I've written previously, a few times, about language and idioms that first appeared in comic strips. For the most part, cartoonists are known for one or two things that they popularized and which have stayed around for years. Rube Goldberg had his machines, Al Capp had Sadie Hawkins Day, and George McManus had his newlyweds. Some, like Billy DeBeck, have a few more.

Then there's Tad Dorgan.

Dorgan was a cartoonist in the early 20th century who was best known at the time for his sports comic strips, such as "Indoor Sports", as well as his comic strips about dogs, like "Judge Rummy" and "Silk Hat Harry". He always signed his work as "TAD," although those were actually his initials. His real name was Thomas Aloysius Dorgan.

He is also a problem. He's credited, in more than one place, with either coining or popularizing a very large number of phrases and idioms. Some of them have gone out of style, some are still in common usage, and some have gone out of usage and have had a resurgence. As a comic strip history enthusiast, it's exciting to me to think that a single cartoonist has has that much of an effect on the language, in the short term and the long term. The problem, however, is that while he's credited with these, it isn't exactly clear whether he actually coined or popularized any of them.

Lots of places think they can fudge history by saying someone "popularized" a word or phrase, basically saying that while they may not have come up with it, they used it a lot and were instrumental in spreading it around. As quite a prolific cartoonist, his work was seen by millions on a daily basis, for many years, and therefore it stands to reason that any popular phrase he wrote would easily be spread. I just get a little suspicious when the list of things he "popularized" becomes as large as it is.

Here's what Wikipedia lists:

• "dumbbell" (a stupid person)
• "for crying out loud" (an exclamation of astonishment)
• "cat's meow" and "cat's pajamas" (as superlatives)
• "applesauce" (nonsense)
• "cheaters" (eyeglasses)
• "skimmer" (a hat)
• "hard-boiled" (tough and unsentimental)
• "drugstore cowboy" (loafers or ladies' men)
• "nickel-nurser" (a miser)
• "as busy as a one-armed paperhanger" (overworked)
• "Yes, we have no bananas"
• "Twenty-three, Skidoo"
• "solid ivory"
• "Dumb Dora"
• "finale hopper"
• "Benny" (a hat)
• "dogs" (feet or shoes)

Now, as an example of how untrustworthy this list can be, let's look at Dumb Dora, a 1920s phrase for a woman who wasn't too bright. If any cartoonist should get credit for this one it's Chic Young, creator of Blondie, who created a comic strip in 1924 called Dumb Dora that was popular in its day. However, around the same time, Burns and Allen had been popularizing the phrase in their vaudeville act, and there had also been a movie by that name. Who knows where the popularization came from?

Then, of course, there's "hot dog." While it's been widely debunked, Dorgan is in several places still credited with first using the term to refer to a sausage at a New York Giants baseball game. The term, however, has been shown to be in usage at least 10 years before Dorgan ever used it in a comic strip.

The same goes for a number of these. There are other explanations for where they were coined and popularized, but somehow Tad Dorgan gets lumped in with them, probably because he was simply using popular language of his time. Now, I'm not saying that he didn't coin any of them, but the evidence certainly isn't good that he coined all of them.

I think of it like medicine: If a medicine or medical treatment claims to treat one particular symptom, it's much safer to believe that it legitimately does. If it claims to heal and cure a ridiculously large list of symptoms, it's probably safe to at least be extremely skeptical of its claims. While I enjoy Dorgan's work, and while I respect him as a prolific user of slang in a popular medium, I don't think he deserves all the credit that he's given.

We all know who John Q. Public is. He's the everyman, the man on the street, the guy the representatives in the government represent. He's who they want votes from. What he thinks is what politicians are supposed to listen to and build their platforms on. He's all of us. That said, he isn't just a turn of phrase, but was an actual newspaper comic strip character.

But who was his father?

The idea of a character representing the common man is traced by some back to Frederick Opper's character "Mr. Common People," a small, perpetually nervous looking man in a top hat, who appeared in many Opper political cartoons beginning in 1902. Mr. Common People is most often shown being taken advantage of by people who are far larger than he is. He is also easily identified by the large tag which always hangs off of his coat and reads "The Common People."

John Q. Public himself was created by by Vaughn Shoemaker and first appeared in an editorial cartoon in the Chicago Daily News in 1922. He appeared as a short, balding, messy-haired gentleman and, much like Mr. Common People, was often taken advantage of by larger people around him. An interesting series of cartoons also inserted John Q. Public into photographs depicting various societal problems. The captions mention his concern at what's going on and his confusion at why nothing is being done about it. The cartoons proved popular, and the phrase "John Q. Public" to refer to ordinary citizens lived on far longer than the character did. Many other similar characters cropped up over the years as well. The most notable of these was "Mr. Voter", created by Jim Lange for the The Oklahoman. That character proved so popular, in fact that in 2006 the Oklahoma State legislature adopted him as the state's official editorial cartoon.

Shoemaker had a very successful career even without John Q. Public, and went on to win two Pullitzer prizes for his work. His World War II cartoons were even criticized by Herman Goering himself as "horrible examples of anti-Nazi propaganda," which is high praise in my book. Most of all, he was able to create powerful symbols that stuck in people's minds, as evidenced by the enduring popularity of John Q. Public.

Additional Info:

John Q. Public photo collages at Art Institute Chicago

More of Vaughn Shoemaker's Work at "Comics Should Be Good" blog

Vaughn Shoemaker biography at Wheaton College Archives and Special Collections, and their write-up on John Q. Public

Article on everyman characters at Slate