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128-551: Rupert Bear is an English children's comic strip character and franchise created by Herbert Tourtel and illustrated by his wife, the artist Mary Tourtel , first appearing in the Daily Express newspaper on 8 November 1920. Rupert's initial purpose was to win sales from the rival Daily Mail and Daily Mirror . In 1935, the stories were taken over by Alfred Bestall , who was previously an illustrator for Punch and other glossy magazines. Bestall proved to be successful in

256-542: A fortnight later. The Press Complaints Commission described the article as a "serious error of judgement" and said, "Although the editor had taken steps to resolve the complaint, and rightly published an apology, the breach of the Code was so serious that no apology could remedy it". The Daily Express gained a reputation for printing conspiracy theories about the death of Diana, Princess of Wales as front-page news. The Independent and The Guardian in 2006 both published

384-541: A syndicate hires people to write and draw a strip and then distributes it to many newspapers for a fee. Some newspaper strips begin or remain exclusive to one newspaper. For example, the Pogo comic strip by Walt Kelly originally appeared only in the New York Star in 1948 and was not picked up for syndication until the following year. Newspaper comic strips come in two different types: daily strips and Sunday strips . In

512-428: A "standard" size", with strips running the entire width of a page or having more than one tier. By the 1920s, strips often covered six of the eight columns occupied by a traditional broadsheet paper. During the 1940s, strips were reduced to four columns wide (with a "transition" width of five columns). As newspapers became narrower beginning in the 1970s, strips have gotten even smaller, often being just three columns wide,

640-590: A 66.6% control of the character. The Express retains minority interest of one-third plus the right to publish Rupert Bear stories in certain Express publications. In 2000, Express Newspapers was bought by Richard Desmond, publisher of celebrity magazine OK! , for £125 million. Controversy surrounded the deal since Desmond also owned softcore pornography magazines. As a result, many staff left, including editor Rosie Boycott and columnist Peter Hitchens . Hitchens moved to The Mail on Sunday , saying working for

768-581: A ban on the sale of the paper. This ban was overturned in March 2016, following a student vote. UKIP Leader Nigel Farage declared that he had signed the "Crusade" petition, and urged others to do the same. Romanian politician Cătălin Ivan expressed "outrage" at the campaign. In a statement released by The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) on 24 April 2015,

896-527: A better genre -neutral name. Comic strips have appeared inside American magazines such as Liberty and Boys' Life , but also on the front covers, such as the Flossy Frills series on The American Weekly Sunday newspaper supplement . In the UK and the rest of Europe, comic strips are also serialized in comic book magazines , with a strip's story sometimes continuing over three pages. Storytelling using

1024-562: A broadsheet in 1900 by Sir Arthur Pearson . Its sister paper, the Sunday Express , was launched in 1918. In June 2022, it had an average daily circulation of 201,608. Under the ownership of Lord Beaverbrook , the Express rose to become the newspaper with the largest circulation in the world, going from 2 million in the 1930s to 4 million in the 1940s. It was acquired by Richard Desmond 's company Northern & Shell in 2000. Hugh Whittow

1152-531: A deal worth £126.7 million. To coincide with the purchase the Trinity Mirror group changed its name to Reach . Hugh Whittow resigned as editor and Gary Jones took over as editor-in-chief soon after the purchase. The Daily Express endorsed Liz Truss in the July–September 2022 Conservative Party leadership election . In 2023, Reach launched a US version of the Express, called the-express.com. It

1280-575: A flock of geese (without anybody mourning their demise). Max and Moritz provided an inspiration for German immigrant Rudolph Dirks , who created the Katzenjammer Kids in 1897—a strip starring two German-American boys visually modelled on Max and Moritz . Familiar comic-strip iconography such as stars for pain, sawing logs for snoring, speech balloons, and thought balloons originated in Dirks' strip. Hugely popular, Katzenjammer Kids occasioned one of

1408-561: A friendly elf with broken English. There is also a recurring country Police Officer who is an adult dog named PC Growler. There are also a few human characters in the stories, such as the Professor (who lives in a castle with his servant, Bodkin), Tiger Lily (a Chinese girl), her father "the Conjuror," and several less frequently occurring characters such as Sailor Sam, Gaffer Jarge, Captain Binnacle,

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1536-447: A friendly tree elf; Ming a baby dragon and Ping Pong's pet; Edward no longer has tusks, his trunk has been straightened and he wears an orange T-shirt and brown shorts; and one of the fox twins (Ferdie) has been changed into a girl named Freda. There are new characters like Miranda the mermaid ; but characters Podgy Pig, his self-obsessed sister Rosalie and the timid Willie Mouse make no appearances. Rupert Bear, Follow The Magic ...

1664-406: A front-page article critical of survivors of the 1996 Dunblane massacre , entitled "Anniversary Shame of Dunblane Survivors". The article criticised the 18-year-old survivors for posting "shocking blogs and photographs of themselves on the internet", revealing that they drank alcohol, made rude gestures and talked about their sex lives. The article provoked complaints, leading to a front-page apology

1792-430: A full page, and daily strips were generally the width of the page. The competition between papers for having more cartoons than the rest from the mid-1920s, the growth of large-scale newspaper advertising during most of the thirties, paper rationing during World War II , the decline on news readership (as television newscasts began to be more common) and inflation (which has caused higher printing costs) beginning during

1920-539: A majority interest in the Rupert Bear character from the Daily Express . Every year since 1936, a Rupert Bear annual has been released, even during the years of World War II , during a paper shortage. All of these books were written and illustrated by Mary Tourtel and originally published from 1928 to 1936, by Sampson Low. There were 46 books in the original series. Some of the titles were later published for

2048-627: A more modern Rupert to tie-in with the CGI -animation Rupert Bear, Follow the Magic... , began. The Rupert Annual for 1960 contained a story called Rupert and the Diamond Leaf , in which he visits "Coon Island", whose inhabitants are little " Coons ". The Coons previously appeared on the cover of The New Rupert: The Daily Express Annual, 1954 and in the interior story Rupert and the Castaway . The first appearance

