Adventures in Dreamland

America's press lords, like their millions of readers, spend more time over their comic strips than over their editorial pages. The late Captain Joseph M. Patterson guided his comics (Orphan Annie, Dick Tracy, Terry, etc.) as cunningly as his anti-Roosevelt campaigns, built a monster circulation (now 2,400.000) for his New York Daily News. William Randolph Hearst was one of the daddies of comics (his early Yellow Kid strip led to the phrase "yellow journalism"). Last week the trade paper Editor & Publisher, reporting the launching of Hearst's newest strip, Dick's Adventures in Dreamland, dipped into the year-long correspondence over it that passed between The Chief and his men, let the trade look over the shoulder of an 83-year-old journalistic genius at work. Excerpts:

Hearst to King Features' Syndicate President J. D. Gortatowsky, Dec. 28, 1945: "I have had numerous suggestions for incorporating some American history of a vivid kind in the adventure strips of the comic section. The difficulty is to find something that will sufficiently interest the kids. . . . Perhaps a title, Trained by Fate, would be general enough. Take Paul Revere and show him as a boy making as much of his boyhood life as possible, and culminate, of course, with his ride.

"Take Betsy Ross for a heroine, or Barbara Frietchie ... for the girls.. . ."

King Features' Editor Ward Greene to Hearst: "There is another way to do it, which is somewhat fantastic, but which I submit for your consideration. That is to devise a new comic ... a 'dream' idea revolving around a boy we might call Dick.

"Dick, or his equivalent, would go in his dream with Mad Anthony Wayne at the storming of Stony Point or with Decatur at Tripoli. . . . [This would] provide a constant character . . . who would become known to the kids. . . ."

Hearst to Greene: "The dream idea for the American history series is splendid. It gives continuity and personal interest and you can make more than one page of each series. . . . You are right about the importance of the artist. . . ."

Greene to Hearst, enclosing samples: "We employed the dream device, building the comic around a small boy. ..."

Hearst to Greene: "I think the drawing of Dick and His Dad is amazingly good. It is perfectly splendid. I am afraid, however, that similar beginning and conclusion of each page might give a deadly sameness to the series. . . . Perhaps we could get the dream idea over by having only the conclusion on each page. I mean, do not show the boy going to sleep every time and then show him waking up, but let the waking up come as a termination to each page. . . . Can you develop anything out of the idea of having Dick the son of the keeper of the Liberty Statue in New York Harbor? I do not suggest this, as it would probably add further complications, but it might give a spiritual tie to all the dreams. The main thing, however, is to get more realism. . . ."

Greene to Hearst: "We do not have to show the dream at the beginning and end of every page. ... If we simply call the comic something like Dreamer Dick, we would have more freedom. . . . Some device other than the dream might be used. . . . A simple method would be to have him curl up with a history book. . . ." Hearst to Greene: "If we find [the first series] is not a success, of course we can brief it, but if it is a success it should be a long series."

Greene to Hearst: "I am sending you two sample pages of Dick's Adventures in Dreamland which start a series about Christopher Columbus. . . ."

Hearst to Greene: "In January, I am told, we are going to 16 pages regularly on Puck, the Comic Weekly. That would be a good time to introduce the Columbus series, don't you think so?"

Greene thought so.

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