WEBVTT - Part One: The Dennis the Menace Creator was a Shockingly Bad Man 0:00:01.800 --> 0:00:11.440 Also media, Ah, what's raising my children? If you're the 0:00:11.480 --> 0:00:15.200 subject of today's episode, the answer is no one really. 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:18.119 I'm Robert Evans. This is Behind the Bastards, a podcast 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:22.240 about terrible parents. We've just finished our Steve Jobs episodes 0:00:22.239 --> 0:00:25.799 who was a Shitty parent for the history books, And today, folks, 0:00:26.160 --> 0:00:28.600 we have a horrible, horrible man who was also a 0:00:28.600 --> 0:00:32.319 horrible horrible parent for you. That is boy howdy, this 0:00:32.360 --> 0:00:36.000 guy much worse than your guessing he's going to be. 0:00:36.280 --> 0:00:40.360 And before I introduce our subject for this week, this 0:00:40.440 --> 0:00:42.560 is a cartoonist who we're going to be talking about. 0:00:42.600 --> 0:00:45.440 And whenever I bring on a cartoonist, bastard and there 0:00:45.479 --> 0:00:50.159 are many, we have our resident official Behind the Bastards 0:00:50.440 --> 0:00:55.000 podcast cartoonist Randy Millholland Grance. 0:00:55.280 --> 0:00:58.440 Thank you so kindly. That was a lovely intro. I 0:00:58.600 --> 0:01:01.720 really can't wait for this best because you're talking about 0:01:02.040 --> 0:01:04.360 his property is done by the same syndic that I 0:01:04.400 --> 0:01:04.800 work for. 0:01:05.120 --> 0:01:09.240 Good Well, speaking of that, you are the creator of 0:01:09.240 --> 0:01:12.240 the webcomics Something Positive and you are currently pop by 0:01:12.280 --> 0:01:15.080 the sailor Man's uncle. I think is I think so? 0:01:15.120 --> 0:01:16.399 I think I'm his adoptive father. 0:01:16.520 --> 0:01:18.959 Now this pot Yeah, yeah, his adoptive father. You draw 0:01:19.120 --> 0:01:20.600 him to this day, and actually we'll be talking a 0:01:20.640 --> 0:01:23.520 little bit about that, about how comics go on when 0:01:23.480 --> 0:01:26.600 they're original artist no longer one's tour is able to 0:01:26.680 --> 0:01:28.520 draw them and stuff. That's part of the story here. 0:01:28.560 --> 0:01:32.920 But our bastard for this episode is the Dennis the 0:01:32.959 --> 0:01:37.040 Menace guy. And I know what you're saying. People, The 0:01:37.280 --> 0:01:40.800 term history's greatest monster gets thrown around a lot, especially 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:44.839 mostly by me. Yeah, mostly by me, But obviously, who 0:01:44.880 --> 0:01:47.160 could be a better pick for the worst human being 0:01:47.160 --> 0:01:49.640 in history than the guy who draws Dennis the Menace? 0:01:49.760 --> 0:01:50.080 I don't know. 0:01:50.120 --> 0:01:53.480 I'm actually surprised you didn't try to do the Hitler 0:01:53.600 --> 0:01:56.280 of comics because you also throw that alout on. 0:01:56.600 --> 0:01:59.200 I've done a lot of the Hitler of X titles 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:00.880 over the last couple of year, Sophie. I'm not a 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:04.200 very creative man. I know, Randy, What can you tell 0:02:04.240 --> 0:02:07.760 me about the Dennis the Menace creator, Hank Ketch him 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:09.679 not spelled like the guy from Pokemon. 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:13.720 Well, I know that he served in the Navy during 0:02:13.760 --> 0:02:17.920 World War Two. I know the names of a few 0:02:18.000 --> 0:02:20.840 his ghost artists who worked on the comic and the 0:02:20.840 --> 0:02:23.480 comic book. I also know that around the time Dennis 0:02:23.480 --> 0:02:26.640 the Minists launched in America and Britain, a comic also 0:02:26.760 --> 0:02:31.240 named Dennish the Menace, Completely Unrated launched. I know he 0:02:31.400 --> 0:02:34.519 was not rumored to be the nicest dad. 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:37.520 Not that we'll be talking a lot about him as. 