Sunday Comics

Well I hope I started your Saturday remembering those morning cartoons. My niece commented, a simpler time, and it was. But some things never change. When we saw the commercials we wanted everything. All the sugary cereals, pop tarts, fake hot chocolate, even the individually wrapped cheese slices, rather than the fresh cheese my mom bought fresh from the deli, sliced so thin. At least our parents just had to go through that on Saturday mornings for the most part, now it's all day, seven days a week! My niece asks for everything. Every commercial that comes on she wants it. I've learned from her parents to just say yes, and she'll forget about it, and it works! No fights, no tears!

Sunday mornings were the comics and for me, the big movie section too. That was second to the comics for a while and then became the first part of the paper I went for.

When I was young, even on weekdays and Saturdays, the New York Daily News listed all the plays that were on Broadway. I loved just looking at that section, seeing what movie stars were here in the same city as me. What plays were in town, the reviews. Didn't matter that I wasn't going, they were here, movies stars!

And I wasn't exactly first in line to get the comics growing up, there were always a few of us fighting over it. And nobody wanted the theatre and movie section.

As I got older I can also remember my father screaming at me to read the rest of the newspaper. If any of us asked a question about something that was going in the news, and should have read about it, he flipped out (his bark worse than his bite!). He read every newspaper he could get his hands on, watched the news whenever it came on, morning, noon and night and even listened to it on the radio (as well as sports). He would be in his glory if he were alive today, having all those news channels to choose from anytime he wanted.

But we did read those comics, as I said in yesterday's post, it was another highlight of our weekends, Saturday morning cartoons, and Sunday COLOR comic section! During the week they were in black and white and I can't remember the Sunday comics first being in black and white when I was really young, and then being in color, but maybe they were.

We were still reading and I think that's important. I also loved comic books, would read everyone I could get my hands on and I remember lots of kids having that big box filled with them. Maybe they had one I hadn't read! There was even a little store not too far from where we lived and they bought and sold used comic books, I was in that store constantly, selling my comics and then buying used ones.

I was reading books during those days, but mostly books assigned from school and to be honest, it was very rare that the books chosen for us to read were ones I enjoyed. I guess to expose us to something different. But I think the Sunday comics and comic books were a big start of my reading. Eventually they weren't enough! I needed something more, something that would last longer, quench that thirst. I spent hours in the library. I would choose my books just by looking at the covers. If that looked interesting, I would pick the book and so many many times I was right. My comic book brain!? Then getting recommendations from friends and family. Comics were a good start for me.

I think I said it before, and I will say it again, kudos to JK Rowling, she opened the door for so many kids to read. I hope the movies don't ruin that for the next generation. I hope they are like me and never see the movie first, always the book, let the author lead you somewhere and use your imagination, live inside a book.

And back to those wonderful Sunday morning comics, here are a few of my favorites that I could remember.

Dondi, Brenda Starr, Dennis the Menace, Family Circle, Sad Sack, Beetle Bailey, Lit'l Lotta, Cathy, Annie, Dick Tracy, Hagar the Horrible, B.C., Doonesbury, Spiderman, Calvin and Hobbs.

Here's a short video showing some of the comics I loved!