history

Blast from the past

I found these in Publix.

The Cracker Jacks aren’t really the original, even though it says it on the bag. They don’t taste the same and there were barely any peanuts in the bag, which are my favorite part. I dumped them in a bowl and there were literally two peanuts in the whole package. Shrinkflation I guess. The box is more fun anway.

The prize inside the Cracker Jacks was some sort of small piece of paper. I don’t even know what it was, I threw it out. They didn’t taste like the original to me, but what do I know, the last time I had Cracker Jacks was when I was maybe 12-years-old.

The Devil Dogs seem to be regular size. If the shrank after all these years, it’s hard to tell. So many of the Drakes and other brands have shrunk the items. Like Yankee Doodles cupcakes are the size of cookies now. Unless I was so small at the time I’m remembering them being larger, but I don’t think so.

You know what I would love to find? These Nabisco chocolate cookies. I remember when I was very young we always had boxes of these in the house. We would get a box each to eat. I remember mashing them up in milk and eating them, which seems a bit disgusting now.

We only had the chocolate, I don’t remember every having the vanilla ones. But just looking at the box brings back the smell and taste instantly.

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The red beanie

If you swipe back and forth on this image, you can see the two options for today’s cartoon.

The stovepipe hat won out in the end. Not just for Abraham Lincoln, but for the cartoon. At the last minute, I changed from the “caught dead” cartoon to the “more formal” one.

I saw a picture of Lincoln the other day and thought, I would love to draw Lincoln. It was the stovepipe hat which drew my attention, and in the end, the hat, which is the star, never made it to the drawing board. At first I thought of funny ideas for the stovepipe hat but the red beanie won out.

I thought it would look funny to put a red woolen hat on him and the cartoons emerged from there. The “over my dead body,” was dark and I’m glad I changed the final cartoon to the fashion-based one.

I’m not sure why I keep calling it a stovepipe hat, rather than a top hat, but I guess in Lincoln’s era it was called a stovepipe hat. In the 1920s, it was called a top hat.

What’s even stranger about the hat is Lincoln here, in 1862, wearing the stovepipe hat on the battle field. It doesn’t seem like the type of thing to wear in a battlefield.

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McSorley’s Old Ale House

A few of us went to McSorley’s Old Ale House the other day. It’s the oldest bar in NYC, founded in 1854. Able Lincoln visited the place! Along with dozens, if not hundreds of celebs.

The 170 year old saloon is located at 15 E. 7th Street. Interestingly enough, across the street from LaSalle, which was my father’s high school.

McSorley’s only sells beer and only sells two types – dark or light, and they price – $2.75 per glass! You get two glasses with every order because of the head on the beer, so to compensate, it comes in two glasses.

I went back a few days later to buy t-shirts, I wanted to buy four. The bartender told me the price was $80.00. I asked, “Per shirt?” He replied, “No, total, tax included!” I think they are usually $25, but since I purchased four, they reduced the price a bit.

So beers are $2.75 and t-shirts are $20.00 – probably the best deal in town. And of course, the history is even better.

The place is full of history – all sorts of items around the bar, old photos on the walls, an old stove in the center of the room and so much more. It looks like a movie set, but it’s all real, all authentic. It’s a museum that you are drinking in!

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It’s all about the farro

It’s interesting when you have one idea in mind when you create a cartoon and then people see other ideas and meanings to the cartoon.

This one in particular came easy to me. I am eating more farro these days. Farro is an ancient grain, eaten by the Egyptians, Romans and others and it came back into fashion in the past few years.

It seems that you can’t just say, “Farro,” you have to say, “Farro, the ancient grain.” And that’s where the cartoon idea came from.

So what if it’s an ancient grain? Was it a magic grain that was mighty and powerful? Did it extend life expectancies? I don’t think so. The mom is feeding the baby Farro, so he could live to a ripe old age, which was 30-years-old back then. I was thinking that when I hear, “It’s an ancient grain!”

Some read the cartoon as meaning the boy was King Tut and he wouldn’t live past 19-years-old anyway. He was just a random boy, but if they want to think that is Tut. That’s fine.

Others felt that if that was King Tut, he was King, so Farro was good for him. But he was only king from ages 9 to 19, so Farro didn’t keep him alive. It’s thought he died from either malaria and/or a bone disease. Both things not prevented from all that farro he may have eaten.

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How comics were made

I donated to the Kickstarter for “How Comics Were Made: A Visual History from the Drawing Board to the Printed Page,” by Glenn Fleishman.

Glenn has put together his research and collections of comics and cartoon artifacts, along with interviews he’s done with cartoonists and other to put this book in print.