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:39.480 A dad, not to his first son anyway, not to 0:02:39.560 --> 0:02:42.680 his first kid. Yeah, ef fact, I would say that 0:02:42.720 --> 0:02:45.720 there's definitely a lot of like sadness involved with children, 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:47.480 because like the TV show, I know there were some 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:49.760 sad things happening to Jane Orth as well. 0:02:50.400 --> 0:02:51.040 I'm nervous. 0:02:51.160 --> 0:02:51.919 I'm not gonna lie. 0:02:52.440 --> 0:02:54.960 This is an interesting story obviously, like we're talking about 0:02:54.960 --> 0:02:57.799 a lower stakes bastard than a lot of our war 0:02:57.880 --> 0:03:00.840 criminals and genocide airs here. But I think it's interesting 0:03:00.880 --> 0:03:04.400 both because Hank's career kind of straddles the birth of 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:07.400 animation as a field, and he has involved in some 0:03:07.480 --> 0:03:11.480 of like the early acts of bastardry within animation as 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:14.639 it relates to like Disney and labor issues. And he's 0:03:14.639 --> 0:03:18.080 also just a fascinating case study of like where's the 0:03:18.160 --> 0:03:22.320 ethical line about creating art that's inspired by your life? Right? 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:24.600 Because most people who do some sort of fictional art, 0:03:24.880 --> 0:03:28.400 especially for like an audience and an ongoing basis. Their 0:03:28.800 --> 0:03:31.800 real life experiences play into that somehow. It's like a 0:03:31.800 --> 0:03:34.920 common joke that like writers and whatnot, you know, takes 0:03:34.920 --> 0:03:37.240 stuff from their lives and put it into their stories. 0:03:37.800 --> 0:03:40.120 And is there actually a moral line? There is there 0:03:40.120 --> 0:03:43.400 a degree to which that's like wrong? Like what is 0:03:43.440 --> 0:03:45.520 the extent to which you should do that when it 0:03:45.520 --> 0:03:47.880 starts to have an effect on the real people that 0:03:47.920 --> 0:03:50.520 you're inspired by. These are actually some kind of tough 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:52.800 questions that I think will be rolling over a little bit. 0:03:52.880 --> 0:03:55.640 But I will tell you Hank does the wrong thing 0:03:55.720 --> 0:04:01.960 in every possible instance. So oh no, yeah, oh god, Yeah. 0:04:02.360 --> 0:04:07.120 So Hank King Ketcham was born on March Fourteen's you 0:04:07.120 --> 0:04:09.920 say king King is his middle name? Yeah, is a 0:04:10.000 --> 0:04:14.160 king of God. And again not like ash Ketchum of 0:04:14.200 --> 0:04:18.640 the Pokemons, that's k e tchu Wim. Hank is k 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:22.400 E tch a m And he was born on March fourteenth, 0:04:22.600 --> 0:04:27.200 nineteen twenty, in the flooded hellscape of Seattle, Washington. His 0:04:27.279 --> 0:04:30.159 father's first name was Weaver, which I don't like. I 0:04:30.160 --> 0:04:31.440 don't think that's a very good name. 0:04:31.839 --> 0:04:32.640 It's a weird one. 0:04:32.800 --> 0:04:34.600 It's a fine last name if you want to get 0:04:34.640 --> 0:04:37.000 shot by the FBI, or at least have several members 0:04:37.040 --> 0:04:38.880 of your family shot by the FBI, but a bad 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:42.760 first name. And his mother's first name was Virginia, which 0:04:42.760 --> 0:04:45.719 I'm neutral on. When he was six years old, he 0:04:45.800 --> 0:04:48.080 met an illustrator who was a friend of the family. 0:04:48.160 --> 0:04:51.000 And this is like his inciting incident as a kid 0:04:51.080 --> 0:04:54.039 who wants to become a cartoonist. And here's how Hank 0:04:54.080 --> 0:04:56.560 describes that moment. A lot of artists I and I 0:04:56.560 --> 0:04:59.440 guess basically everyone who becomes an artist has a moment 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:02.880 like this. Hank describes his in his autobiography, which has 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:07.280 the most insufferable title of a famous cartoonist attabious, imaginable. 