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The New Breed

I’m still finding things as I clean out my old room. In among to the school newspapers were newspapers that published my cartoon panel.

In the 1990s, I was part of a thing King Features called “The New Breed.” It was a different cartoon every day sent in by various cartoonists. They were grooming us at the time for better things. So many of the cartoonists that were part of the The New Breed are professional cartoonists today, with their cartoons published daily in newspapers.

I started a marketing biz at the time and sort of stopped after having so many cartoons published. I sometimes regret it now, but I guess that was my fate to go in another direction.

What I would do is send in a batch of cartoons and they would buy the ones they liked and have them published in hundreds of subscribing newspapers as part of the feature. This sample shown hre is from the Kansas City Star. I like how they have the feature at the very top of the page. There I am with Family Circus, Dennis the Menace, Marmaduke and Peanuts! Mine is the Santa one.

King Features would send back the ones they wanted changes on, after editing the cartoon – simple things like, “change this word to this,” or “take the shading off this.” I don’t know why they just didn’t make the changes themselves, but I guess they didn’t want to touch the art and they had the cartoonists make the changes on their own work.

This was all done by snail mail. I would mail in a batch and they would mail back the edited ones that needed changes. I would make the changes and snail mail the cartoons back and they would appear in the newspapers a few weeks later.

While I’m trying to grow my audience on my current work today, I don’t think I want to be published in newspapers. It’s too restrictive and most people read their cartoons online or on social media.

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Memories

My parents passed away – my Dad last September and my Mom the October before that. The house is still sitting as it was left. I’m not sure what it taking us so long to clean it out. Too many memories maybe, maybe too big of a job. There is 50 years worth of stuff in that house. 50 years this month.

I decided to start going a couple of days a week and try to make a dent. I started with my old room. I’m amazed that so much of my old art from when I was a kid and also from high school and college is still there. Not that anyone would dispose of it, but 30 years ago, Hurricane Andrew struck and the house was inundated with water. There was so much water in the house that the refrigerator was on its side. It was lifted up and thrown over! I guess maybe four feet of water or more was in the house.

The art was on the top shelf of the closet, I’m luckily it survived. Everything below that is gone now, destroyed in the flood.

There were piles and piles of large pads full of cartoons and comic strips I drew and also art from high school and college classes.

Yes, we had nude models in college for figure drawing. I guess we got used to it after the first couple of times.

It’s funny, but I remember this guy’s face from so many years ago. I know, he was naked, but it’s his face I remember. For some reason, it had a familiar look, almost like a famous person or so, so when I look at this I can almost remember him.

Here’s a more detailed figure. These nudes are from college, But one image from high school sticks out. We had to draw a pair of sneakers that were on the table and I remember doing that. I remember how happy I was with the results. I guess I’ll find that in the pile of art I now have.

Not sure who this is, but I don’t remember her being a model. Maybe it was from a book or magazine.

I saw this photo of the Obamas on my mother’s dresser. I don’t remember ever seeing it before.

When I picked it up and read it, I see she must have donated to them or his campaign or something. I was living out of the house by then so I guess I never saw this and she never mentioned it.

My mom loved the Obamas, so did my dad, I was happy to see that she kept the image along with family photos on/in the mirror like people do.

My mom gave to all sorts of charities, she always did. I’m glad to see she donated to political campaigns, too.

One sad thing about the way my parents passed away was that they left the house and didn’t come back in the end. And things are left as if they just walked out of the room.

This looks like my dad’s eyeglasses, just sitting on the side of the bed.

In the kitchen, next to the sink there is a towel and there are two spoons on it, looking as if they were washed and placed there to dry. Just like it was yesterday.

My dad used the dining room table as a desk. All of his papers are there – just as he left them. A pen sits on the pile, just as if he put it down and walked out of the room for a second.

All this reminds me of famous houses I’ve visited – the Roosevelts, Hemmingway, etc. Their personal papers and things were just sitting there, although they were probably set up and placed there. But it gives the illusion that they just walked out of the room for a second. In these cases at my parents’ house, they were really just left as I see them now.

I spoke to one of my brothers. We may start going through the house next weekend, to just start packing things up. We’ll do it as a group to make it go faster, I guess. We grew up up there. It won’t be easy.

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School days

Today is the first day of school in Miami-Dade County. The private schools started last week.

The reason I bring that up is because I started going through things in my old room at my parents house and I came upon so many things I had forgotten I had like these school newspapers.

For many years, I had a company that printed school newspapers among so many other things. I found all the newspapers I had saved that we printed – years and years worth of papers. I plan on giving them to the schools – a time capsule from the 1980s through the early 2000s.