2176-719: A previous cost-cutting exercise triggered the first 24-hour national press strike in the UK for 18 years. In late August 2009 came plans for a further 70 redundancies, affecting journalists across Express Newspapers (including the Daily and Sunday Express , the Daily Star , and the Daily Star Sunday ). In August 2009, the Advertising Standards Authority criticised the company for advertorials as features alongside adverts for

2304-481: A secondary strip by the same artist as the main strip. No matter whether it appeared above or below a main strip, the extra strip was known as the topper , such as The Squirrel Cage which ran along with Room and Board , both drawn by Gene Ahern . During the 1930s, the original art for a Sunday strip was usually drawn quite large. For example, in 1930, Russ Westover drew his Tillie the Toiler Sunday page at

2432-619: A selection of then recent Express headlines on the topic. This practice was satirised in Private Eye as the Diana Express or the Di'ly Express , and has been attributed to Desmond's friendship with regular Eye target Mohamed Fayed . The articles regularly quoted Fayed with the newspaper describing its campaign as "Our relentless crusade for the truth". In 2006 and 2007, these front-page stories consistently appeared on Mondays, and ended only when

2560-540: A sequence of pictures has existed through history. One medieval European example in textile form is the Bayeux Tapestry . Printed examples emerged in 19th-century Germany and in mid 18th-century England, where some of the first satirical or humorous sequential narrative drawings were produced. William Hogarth 's 18th-century English caricature include both narrative sequences, such as A Rake's Progress , and single panels. The Biblia pauperum ("Paupers' Bible"),

2688-616: A settlement at the High Court of Justice , the newspapers ran a front-page apology to the McCanns on 19 March 2008, another apology on the front of the Sunday editions of 23 March and a statement of apology at the High Court. The newspapers also agreed to pay costs and damages, which the McCanns said they would use to fund the search for their daughter. Guardian media commentator Roy Greenslade said it

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2816-493: A similar width to the one most daily panels occupied before the 1940s. In an issue related to size limitations, Sunday comics are often bound to rigid formats that allow their panels to be rearranged in several different ways while remaining readable. Such formats usually include throwaway panels at the beginning, which some newspapers will omit for space. As a result, cartoonists have less incentive to put great efforts into these panels. Garfield and Mutts were known during

2944-500: A single panel with a single gag, as seen occasionally in Mike Peters ' Mother Goose and Grimm . Early daily strips were large, often running the entire width of the newspaper, and were sometimes three or more inches high. Initially, a newspaper page included only a single daily strip, usually either at the top or the bottom of the page. By the 1920s, many newspapers had a comics page on which many strips were collected together. During

3072-558: A size of 17" × 37". In 1937, the cartoonist Dudley Fisher launched the innovative Right Around Home , drawn as a huge single panel filling an entire Sunday page. Full-page strips were eventually replaced by strips half that size. Strips such as The Phantom and Terry and the Pirates began appearing in a format of two strips to a page in full-size newspapers, such as the New Orleans Times Picayune , or with one strip on

3200-488: A tabloid page, as in the Chicago Sun-Times . When Sunday strips began to appear in more than one format, it became necessary for the cartoonist to allow for rearranged, cropped or dropped panels. During World War II , because of paper shortages, the size of Sunday strips began to shrink. After the war, strips continued to get smaller and smaller because of increased paper and printing costs. The last full-page comic strip

3328-510: A tradition of picture Bibles beginning in the Late Middle Ages , sometimes depicted Biblical events with words spoken by the figures in the miniatures written on scrolls coming out of their mouths—which makes them to some extent ancestors of the modern cartoon strips. In China, with its traditions of block printing and of the incorporation of text with image, experiments with what became lianhuanhua date back to 1884. The origin of

3456-549: A two-tier daily strip, Star Hawks , but after a few years, Star Hawks dropped down to a single tier. In Flanders , the two-tier strip is the standard publication style of most daily strips like Spike and Suzy and Nero . They appear Monday through Saturday; until 2003 there were no Sunday papers in Flanders. In the last decades, they have switched from black and white to color. Single panels usually, but not always, are not broken up and lack continuity. The daily Peanuts

3584-503: A wide range of colors. Printing plates were created with four or more colors—traditionally, the CMYK color model : cyan, magenta, yellow and "K" for black. With a screen of tiny dots on each printing plate, the dots allowed an image to be printed in a halftone that appears to the eye in different gradations. The semi-opaque property of ink allows halftone dots of different colors to create an optical effect of full-color imagery. The decade of

3712-561: Is a "frequent offender" which pays little heed to the ASA's criticisms. In May 2010, Desmond announced a commitment of £100 million over five years to buy new equipment for the printing plants, beginning with the immediate purchase of four new presses, amid industry rumours that he was going to establish a printing plant at Luton. On 31 December 2010, the Express, with all the media titles in Desmond's Northern & Shell group, were excluded from

3840-544: Is a part of children's culture in the United Kingdom , and appears in 4 TV shows based on the character. Rupert is a bear who lives with his parents in a house in Nutwood, a fictional idyllic English village. He is drawn wearing a red jumper and bright yellow checked trousers, with matching yellow scarf. Originally depicted as a brown bear , his colour soon changed to white to save on printing costs, though he remained brown on

3968-499: Is a strip, and the daily Dennis the Menace is a single panel. J. R. Williams ' long-run Out Our Way continued as a daily panel even after it expanded into a Sunday strip, Out Our Way with the Willets . Jimmy Hatlo 's They'll Do It Every Time was often displayed in a two-panel format with the first panel showing some deceptive, pretentious, unwitting or scheming human behavior and

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4096-458: Is available at UK Press Online. In September 2017, Daily Mirror publisher Trinity Mirror announced its interest in buying all of Express Newspapers from Desmond. The Financial Times called it potentially the biggest change in the British newspaper industry for a decade. In February 2018, Trinity Mirror acquired the Daily Express , and other publishing assets of Northern & Shell, in

4224-789: Is based in New York City. The printing press of the Sunday Express was first started by Lady Diana Manners on 29 December 1918. It was edited by Michael Booker from 2018 to 2021 when he left for GB News . Its circulation in December 2022 was 153,377. Suspected serial killer John Bodkin Adams was arrested in 1956, accused of murdering up to 400 wealthy patients in Eastbourne . The press, "egged on by police leaks, unanimously declared Adams guilty," except for Percy Hoskins , chief crime reporter for