0:05:07.279 --> 0:05:09.920 Do you know what this autobiography is named? I am 0:05:10.040 --> 0:05:13.559 dreading this so you know he's the guy who created 0:05:13.560 --> 0:05:16.240 Dennis the Menace, right, not weird that people might want 0:05:16.240 --> 0:05:19.159 an autobiography for that. What do you call that? I'm 0:05:19.160 --> 0:05:21.800 the Dennis the Menace guy, you know, Hank Ketchum a 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:23.400 life in cartoons now. 0:05:23.279 --> 0:05:25.880 Drawing trouble. That that's why I go drawing trouble. 0:05:25.960 --> 0:05:28.280 Sure, all of these are fine titles. He calls it 0:05:28.320 --> 0:05:32.200 the Merchant of Dennis the Menace, Oh, like the Merchant 0:05:32.240 --> 0:05:35.680 of Venice for no reason, because there's no similarity, like 0:05:35.839 --> 0:05:38.720 other than the fact that there's an iss in both that, like, 0:05:38.880 --> 0:05:41.720 there's no through line between the Merchant and Venice and 0:05:41.839 --> 0:05:46.200 drawing Dennis the Menace. I'm so angry about this, and 0:05:46.279 --> 0:05:48.640 I shouldn't be, And like, I don't normally say this, 0:05:48.760 --> 0:05:51.240 but Hank Ketchum should have been murdered by the government. 0:05:52.400 --> 0:05:54.520 What else can you say about that? I'm sorry. 0:05:55.320 --> 0:06:00.200 The next National Cartoon Society meeting after this podcast, my 0:06:00.240 --> 0:06:02.960 next editors meeting, where they're like, hey, heard you were 0:06:02.960 --> 0:06:06.600 on a podcast about talking about property distribute, But. 0:06:06.520 --> 0:06:09.719 Seriously, why would you call it the Merchant of Dennis 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:10.320 the Menace. 0:06:10.720 --> 0:06:14.039 I'm sure you thought it, and I'm sure he had 0:06:14.160 --> 0:06:17.080 no one who was willing to say no. 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:18.240 Yeah. 0:06:18.360 --> 0:06:21.279 I mean it is a little telling because past a 0:06:21.279 --> 0:06:23.760 certain point in his career, this is just a property 0:06:23.800 --> 0:06:26.360 he's marketing, rather than which I mean, I don't actually 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:28.600 hold that against him, right, Like, if you draw a 0:06:28.680 --> 0:06:31.240 doodle of a misbehaving little kid and it makes you 0:06:31.279 --> 0:06:33.880 a very wealthy man, you kind of ride that ship 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:36.080 as long as you can, right, Who wouldn't you know? 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:38.760 It's also really common in comics that a lot of 0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:42.120 times you'll have cartoonists who will get ghost artists and 0:06:42.120 --> 0:06:44.599 ghost writers, and you know, once you get big enough, 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:47.800 you can like Jim Davis hasn't drawn Carfield probably decades. 0:06:47.960 --> 0:06:50.760 God has been, of course not. And we're well on 0:06:50.800 --> 0:06:55.520 the record of saying there's nothing wrong with Jim Davis. 0:06:54.160 --> 0:06:56.680 Really not a lot of my friends. In fact, a 0:06:56.680 --> 0:06:59.159 lot of cartoonists like Jim Davis Scott their start in 0:06:59.279 --> 0:07:02.200 this field. Yeah, being ghost artists, it's a very common. 0:07:02.520 --> 0:07:05.280 Yeah. Yeah. And of all the ways to get that 0:07:05.400 --> 0:07:08.200 kind of money, drawing a little a weird little guy 0:07:08.440 --> 0:07:11.040 is like one of the least problematic ways, right, Like, 0:07:11.520 --> 0:07:15.680 there's not as much exploitation normally with Hank there kind 0:07:15.720 --> 0:07:18.720 of is because his child is like the sacrifice he 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:20.560 makes for his comic to work. But I've gotten ahead 0:07:20.560 --> 0:07:21.000 of myself. 