
We want you totally. We'll we'll find a writer. We
want to have all control because this would have been
with another syndicate. So Lou was asked aside, and so
(13:31):
Sylvan Bike and Mort said, hey, let's meet next week.
Come back in a week to make a list of
possible artists, and I'll do the same. They both came
back with number one on their list was Richard Dick
Brown who history Yeah. Stam Drake, who was a great
(13:53):
illustrator and friend of theirs, had suggested they Stan and
Dick worked at either probably think was young and Rubacam
because Dick was doing so many of the Sunday Supplement
artworks and he was doing the Tracy Twins which was
had just in nineteen fifty four, started in Boys Life magazine,
this beautifully drawn strip, and somehow Mort had seen that
(14:17):
along with Sylvan was aware of it, and they saw
that artwork and immediately asked Dick. Dick got a call
at the studio at his workplace, thought it was a joke,
hung up the phone and yelled outside the cubicle. Okay,
who's pulling my leg here? You know? Suppose who's the
person saying there? King Feature Syndicate. Sylvan Bike called again
(14:40):
and said, you know, do we have Dick Brown? Then
he only then did he realize it was a real deal,
and that he was asked to work on the comic strip.
And he lived at New Jersey at the time, and
the rest is history. Oh yeah, there you go, out there,
you go.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
I want to make sure people here the exact time
the book. You've said it a couple of times. But
spell your last name. Bill is easy to spell. But
tell your last spell your last name, and give the
exact title of the book on Mort Walker.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
All right, My name is Bill. Last name Janoka j
A no C h A. And the title of the
book is the Life and Art of Mort Walker, with
a subtitle of a survey of his cartoon indeed it is.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
And I will say this, it might be a few
pennies more than you're used to when you buy a
commercial book, but it's worth it if you're at all
into the comic strips we read when we were a kid.
I was a boy Scout. I used to have a
subscription The Boy's Life, Pee Wee Harris, etc. The twins
(15:52):
and the names that you've heard mentioned, they're all going
to be in across referenced in this book. I mentioned
Ted Key, who did Hazelt. We talked pretty much at
length about Jack Davis, Charles Schultz. There was an interesting
interaction between Charles Schultz and Mort Walker. And we'll get
(16:15):
into that. We've got news coming up in roughly ninety seconds,
so we'll talk more about that after the news. And
you know Dick, Dick Brown, Johnny Hart, yes, Johnny Hart,
had BC and the Wizard of ID. So these names,
(16:37):
these people all will appear in this book about Mort Walker.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
Each one of them I was blessed to know personally.
Thumbs up to all of them.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
God bless them, God bless all right, And if you
want to call in six one, seven, two, five, four, ten,
thirty or eight eight nine to nineteen thirty. I know
a lot of you are just sitting back and enjoying
the conversation. That's fine too, But if you want to
participate with your voice, those are the phone numbers you
(17:07):
need to do it. And you did spell your name,
did you not, Bill? Yes, I could do it do
it again?
Speaker 3 (17:17):
Yes, j A Nocha Dejanoka Janoka.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Bill Chenoka is here and he's litting you know that
he wrote a book about the cartoonist known as mort Walker.
I'm going to take a break here, maybe a commercial,
maybe to quick get the news, and we Bill and
I will be back. Time and temperature here on night
(17:46):
Side nine nine, I'm guessing it's still holding its seventy degrees.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
You're on Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ, Boston's
news radio.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Welcome back, everybody. We're talking about a certain Cormic strip
one named Beatle Bailly, where there were these soldiers. The
name of their camp was Camp Swampy. I like the
name of the chaplain. His name was Chaplain Stained Glass
inside joke there, And my guess Bill Janoka has written
(18:22):
a book about what Walker and we are talking about
that book. You can go out and buy it right now.
What bookstores carry it.
Speaker 3 (18:33):
Oh, I don't know if this publisher really caters to bookstores.
That's what makes it more rarer, makes it more difficult
to find. It's a niche publisher. So I encourage you
actually to purchase it from me if you're interested, I
can directly get it to you, and anyone that does
(18:55):
purchase it from me will I'm more than happy to
inscribe it with a drawing and some added materials that
were edited out of the book.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
So give your web information.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
I'm sorry repeat that, give your.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Information so people know how to reach you and buy
a book.
Speaker 3 (19:14):
Yes, I guess my email would be great. Let's start
with that. Well, I'm giving my email address to all
of Boston, but here.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
We go all of the country. We're hurting thirty eight
states and parts of Canada. Oh boy, I'm better a
big audience. Bill.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Well, it's easy. My email address is Bill Comic as
it sounds b I L. L Comic at aol dot
com and I live in Stamford, Connecticut, and I'm more
than happy to share the book with you.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
Okay, let's talk about how the American public view of
the military changed. We were all gung ho and World
War Two, beat the access powers, yay America, and were
still that gung ho for the Korean skirmish or whatever
(20:14):
term you want to use. But by Vietnam, America's psyche
had changed a little bit. And I'm assuming what Walker
took that into consideration as he drew the strip. Am
I right or wrong?
