Letters
"I Go Pogo" receives quite a few emails. Some are quite
interesting. Here are some of the best...
August 2004
Dear,
dear, wonderful Ms. Beaver:
I bet
this is the first fan letter from Colina, Chile. Your Pogo website is the
most wonderful, most joyous thing I have seen on the internet in the last 10
years. Have recommended it to my children in the US Keep up the good work.
Benito Vilα
August 2004
Dear Miz Beaver,
I
have been a Pogo fan since early childhood, when my father would read aloud
to the family of a Subday night from his collection of Pogo books. We didnt
get the political references, but the slapstick had us laughing till we
cried. My fathers favorite swearword was, Rowrbazzle! During his final
illness I painted him a pillow with two Albert pictures (he was Albert to
me). The good mood side was Albert blithely leaping unbeknownst to him
into the hole someone had dug for the National Arbor Day tree, and the bad
mood side was a picture of Albert stomping up and down. I believe the
picture I used was captioned Foobazz!, but I used Rowrbazzle instead.
After his death, I was allowed to be the keeper of the collection, so I have
a number of loved-to-death Pogo books, one LP, and a pillow.
This
evening Pogo somehow came up in a dinner conversation startig at the
Okeefenokee Swamp, and I appointed myself to look on the internet....and
here you were! Everyone who has praised your site now has me to join them,
and Im nowheere near finished yet.
But
seeing the strip w/ your name on the boat reminded me nostalgically of the
Pogo-boat my Daddy built for my sister and me when we were about 11 and 12.
We painted it green but put no names on it. We floated it in the Calf
Pasture River in Virginia, and spent hours paddling around , always with our
lunch to hand.
I Go
Pogo, especially this year..........and thank you for a beautiful experience
here!
Chris
Ertell
August 2004
Dear Miz Beaver:
I have just recently and with pure delight discovered
your website! Thank you so much for putting it up!
As a child my dad used to read to me from the pogo
strips in the paper-then back in the late50s to 60s. By the mid-60s in the
4th, 5th and 6th grades, I started clipping
the Pogo strips from the paper and glueing them into loose leaf notebooks at
first merely enjoying the elaborate artwork and zany characters in that
beloved swamp. However with each year older that I became, I came to
appreciate more and more the wit and humor of Walts denizens as they
skewered one public buffoon after another! Lord what a treasure the world
lost in Walts passing! What fun he and his menagerie could have had with
subsequent public figures that the years have foisted on the unsuspecting
world. And what a treasure I lost when as all Army families do, we made one
last move to Texas where I discovered my loose leaf clipping collections
never made the trip somehow.
Anyhow, thanks again! And I do hope all is well with
you since I noticed the last letters to you website seem to go only through
December 2002 I believe.
Now I am goning to relish checking out your tribute
to Pogo and Walt in much further detail!
Best wishes!
Laird Ferguson
Georgetown, Texas
December 2002
Dear Miz Beaver:
I was afraid I was getting old. I know more people
who've gone on than are still here. We (the missus and me) were given this
old, outdated three-year old computer. Heck! I got it beat more'n 20 times
over and I still get around.
Somebody said they have a new type party line, just like the one Aunt Ezzie
listened to, but you have to have a computer to get on.
Dang! Hope a nice lady like yourself never runs into
some of what I saw. I thought somebody might have done a scholarly review
of Pogo, and looked for pogo comic strip. Pogo and comic are jes fine, but
the other, oh, my.
All the way through graduate school, I relied on Pogo for in depth
philosophy. Getting a degree in chemistry doesn't leave much time for
leisure, not when you work 30 hours a week for the privilege.
At 50, I changed courses and went back to school. My last career was as a
children's therapist. There's a high burnout rate, and I had to put it aside
after a few years. I still work with children, teaching Sunday school and
volunteer tutoring. I think is a shame that Pogo and the gang can't be
around. They still need Walt.
I suppose its ludicrous for a new grandpa (I'd E-mail
you a picture, but you might forget to return it) to get all bubbly over an
old comic strip. But its like going back to the old home place, sitting out
on the front porch and visiting. Its my youth and fond remembrances of the
love and laughter of those I shared it with.
Thank you so very much for this gift.
Harry
December 2002
Dear Miz Beaver,
I just discovered your web site and am
delighted? Pogo was an important part of my education and personality
formation. To this day, I still moan ooog! when Im in pain or despair.
The wonderful parodies of the McCarthy era helped legitimize my own early
political views. My sister and I have a ritual where we call each other and
together sing the birthday song (Once you were two dear birthday friend,
in spite of purple weather
). Thirty years ago I welcomed the participants
at a large conference (at Notre Dame where I taught) on warfare by citing
the Weve met the enemy and he is us line. It went over big. At least
for the English speakers.