0:07:21.120 --> 0:07:21.640 Oh God. 0:07:21.720 --> 0:07:25.440 Anyway, here's how he describes first getting pilled on the 0:07:25.480 --> 0:07:28.800 wonders of working as a cartoonist. As I watched him 0:07:28.800 --> 0:07:32.320 scribble some quick sketches of Barney Google, Moon Mulleins and 0:07:32.320 --> 0:07:34.760 Andy Gump. I couldn't wait to borrow his magic pencil 0:07:34.800 --> 0:07:37.320 and try my own hand at drawing these comic strip characters. 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:39.480 It looks so easy and such a lot of fun. 0:07:39.520 --> 0:07:41.160 I couldn't have been more than six years old at 0:07:41.200 --> 0:07:43.440 the time. Well, the two men sure came up with 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:44.960 a good way to get rid of me. In a hurry, 0:07:45.000 --> 0:07:47.080 I moved over to the creaky roll top desk, found 0:07:47.080 --> 0:07:49.440 some thin sheets of paper, and remained there until dinner, 0:07:49.680 --> 0:07:53.360 slavishly tracing the visitor's sketches. Quite sure the pencil was magic. 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:58.120 And uh, yeah, I think that that's not an uncommon 0:07:58.200 --> 0:08:00.280 kind of story, right, Yeah. 0:08:00.560 --> 0:08:02.000 I think it's how a lot of us start off. 0:08:02.000 --> 0:08:04.760 Either we see it or we just are lucky enough 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:06.760 to start doodling one day you just can't stop. 0:08:07.080 --> 0:08:09.760 Yeah, yeah, And that's what happens with Hank. He starts doodling. 0:08:09.760 --> 0:08:12.160 When this guy comes over, he sketches his drawings. He 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:14.840 actually has the opposite experience I had his little kid 0:08:14.840 --> 0:08:17.760 where his teacher finds his cartoons and takes them on 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:19.200 in front of the class to be like, look at 0:08:19.200 --> 0:08:21.280 how good Hank is it drawing, And she has him 0:08:21.320 --> 0:08:23.840 like draw for the class to like praise him, not 0:08:23.880 --> 0:08:27.280 as like a to punish him or whatever in. 0:08:27.280 --> 0:08:31.360 This garbage you were doing, piece of shit. I had 0:08:31.400 --> 0:08:32.800 those teachers. I had a lot of those teachers. 0:08:33.040 --> 0:08:35.280 Yeah I got. I got in trouble because my cartoons 0:08:35.280 --> 0:08:38.880 were way too violent and in a post column by 0:08:38.920 --> 0:08:41.520 in America, you didn't want to your teacher to find 0:08:41.520 --> 0:08:43.000 your notebook with those drawings. 0:08:43.080 --> 0:08:45.080 Oh shit. I didn't realize how lucky I was to 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:46.480 graduate in nineteen ninety four. 0:08:46.840 --> 0:08:49.560 Yeah. I would have been in so much trouble for 0:08:49.640 --> 0:08:52.480 so many things. Yeah. I mean it's only gotten worse since, 0:08:52.720 --> 0:08:54.880 like I was not there and nearly as bad as 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:56.760 it would become. But like I did have, I did 0:08:56.840 --> 0:09:00.320 catch some flak for some of my cartoons. So in 0:09:00.360 --> 0:09:03.520 his autobiography, Hank describes himself as lucky. And I find 0:09:03.520 --> 0:09:07.440 this interesting because he's aware that, like other kids spend 0:09:07.520 --> 0:09:09.240 years trying to figure out what they're going to be, 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:12.520 and like often never really do And he knew from 0:09:12.600 --> 0:09:14.760 like is, basically as long as he could remember, he 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:17.400 knew the only thing I want to be is a cartoonist. 0:09:18.040 --> 0:09:20.160 It is interesting he's got that kind of self awareness 0:09:20.200 --> 0:09:22.719 that is a blessing, right knowing that you have this 0:09:22.760 --> 0:09:25.200 one very specific thing, and it's the only thing you'll 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:25.840 ever want to do. 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:30.160 I can relate. Actually, that's something my earliest memory was bluring. 