Comics will salute essential workers by hiding symbols in their Sunday strips.
The idea began with “Baby Blues” co-creator Rick Kirkman, who contacted some of his fellow cartoonists about coordinating a campaign while sheltering in place. Kirkman’s syndicate, King Features, and the National Cartoonists Society helped boost the initiative, as did Andrews McMeel Syndication.
On Sunday, June 7, 2020 a number of comic strip and panel cartoonists will join forces to…
pay visual tribute to first responders and other essential workers in their print and online color art on Sunday. The coordinated “cartoon gratitude” campaign will feature a handful of icons embedded into the strips, to thank everyone from medical personnel (symbolized with a cartoon mask) to scientists (a microscope symbol) to teachers (an apple) to food workers (a fork).
Below is a sample of what is coming.
(Dan Collins jumped the gun a bit but will have another one ready for June 7.)
June 2 update:
The Associated Press also carries the story:
The funny papers this Sunday will have more than laughs.
More than 70 comic strips and panels — ranging from Garry Trudeau’s “Doonesbury” to Jim Toomey’s “Sherman’s Lagoon” and Jeff Keane’s “Family Circus” — will each have six symbols hidden in the artwork to honor workers on the frontlines of the coronavirus pandemic.
Look closely and you’ll find a mask for medical workers and caregivers, a steering wheel for delivery workers, a shopping cart for grocery workers, an apple for teachers, a fork for food service workers and a microscope for medical researchers.
AP, courtesy King Features, carries a Hilary Price Rhymes With Orange sneak peek.
For some strips, the task was pretty easy. For others, it required a bit more work. How exactly was “Prince Valiant” — set in the fifth century — supposed to add a microscope, which wasn’t invented until the late 16th century?
One cartoonist, Wiley Miller, had to really scramble since his “Non Sequitur” panel set for Sunday takes place in the Pleistocene era. “I told him, ‘Well, you know, you just hide stuff in there,’” Kirkman said. “And the next day he came back and he said, ‘I did it!’”