4352-617: The Lansing State Journal in two sheets, printed much larger than the final version and ready to be cut apart and fitted into the local comics page." Comic strip historian Allan Holtz described how strips were provided as mats (the plastic or cardboard trays in which molten metal is poured to make plates) or even plates ready to be put directly on the printing press. He also notes that with electronic means of distribution becoming more prevalent printed sheets "are definitely on their way out." NEA Syndicate experimented briefly with

4480-612: The Beatles ' producer George Martin . The song reached No.3 in the UK Singles Chart. The British video-game publisher Quicksilva adapted Rupert Bear for the Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum 8-bit computers, in two game instalments: the 1985 Rupert and the Toymaker's Party and the 1986 Rupert and The Ice Castle . In September 2020, Royal Mail issued a set of eight stamps to commemorate

4608-504: The Canterbury Heritage Museum , which has since closed, had collections that covered much of the history of Rupert and his friends, as well as Tourtel and other illustrators. The museum was geared toward families and those interested in the general history of Rupert. On 31 October 2005, UK Media Group Entertainment Rights (which was later bought by Boomerang Media , then DreamWorks Classics and now NBCUniversal ) purchased

4736-454: The Express led with "SPIES COVER UP DIANA 'MURDER'". According to The Independent "The Diana stories appear on Mondays because Sunday is often a quiet day." In February and March 2010, the paper returned to featuring Diana stories on the front page on Mondays. In September 2013, following an allegation raised by the estranged wife of an SAS operative, the Daily Express returned to running daily Princess Diana cover stories. In

4864-462: The Express said "a number of articles in the newspaper have suggested that the couple caused the death of their missing daughter Madeleine and then covered it up. We acknowledge that there is no evidence whatsoever to support this theory and that Kate and Gerry are completely innocent of any involvement in their daughter's disappearance." This was followed in October by an apology and payout (forwarded to

4992-430: The Express . Hoskins was adamant that Adams was a naive doctor prosecuted by an overzealous detective, Herbert Hannam , whom Hoskins disliked from previous cases. The Express , under Hoskins's direction, was the only major paper to defend Adams, causing Lord Beaverbrook to question Hoskins's stance. Adams was cleared in 1957 of the murder of Edith Alice Morrell (a second count was withdrawn controversially). After

5120-567: The House of Commons for running "a sustained vendetta" against the British Royal Family in the Express titles. In the same month, the Duke of Edinburgh described the Express as "a bloody awful newspaper. It is full of lies, scandal and imagination. It is a vicious paper." At the height of Beaverbrook's control, in 1948, he told a Royal Commission on the press that he ran his papers "purely for

5248-611: The ITV network that ran for 156 ten-minute episodes. The characters were all puppets, although the opening sequence featured a toy Rupert bear sitting in a live-action child's bedroom. Rupert's friends and flying chariot appeared straight from the Daily Express pages, although he was joined by some new friends including Willy Wisp, Drizzle, Della, Jimmy, Mr Grimnasty, Gypsy Granny, Chun-Mao, The Wise Old Wizard, and Mr Koskora The theme song, written by Len Beadle (also known as Frank Weston) and Ron Roker , sung by Jackie Lee , reached number 14 in

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5376-615: The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination * (both of which have been ratified by the UK, as well as by all other EU countries), were rooted in the desire to outlaw the type of anti-Semitic and other racially based hate speech used by the Nazi media during the 1930s". Appearing in April 2018 before Parliament 's Home Affairs Select Committee , which

5504-544: The Internet . Many are exclusively published online, but the majority of traditional newspaper comic strips have some Internet presence. King Features Syndicate and other syndicates often provide archives of recent strips on their websites. Some, such as Scott Adams , creator of Dilbert , include an email address in each strip. Most comic strip characters do not age throughout the strip's life, but in some strips, like Lynn Johnston 's award-winning For Better or For Worse ,

5632-694: The Labour Party , and the 2015 general election when it backed the UK Independence Party , the newspaper has declared its support for the Conservative Party at every general election since World War II . In 2011, when the newspaper first endorsed UKIP, it became one of the first media outlets in the United Kingdom to demand a withdrawal from the European Union . "Crusade for Freedom"

5760-572: The Press Complaints Commission after withholding payment. Lord Black , chairman of PressBof , the PCC's parent organisation, called this "a deeply regrettable decision". According to Press Gazette , in December 2016 circulation figures showed gross sales of the Daily Mail were 1,491,264 compared to 391,626 for the Daily Express . The full run of the Daily Express has been digitised and

5888-465: The Woolworth's retail chain, with only 18 of the original titles. However, the titles and numbers for this series did not relate to the earlier published series. Brainwaves Limited of Basingstoke , Hampshire, produced a series of Rupert storybooks in 1991 (no author or artist credited): In addition, they published other Rupert series: Rupert first appeared on television in an ITC series produced for

6016-537: The editorial or op-ed page rather than the comics page because of their regular political commentary. For example, the August 12, 1974 Doonesbury strip was awarded a 1975 Pulitzer Prize for its depiction of the Watergate scandal . Dilbert is sometimes found in the business section of a newspaper instead of the comics page because of the strip's commentary about office politics , and Tank McNamara often appears on

6144-519: The newspaper war (1887 onwards) between Pulitzer and Hearst . The Little Bears (1893–96) was the first American comic strip with recurring characters, while the first color comic supplement was published by the Chicago Inter-Ocean sometime in the latter half of 1892, followed by the New York Journal ' s first color Sunday comic pages in 1897. On January 31, 1912, Hearst introduced

6272-441: The 1920s the medium became wildly popular. While radio, and later, television surpassed newspapers as a means of entertainment, most comic strip characters were widely recognizable until the 1980s, and the "funny pages" were often arranged in a way they appeared at the front of Sunday editions. In 1931, George Gallup's first poll had the comic section as the most important part of the newspaper, with additional surveys pointing out that

6400-458: The 1930s, the original art for a daily strip could be drawn as large as 25 inches wide by six inches high. Over decades, the size of daily strips became smaller and smaller, until by 2000, four standard daily strips could fit in an area once occupied by a single daily strip. As strips have become smaller, the number of panels have been reduced. Proof sheets were the means by which syndicates provided newspapers with black-and-white line art for