0:09:30.160 --> 0:09:31.920 People can draw for a living, and that's why I 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.800 wanted to do. I God, I hope that is the 0:09:34.800 --> 0:09:36.240 only similarity between us. 0:09:37.000 --> 0:09:39.760 I'm I also hope that's the only similarity between you. 0:09:41.040 --> 0:09:44.400 In his autobiography, he describes himself as like becoming increasingly 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:47.400 obsessed with cartoons as a child. The Wondrous World is 0:09:47.480 --> 0:09:50.680 inhabited by Barney Google, Harold Teene, Mutt and Jeff, the 0:09:50.720 --> 0:09:53.680 Tuonerville Folks, and the Gumps, and like I went through 0:09:53.679 --> 0:09:55.000 those and I was like, I have not heard of 0:09:55.000 --> 0:09:57.800 any of these fucking people. M Jeff A little bit, 0:09:57.880 --> 0:09:58.600 A little bit. 0:09:58.559 --> 0:10:01.720 Yeah, Andy. The Gumps was actually one of the first 0:10:01.760 --> 0:10:06.560 comics to have continuity. It started just before Simple Theater did. 0:10:07.520 --> 0:10:10.280 It was also had like one of the first storylines 0:10:10.280 --> 0:10:13.120 where a character died. It was a national event. 0:10:13.160 --> 0:10:17.600 People freaking wow. Yeah, like America for a while. Oh 0:10:17.920 --> 0:10:19.079 like wow, that dates it. 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:21.920 Yeah, Like it was like I think it was Spanish 0:10:21.960 --> 0:10:24.960 flu or some It was something that a woman got sick, 0:10:24.960 --> 0:10:26.120 and it was a very big deal. 0:10:27.640 --> 0:10:27.679 No. 0:10:27.920 --> 0:10:30.319 Granted today I would probably get fireball and for doing 0:10:30.400 --> 0:10:32.960 the same thing. But at the same time. 0:10:33.000 --> 0:10:34.880 That is I don't know. I don't know if kids 0:10:34.920 --> 0:10:36.880 today are having these experience, but I like one of 0:10:36.920 --> 0:10:38.920 the first things I remember learning about death was from 0:10:38.960 --> 0:10:40.320 a Calvin and Hobbes cartoons. 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:42.520 So oh the bird or the phone? 0:10:42.520 --> 0:10:46.280 No it was it was the raccoon, I think. Sah, yeah, yeah, 0:10:46.320 --> 0:10:49.319 it really was. And one one of the fun things 0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:52.560 about cartoons is that they never die, at least if 0:10:52.559 --> 0:10:54.160 they're successful enough, they never die. 0:10:54.240 --> 0:10:54.400 Right. 0:10:55.000 --> 0:10:56.880 The reason I bring that up is because some of 0:10:56.880 --> 0:10:59.480 these comics I hadn't heard of. I looked up and 0:10:59.520 --> 0:11:02.520 in the case of Bunkie and Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 0:11:02.559 --> 0:11:05.080 which is a cartoon I was not aware of, it 0:11:05.120 --> 0:11:07.760 was created the year before Hank was born, and it 0:11:07.840 --> 0:11:11.559 is still in print today under a new cartoonist. Yeah. 0:11:11.559 --> 0:11:12.000 Oh cool. 0:11:12.080 --> 0:11:16.720 Oh, Rose is a sweetheart. He's a wonderful man. Again. 0:11:16.840 --> 0:11:19.960 It's the King Features And like Bimble Theater, it's a 0:11:19.960 --> 0:11:23.160 comic that started off about one character, Barney Google. Yeah, 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:26.320 eventually they're brought in Snuffy Smith, and Snuffy kind of 0:11:26.360 --> 0:11:28.720 outshine Barney and he just kind of vanished from the comic. 0:11:28.800 --> 0:11:30.920 Yeah, they like killed him or took him away for 0:11:30.920 --> 0:11:32.280 a while, and he came back back. 0:11:32.360 --> 0:11:35.000 Every once in a while the current artist does his 0:11:35.080 --> 0:11:37.120 best to bring him back and actually bring back a 0:11:37.160 --> 0:11:38.720 lot of old characters from the old days. 0:11:38.960 --> 0:11:41.320 And yeah, I had not heard of this comic at all, 0:11:41.440 --> 0:11:43.800 but I you know, when I came upon the name, 0:11:43.840 --> 0:11:45.720 I was immediately like, I wonder if this has anything 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:49.320 to do about like Google, the search engine, and you know, 0:11:49.360 --> 0:11:53.200 the Barney Google comic, I think obviously exists before the 0:11:53.240 --> 0:11:56.480 concept of computers in most people's mind. But the answer 0:11:56.559 --> 0:11:59.880 is probably. As a matter of fact. In the book 0:11:59.880 --> 0:12:03.319 That Hidden History of Coined Words, published by Oxford University Press, 0:12:03.360 --> 0:12:06.960 author Ralph Keyes argues that Barney Google was probably the 0:12:06.960 --> 0:12:10.200 inspiration for the term goggle, which is the term for 0:12:10.240 --> 0:12:12.600 a very large number, which is what inspired the name 0:12:12.640 --> 0:12:16.080 for Google. So you know, what does all this mean? 