Starting way back in the 1930's when you bought a piece of 1c Fleer Dubble Bubble gum you got a Pud comic. By the 1960's, Pud had evolved into a round headed kid with a stripped shirt and rolled up jeans. I love the color palette with the light green and light yellows. This was quite counter to Bazooka Joe comics which always hit you with primary red, blue and yellow. Pud comics were much more subtle. They were also more visual and played with the tiny space they were allowed. Sometimes the comics were just a single panel or the panels were turned vertically. And of course if you saved up hundreds of comics you could send away for some crappy prize. I am just glad every kid didn't do this so I can occasionally find a little stack of these gems.
Haha. Pud comics are the best.
ReplyDeleteI'm old enough to remember Pud when he was a jolly fat kid with the same striped shirt. The one you're a fan of is an aneorexic imposter.
ReplyDeleteThen again, I used to like Bazooka Joe better, because Joe had an eye patch (perhaps due to some traumatic accident?). Also, Mort was the weird kid who wore his turtleneck shirt up over his mouth. All this has been sanitized, too, since those days.
It's tough becoming an old fart.
I haven't been able to find pictures of the fat Pud anywhere on the 'net. Evidently Pud started out in the 30's as a normal-sized kid, but by the 50's, when I first saw him, had become grossly obese. His name was odd, too...my Mom explained to me that "Pud" was a pet name, short for "Puddin'". At some point they slimmed Pud back down, and apparently made him a Black kid for a while.
ReplyDeleteI am not so sure that Pub was ever an African American kid. Also I am pretty sure when he started out he was a big kid. I will try to dig out some of the 40's comics and post them on my blog.
ReplyDeleteThese Pud comics are actually pretty funny. How come whenever I eat Dubble Bubble, my Pud comics are always not funny?
ReplyDeleteHas the quality just gone done over the years? I can't imagine why they couldn't reuse old jokes (that were funny).
Pud and Bazooka Joe were the bane of my existence as a child. I never ever found them funny. And I found ARCHIE comics funny as a kid! It got to the point where I'd just unwrap my gum and chuck the wrappers - my friends were SHOCKED that I didn't want to read the horrendously bad comics hidden inside!
ReplyDeleteI seem to recall that back in the day there was a comic strip where Pud tried to kill himself. I always found that hilarious, personally.
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