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I've posted some Gasoline Alley Christmas strips a couple of times previously, so here's another one, because I can't get enough. I love Frank King's artwork, and I love the bumbling way that Walt does things for Skeezix, because he just wants to make him happy. I also get the feeling that maybe Skeezix knows it wasn't really Santa but is playing along for Walt's benefit. It makes this a very cute strip all in all.

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Here's another one from Harry Hershfield (whose name the paper erroneously spells "Herstfield"). This is clearly some kind of dream sequence, where Abie is flying with Santa Claus above the world and doing a crossword puzzle with the land below. It's still a bit odd that a Jewish immigrant would dream of this, but I guess Christmas is such a large part of American culture in December that it's very difficult to avoid it.

Also, I just love the hatching and crosshatching in this strip. It's a thing of beauty.

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Harry Hershfield, creator of Abie the Agent, was a Jewish American, and the comic strips he created featured Jewish people, often immigrants, and how they assimilated, and didn't, into American culture. It's very interesting, then, that Hershfield drew at least one Christmas comic strip a year. In searching for Christmas strips, I really didn't expect to find any Abie the Agent ones, but they were definitely there.

Also, Hannukah starts on December 22 this year, in case you wondered.

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Here's another Fred Faber Then The Fun Began. It's clear, of course, that this Santa's first mistake was going in through the window and not down the chimney. His second mistake was thinking that giant bag of toys would fit through the window.

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There isn't much info about this comic panel online, other than it was started by Walter Berndt, and abandoned and passed off to Fred Faber when Berndt's other strip Smitty became more popular. Faber did an admirable job carrying it on for another 5 years, and this is one of his.

I really enjoy this panel, mainly because it relies on what isn't actually shown in the strip for its comedy. It's about the funny consequences of the situation that's presented more than the situation itself. Plus, the artwork is very fun and well-drawn.

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Edwina Dumm, the cartoonist behind "Capp Stubbs and Tippie" (abbreviated here in the Dayton Herald as simply Cap Stubbs) was the first full-time female editorial cartoonist, and one of few women in the early days of comics to have a syndicated feature. It ran for an impressive 48 years, produced only ever by Dumm herself.

The thing that is most striking to me is the quality of the lettering. Many early comic strips can be difficult to read because of some very messy lettering, but Dumm's letters are very clear and well-formed. The line work is wonderful as well, and a joy to look at. While the dialogue in many Cap Stubbs strips can be a bit dull, it's always, as we see here, very genuine and true to life.

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Skippy, created by Percy Crosby, was a comic strip that was popular enough in its day to spawn a radio show, a novel, an Oscar-nominated movie, and even a highly contentious copyright feud with a peanut butter brand. It probably deserves its own much longer blog post (which I will probably do eventually), but for now we'll just focus on Christmas.

I absolutely love Crosby's artwork. I've seen a few Skippy Sundays, and normally Sunday comics are superior to the dailies due to the larger format and ability to add color, but Crosby's simple linework on its own actually makes me enjoy the dailies more. It's said that this strip was a major influence on Charles Schulz when he created Peanuts, and I can see why.

Moon Mullins was a surprisingly long-running strip that began in 1923 and ran all the way to 1991, and went through three different cartoonists. Ferd Johnson worked on the strip for a record 68 years, first as assistant to the original creator Frank Willard, and then as the main writer and artist.

Here we have one from the Willard years, with Kayo, the younger brother of the eponymous Mullins, trying to get a little money out of the grumpy (but comparatively rich) Lord Plushbottom, one of the denizens of the boarding house most of the cast lives in. Lady Plushbottom owns the place, so Kayo is probably obligated to get her something. Kayo is definitely my favorite character of the crew, because I love his character design and personality. Any kid who stands up to grown-ups while wearing a bowler hat is funny in my book.

Bill Holman is best known for "Smokey Stover," the Sunday comic about funny fire fighters, but around the same time that strip started, he also took over a gag panel originally created by Gaar Williams. The panel had run under many different titles, sometimes changing daily, though eventually under Holman it would come to be known as "Nuts and Jolts."

This particular one is named "Christmas Spirit," and has a pretty good solution for those times when you live in a multi-story apartment but you buy a Christmas tree that's much too tall.

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Here we have Mickey Finn, a strip about a small town Irish-American policeman and his family. The actions of his Uncle Phil teach us a few things: Don't wait until 3 days before Christmas to get a tree, don't get a dried out one just because it's cheap, and don't smoke a pipe as it can become a huge waste of money.