6528-744: The 1940s. On 24 March 1933, a front-page headline, "Judea Declares War on Germany" (because of the Anti-Nazi boycott of 1933 ), was published. During the late 1930s, the paper advocated the appeasement policies of Neville Chamberlain 's National Government , due to the influence of Lord Beaverbrook. On 7 August 1939, the front-page headline was "NO WAR THIS YEAR". Less than a month later, Britain and France were at war with Nazi Germany following its invasion of Poland . The front page, floating in dirty water, later featured in In Which We Serve . The ruralist and fascist author Henry Williamson wrote for

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6656-1047: The 1960s saw the rise of underground newspapers , which often carried comic strips, such as Fritz the Cat and The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers . Zippy the Pinhead initially appeared in underground publications in the 1970s before being syndicated. Bloom County and Doonesbury began as strips in college newspapers under different titles, and later moved to national syndication. Underground comic strips covered subjects that are usually taboo in newspaper strips, such as sex and drugs. Many underground artists, notably Vaughn Bode , Dan O'Neill , Gilbert Shelton , and Art Spiegelman went on to draw comic strips for magazines such as Playboy , National Lampoon , and Pete Millar's CARtoons . Jay Lynch graduated from undergrounds to alternative weekly newspapers to Mad and children's books. Webcomics , also known as online comics and internet comics , are comics that are available to read on

6784-413: The 1970s had been waning as an entertainment form. From 1903 to 1905 Gustave Verbeek , wrote his comic series "The UpsideDowns of Old Man Muffaroo and Little Lady Lovekins". These comics were made in such a way that one could read the 6 panel comic, flip the book and keep reading. He made 64 such comics in total. The longest-running American comic strips are: Most newspaper comic strips are syndicated;

6912-474: The 1997 Switcheroonie was a one-time publicity stunt, an artist taking over a feature from its originator is an old tradition in newspaper cartooning (as it is in the comic book industry). In fact, the practice has made possible the longevity of the genre's more popular strips. Examples include Little Orphan Annie (drawn and plotted by Harold Gray from 1924 to 1944 and thereafter by a succession of artists including Leonard Starr and Andrew Pepoy ), and Terry and

7040-497: The Brainy Pup , the identical twins Freddy and Ferdy Fox , the identical twins Reggie and Rex Rabbit , and Ming the dragon . The kindly Wise Old Goat also lives in Nutwood, and helps Rupert in some of his adventures. One of the most unusual and evocative characters is Raggety, a woodland troll-creature made from twigs, who is often very grumpy and annoying. In the 2006 television revival of the series, Raggety has been transformed into

7168-426: The British magazine Judy by writer and fledgling artist Charles H. Ross in 1867, Ally Sloper is one of the earliest comic strip characters and he is regarded as the first recurring character in comics. The highly popular character was spun off into his own comic, Ally Sloper's Half Holiday , in 1884. While in the early 20th century comic strips were a frequent target for detractors of "yellow journalism", by

7296-780: The Life of Buonaparte . His contemporary Thomas Rowlandson used strips as early as 1784 for example in The Loves of the Fox and the Badger . Rowlandson may also be credited with inventing the first internationally recognized comic strip character: Doctor Syntax whose picaresque journeys through England were told through a series of comic etchings, accompanied by verse. Original published in parts between 1809 and 1811 in Rudolf Ackermann 's Poetical Magazine , in book form The Tour of Doctor Syntax in search of

7424-843: The NCS, enthusiastically promote the medium, which since the 1970s (and particularly the 1990s) has been considered to be in decline due to numerous factors such as changing tastes in humor and entertainment, the waning relevance of newspapers in general and the loss of most foreign markets outside English-speaking countries. One particularly humorous example of such promotional efforts is the Great Comic Strip Switcheroonie , held in 1997 on April Fool's Day, an event in which dozens of prominent artists took over each other's strips. Garfield ' s Jim Davis, for example, switched with Blondie ' s Stan Drake, while Scott Adams ( Dilbert ) traded strips with Bil Keane ( The Family Circus ). While

7552-583: The PCC. The chairman of the Press Standards Board of Finance , which manages PCC funds, described Express Newspapers as a "rogue publisher". The Express group lost prominent libel cases in 2008–2009; it paid damages to people involved in the Madeleine McCann case (see below), a member of the Muslim Council of Britain , footballer Marco Materazzi , and sports agent Willie McKay . The losses led

7680-423: The Pirates , started by Milton Caniff in 1934 and picked up by George Wunder . A business-driven variation has sometimes led to the same feature continuing under a different name. In one case, in the early 1940s, Don Flowers ' Modest Maidens was so admired by William Randolph Hearst that he lured Flowers away from the Associated Press and to King Features Syndicate by doubling the cartoonist's salary, and renamed

7808-452: The Sage of Um (who is seen travelling in a magical upside down umbrella) and Rollo, the Gypsy boy. There is also a recurring Merboy . During his time as Rupert writer, Alfred Bestall added further characters such as the girl guides Beryl, Pauline and Janet, with Beryl's cat, Dinky. These characters were based on Girl Guides from Bestall's own church who asked him in late 1947 if they could have their own adventure with Rupert. They remain part of

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7936-587: The UK charts in 1971. Rupert returned to television in 1985 to the BBC , in the form of 36 five-minute-stories. In this series, each episode consisted of a series of still illustrations and narration. The sole narrator was Ray Brooks . The short title music is credited to Brave New World. In the US, these shorts aired on the Disney Channel as part of its "Lunch Box" program. In 1991, Rupert Bear featured in an animated television series with 65 episodes and five seasons (13 per season) produced by Nelvana (Canada), Ellipse (France) and Television South (TVS) for

8064-427: The United States, a daily strip appears in newspapers on weekdays, Monday through Saturday, as contrasted with a Sunday strip, which typically only appears on Sundays. Daily strips usually are printed in black and white, and Sunday strips are usually in color. However, a few newspapers have published daily strips in color, and some newspapers have published Sunday strips in black and white. Making his first appearance in

8192-406: The World ), some have verbal thoughts but are not understood by humans, ( Garfield , Snoopy in Peanuts ), and some can converse with humans ( Bloom County , Calvin and Hobbes , Mutts , Citizen Dog , Buckles , Get Fuzzy , Pearls Before Swine , and Pooch Cafe ). Other strips are centered entirely on animals, as in Pogo and Donald Duck . Gary Larson 's The Far Side