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:19.000 Should you burn down Google headquarters and draw and quarter 0:12:19.080 --> 0:12:22.440 there's c suite in public as vengeance for Barney Google suffering. 0:12:23.080 --> 0:12:25.560 Maybe I haven't read the comic. I don't know. Pop 0:12:25.600 --> 0:12:26.640 Probably I feel like I. 0:12:26.600 --> 0:12:29.760 Should say at this point no opinion here expressed as 0:12:29.800 --> 0:12:32.760 an opinion of King Features Syndicate or their parent company 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:36.120 hurst uh want to get fired? 0:12:36.480 --> 0:12:39.040 Yeah, none of these are even my opinions usually. So 0:12:40.160 --> 0:12:43.400 the first animated movie that's going to come out that 0:12:43.400 --> 0:12:44.760 that Hank is going to be aware of as a 0:12:44.840 --> 0:12:47.480 kid is the French film Phantasma Gory. 0:12:48.360 --> 0:12:51.400 Oh probably, Yeah, I've heard of that. I haven't seen it. 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:55.280 Seen some ancient stuff, and like we're saying probably because 0:12:55.320 --> 0:12:57.080 like a lot of media from them was lost, so 0:12:57.080 --> 0:12:59.840 you can't ever say, like for certain nobody tried it before. 0:13:00.160 --> 0:13:01.920 But if you look at least from the clips I've 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:03.599 seen and stuff, it actually kind of reminds me a 0:13:03.600 --> 0:13:05.680 little bit of Don Hertzfeldt's work, Like a lot of 0:13:05.679 --> 0:13:09.640 it's like stick figure style animated art. There were also 0:13:09.679 --> 0:13:13.120 some pseudo animated movies that kind of predated Phantasmagori, but 0:13:13.160 --> 0:13:16.000 they were all animated by like putting images on a 0:13:16.080 --> 0:13:18.920 wheel and projecting light through it and like moving the 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:21.640 wheel around to make the images move or some shit, 0:13:21.840 --> 0:13:24.640 which is like it's not considered like it's not animation 0:13:24.720 --> 0:13:27.439 in the same way that like traditional animation is done 0:13:27.559 --> 0:13:30.520 right now, cartoons grew up fast from this point in 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:34.120 nineteen twenty eight, we get Steamboat Willie, a short film 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:37.960 by Walt Disney and UBI Works that is generally considered 0:13:38.000 --> 0:13:41.080 the first Mickey Mouse cartoon recently enter the public domain. 0:13:41.200 --> 0:13:42.640 As I think we're all aware. 0:13:42.920 --> 0:13:45.480 I'm doing a comic based off of it right now too. Yeah, 0:13:45.559 --> 0:13:46.880 I want to see if I get sued. 0:13:48.960 --> 0:13:51.680 Where is that line You're allowed to call him Mickey? 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:51.920 Right? 0:13:52.480 --> 0:13:52.640 Uh? 0:13:52.720 --> 0:13:56.000 Yeah, I'm also a Mickey. He's not allowed to have 0:13:56.080 --> 0:13:57.880 read shorts. He's not allted have gloves. 0:13:59.040 --> 0:14:00.360 I love copyright law. 0:14:01.760 --> 0:14:03.839 It's a little dance we do. And I know there's 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:06.880 there's some poor lawyer in the basement of Disney whose 0:14:07.040 --> 0:14:09.120 job is every day like as he fucked up. 