I used to celebrate the start of school – I used to go to the beach on the first day – the beach was dead due to it being the first day of school – and I had the place to myself.

I was celebrating because business picked up again. My business was dead all summer. There were no school newspapers or other things to print since most of the work I did was seasonal. So I worked for nine months, but for those three summer months, there was no money or business coming in. But starting in the fall and particularly, the first day of school, business picked up again for the year.

It’s interesting going through the newspapers because most have the news of the world, not just school news. There are a lot of movie reviews from new movies of the time – Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Back to the Future and things like that. The kids loved the movies, by the way. There is national news that the kids were interested in and it’s interesting to see their take on all that and how it played out at the time. Lots of pop culture made it into the newspapers – music, movies, tv – Madonna!

I loved those days. The work was easy and I was in schools around the county almost daily. I would go by to pick up the work and then deliver it after it was printed. I not only handled the newspapers, but we printed year book supplements, literary magazines, sports journals and so many other things. I loved being part of that as it kept me young being in the high schools and junior high schools which became middle schools some time in the middle of all that.

I taught the newspaper classes sometimes – meeting up with classes and explaining the process. I was friendly with most of the teachers and office staff.

The black and white newspapers started experimenting with full color and computers took over the schools and rather than my company doing the typesetting and paste-up, the kids did it all and handed the job in ready to print. So I was there at that interesting time of all the tech changes.

I drive by so many of the schools these days and it brings back so many memories as I drive by. It all comes flooding back.

Back then I had my run of the schools. Toward the end of my doing the newspapers after doing it for so many years, something sad happened. Metal detectors started appearing at the front doors and many of the entrances. I had to show my ID to enter and it was the end of those innocent time.

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Words are very unnecessary

Depeche Mode has a new album out, I saw a segment about them on the CBS Sunday Morning, you can see that CBS segment below.

They were one of my favorite bands in the ’80s and ’90s.

I drew this cartoon in 2019. I’ve been holding on to it because I was thinking of redrawing it – having the guys in ice cream, you know, sort of lounging in a banana split or something. But I left well enough alone and just made it look like a new album, which, as I said, is now out. It’s called Memento Mori, which means “Remember You Must Die,” which is a bit morbid, because fellow band member, Andy Fletcher passed away in May 2022.

Dave Gahan and Martin Gore are the remaining duo.

Memento Mori can be heard here in full at YouTube.

The CBS interview is here.

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Pumpkin Spice Latte

Today’s cartoon is about Pumpkin Spice Latte. It’s just August 9, but already Pumpkin Spice Latte is on the menu at many coffee and other places, it’s all over the news. I guess apple cider doughnuts and apple cider doughnuts are out, now, too. It all reminds me of the Hudson Valley where we go pumpkin picking in October and have these things.

I’m not sure if I’ve ever tried Pumpkin Spice anything, I probably did, but it doesn’t seem to be something I would like.

I eat pumpkin seeds almost daily and I love pumpkin pie, it’s second to my favorite, Cherry Pie, but Pumpkin Spice things don’t really have pumpkin in it, I’m told, but it’s all about the spices – fall spices, my favorite season (and seasonings).

Ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves are part of the mix in Pumpkin Spice.I put cinnamon in my coffee daily and I try to use fresh ginger or powdered ginger in my food.

Maybe I’ll give it a try soon, but still, it seems like we are rushing autumn, but then again, in autumn, usually in early September, we start seeing Christmas commercials on tv, and I haven’t been to Home Depot or Target lately, but I’m betting Christmas decorations maybe up already – not sure – but just a guess.

For years I was in the newspaper and publishing business and we would be doing a lot of Christmas stuff starting in summer and early fall. By the time Christmas actually came, we had experienced it already for that year, so we basically had two. Same with other holidays – always two – the early publication material and the actual holiday.

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The glues of our life

I saw an image of the Lepage glue with the rubber top on Facebook and memories came flooding back. I remember using it as a child. Then I remember all of these glues – Elmer’s Glue, rubber cement and white paste, also by Lepage.

The glue with the rubber top had a slit in the top of the rubber and you would press down to let the glue out, it looked sort of like maple syrup, only thinner. The Elmer’s Glue we would put on our fingers, the white would turn clear as it dried, and then we peel it off. The rubber cement we made into small rubber balls and we played with them. I think we used rubber glue more than most of them other types of glues here.

And the White Paste. What I remember about the white paste is eating it. Yup, we would eat the white paste. I don’t know why and I don’t remember what it tastes like, but that was the thing to do when you were eight years old.