8320-685: The adventures of Winnie Winkle , Moon Mullins and Dondi , and waited each fall to see how Lucy would manage to trick Charlie Brown into trying to kick that football. (After I left for college, my father would clip out that strip each year and send it to me just to make sure I didn't miss it.)" The two conventional formats for newspaper comics are strips and single gag panels. The strips are usually displayed horizontally, wider than they are tall. Single panels are square, circular or taller than they are wide. Strips usually, but not always, are broken up into several smaller panels with continuity from panel to panel. A horizontal strip can also be used for

8448-413: The art; for example, within speech balloons . Bestall developed the classic Rupert story format: the story is told in picture form (generally two panels each day in the newspaper and four panels to a page in the annuals), in simple page-headers, in rhyming two-line-per-image verse, and as running prose at the foot. Rupert Annuals can therefore be "read" on four levels. Rupert's unspectacular introduction

8576-541: The benefits in keeping the case in the public eye, but said coverage needed to be toned down since daily headlines were not necessarily helpful. In March 2008, the McCanns launched a libel suit against the Daily Express and the Daily Star , as well as their Sunday equivalents, following their coverage. The action concerned more than 100 stories across the four newspapers, which accused the McCanns of causing and covering up their daughter's death. Express Newspapers pulled all references to Madeleine from its websites. In

8704-405: The case, Beaverbrook phoned Hoskins and said: "Two people were acquitted today", meaning Hoskins as well. The Express carried an exclusive interview with Adams, whom Hoskins interviewed in a safe house away from other newspapers. According to archives released in 2003, Adams was thought by police to have killed 163 patients. On 8 March 2009, the Scottish edition of the Sunday Express published

8832-415: The centenary of Rupert Bear. Featuring Bestall's artwork, they comprised two second-class stamps, two first-class, two at £1.45 and two at £1.70. A cartoon of Rupert superimposed on a Robert Crumb drawing, showing the bear in a sexual situation, was a notable part of the notorious edition of the British underground magazine Oz guest-edited by schoolkids. Subsequently, the adult editors and publishers of

8960-623: The characters age as the years pass. The first strip to feature aging characters was Gasoline Alley . The history of comic strips also includes series that are not humorous, but tell an ongoing dramatic story. Examples include The Phantom , Prince Valiant , Dick Tracy , Mary Worth , Modesty Blaise , Little Orphan Annie , Flash Gordon , and Tarzan . Sometimes these are spin-offs from comic books , for example Superman , Batman , and The Amazing Spider-Man . A number of strips have featured animals as main characters. Some are non-verbal ( Marmaduke , The Angriest Dog in

9088-415: The characters. Hearst promptly hired Harold Knerr to draw his own version of the strip. Dirks renamed his version Hans and Fritz (later, The Captain and the Kids ). Thus, two versions distributed by rival syndicates graced the comics pages for decades. Dirks' version, eventually distributed by United Feature Syndicate , ran until 1979. In the United States, the great popularity of comics sprang from

9216-524: The comic series even today. The series often features fantastic and magical adventures in faraway lands. Each story begins in Nutwood, where Rupert usually sets out on a small errand for his mother or to visit a friend, which then develops into an adventure to an exotic place such as King Frost's Castle, the Kingdom of the Birds, underground, or to the bottom of the sea. Sometimes one of the Professor's inventions opens

9344-594: The comic strips were the second most popular feature after the picture page. During the 1930s, many comic sections had between 12 and 16 pages, although in some cases, these had up to 24 pages. The popularity and accessibility of strips meant they were often clipped and saved; authors including John Updike and Ray Bradbury have written about their childhood collections of clipped strips. Often posted on bulletin boards , clipped strips had an ancillary form of distribution when they were faxed, photocopied or mailed. The Baltimore Sun ' s Linda White recalled, "I followed

9472-555: The company's own presses. Johnston Press has a five-year deal, begun in March 2015, to print the northern editions of the Daily Express , Daily Star , Sunday Express and the Daily Star Sunday at its Dinnington site in Sheffield. The Scottish edition is printed by facsimile in Glasgow by contract printers, the London editions at Westferry Printers. In March 1962, Beaverbrook was attacked in

9600-695: The covers for the annuals until his retirement in 1973. Much of the landscape in Rupert is inspired by the Vale of Clwyd in North Wales (Alfred Bestall himself lived for many years in the north Welsh village of Beddgelert )(the Professor's castle is based on Ruthin Castle), the Sussex Weald and East Devon . Bestall's successor was Alex Cubie. Cubie created Rupert annual artwork between 1974 and 1977. His images are recognisable from

9728-529: The covers of the annuals. Most of the other characters in the series are also anthropomorphic animals. They are all scaled to be about the same size as Rupert, regardless of species. Rupert's animal friends are usually referred to as his "chums" or "pals." Aside from his best friend Bill Badger , some of the most enduring pals are an elephant (Edward Trunk), a mouse (Willie), Pong-Ping the Pekingese , Algy Pug (who actually pre-dates Rupert), Podgy Pig , Bingo

9856-404: The door to one of Rupert's adventures. At the end of the story Rupert returns to Nutwood, where all is safe and well, and where his parents seem perfectly sanguine about his adventures. Unlike most modern comic strips , Rupert Bear has always been produced in the original form of strip with illustrations accompanying text, called " text comics ", as opposed to text being incorporated directly into

9984-517: The feature Glamor Girls to avoid legal action by the AP. The latter continued to publish Modest Maidens , drawn by Jay Allen in Flowers' style. As newspapers have declined , the changes have affected comic strips. Jeff Reece, lifestyle editor of The Florida Times-Union , wrote, "Comics are sort of the ' third rail ' of the newspaper." In the early decades of the 20th century, all Sunday comics received

10112-418: The field of children's literature and worked on Rupert stories and artwork into his nineties. More recently, various other artists and writers have continued the series. About 50 million copies have been sold worldwide. The comic strip is published daily in the Daily Express , with many of these stories later being printed in books, and every year since 1936 a Rupert annual has also been released. Rupert Bear