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:11.800 It is fucked up. It is wild, like is like 0:14:11.800 --> 0:14:15.040 a seven or eight year old Hank's watching Steamboat Willie 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:18.200 with no idea that like, in the not too distant future, 0:14:18.280 --> 0:14:20.320 this mouse will be worth more than most of the 0:14:20.440 --> 0:14:25.080 nations on Earth, Like he will absolutely change large aspects 0:14:25.120 --> 0:14:28.520 of how life is lived and creativity functions for a 0:14:28.640 --> 0:14:34.160 huge percentage of the human population. Yep, it's so fucking 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:37.920 crazy where that all goes. But yeah, so he loves 0:14:37.960 --> 0:14:40.800 this as a little kid. He's enthralled by all animation. 0:14:40.960 --> 0:14:44.040 You have to think about animation in the period where 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:46.880 Hank is a kid. It's not like we animation today 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:49.360 is like, yeah, kids like animated movies, right, and so 0:14:49.400 --> 0:14:52.120 do adults. Animated movies are a big deal. Animation is 0:14:52.200 --> 0:14:55.000 kind of like it's close to the Internet than it 0:14:55.080 --> 0:14:59.000 is to like a type of entertainment. Yeah, because the 0:14:59.160 --> 0:15:02.280 idea that you could just like draw pictures and have 0:15:02.400 --> 0:15:04.240 them move and have that on a screen is like 0:15:04.320 --> 0:15:07.960 such a wild like it really has this almost hallucinogenic 0:15:08.000 --> 0:15:10.080 effect on people in the day because it's such a 0:15:10.120 --> 0:15:13.080 new concept. Like you have to imagine going from like 0:15:13.320 --> 0:15:17.920 dying of the Spanish flu to seeing Fantasia is quite 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:20.360 an experience, you know, Oh my. 0:15:20.200 --> 0:15:23.880 God, or seeing the goddamn donkey transformation in Pinocchio. 0:15:24.360 --> 0:15:27.520 Yeah, that shit's intense, you know. And I do think 0:15:27.520 --> 0:15:29.640 that like really or you know, it might be better 0:15:29.680 --> 0:15:31.920 than compared to the Internet, compared to like how YouTube 0:15:32.000 --> 0:15:35.280 videos impacted the development of kids who were born like 0:15:35.480 --> 0:15:39.480 after the two thousands. Right, It's both in some good 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:41.680 ways and some bad ways. It's this thing that just 0:15:41.720 --> 0:15:45.840 like utterly captures a generation. And Hank is right in 0:15:45.880 --> 0:15:49.280 the center of the blast radius. Hank saw cartoons from 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:51.040 a very early age, not just as a method of 0:15:51.040 --> 0:15:53.880 self expression, but as a path to money. His first 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:56.800 job was when he was ten years old. A classmate 0:15:56.840 --> 0:15:58.840 with a rich dad offered to pay him twenty five 0:15:58.920 --> 0:16:01.680 cents cash. He writes it in his book if he 0:16:01.800 --> 0:16:04.720 drew one hundred cartoon heads, and he describes this as 0:16:04.760 --> 0:16:06.880 like a nightmare job. It was like the first time 0:16:06.920 --> 0:16:10.640 he took a horrible gigwork animating piece and was like, Oh, 0:16:10.680 --> 0:16:12.720 this sucks. Why would anyone do this? 0:16:14.680 --> 0:16:17.240 Every cartoonist has that job in their history. I'm glad 0:16:17.240 --> 0:16:18.080 he got out of the system. 0:16:18.120 --> 0:16:21.640 Really back in his day, like that was the equivalent 0:16:21.680 --> 0:16:23.520 of mid journey is find a kid who's good at 0:16:23.560 --> 0:16:27.280 sketching and give him a quarter. His childhood was not 0:16:27.320 --> 0:16:29.440 all cartoons, of course, and they seem to have served 0:16:29.480 --> 0:16:31.800 as at least a partial escape from his world, you know, 0:16:31.840 --> 0:16:33.400 And he grows up in a world you might want 0:16:33.440 --> 0:16:36.240 to escape. He's kind of comes into being right after 0:16:36.320 --> 0:16:39.040 the Spanish Flu and shit calms down, and he grows 0:16:39.120 --> 0:16:41.800 up right in the teeth of the Great Depression, and 0:16:41.840 --> 0:16:46.400 his own description