Wednesday, April 02, 2008

Looking Out For The Mailman

The Succes of Willy Lumpkin

According to a press release from Publisher's Syndicate, when Willy Lumpkin was only three weeks old, he already was the world's busiest mailman... covering a route of more than 13.750.000, reached by 62 prominent newspapers in the U.S. and Canada. Willy Lumpkin's debute included radio and tv announcements, special circulars distributed by carrier boys and in-paper ads.

Among the papers carrying this strip were...

The New York Mirror
The Detroit News
The Cleveland Plain Dealer
The Washington Post
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The Columbus Dispatch
The Houston Post
The Dallas Morning News
The Oklahoma City Oklahoman
The Atlanta Consitution
The Salt Lake City Tribune
The LKouisville Courier Journal
The Norfolk Virginian Pilot
The St. Petersburg Times
The Tulsa World
The Hatford Courant
The Dayton Daily News
The Charlotte Observer
The Evansville Courier
The Hamilton Spectator
The Ottawa Journal
The Portland Press Herald
The Winnipeg Free Press
The Little Rock Gazette
The Tampa Times
The Jackson Clarion Ledger
The Lima Citizen
The Chicago Sun-Times
The Los Angeles Times
The Boston Globe
The Indianapolis Star
The Miami Herald
Yje Milwaukee Journal
The Toledo Blade
The Newark News
The Birmingham News
The San Antonio Express
The Toronto Telegram
The Nashville Banner
The Wichita Eagle
The Ft. Wayne Journal Gazette
The Montreal Star
The San Diego Union
The Portland Oregonian
The Tacoma News Tribune
The Syracuse Post Standard
The Honolulu Star Bulletin
The Tuscon Star
The Vancouver Province
The Montreal Le Petit Journal
The Eerie Times News
The Peoria Journal Star
and The Trow Record

Anyone living in any of these places who wants to have a look in the library to see if any of these survive on microfiche or bound volumes are more than welcome to do so. If you come across any mention of the strip, promotions, announcements, publicity stuff, comments in the letter section, please try to get a scan and contact me. I would love to track the development of the strip on this blog, in preparation of a full reprint of all 14 months. I don't think all papers would have stayed with it the whole run, because otherwise Stan and Dan would not have stopped the strip as soon as they did.

2 comments:

Angelo said...

I live in Italy but I know people around the USA, I will ask them to try to help us in this search... you had a very good idea, thank you very much.
Angelo

Angelo said...

Hello!!!
I hope I don't annoy you but may I ask you if are there news about the Willie Lumpkin newspaper strips still missing? I really would like to help in finding the ones we still need to have every one of them, if possible.
Thank you very much,
Angelo from Italy