The Adventures of Smilin' Jack

"Smilin' Jack" was an aviation comic strip that first appeared October 1, 1933 in the "Chicago Tribune" and ended April 1, 1973. After a run of 40 years, it was the longest running aviation comic strip. The strip was created by 27-year-old cartoonist and aviation enthusiast Zack Mosley, who had previously worked on the "Buck Rogers" and "Skyroads" strips.

Smilin' Jack was originally Mack Martin, in "On the Wing", but "Chicago Tribune" editor Joseph Medill Patterson did not like the original title, so on December 31, 1933, the name was changed to Jack Martin, and the strip was retitled "The Adventures of Smilin' Jack" after its creator, who had been nicknamed "Smilin' Zack" by his colleagues.

Characters

"Smilin' Jack" developed an extremely colorful and imaginative band of supporting characters through its lengthy run, including Downwind Jaxon; Fatstuff, a humorous Hawaiian character; and eventually Jack Jr., plus various romantic interests, referred to by Mosley as "de-icers." Villains included The Claw, Toemain the Terrible, The Head and his sister, The Mongoose.

Many of the supporting characters in this strip were drawn with distinctive visual devices. The corpulent Fatstuff was always drawn with buttons popping off his tight-fitting shirt, never explaining how the buttons magically regenerated from one panel to the next. (Mosley would sometimes draw a chicken in one corner of the panel, eating one of the buttons as they flew off.) Even more distinctive was Smilin' Jack's handsome sidekick and occasional co-pilot Downwind, whose face drove women wild with passion. Downwind's features remain a mystery; he was invariably drawn with his head in three-quarters rear view so that his face was averted from the reader. Occasionally this visual device became somewhat contrived, such as whenever some villain stood in front of Downwind aiming a weapon at him: the co-pilot would still be looking back over his shoulder, as if something more interesting was happening behind him.

Zack Mosley's assistant for some years was Boody Rogers.

Parody

"Smilin' Jack" was parodied by Harvey Kurtzman and Wally Wood in an early issue of "Mad" as "Smilin' Melvin!", with Fatstuff renamed Thatstuff and Downwind altered to Tailwind. The parody explained why the co-pilot's unseen face drives women wild with passion: although he looks quite ugly, he has a $100 bill between his teeth.

"Smilin' Jack" was influential in the expansion of NASCAR racing. NASCAR founder Bill France, Sr. was Mosley's friend, so information about NASCAR's first "Strictly Stock" (now Sprint Cup) race was written into the strip. After drivers throughout the United States, including race winner Jim Roper, read the strip, they drove across the country to race. [cite news |title=50 Years of Speed |publisher=American Media Operations |page=10 |date=1997 |accessdate=2007-11-06 ]

Radio

The "Smilin' Jack" radio series was broadcast on the Mutual Broadcasting System from February 13 to May 19, 1939 with aviator Smilin' Jack Martin (Frank Readick) fighting such international criminals as the Mad Dog in Arabia. The 15-minute series, airing three times a week at 5:30pm ET, was sponsored by Tootsie Rolls which offered a premium for ten candy wrappers--a flying chart "just like the one Jack uses." The program opened each episode with announcer Tom Shirley demanding, "Clear the runway for Smilin' Jack!", over the road of an airplane.

Movie serial

In 1943 Universal Studios produced a serial, "The Adventures of Smilin' Jack ", in which Smilin' Jack Martin (Tom Brown) works with the Chinese government to stop the Black Samurai, a Japanese covert spy ring led by the German operative Fraulein von Teufel.

Other

"Smilin' Jack" was also a Dell comic book.

See also

*List of film serials

References

External links

* [http://www.smilinjackart.com/ Jill Mosley's official site]
* [http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=Adventures%20of%20Smilin%27%20Jack%20AND%20mediatype%3Amovies%20AND%20collection%3Afeature_films Complete public domain serial in various formats]
* [http://www.toonopedia.com/smilin_j.htm Toonopedia: Smilin' Jack]
* [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035611/ "The Adventures of Smilin' Jack" IMDB]
* [http://www.comics.org/series.lasso?SeriesID=18461 Cover gallery of "Smilin' Jack" Dell comics]