Speaker 3 (20:29):
Uh? Yes? And no, Mort was definitely uh prescribed to
He was no Jewel Sfiffer. With all due respect, we
just lost him great satirist.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
J oh, yeah, forgive me.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
And then you have Gary Trudeau, who Gary was nice
enough to write a testimonial that's in the book. Okay, oh,
I appreciate, Thank you, Gary. But Mort was definitely wanted
to avoid topical humor throughout the entire of his career,
and miraculously he created a comic strip that really transcended
(21:05):
the military. I mean it was a military setting and
if you read the if you have the ability to
read the comic strip in the nineteen fifties, which his
work was great throughout, but I love it in the
fifties and there was definitely more of reference to terms
in the military. The illustrations were more rich and they
(21:26):
had all of those type of things. But he simplified
his style as the years went on and it became
more of a strip that was based in the military,
but you had the delineation of power, the revolt against authority.
That could be your boss against your boss. It could
be for God forbid, your wife or a neighbor or something.
(21:49):
So characters like Sergeant Snorkel, who I believe was his
most important character he created, because when he created that character,
that was the polar opposite of Beetle, and you had
that more. It was always challenging authority. In his own life,
he lived that way and wanted to have fun and
wanted to get around details and such and create his
(22:11):
own independent world. And he lived that through Beetle Bailey
and through his characters. So the strip really transcended the military.
And so by the time were excuse me, Vietnam had
come around. I'm sure that he realized which really was
coming through the fifties. It wasn't like it suddenly happened
(22:32):
in nineteen sixty.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
Five or anymore.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
But he did a series of and I don't have
the date in front of me, but they were really cool.
He created this character name Rocky, and that was that fifties,
and Rocky really was like a James Dean, a Marlon
Brando type rebellious character, and he had actually the long
calic and the hair in the back, he smoked a cigarette.
(22:56):
He came from the rough side of town, kind of
a beat nick kind of character. So by the sixties,
the way he wanted to comment on the protests that
were going on, the pitch, the signage and stuff, he
had Rocky, who kind of that character sided with the rebellion,
(23:16):
and so he based him during a week or more
of strips talking directly to these beat neck type characters.
I want to use that term because they didn't have
the long woodstock era hare at that point. They were
more like post beat neck fifties characters. But it was
that sensitivity that he sensed the reaction against ban the
(23:38):
war and ban the bomb and that kind of thing,
and he did put that in the strip to humorous effect.
I wish I had more that was in front of
me right now, but they're easy enough to research, but
more was able to Other than that, he really was
able to skirt that period or that because the strip
(23:58):
was so iconic at that point, you know, we just
played the theme for the TV cartoons that I don't
believe he had too much blowback about it, too much
challenge Morgan that there's a particular strip that I'm unaware
of that he directly dealt with Vietnam, but so I'm
sure he did, but so more kind of got around it.
(24:21):
His problems came up as the seventies started. When he
created Lieutenant Flapp, the first African American character, he actually
lost papers in the South. He was banned for the
second time from Stars and Stripes, albeit briefly, and then
the next year when he created Miss Bucksley, the Secretary
(24:42):
to the General. It was cute and fun at the beginning,
but it definitely was misogynistic and you know, hey, baby,
that kind of humor which was being dated already and
women's lib if you want to use that term, and
that's what it was. Then throughout the seventies and definitely
into the early eighties he had trouble with that. So
(25:04):
that was rather anachronistic already at that time. So his
conflicts were self generated, you could say that occurred in
the seventies and into the eighties, but the Vietnam era
he really was able to breeze through it. And not
have any problem with that conflict.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Oh, I told you I have one of these weird memories.
It locks things in. And I had a number of
the Beetle Bailey paperback books, which were the reprinting of
the newspaper strips.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Yeah, they were great.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
There was a strip in this paperback book, my Beetle
Billy paperback book that showed uh, Sergeant Sergeant Snorkel teaching
a self defense class and Beetle, who always had this
nonchalant look about him, didn't want to be there, and
(26:00):
Sergeant Snuckle saying all right, come at me, Beetle, and
Beetle looked at the sergeant and just said kaibala to
juice in lee. I memorized that phrase because I thought,
maybe one day if I was drafted, because I'm reading
this at age fifteen or sixteen, and the draft was
(26:21):
around the corner from me. Fortunately I never got drafted.
But that phrase meant your shoelace is untied in Vietnamese. Now,
I thought that that embodied everything. It would make you
laugh a little bit, but make you think, thank you.