10240-402: The fifties and sixties led to Sunday strips being published on smaller and more diverse formats. As newspapers have reduced the page count of Sunday comic sections since the late 1990s (by the 2010s, most sections have only four pages, with the back page not always being destined for comics) has also led to further downsizes. Daily strips have suffered as well. Before the mid-1910s, there was not

10368-400: The first comic-strip copyright ownership suits in the history of the medium. When Dirks left William Randolph Hearst for the promise of a better salary under Joseph Pulitzer , it was an unusual move, since cartoonists regularly deserted Pulitzer for Hearst. In a highly unusual court decision, Hearst retained the rights to the name "Katzenjammer Kids", while creator Dirks retained the rights to

10496-448: The first season (13 episodes), with Scottish TV taking over control from season 2 when Television South lost its ITV franchise. The show followed the style and tone Bestall established in the Rupert newspaper series, with many of the stories being almost direct adaptations of his or others' panel stories from the Daily Express . It was aired in syndication on YTV in Canada. In the U.S.,

10624-521: The fund again) to a group who had become known as the " Tapas Seven " in relation to the case. In 2013, the paper launched a "crusade" against new European Union rules on migrants from Bulgaria and Romania, inviting readers to sign a petition against lifting restrictions on immigration. The front page on Thursday 31 October declared: "Britain is full and fed up. Today join your Daily Express Crusade to stop new flood of Romanian and Bulgarian migrants". The Aberystwyth University Student Union announced

10752-547: The history of London. The Reuben , named for cartoonist Rube Goldberg , is the most prestigious award for U.S. comic strip artists. Reuben awards are presented annually by the National Cartoonists Society (NCS). In 1995, the United States Postal Service issued a series of commemorative stamps, Comic Strip Classics , marking the comic-strip centennial. Today's strip artists, with the help of

10880-515: The late 1920s, comic strips expanded from their mirthful origins to feature adventure stories , as seen in Popeye , Captain Easy , Buck Rogers , Tarzan , and Terry and the Pirates . In the 1940s, soap-opera -continuity strips such as Judge Parker and Mary Worth gained popularity. Because "comic" strips are not always funny, cartoonist Will Eisner has suggested that sequential art would be

11008-401: The late 1960s, it became a mouthpiece for Capp's repudiation of the counterculture. Pogo used animals to particularly devastating effect, caricaturing many prominent politicians of the day as animal denizens of Pogo's Okeefenokee Swamp. In a fearless move, Pogo's creator Walt Kelly took on Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, caricaturing him as a bobcat named Simple J. Malarkey, a megalomaniac who

11136-403: The late 19th century. The Yellow Kid is usually credited as one of the first newspaper strips . However, the art form combining words and pictures developed gradually and there are many examples which led up to the comic strip. The Glasgow Looking Glass was the first mass-produced publication to tell stories using illustrations and is regarded as the world's first comic strip. It satirised

11264-596: The magazine were prosecuted in a high-profile obscenity trial at the Old Bailey in June 1971; the inclusion of Rupert formed a part of the prosecution's case and defence witnesses were cross-examined on it. Comic strip Most strips are written and drawn by a comics artist, known as a cartoonist . As the word "comic" implies, strips are frequently humorous. Examples of these gag-a-day strips are Blondie , Bringing Up Father , Marmaduke , and Pearls Before Swine . In

11392-587: The media commentator Roy Greenslade to conclude that Express Newspapers (which also publishes the Star titles) paid more in libel damages over that period than any other newspaper group. Although most of the individual amounts paid were not disclosed, the total damages were recorded at £1,570,000. Greenslade characterised Desmond as a "rogue proprietor". In late 2008, Express Newspapers began cutting 80 jobs to reduce costs by £2.5 million; however, too few staff were willing to take voluntary redundancy. In early 2008,

11520-561: The members with his drawings and the force of his personality. The comic strip was safe for satire. During the early 20th century, comic strips were widely associated with publisher William Randolph Hearst , whose papers had the largest circulation of strips in the United States. Hearst was notorious for his practice of yellow journalism , and he was frowned on by readers of The New York Times and other newspapers which featured few or no comic strips. Hearst's critics often assumed that all

11648-413: The mid-to-late 80s and 1990s respectively for their throwaways on their Sunday strips, however both strips now run "generic" title panels. Daily Express Defunct The Daily Express is a national daily United Kingdom middle-market newspaper printed in tabloid format . Published in London, it is the flagship of Express Newspapers, owned by publisher Reach plc . It was first published as

11776-617: The modern English language comic strip can be traced to the efflorescence of caricature in late 18th century London. English caricaturists such as Richard Newton and George Woodward developed sophisticated caricature styles using strips of expressive comic figures with captions that could be read left to right to cumulative effect, as well as business models for advertising and selling cheap comic illustration on regular subscription. Other leading British caricaturists produced strips as well; for example James Gillray in Democracy;-or-a Sketch of

11904-462: The nation's first full daily comic page in his New York Evening Journal . The history of this newspaper rivalry and the rapid appearance of comic strips in most major American newspapers is discussed by Ian Gordon . Numerous events in newspaper comic strips have reverberated throughout society at large, though few of these events occurred in recent years, owing mainly to the declining use of continuous storylines on newspaper comic strips, which since

12032-556: The new owner was a moral conflict of interest since he had always attacked the pornographic magazines that Desmond published. Despite their divergent politics, Desmond respected Hitchens. In 2007, Express Newspapers left the National Publishers Association due to unpaid fees. Since payments to the NPA fund the Press Complaints Commission , it is possible that the Express and its sister papers could cease being regulated by

12160-463: The paper focused instead on the Madeleine McCann story (see below). Even on 7 July 2006, the anniversary of the London bombings (used by most other newspapers to publish commemorations) the front page was given over to Diana. This tendency was also mocked on Have I Got News for You when on 6 November 2006, the day other papers reported the death sentence given to Saddam Hussein on their front pages,

12288-622: The paper on many occasions over a span of half a century. He also wrote for the Sunday Express at the beginning of his career. In 1938, the publication moved to the Daily Express Building, Manchester (nicknamed the "Black Lubyianka"), designed by Owen Williams on the same site in Great Ancoats Street . It opened a similar building in Glasgow in 1936 in Albion Street. Glasgow printing ended in 1974 and Manchester in 1989 on

