Pogo No. 13, 1953

One of cartoonist Walt Kelly's favorite gambits was to show the ineptitude of officialdom and authority figures. In this cover from July-Sept of 1953, the fire department appears to be bringing a fire to wherever they are headed. Albert blithely cooks himself a hot dog on the way to the inferno; Churchy La Femme has thoughtfully brought along a bag of Star Brand marshmallows.

Inside, there's lots of amusing word play (see "The Fiasco Kid Writhes Again," and the word "trigonometry" is spelled, variously, as "triggernominy" and "triggerbonicky"). But the back cover is my favorite, as Pogo and Albert hustle subscriptions for Dell Comics. Their pitch is to get readers to pay $1.20 for a two-year subscription, eight issues in all, but this was issue No. 13, and since the series only ran until issue No. 16, well, uh, er....