American newspaper comic strip, created by
Milton Caniff in 1943. There's quite a bit of
history leading up to the first appearance of this strip, so let's take a trip down
Memory Lane...
First, you've got Milt Caniff, who was a major
patriot and a big
booster of the
military but, because of a
childhood illness that weakened his
lungs, he wasn't allowed to
enlist during
World War II. Wanting to
contribute to the
war effort, he came up with the idea of donating a weekly version of "
Terry and the Pirates," his astoundingly
popular comic strip, to military newspapers.
Military officials loved the idea, but legally, the military and camp papers weren't allowed to accept material from
civilians. So a new
syndicate, the
Camp Newspaper Service, was established specifically to accept
material from civilians. Caniff began sending the new
weekly strips of "Terry and the Pirates" to the military papers in October of 1942, and the series was met with
enthusiasm from the boys over there. Terry himself didn't appear in the strip -- the
star was
Burma, a
gorgeous,
sly blonde. Gee, a comic strip about a gorgeous, sly blonde earning a bunch of loyal fans among lonely
soldiers fighting far from home -- who'da thunk it?
But only three months after the strip started, the
Chicago Tribune Syndicate got some
complaints from its paying members and ordered Caniff to quit the military-only strip, which he did in January of 1943. Soon, however, syndicate chief
Joseph M. Patterson heard about the situation when he started getting tons of
protesting calls and letters from the editors of the small camp newspapers. Patterson, who'd fought in
World War I, called Caniff in and told him he could start the strip up again, though he asked him to change the
name of the strip and to get rid of Burma.
When the strip reappeared later that month, it was called "
Male Call" and starred a
gorgeous, but more
innocent brunette named
Miss Lace, who called everyone she met "
General." The first edition of the new strip started with the soldiers mourning the sudden
departure back to the states of Burma, though she was never mentioned by name. Lace quickly made her appearance, telling the soldiers that Burma was an old friend and had asked her to come visiting. The only other
recurring character was a minor player called
PFC J. Snafroid McGoolty.
Lace's
adventures covered all aspects of military life, and they tended to be a bit
risqué -- again, being written for a bunch of lonely,
horny soldiers, who saw that coming? The strip got a few
complaints from
uptight prudes, but the complaints were far drowned out by the overwhelmingly
positive response from everyone else.
"Male Call" may have been the most syndicated comic strip in
history -- it appeared in about 3,000 camp newspapers. And Lace may have been the first comic strip character to appear on
television; in July of 1945, Caniff was interviewed on
WNBT in
New York City. Appearing with him was Miss Lace herself, in the guise of model
Dorothy Partington.
"Male Call" made its last appearance on March 3, 1946.
Research from http://www.toonopedia.com/malecall.htm