Something about Eugene

I mentioned yesterday that CulturePulp was special to me, and this goes back to my love of comic strips.

Yes, even as a poor college student I maintained my subscription to the Oregonian (not only for the comics, but still), but I was also an avid reader of the Oregon Daily Emerald, and that included its comics. In my first year that involved Hudson Van Curren by M.E. Russell. I missed fall term so I came in a little late, but he later released a book with all of the strips, which I still have.

In the next year Hudson had moved to the Oregon Commentator, and changed its format from a strip to a page. This made sense as the Commentator was not a daily paper. Honestly, I did not care for any of the other papers. The Emerald was the official student paper, and I think journalism students got credit for working at it, but there was a bit more of a sense of professionalism and objectivity.

There were several other, smaller papers, and I don’t remember any of them not being annoying, especially the Commie-hater, as it was frequently called. (It was right-leaning, and the school was more left-leaning, which may have made the staff feel a little more aggrieved and besieged beyond the normal young Republican attitude.)

However, many of these smaller papers did have pretty good comics, so I did at least have to look through them for that. In addition, the Emerald had gotten a new regular strip, Oscar the Freshman, by Neal Skorpen. Neal, although not a Resident Assistant, was good friends with one, as was I, though not the same RA, so running with that crowd I did know who he was, and also he planned some amazing interactive mystery nights. I want to say murder mystery, but with the one I did, Red Riding Hood was not dead, just missing. Snow White was dead before the end of the evening though.

(I never met M.E. Russell, though another friend that I met through Sid had apparently attended a party thrown in honor of Liberace’s birthday that he organized.)

The Emerald also added Weasel’s World, by Kraig Norris, which I enjoyed a lot, and though I don’t remember exactly when they ran Flaxen, by A C Smid, and I think I actually first saw Hairlis Kat (Vernon C. Wallingford III) in a guest appearance in someone else’s strip, but this is going back twenty years. Anyway, there was cool stuff going on, and another book came out, which I have right in front of me or I would never be getting these spellings right. That was “Panels: UO Cartooning 1991-92. Russell was listed as the editor, but Skorpen, Norris, and Adrian Wallace also assisted with production.

Time goes on, and college is far behind, and I still read the Oregonian. Some time ago they add CulturePulp, and there was something familiar about the drawings (especially something about the legs and feet), and it was Mike Russell, whose middle initial is in fact E, and although he does not only draw but also reviews movies and things, he is in fact still drawing and making a living at it.

Go on a few years later, and this thing called Facebook is developed, which I join in October of 2008, and slowly start reconnecting with people. It is mainly people from high school, church, and work, because in college I almost never knew anyone’s last name, but I was able to locate a few, and one of them is Neal.

Not only is Neal a graphic novel instructor at PNCA, but he still organizes things like 24-hour cartoon projects and things like that. So I did some more searching, and a lot of the featured cartoonists are still drawing. Some of them still seem to be in touch with each other.

I don’t know that it makes sense how happy this makes me. I guess it is a lot like the musicians I know who are still always in some kind of a band (even though they have day jobs) and get paying gigs. There is that creative need to fulfill, and I relate to that, but also it is great that they get some recognition for it. They find an audience. Well, maybe I’m not too hard to please, but I like it.

For the record, my own contributions to the Emerald included two cartoon submissions (only the political one was selected), an article on recycling that may not have been printed, several letters to the editor, and one picture that gave some incorrect impressions. Pretty typical, I would say.