Boy, were we lucky to have had a Walt
Kelly during our formative years!
Irwin Press, Ph.D.
November 2002
Hi there!
I really love your website, and I am a great Pogo fan, or is that a Churchy
fan, or an Albert fan? I guess all of the above. Howland and Porkypine also
deserve honorable mentions.
I learned about Pogo back in the 4th grade. I was born in 1950, so that's
1959. My parents never so much as mentioned Pogo, but I moved from South
Pasadena to San Marino in that year, and became good friends with Glenn
Lewis. Glenn's parents, Edward and Pamela, had every Pogo book there was,
and I, like my friend Glenn, quickly became immersed.
I'm going into this detail about the Lewis family because in 1995, Edward
Lewis (a professor at CalTech) received the Nobel prize for his work in
genetics. He used fruit flies for his experiments, and I recall that there
were bottles of fruit flies with agar-agar at the bottom, and cheesecloth
at the top (in mini-milk-bottle carriers) in almost every room of the
house. (Most of the flies had one eye a different color from the other, or
some other strange characteristic.) Glenn's mother, Pamela, was fascinated
with the colors and textures conveyed by the tiny facets of moth and
butterfly wings, and had her painting easel set up in the living room, with
a moth wing under a huge magnifying glass, deftly transferring every detail
to her canvas with the tiniest of brushes. Glenn inherited his father's
genius and his mother's creativity, and was easily the most brilliant
student in our school. Tragically, he died--slipping off a mountain trail
while riding his bicycle--in our freshman year of high school. ...
...I just cannot get over Walt Kelly's genius. Taken separately, the artwork
and dialog of his cartoons are each amazing and wonderful. Together, they
rise to an almost unimaginable degree of excellence.
Walt's artwork is fabulous. I can only assume that he must have worked very
rapidly to have created so many astonishingly detailed inked panels in his
career. Beyond the volume of work is a passion for each character, good or
evil.
I somehow think that Walt started Pogo as a tribute to innocence, but that
the events of the world, and the catastrophe of the McCarthy era--plus the
cold war, forced him to use his creation as a soap box to speak out against
villiany--in Washington, in the dictators of the world, and in the
religious fanatics that (to this day) seem to dot the countryside.
The storylines and dialog of the Pogo strips runs the gamut: from the
brutally logical, to the semi-surreal meanderings of
stream-of-consciousness, to the sweet timing of masterful humor. Walt lets
his readers wander through his stories as a third party--taking in what we
choose, while all the time being led to treasures of common sense,
satisfaction, and humor. This review, however, is stiff and clunky compared
with the art of the master. Let's face it: in the Pogo strips, we learn
about ourselves, and yet, we howl with laughter! Then, thinking back, again
we howl with laughter!...
...Ms. Beaver, again, I thank you for your wonderful site, and hope this has
been a pleasure reading.
Your email friend
Scott Hooper
May 2002
Dear Miz Beaver,
I live in a world where Pogo is unknown; Mexico City, 2002. That is very
sad, because for practically all of my 44 years, I've tried to translate
into Spanish for my friends something that is essentially untranslateable,
the very soul of the Okeefenokee swamp. So how can you explain "Sis Boombah"
or "G.O. Fizzicle" or "Deck us all..." , not to mention the references to
50's and 60's American policies. Fortunately, I have an older brother with
whom I have formed an unbreakable bond of conspiracy and in-jokes around
Pogo. We started a used-record store and we called it Pogo Music just so
people would ask us where we came up with the name. Really.
And nowadays my business is called Pogo Audio Pro. Same reason.
Sadly, all we ever, ever got was blank faces and polite nods when we spouted
out all the virtues and lovable defects of the Swamp's characters. Still,
here we are, decades later, sharing in Pogo's wisdom and silliness. So I
say, it's their loss. All who arrive here know better...
It's a wonderful, loving site you have here. Congratulations!!!
Esteban Silva
Mexico City
April 2002
Dear Miz Beaver,
I'll try to keep this brief. I am an English professor
in my early sixties who grew up in a small town in central Alberta, Canada.
The Edmonton Journal, our local paper, ran Pogo every day and once
on Saturday (Sunday papers were deemed godless and illegal). As a high
school student in the 'fifties, I became an ardent Pogo fan, religiously
clipping him from the newspaper and storing them in my desk drawer. When I
went away to college in Minnesota, my mother kept up the clipping, sending
me a sheaf of Pogo every month. Then, to my amazement the head of the
English Department, Dr. Walter Prausnitz, confessed his Pogophilia in class
one day. I shyly brought him my clippings. He was speechless with delight
because the Fargo Forum did not carry Pogo, probably because Kelly's
views on current politics were so outspoken. Every month after that, he
received my mother's care package of Pogo files -- after I had pored over it
and read it aloud to my room mate.