And if you if you were about to be face
(26:42):
to face with the enemy and you said that he's
not expecting an American to say that in his language,
so he'll look down advantage beetle. And I thought that
I'm remembering this literally from fifty five years ago, but
(27:02):
that those set of words are emblazoned in the back
of my mind. And I told Bill about this. Yeah,
and you weren't aware of it, but you knew I
was telling you the truth. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
No, that's fascinating. That really is that in that way?
It is topical. So yeah, well, hey, I'm surprised I'm
learning something here that's really really cool. Thank you for
sharing that with all of us.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
Well, no problem, and tell you what. I'm going to
tell the story about mort Walker versus Child Sholtz, and
then we'll take our break.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Sergeant Snuckle had a dog Otto and periodically the dog
would do comic strip like things, but the dog began
to do more snoopy like things, and Child Schultz felt,
uh huh, don't do that the world of a dog
(28:03):
kind of being human? Now, were you aware of their
discussion about this?
Speaker 3 (28:10):
This would have occurred long before I started working with
more than nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
Yeah, before in the seventies.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Yes, And and there was a sudden change where Otto
was on all fours and then kind of the next week.
And I believe it was Mort's good friend and writer
Jerry Dumas that suggested that he humanize him a bit
and give him a uniform, a miniature one stand on
two legs. That changed the dynamic of this of the character.
(28:41):
But moret admittedly was in competition with Sparky for years
actually throughout their life, and so he you know, but
they were and Sparky had he was someone who was
very aware of other cartoonists and whatnot, and was competitive Nate, and.
Speaker 2 (29:01):
I'm going to use the twenty first century word, they
were frenemies. They were in competition with each other, but
they knew each other, liked each other, and they wanted
to be one up over the other guy whenever possible.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
They worked independently, and certainly Sparky needed no help. I
mean when he created Snoopy and went forward heat and
was the first to get a book deal and whatnot,
And so yes, I admit there was a competition there.
I mean, both gentlemen were extremely successful with their their
comic strips, and they both went for humor, but in
(29:41):
very different ways. And so you know, I'll admit that,
but there was some crossover more than one point. Definitely
did want to increase Auto's prominence in the strip when
he put them on two legs and there's a famous
episode where we all can't be Snoopy was what autos?
(30:02):
And that was you know, that kind of a thing
because I think I forget the gag, but it was
a three panel gag and sargers yelche, he says. So
that was a direct And there were a number of
times where he would have dream sequences of Sergeant the
Sunday Page, and there was one where he definitely mentioned
peanuts and he had all these bags of peanuts. It
was kind of a silly joke, but it had Snoopy
(30:25):
on the soop with camel and whatnot. So he did mention.
He mentioned Charlie Brown in his short lived comic strip
Genius Strip Sam Strip that was a comic strip about
comic strips. It was ahead of its time. He worked
with Jerry Dumas on it, and that ran from nineteen
sixty one to sixty three, and he definitely put Charlie
(30:47):
Brown in that. I don't know about Snoopy, but he
directly drew. It's Jerry actually drew that strip.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
But let me stop you here because into my break time,
we'll come right back. I promise you.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
Any who else we keep going, that's for sure.
Speaker 2 (31:04):
Go ahead if you want to hear the phone number
six one, seven, five, four, ten thirty eight eight eight,
nine to nine, ten thirty, give a call if you
want time here on Nightside nine forty six temperature. I'm
gonna stick with seventy, but it may change.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
It's Nightside with Dan Ray on wb Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
Dan. We'll be back on Monday. I promise eight pm
sharp he will return to doing Nightside. He's taking a vacation.
I hope he's enjoyed himself. Bill Jenooka is my guest.
We're talking about mort Walker, the artist who created Beatle Bailey.
And I was speaking to my producer while the commercials
(31:48):
were playing. And I don't know if you know this, Bill,
but there is a Charles Shultz Peanuts Museum in Santa Rosa, California,
which makes me think, does Walker have a museum?
Speaker 3 (32:06):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (32:07):
And no.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
First off, I know the Schultz Museum very well. The
National Cartoon Society hosted us there. Oh short about a
few years after Sparky died and it was a fabulous facility.
I'm sorry I haven't been out there since we were
guests and watched Snoopy at the ice rink. And the
(32:29):
actual woman who actually spoiler alert Snoopy has performed with
as a costume character with a real person inside. She
actually lives in this area and I have a pleasure
of calling her a friend so that I said, Wow,
I saw you ice dance years earlier. So yeah, that's
a great museum. Jean Schultz is a dear friend, and
(32:51):
I encourage anyone to go out see the museum and
the ice rink. Out in Santa Rosa, Moret created a
museum of He loved comics so much that he got
the idea over fifty years ago to create a museum
of cartoon art, which started in Greenwich, Connecticut, at a
(33:11):
rented home that nineteen eight seventy four. By nineteen seventy seven,
it had moved to a new facility in Portchester, New York,
a castle actually, and it was there until nineteen ninety
two or something to that effect, I believe. Then they
moved it down to boker Raton, Florida, a great facility,
(33:35):
but then it lasted until two thousand and one or
two thousand and two or so, and currently all of
that artwork has been donated to the Ohio State University.
