HALF HITCH was a pretty funny Navy comic strip that we used to read in the early seventies in out of town papers as ours didn't carry it. To look at it, you'd think it was done by Hank Ketcham, the creator of DENNIS THE MENACE. This misconception may well come from the fact that the cover says "by Hank (Dennis the Menace)Ketcham." Yep, they fooled me, too. According to Don Markstein's Toonopedia: Half Hitch, it had originally been done back during the war by Ketcham in the SATURDAY EVENING POST but the comic strip version which debuted in 1970 was actually written by one Bob Saylor and drawn by Dick Hodgins. This
paperback was the only collection od these pretty funny SAD SACK style strips.
Well Hank Ketcham produced the strips, and these guys were his assistants (or maybe his ghosts) --
ReplyDelete-- you did know that Ketcham didnt do the Dennis sunday strip, didnt you? - his ghosts did.
Yes, I did know that about the Sunday pages. In fact, I always preferred the Sunday strips to the daily gags. A favorite was one in the seventies where Joey had fallen in love with Shirley Temple from a TV screening of her movies and Margaret attempts (and fails)to convince the boys that Shirley was now all grown up. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteStevenT
THE US NAVY BOUGHT THE RIGHTS OFF KETCHAM TO PRODUCE THE WORK OF KETCHAM'S ":HALF-HITCH" THEMSELVES. MY FRIEND WHO DID 20 YRS IN THE NAVY WON A WORLD WIDE SEARCH CONTEST TO TAKE KETCHAM'S WORK AND CREATE IT IN HIS OWN HANDIWORK.
ReplyDeleteHE HAS SITTING IN 2 BOXES THE
"ORIGINAL PANELS" THAT THE US NAVY BOUGHT OFF KETCHAM TO PRODUCE THE STRIP FOR THE NAVY. THAT'S RIGHT, I SAID ORIGINAL PANELS. I HAVE ONE OF THEM. I AM ASKING FOR SOME HELP ON THIS ONE. I WANT TO SELL THEM FOR MY FRIEND BUT DO NOT KNOW WHO I COULD GO TO TO SELL THESE RARE ONE OF A KIND PANELS. I THINK HE HAS ABOUT 500 OF THEM.
ANY SUGGESTIONS? MY EMAIL IS SMALL CAPS: mamgblm@yahoo.com
please email with any suggestion. I called a place in New York city to ask their value: they said between 50 to 120 dollars I could fetch for them.
Been trying to buy a copy of this book for years. Amazon, EBay....no luck. Remember having a copy when I was a kid in the early 70's.
ReplyDelete