There are many examples of what’s to come at the Kickstarter page here: kickstarter.com/projects/glennf/how-comics-were-made along with photos and videos of interviews along the way.

It’s more than just a reprint of comics, although there should be that, but it explains everything about the history of comics and comic strips from 1890 to present and explains how certain techniques were done and includes info on newspaper comics along with webcomics.

The project is almost funded but of course you may still want to order now. Publication is planned for October 2024.

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Visiting the 16th century

We went to the 32nd annual Florida Renaissance Festival on Saturday. I hadn’t been for years. I went with some of my family this past weekend, but in the past, for many years, I would go with my friends, maybe two or three carloads of us would head to Quiet Waters Park in Deerfield Beach to attend.

It was just as I remembered. You travel back in time to the 16th century, it seems they want a lot of things paid in cash this year, I remember paying with “MasterCard and Lady Visa” in the past.

We ate a lot, we drank a lot, we spent a lot. After having such a cool/cold winter (for Florida), Saturday seemed to be the hottest day of the year.

Vendors for food and items made by artisans who are on site, are set up all over the forested park, around the lake, and there are performances and performers everywhere from horse jousting (my favorite) to archery, a maze, the human flying carrousel, glass blowing, minstrels, magicians and so much more. The king and queen are just a few of the “characters” who wander around the park.

The Festival runs until March 24, weekends only.

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Digital Van Gogh

I’ve been thinking of going to Paris. And Italy. But this is a perfect reason to visit Paris.

I saw this report on CBS Sunday Morning about Vincent Van Gogh and a new digital feature about him and his art.

The Musee D’Orsay in Paris has a new exhibit of Van Gogh called, “Hello Vincent.” Anyone can go up and ask Vincent anything they would like to know about him.

His replies and his image are AI generated and the answers come from the over 900 letters he wrote in his life, where he told (in the letters) about everything from his health, personal life and art. You just walk up and ask him anything, and he’ll look at you and answer.

*Seth Doane (and Vincent) on CBS Sunday Morning.*

It works along with the art because people ask serious questions of Vincent; things that they really want to know about.

Maybe the exhibit will travel to the U.S. and I won’t have to go to Paris, although I still want to go to Paris. And Italy.

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What year is it?

This recent cartoon is not really correct – the hieroglyphics are not numbers.

The ankh, the cross symbol is an ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic symbol meaning “key of life,” used to represent the word for “life” it’s a symbol of life itself.

And the eye symbol – the Eye of Horus, in ancient Egypt, symbol representing protection, health, and restoration.

Numbers are shown here, as an example you can see the year 2765 is written as shown above and here are the Eye of Horus and the Ankh, the cross symbol.

But the Egyptians didn’t count the years as we do. The ancient Egyptians counted the years starting at the year a Pharaoh started his reign (called Regnal Years). So back then they started over every time they had a new Pharaoh.

Other than all that, I think it’s a cool cartoon.

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Sleepy Hollow

As we drove back down to the city from Highland and pumpkin picking last weekend, we stopped to see the Hudson River views in Tarrytown, NY, but as we wandered around, we wandered into the village next door which was Sleepy Hollow!

What a find. It’s so wonderful. It reminded me a lot of Salem, MA, but also so much of Stars Hollow, the fictional town from Gilmore Girls. So quaint and such a special place to be in the fall.

So many hills and backstreets to explore. We also explored the cemetery and all the Headless Horseman locations. One problem – so did thousands of other people. The poor little town is overrun by tourists, including us. I’m not sure how the locals deal with this.

It’s one of those good things that is ruined by crowds. But even with the crowds, it was special and I would not mind visiting again, maybe in a quieter time of year when it’s out of season.

There is so much history there starting in the 1600s, including the church and grave stones.

We had lunch at a nice restaurant overlooking the Hudson River and called it a day. Exhausted by all the walking up and down hills, but very happy. A good exhaustion.

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At the MET in the rain

It was raining Saturday, so I headed to the MET Museum, which I probably would have done even if it was sunny. But since it was raining, it seemed like the whole city showed up, The lines to get in were endless. But since I trudged up there via subway and walked around in the rain a bit to get there, I stayed.

I did miss a couple of cool things which is weird because I’m usually in the right place at the right time, but in these two instances I was not where I should have been.

The first was a wedding proposal. I heard a loud applause in the next gallery and when I walked over, it saw that a guy proposed to a girl. I missed it, I only caught the applause and happiness part.

Then I walked into the Temple of Dendur area of the MET and I just missed a ballet performance, right up near the temple building.

Otherwise it was maddening with all the people there, but it was more fun than being out in the rain.

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