First appearance of the comic strip "Blondie" - September 8th, 1930

On this day in 1930, a new comic strip appeared in American newspapers introducing readers to Blondie Boopadoop, better known today as Blondie Bumstead or just plain Blondie.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio, Hello, and welcome to This Day in History Class,
a show that flips through the pages of history to
deliver old news in a new way. I'm Gabe Bluisier,
and today We're going back in time to look at

(00:22):
one of the most famous and long running comic strips
to ever grace the Funny Pages. The day was Monday,
September eight. A new comic strip appeared in American newspapers
introducing readers to Blondie Boopa Dupe, better known today as

(00:45):
Blondie Bumpstead or just plain Blondie. Although personally I would
never give up a maiden name as good as Boopa Dupe.
Bumpstead is such a downgrade. The strips creator M. B.
Chick Young had dreamed of being a cartoonist since childhood.
His nineteen nineteen high school yearbook contained some of his

(01:06):
earliest drawings, which were signed with his nickname Chicken, from
which he would later derive his pen name. Before the
Blondie strip debuted in nineteen thirty, Young had tried to
launch several female driven comics with little success. One reason
for the failure of such titles as beautiful, bab and
dumb Dora was Young's penchant for portraying his female leads

(01:30):
as insipid and flighty. He initially followed the same chauvinous
pattern for Blondie, perpetuating the tired, dumb blonde stereotype in
the early strips. Gradually, Young was able to reign in
this impulse, and Blondie began to appear just as smart
as the string of boyfriends vying for her affections. One

(01:51):
such suitor was the playboy Dagwood Bumstead. Despite the strip's title,
many readers are probably more familiar with Blondie's future husband,
who's bumbling antics tend to provide much of the comics humor.
But in the early days, Dagwood was a far cry
from his current incarnation as a sandwich loving working man. Instead,

(02:13):
he was originally portrayed as the son of a wealthy
railroad tycoon. The comic strip struggled initially, but once Young
decided to have Dagwood and Blondie fall in love, his
readership began to climb. The couple's relationship hit a snag, though,
when Dagwood told his family of his plans to marry Blondie.

(02:34):
His father feared she was only out for his money
and threatened to cut Dagwood off from the family fortune
if he went through with the wedding. This prompted Dagwood
to go on a hunger strike as a way of
proving his affections and winning the blessing of his family.
This narrative stunt played out in real time, with Dagwood
refusing to eat for twenty eight days or twenty eight strips.

(02:58):
In the end, dad Wood's father relented and grudgingly gave
his consent for the wedding. However, he did stick to
his word and refused to provide his son with any
financial support for the rest of his life. Nonetheless, the
happy couple married on Friday, February seventeenth, nineteen thirty three.

(03:19):
The marriage proved to be a turning point for the
comics Trip, raising its profile and winning a slew of
new readers. It was a well planned effort on Young's
part and his way of acknowledging the downturn of the
Great Depression. Cut Off from dagwoods family connections and wealth,
the Bumpsteads moved to the middle class and became instantly

(03:40):
more relatable In the process, they became a reflection of
many American families of the time, and even today, those
who live and rented houses, take public transportation to work,
and rarely dine out at restaurants. These readers appreciated the
strips funny daily reminders that even when a lack of
money makes life difficult, love makes it worthwhile. Blondie herself

(04:05):
also benefited from the transition to a more family oriented strip.
No longer portrayed as rash or ditzy, she became a
more capable, practical, and assertive character, the voice of reason
in her household. In fact, shortly after their wedding, Blondie
led a campaign demanding eight hour work days for the

(04:25):
housewives and her neighborhood. She also made sure Dagwood did
his fair share of housework, often using reverse psychology and
some well intentioned cunning to get her way. Readers seemed
to find this inversion of gender roles to be a
refreshing change from Young's earlier strips, as well as other
comics of the day. Blondie became a big success, and

(04:48):
fans all over the world began to identify with the
strips universal themes Chick Young continued producing Blondie seven days
a week from nineteen thirty until his death in ninety
seventy three. The one exception was during nineteen thirty seven,
when Young took a one year hiatus following the death

(05:08):
of his firstborn son. The Bumsteads had welcomed the first
of their two children a few years earlier, and Young
reportedly found it too painful to draw their child. After
working through his grief, Young returned to the strip and
went on to produce more than fifteen thousand Blondie comics
in his lifetime. When he passed away in nineteen seventy three,

(05:31):
his son, Dean Young, took over writing duties. Today, Dean
Young continues to write the strip with illustrations by artist
John Marshall. More than two thousand newspapers published Blondie in
fifty five countries and thirty five languages, boasting an estimated
readership of two hundred and eighty million. Of course, there's

(05:53):
no way to talk about Blondie without acknowledging the world
famous Dagwoods sandwich at is defined by Webster's New World Dictionary.
A dagwood is a quote many layered sandwich. It's named
in honor of the comic strip character and the mountainous
sandwiches that he frequently crafts during late night raids on

(06:14):
the refrigerator. According to Chick Young, a pile of random
leftovers stacked between two slices of bread was the extent
of Dagwood's culinary abilities. That's probably true if dad Wood
were left to his own devices, but if anyone could
coax a better meal out of him, it's Blondie. I'm

(06:34):
gay Bluesier, and hopefully you now know a little more
about comics history today than you did yesterday. You can
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you have any comments or a suggestion for a historical
event you'd like to see covered on the show, you

(06:57):
can send it my way at this Day at i
heart media dot com. Thanks to Channeler Mays for producing
the show, and thank you for listening. I'll see you
back here again tomorrow for another day in History class.

(07:20):
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