of his father's discipline style sounds unpleasant 0:16:46.440 --> 0:16:49.120 to say the least. Quote. My sister Joan is two 0:16:49.200 --> 0:16:51.160 years younger than I, and we grew up as too normal, 0:16:51.200 --> 0:16:54.920 well behaved, insecure, terrified kids. Dad served in the Navy 0:16:54.960 --> 0:16:56.760 during the First World War and was by nature a 0:16:56.760 --> 0:16:59.480 stern disciplinarian. I don't know what prompted it, but one 0:16:59.520 --> 0:17:02.360 evening he brought home a horsewhip, a stiff, tapered thing 0:17:02.360 --> 0:17:04.560 about three feet long that he solemnly placed in the 0:17:04.600 --> 0:17:07.560 corner near the front door. My first thought was, oh boy, 0:17:07.720 --> 0:17:10.000 when is he goin to bring the horse? The rules 0:17:10.000 --> 0:17:12.520 were quite simple, no whipping above the knees. Now, maybe 0:17:12.520 --> 0:17:14.560 this is as it should be on horses, but on skinny, 0:17:14.560 --> 0:17:17.800 little underfed kids, it's murder. However, it did stimulate the 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:20.840 circulation on cold afternoons, and I developed various techniques of 0:17:20.880 --> 0:17:23.199 fancy footwork that to this day have given me the 0:17:23.240 --> 0:17:26.560 reputation of being an agile dancer, which is like a 0:17:26.680 --> 0:17:28.920 very funny and lighthearted way of saying, yeah, like, my 0:17:29.000 --> 0:17:30.520 dad beat the hell out of us when we were 0:17:30.520 --> 0:17:34.719 bat Oh my god, love the old times. 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:36.800 I'm sure that's not gonna come back later in any way, 0:17:36.920 --> 0:17:38.879 that's not the effect anything in the future, is it. 0:17:39.600 --> 0:17:41.680 I mean, you know, his kid might have done better 0:17:41.760 --> 0:17:44.960 if he'd been like there and just smacking him sometimes 0:17:45.000 --> 0:17:47.080 as opposed to like this is a weird case of 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:49.800 like honestly, if he'd just been there at all, it 0:17:49.880 --> 0:17:52.359 might have been better. Fuck, I don't know. I can't 0:17:52.359 --> 0:17:53.880 make a conclusive stance. 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:57.399 There still like what a what a fuck of a thing? Like, yeah, 0:17:57.560 --> 0:18:01.360 we grew up as normal terrified children. That's not fucking normal. 0:18:01.760 --> 0:18:03.840 Dad brought a whip and just laid it in the room, 0:18:03.960 --> 0:18:05.879 so we had to think about it for a while. 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:08.280 Oh my Jesus Christ. 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:10.480 I mean I had I had the healthy version of 0:18:10.480 --> 0:18:12.840 that as a kid, which was my dungeon Master bought 0:18:12.840 --> 0:18:14.760 a copy of The Book of Vile Darkness and just 0:18:14.760 --> 0:18:16.800 like set it out on the table for like five 0:18:16.880 --> 0:18:19.399 sessions before he ever used anything from it. And the 0:18:19.520 --> 0:18:21.560 instant we're in a fight and he like grabs it 0:18:21.560 --> 0:18:23.480 from the middle of the table and opens it up. 0:18:23.640 --> 0:18:28.320 We're all like, oh fuck, that was my having a switch. 0:18:28.040 --> 0:18:30.040 That book, wasn't it. 0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:30.640 Yeah? 0:18:30.720 --> 0:18:33.560 Yeah, yeah, I had a book that was awful, great, 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:36.440 great source book. I never used him a player once, 0:18:36.520 --> 0:18:38.040 couldn't so. 0:18:38.440 --> 0:18:41.000 Hank doesn't claim to we have had a bad relationship 0:18:41.000 --> 0:18:43.920 with his father, who actually supported his ambitions to be 0:18:43.960 --> 0:18:46.840 an animator. I do think that description of himself as 0:18:46.880 --> 0:18:50.240 his and his sister as insecure and terrified shouldn't just 0:18:50.320 --> 0:18:52.760 be read as a joke. We should maybe use that 0:18:52.800 --> 0:18:55.200 as a little bit of like a oh, yeah, the 0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:58.480