12416-481: The paper set newspaper sales records several times throughout the 1930s. Its success was partly due to aggressive marketing campaign and a circulation war with other populist newspapers. Arthur Christiansen became editor in October 1933. Under his direction sales climbed from two million in 1936 to four million in 1949. He retired in 1957. The paper also featured Alfred Bestall 's Rupert Bear cartoon and satirical cartoons by Carl Giles which it began publishing in

12544-606: The paper] purely for the purpose of making propaganda and with no other motive". Lord Beaverbrook , former owner (1948). Partially as a result of the rejuvenation of the Daily Mail under David English and the emergence of The Sun under Rupert Murdoch and editorship of Larry Lamb , average daily sales of the Express dropped below four million in 1967, below three million in 1975, and below two million in 1984. The Daily Express switched from broadsheet to tabloid in 1977 (the Mail having done so six years earlier), and

12672-625: The picturesque ran to 9 editions between 1812 and 1819, spun off two sequels, a prequel, numerous pirate imitations and copies including French, German, Danish and translations. His image was available on pottery, textiles wallpaper and other merchandise. The Caricature Magazine or Hudibrastic Mirror , an influential English comic series published in London between 1807 and 1819 by Thomas Tegg included some satirical stories in comic strip format such as The Adventures of Johnny Newcome . The first newspaper comic strips appeared in North America in

12800-612: The political and social life of Scotland in the 1820s. It was conceived and illustrated by William Heath. Swiss author and caricature artist Rodolphe Töpffer (Geneva, 1799–1846) is considered the father of the modern comic strips. His illustrated stories such as Histoire de Mr. Vieux Bois (1827), first published in the US in 1842 as The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck or Histoire de Monsieur Jabot (1831), inspired subsequent generations of German and American comic artists. In 1865, German painter, author, and caricaturist Wilhelm Busch created

12928-499: The purchase. The paper's editorial stances have often been seen as aligned to Euroscepticism and supportive of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), and other right-wing factions including the European Research Group (ERG) of the Conservative Party . The Daily Express was founded in 1900 by Sir Arthur Pearson , with the first issue appearing on 24 April 1900. Pearson lost his sight to glaucoma in 1913, and sold

13056-477: The purpose of making propaganda". The arrival of television , and the public's changing interests, took their toll on circulation, and following Beaverbrook's death in 1964, the paper's circulation declined for several years. During this period, the Express , practically alone among mainstream newspapers, was vehemently opposed to entry into what became the European Economic Community . "[I run

13184-439: The reproduction of strips (which they arranged to have colored in the case of Sunday strips). Michigan State University Comic Art Collection librarian Randy Scott describes these as "large sheets of paper on which newspaper comics have traditionally been distributed to subscribing newspapers. Typically each sheet will have either six daily strips of a given title or one Sunday strip. Thus, a week of Beetle Bailey would arrive at

13312-572: The same products. The ASA noted that the pieces were "always and uniquely favourable to the product featured in the ads and contained claims that have been or were likely to be prohibited in advertisements". In January 2010, the Daily Express was censured by the Advertising Standards Authority over a front-page promotion for "free" fireworks. This led to comment that the Express has become "the Ryanair of Fleet Street ", in that it

13440-486: The second half of 2007 the Daily Express gave a large coverage to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann . From 3 August 2007 to 10 November 2007, the Express dedicated at least part of the next 100 front pages to her. Of those, 82 used the headline to feature the details of the disappearance (often stylised by "MADELEINE" in red block capitals, plus a picture of the child). Though the family initially said some journalists may have "overstepped their mark" they acknowledged

13568-413: The second panel revealing the truth of the situation. Sunday newspapers traditionally included a special color section. Early Sunday strips (known colloquially as "the funny papers", shortened to "the funnies"), such as Thimble Theatre and Little Orphan Annie , filled an entire newspaper page, a format known to collectors as full page . Sunday pages during the 1930s and into the 1940s often carried

13696-572: The show also airs daily on Qubo channel, although only the latter 26 episodes are being shown. In South America , the show was aired in Brazil by the TV Cultura channel between 1998 and 2008. In 2000, the Canadian producer Nelvana made plans to produce a feature film about Rupert at Hollywood studios, but the project was not implemented. In 2006, a new Rupert Bear stop-motion-animated television series

13824-648: The show first aired on Nickelodeon (as part of Nick Jr. block) before moving to CBS in January 1999; repeats of the series came to Qubo 's digital service in January 2007. The show was aired in the United Kingdom on CITV . In Australia, the show was aired on the ABC and on TV2 in New Zealand as part of the Jason Gunn show . The show has been returned in the United Kingdom on the satellite and cable network Tiny Pop . As of 2009,

13952-494: The sports page because of its subject matter. Lynn Johnston 's For Better or For Worse created an uproar when Lawrence, one of the strip's supporting characters, came out of the closet. The world's longest comic strip is 88.9-metre (292 ft) long and on display at Trafalgar Square as part of the London Comedy Festival. The London Cartoon Strip was created by 15 of Britain's best known cartoonists and depicts

14080-463: The strip Max and Moritz , about two trouble-making boys, which had a direct influence on the American comic strip. Max and Moritz was a series of seven severely moralistic tales in the vein of German children's stories such as Struwwelpeter ("Shockheaded Peter"). In the story's final act, the boys, after perpetrating some mischief, are tossed into a sack of grain, run through a mill, and consumed by

14208-451: The strips in his papers were fronts for his own political and social views. Hearst did occasionally work with or pitch ideas to cartoonists, most notably his continued support of George Herriman 's Krazy Kat . An inspiration for Bill Watterson and other cartoonists, Krazy Kat gained a considerable following among intellectuals during the 1920s and 1930s. Some comic strips, such as Doonesbury and Mallard Fillmore , may be printed on

14336-586: The tabloid's name was mentioned in an accusation of producing hate speech , initially referring to an article in The Sun : "...To give just one glimpse of the scale of the problem, back in 2003 the Daily Express ran 22 negative front pages stories about asylum seekers and refugees in a single 31-day period" ... "..the High Commissioner noted that Article 20 of the ICCPR , as well as elements relating to hate speech in

