Eighty years ago Murat B. (Chic) Young had the idea for a comic strip. He took a gorgeous flapper and introduces her to a young bachelor son of a very rich industrial tycoon. Have his parents disapprove and see what happens.  A cartoon star is born called Blondie.

When Blondie and Dagwood finally got married in February 17 of 1933, one of the fictional female guests made a venomous prediction during the wedding: The couple would never be happy. She was wrong. In this September 8, Blondie and Dagwood celebrate its 80- year- old- marriage-- as comic strip characters, of course.

Blondie is one of the most popular comic strips around the globe. It is published in more than 1800 newspapers in the world and is rigorously read for more than 150 million people in 47 countries in 35 languages. Blondie, additionally, was featured in 28 films (1938-1950) starring Penny Singleton as Blondie Bumstead and ArthurLake as Dagwood Dag Bumstead.

September 8 1930 was the first time Blondie was featured in the newspapers. In this very first comic feature we are able to see a young Dagwood, wearing a black suit and a formal tie (not the classic bow-tie we are accustomed to see him wear) who introduced Blondie to his grumpy old tycoon father. He revealed to his father his engagement with the vivacious and spectacular blond, with a very unusual self confidence. The girl immediately asked to Dagwood’s father, between hugs and giggles, if she can call him pop. During the first three years of this comic strip, all of its faithful readers had fun of the daily adventures of this lovely couple fighting constantly to get Dagwood’s aristocratic family approval for getting married.   Dagwood’s rich relatives hesitated to invite a woman with no money and apparently no future among the American aristocratic elite.

Love finally triumphs against tide and wind and Dagwood Bumstead gets married with Blondie Boopadoop. Dagwood’s father disinherited him and he has to get an office job (what he does in the office was never made clear) and they move into small house in the suburbs (where they got the money was never mentioned). Blondie gave up flapping to become America’s favorite wife, mother and homemaker of the years of economic depression.

The supporting cast members are equally charming: Dithers, the tyrant- good-hearted-boss and his bitterly charming wife Cora; Herb and Tootsie Woodley, the next-door neighbors and Dagwood and Blondie’s best friends; Mr. Beasely, the postman and Dagwood’s victim who clashes with him every morning to catch his bus; Elmo, the pestering little boy who seems ruling Bumstead’s residence; the short order cook who never allows substitutions in the menu and the door-to door salesman who always interrupts when Dagwood is taking a nap or when he is having one of his nice, hot and relaxing baths.

Certainly, here we have the rest of the Bumstead family: Alexander, who looks a lot like Dagwood, Cookie, their daughter, Daisy the dog and all her female quintuplets, but Elmer, the lone and charming male cub.

When Chic Young passed away in 1973, his son Dean and his colleague Jim Raymond---brother of Alex Raymond, creator of Flash Gordon and Jungle Jim--- decided to maintain the tradition of inventing new and fresh adventures for the Bumstead family. Since Raymond’s death in 1981, Dean Young collaborated with different artists to continue the development of this comic strip: Mike Gersher, Stan Drake, Denis Lebrun and currently John Marshall with his assistant Frank Cummings.

According to Dean Young, his collaboration with Blondie started as children by submitting gags to his father Chic. Dean was an immediate success: My father said “not to bad” as he crumpled up and threw into the wastebasket the very first idea I ever submitted to him.

Dagwood Bumstead and family, including Daisy and the pups, live in the suburbs of Joplin, Missouri, according to the 1946 Joplin Globe, citing Chic Young.

Happy anniversary Blondie and Dagwood!

The material for this article was based on Blondie Good as Gold, courtesy of King Features Syndicate 1980 and Swann Gallery exhibition Blondie Gets Married, featured by the Library of Congress in 2000.

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