QUESTION: What happened to Leroy and Loretta in the Sunday comics? They were my favorites and I miss them. Thank you.
A reader of The Longview News-Journal ask whatever happened to The Lockhorns
and the answer is that when the panel left King Features the panel left The News-Journal (LNJ):
ANSWER: We received several inquiries about their absence. I love The Lockhorns, too, and I’m sorry they’re gone.
Andrew Gould, a senior vice president for M. Roberts media, explained that our company purchases our cartoons from King Features.
King Features stopped carrying that comic at the end of the year. The Lockhorns are now distributed by Andrews McNeel (sic) Syndication.
Except…
The daily LNJ carries (or carried as of last month) Andrews McMeel (AMS) comics as well as King Features comics and even a couple Creators comics. And while I couldn’t dig up an LJN Sunday comics section its sister M. Roberts Media paper The Victoria Advocate has a Sunday section with an AMS comic strip front and center.
Their answer shows they know where The Lockhorns went and they have (had?) a relationship with that company. So unless the paper switched to strictly King Features material at the beginning of the year …
This article clearly shows that comic preferences are far from universal. At 56 years of age, “The Lockhorns” are less than a decade away from retirement age. I found the disfunctional marital relationship funny back when I was in college, but I cannot imagine missing the strip at all now. I can only hope that it does not become a syndicated zombie when the current authors retire.