14464-441: The thicker black outlines around the characters and the use of more vibrant colours than Bestall employed. A Rupert Annual is still produced every year and Rupert appears each day in the Daily Express . In 1978, his new adventures became illustrated by John Harrold; his drawings in the annual were usually coloured by Gina Hart . In 2008 John Harrold was succeeded by Stuart Trotter and a new style of annual ( sans serif typeface) with

14592-543: The title to the future Lord Beaverbrook in 1916. The Express was one of the first papers to place news instead of advertisements on its front page, and carried gossip, sport, and women's features. It was also the first in Britain to have a crossword puzzle . It began printing in Manchester in 1927. In 1931 it moved its London headquarters to 120 Fleet Street , a specially commissioned Art Deco building. Under Beaverbrook,

14720-505: The way for some of these strips, as its human characters were manifest in diverse forms—as animals, vegetables, and minerals. The comics have long held a distorted mirror to contemporary society, and almost from the beginning have been used for political or social commentary. This ranged from the conservative slant of Harold Gray's Little Orphan Annie to the unabashed liberalism of Garry Trudeau's Doonesbury . Al Capp's Li'l Abner espoused liberal opinions for most of its run, but by

14848-491: Was "unprecedented" for four major newspapers to offer front-page apologies but also said it was more than warranted given that the papers had committed "a substantial libel" that shamed the British press. Craig Silverman of Regret the Error , a blog that reports media errors, argued that given how many of the stories appeared on the front page, anything less than a front-page apology would have been "unacceptable." In its apology,

14976-513: Was bent on taking over the characters' birdwatching club and rooting out all undesirables. Kelly also defended the medium against possible government regulation in the McCarthy era . At a time when comic books were coming under fire for supposed sexual, violent, and subversive content, Kelly feared the same would happen to comic strips. Going before the Congressional subcommittee, he proceeded to charm

15104-458: Was bought by the construction company Trafalgar House in the same year. Its publishing company, Beaverbrook Newspapers, was renamed Express Newspapers. In 1982, Trafalgar House spun off its publishing interests to a new company, Fleet Holdings, under Lord Matthews , but this succumbed to a hostile takeover by United Newspapers in 1985. Under United, the Express titles moved from Fleet Street to Blackfriars Road in 1989. Express Newspapers

15232-521: Was first aired on Five from 8 November 2006 until 1 February 2008. 52 ten-minute episodes were broadcast and subsequently repeated. A short film directed by Geoff Dunbar based on ideas/music/songs by Paul McCartney was made in 1984, titled Rupert and the Frog Song . It follows Rupert as he explores the country one night and finds a special gathering of frogs. The film contains a song titled " We All Stand Together ", written by McCartney and arranged by

15360-485: Was in a single panel, the first of 36 episodes of the story "Little Lost Bear" written by Herbert and drawn by Mary Tourtel. Bestall expanded the stories and plots of Rupert; and in addition to precise and detailed drawings for the Daily Express panels he also created beautifully crafted illustrations in the Rupert Annuals. Bestall drew the Rupert stories for the Daily Express until 1965; and continued to illustrate

15488-685: Was in the 1946 soft cover summer special Rupert on Coon Island . Rupert appeared in Paul McCartney 's 1984 music video " We All Stand Together "; McCartney also made an animated video starring Rupert called Rupert and the Frog Song . The short film, produced by McCartney won the British Academy Award . Tourtel's home was in Canterbury in Kent, and the Rupert Bear Museum , formerly part of

15616-426: Was investigating the treatment of minority groups in print media, Daily Express editor Gary Jones said that he would be looking to change the tone of the paper. Jones said that he had found past pages of the newspaper "downright offensive," adding that they made him feel "very uncomfortable" and contributed to an " Islamophobic sentiment" in the media. With the exception of the 2001 general election when it backed

15744-444: Was produced, skewing almost entirely towards small children. Changes to the characters are that Rupert wears trainers and his fur has a slight tan; Bill wears a dark blue leather jacket and blue pants with yellow stripes instead of his suit and bowtie, and tends to carry a personal digital assistant with him at all times; Pong Ping has become a girl who uses magic and had her name reversed; Raggety, who rarely appeared before, has become

15872-535: Was sold to publisher Richard Desmond in 2000, and the names of the newspapers reverted to Daily Express and Sunday Express . In 2004, the newspaper moved to Lower Thames Street in the City of London . In February 2018, it moved into 1 Canada Square in Canary Wharf. On 31 October 2005, UK Media Group Entertainment Rights secured majority interest from the Daily Express for Rupert Bear . They paid £6 million for

16000-662: Was the Prince Valiant strip for 11 April 1971. Comic strips have also been published in Sunday newspaper magazines. Russell Patterson and Carolyn Wells' New Adventures of Flossy Frills was a continuing strip series seen on Sunday magazine covers. Beginning January 26, 1941, it ran on the front covers of Hearst's American Weekly newspaper magazine supplement, continuing until March 30 of that year. Between 1939 and 1943, four different stories featuring Flossy appeared on American Weekly covers. Sunday comics sections employed offset color printing with multiple print runs imitating

16128-407: Was the editor from February 2011 until he retired in March 2018. In February 2018 Trinity Mirror acquired the Daily Express , and other publishing assets of Northern & Shell, in a deal worth £126.7 million. To coincide with the purchase the Trinity Mirror group changed the name of the company to Reach . Hugh Whittow resigned as editor and Gary Jones took over as editor-in-chief soon after

16256-563: Was the newspaper's own campaign to give the people of the United Kingdom the opportunity to add their names to a petition addressed to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in favour of Britain's withdrawal from the European Union . Each edition of the 8 January 2011 issue had four cut-out vouchers where readers could sign the pledge and send them to the paper's HQ where the petition was being compiled; there were also further editions with

16384-561: Was unusual, as there were no central characters. Instead The Far Side used a wide variety of characters including humans, monsters, aliens , chickens, cows, worms , amoebas , and more. John McPherson's Close to Home also uses this theme, though the characters are mostly restricted to humans and real-life situations. Wiley Miller not only mixes human, animal, and fantasy characters, but also does several different comic strip continuities under one umbrella title, Non Sequitur . Bob Thaves 's Frank & Ernest began in 1972 and paved

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