I remember one time in class, I was “tasting” the white paste and I heard a shriek from the teacher – it was a shriek like you would hear when someone sees a mouse. She looked at me and said, “You’re not eating the paste, are you?” And even at eight years old, I was a quick thinker – I told her, “No, I was smelling it.” A stupid answer but I guess I thought it was better to be smelling it than eating it.

I can almost picture the teacher in my head, but she wasn’t our regular teacher, she was either a substitute or a teacher’s aid, something like that. I suppose the regular teacher was used to us eating paste so it was nothing for her to be shocked over.

It’s amazing how seeing something or smelling something brings back so many memories.

I used to see a Facebook page where pictures of old toys and games were posted. There wasn’t any text, someone would just post a picture and the memoires would start flooding back, people would comment about their memories about the toy or game.

I guess my brothers and I were spoiled because I can’t remember seeing an old picture of something that we didn’t have. Every toy and game that was shown we seemed to have – Trouble, Skittle Pool, Clue, Monopoly, Flintstones things, Operation, Lite-Brite, Creepy Crawlers and even the Hasbro Frosty Snowman Machine, and lots of models – we used to make lots of plastic models and do puzzles.

I don’t know what happened to all these things, I guess my mother threw them out, but when I think of what they are worth now.

The interesting part is that my brothers and I must have shared everything no matter whose toy they were because I can’t remember who owned what. We must have kept everything in one place in the house and just picked and chose what we wanted to play with.

Now it’s all about electronics. Kids have so many electronics that one day will probably seem quaint to them.

**Hasbro Frosty Sno-Man Sno-Cone Machine.**

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Protecting the entertainers

There are two cartoons published today – same concept, two images.

I wasn’t sure which version to use, so I did two of them.

As you know, lately performers have things thrown at them from the audience. Not sure why, seems like a stupid thing to do. Cardi B threw a mic at one guy who threw water from a plastic cup on her!

The story goes that Cardi B was asking the audience to throw water on her because she was burning up in the Las Vegas heat. So this person threw the water. But when Cardi B threw the mic into the crowd, she hit someone else – a lady, and now the lady is suing because she is “bruised.”

The world we live in today.

Even the Sign Guy agrees. Saw this on his Facebook page.

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A Messi, Barbie weekend

It’s a pink weekend. Between the new Barbie movie and Lionel Messi. the soccer superstar’s USA debut, it’s all pink. You can swipe back and forth for both cartoons here.

Pink is of course the theme of Barbie and Messi’s color is pink. Messi’s pink a little bit lighter in color, but still, I think this deep, bright pink makes the point (cartoonwise).

I first did the Barbie cartoon and at the last minute I thought of Messi. Here in Miami, it’s Messi all over the place. Murals are appearing on buildings, soccer tickets have zoomed up in price and that’s all you hear about – Messi, Messi, Messi.

On the national news, I’ve seen lots of reports on Messi, so I thought I would add it to today’s cartoon as a second option, to add to the pink theme of the weekend.

The Oppenheimer movie is opening this weekend, too, and people are buying tickets for both Barbie and Oppenheimer and will do a double feature, sort of like the old days. The big debate there is which one to see first so as to set the tone for the next movie.

I couldn’t fit Oppenheimer into the pink theme. It’s anything but bright and pink.

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On strike

Today’s cartoon is about the Hollywood actor’s strike. First off, let me say I am in favor of everyone being paid what they are worth. And I’m in favor of the actor’s receiving their due. I also know that the majority of actors are not paid millions of dollars and some barely make a living wage. I know that.

This is just one view of how some people see the strike. It could be because they have big names as the face of the strike, like Fran Drescher, Jason Sudekis, Susan Sarandon and Brian Cox, who are just a few that have been shown on tv talking about the issue. I know the big names get the air time.

If it was a character actor that we don’t know, then perhaps people might feel differently. But again, I understand the SAF-AFTRA issue. They want their fair share, they don’t want their likenesses used with AI formats and so on.

When I started my Huffington Post column, 10 With Tom, my goal was to interview up- and-coming artists and musicians – people who were not known, but I was asked to write about well-known people, because that’s what the readers apparently wanted to read. So it’s the same here, publicize the famous stars rather than those in the picket line who really need to strike.

I know the writers are on strike, too, and many of them barely make a living wage.

I’m hoping for a good outcome for everyone involved.

When I first wrote the cartoon, I used a husband and wife watching tv, worried about their cable bill or streaming bill going up due to the eventual outcome of the strike, but I thought the two homeless guys would make more of an impression.

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