So there's the Mortwalker Gallery. So the museum lives on
in a different way at Ohio State. And I had
the pleasure of being very involved with That's where I
(33:55):
met Moret at his museum in New York, and there
you go. We could talk all night about his museums.
But no, he created a museum for to benefit all
of cartooning. Okay, so you know, the Schultz Museum definitely
showcases other certainly Sparky's work. That's was Schultz's pet name
(34:17):
to his friends and whatnot. But there's so many regional
and new cartoonists in that area and guest speakers that
come and showcase. So it's a great facility for all
of cartooning, and certainly the Ohio State Facility is definitely
one also, So I urge anyone to go to Columbus,
Ohio and see that one.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
Also, what do you know about Mort Walker that the
public doesn't know? He was an eagle Boy scout. I'm
just throwing out silly examples.
Speaker 3 (34:49):
I'm an eagle scout, so hello, fellow scout.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
I was the first class scout. But life ele looked
like a huge mountain to climb, so I just said.
Speaker 3 (35:01):
Yes, it was. But it definitely, you know, as long
as you enjoyed yourself in a safe, fun environment, that's
what count. And idea, it's true with everything more. Just
was very, very committed to the day he died. Really
of cartooning, writing. He worked harder as towards the end
of his life, which I write about actually in the book.
(35:24):
The book showcases his actually predates him. His parents both
work artists, writers, poets, and he was influenced by that.
It goes through his whole career, his childhood in the twenties,
throughout the depression years of World War two, college and whatnot.
(35:45):
But then I jump after nineteen fifty four when his
last magazine cartoons containing Spider, the pre Beatle character. I
know I'm carrying. I've got a lot of information. I'm
trying to get out quickly here, so bear with me.
I jump ahead three decades or so four maybe through
the later years that I witnessed. Compare what I write about,
(36:09):
you know, as a youth, and how he was towards
the end of his life. I was with him for
thirty five years, so but I jumped towards the very end,
and his commitment was unyielding. I mean he was so
driven and really beatle Bailey was his eighth child. He
had seven, and beatle Bailly was certainly the eighth. And
(36:30):
I fit in there somewhere in a way. But and
so you know that part. He was committed to it,
as was Schultz with his trip. They worked it, they
were their comic strips were their life, and it really
was and it was he did fine art too, and
early on, and so that was something that he was
(36:50):
very interested. He was not really into music. He loved
golf and the athletics in that way. Committed to his family,
certainly to his wife. And he lived in a great home.
That was the home the studio of guts In Borglam,
who was the Mount Rushmore sculptor. Y was a great
for me. I was going to this historic Not only
(37:11):
was I working with an iconic cartoon creator, but I
was in the home of an iconic American sculptor. And
he collected original and excuse me, cartoon art, but illustration art.
So I'm looking at Norman Rockwell's on the wall and
see Wyath and Dean Cornwell and we could get into
(37:32):
that discussion too. So the aesthetics were just brimming, you know.
It was like wallpaper to me. I Norman Rockwell painting.
So what people paid, they paid money to go to
museums to stuff that I saw hanging over his pool table, right.
But it just it helped though creatively the juices to
(37:52):
just the aesthetics. It just it was such a thrilling thing.
He worked on a musical witnessing that he was the museum,
and we had any books that I worked on with him,
So there really never was a dull moment, you know.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
I was, I am almost out of time, but I've
saved thirty seconds for you to give your address, the
title of the book and the spelling of your name,
so anybody who wants it can get it. You've got
thirty seconds.
Speaker 3 (38:20):
Go okay again, it's Bill Jinoka. I've spelled it j
A N O c Cha. My personal address is twenty
three Skyline Lane in stam with an M. Stamford, Connecticut,
six nine three. And the cost of the book it
(38:41):
has retails for sixty dollars if I'm shipping it out,
I'm going to have to ask for sixty five. I
have to pay half price when I buy it, so
and I have to ship it. So I'm adding some
extras to it. But you and tell me how you
want it inscribed. I promise you it's a book filled
with information and the rarest of rarities. The faults were open.
(39:04):
There's material in this book you would never heard, and
it's I believe that you will really enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (39:12):
Bill. Thank you very very much. Good luck with the book,
and stay in touch.
Speaker 3 (39:16):
Okay, okay. I love talking to you all, and certainly
we could keep doing another time. So thank you all
and enjoy the rest of your summer.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
Good night, Bill, take care. Time nine fifty eight temperature
pending seventy degrees
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