15 Year Old Baldo is 25

Comments ⁷

1. Solomon J. Behala

   The first Baldo is mis-dated in the caption

   1. D. D. Degg  (admin)

      Corrected, thanks.

2. Eric

   Dr. Elba Garcia is lying or is too young to remember GORDO by Gus Arriola, which is one of the greatest comic strips in history.

   1. D. D. Degg  (admin)

      Confirmed bachelor Gordo was not “center[ed] around a Latino family.” And Mexico-based Gordo contained no conflict between a homeland (Mexico) born older generation and a US born younger one and so no culture clash, or as Garcia put it there was no “experience of living between two cultures and languages.”

      Their commonality is that both strips feature Mexican characters. Would you say that Brumsic Brandon Jr.’s Luther and Percy Crosby’s Skippy were the same because they both starred city kids?

      1. Eric

         Gordo was indeed a bachelor, but he had a family, like his sister and his nephew Pepito, so yeah, it was about a Latino family, although from a different perspective.

         Their commonality is that both strips feature Mexican characters and were told from a Mexican/Latino point of view.

         Would I say that Brumsic Brandon Jr.’s Luther and Percy Crosby’s Skippy were the same because they both starred city kids?

         No, but I wouldn’t say that LUTHER was the first strip about a Black kid either. WEE PALS by Morrie Turner was (In the mainstream press, “Black” newspapers had comics in them for decades—but they don’t count for our purposes).

         Both BALDO and GORDO were about the Hispanic experience and syndicated in English-speaking North America, and I was talking about who was first, not who was better than who.

      2. D. D. Degg  (admin)

         So your response is to completely ignore what Dr. Garcia is quoted as saying?

         Gordo has never been described a being centered around a Latino family until your attempt to do so now. The Lone Ranger had a nephew so it was centered around a Western family?

         I never said Gordo was without family, only that family was not the focus. Apparently Dick Tracy and Sam & Silo are of a kind as both star law enforcement characters.

3. Eric

   What he said was: “Baldo was the first syndicated comic strip to center around a Latino family,…” It wasn’t. Also, did I say it was a BAD strip? Did I say it didn’t deserve to celebrate being around for a quarter century?

   No, I just said that it wasn’t the first Hispanic-themed English comic strip in the US. And it’s NOT. Nor is it pioneering. Long may it run. That’s all.

   Dick Tracy and Sam & Silo? If you’re going to make a crack like that, do Beetle Bailey and Steve Canyon, more people would get it.

   IT’s a pity that there isn’t more discussion here about Hispanic/Latin American comics. I’m a huge fan of Malfalda. Also, MAD magazine had Sergio Aargonas and Antonio Prohias back in the day. Geniuses both.