By the time I was a senior, I had earned the nickname
"Pogo," and I ran for VP of the student senate under the slogan: "I Go
Pogo." And I won!
When I entered graduate school in 1960, I told them
that I wanted to write my thesis on Pogo. Not on your life! So I
compromised. Little did I know that something called "Cultural Studies"
were coming down the road three decades later. Last year, a student wrote a
thesis on Madonna and another on the Simpsons, neither of which could hold a
brazen candlestick to our beloved swamp-chronicler.
Keep up the great work!
Ron Marken
English Department
University of Saskatchewan
Saskatoon, Canada (Yes, I know it sounds like a fake address, but it's
just as real as Pogo's!)
January 2002
Just had a really fun
experience spending the evening purousing through your website, and what a
sight it is to see. I also, like so many other Pogo-phillys began my
journey into such uncharted swamplands as a "chile".
I started my love for
these "swampthings" while hiding from Grandma in my uncle's room. By the
side of some makeshift bookshift bookshelves I would spend hours reading
such "undercover" books as his old and tattered first edition releases
of "Pogo" and "I Go Pogo", and the like. (I think he had a collection of the
first six books that were published in "paperback" form. I say "undercover"
because my uncle was a student at the big university, and as such a real
"Man of the World", while I was an innocent budding teen-age wannabe, just
finishing grade school. And in my way of thinking at the time, such "adult
comics" were just this side of contraband. However despite the aura
of "sneaking an adventure" that accompanied these books, I found a great
love of the humor and in a manner of speaking, the vernacular of these
simple swamp folk. It didn't take long before I found some of the tales so
interesting, that I reread them until they were committed to memory - or I
was committed, I don't remember so well after all these years.
As a budding young
high school "stud", I had quickly memorized as my "tagline" the phrase from
"Lines Upon a Tranquil Brow," - "Break Out the Cigars, This Life is for
Squirrels, We're off to the Drugstore to Whistle at Girls." It really didn't
get me anywhere with the skirts, but it made for a good line to end
wrestling practice at the end of the day.
We spent many
afternoons as teens "keeping up" with the continuing comic strip stories in
the daily newspaper. And their "furry logic" managed to get entangled into
our way of thinking as well.
One such story that
later served me well was the one about Sneaky Sam selling "dry-water" from a
boat in the swamp. Many years later, at a Toastmaster's District
Competition I had occasion to give an extemporaneous 2 minute speech about
"Water". Although the years had clouded my memory of that comic strip it
was nevertheless the key that opened that speech, and won me an award at
that competition.
I scared my wife of 15
years one day when I happ-ended upon a "Pogo Song Book - I Go Pogo", and to
this day she hides when I sing "Deck Us All With Boston Charley". She won't
even let me play the familiar song on the piano, at Christmas time cuz she
knows I'll "mess it up"!!!
So with great delight,
I found your website, and have rekindled some warm memories as I've read
through the titles and taglines of the books and comic strip headings. Thanx
for providing someplace where such things can be found again. I'm sure I'll
be back often.
- Mike
Richardson - SLC,Ut.
January 2002
I was pleased to
find your website. Like many of your other visitors,, I grew up reading the
Pogo books that my dad collected. One of his treasured possessions (which
still hangs, framed, in my mom's house) was the original ink drawing for one
of the daily strips with an autographed inscription by Walt Kelly "To the
original Mock Throrton." Apparently, though I never recall seeing it in any
of the books, there was, probably in passing, a minor character (another
turtle?) named "Mock Throrton". My dad, Charlie Throckmorton, used the
opportunity to express his admiration to Mr. Kelly and was rewarded with the
drawing.
I loved reading
the Pogo books too, and of course, it thrilled my dad that I "got it." Pogo
evokes many happy memories. Long live Pogo. Thanks for creating your site.
Chuck
Throckmorton
December 2001
Aloha Miz Beaver!
Finding your wonderful website has been an absolute delight, and kudos to
Mister Beaver for creating such a well-designed, easy-access site! As they
say Over here, "I stay impress!"
I'm another baby boomer who grew up loving my parents' collection of Pogo
books (we also had a record album of Pogo songs, sung by Walt Kelly
himself!) even when I didn't fully understand who was being lampooned. I
have always delighted in all things Pogo, and now that I know about the
PogoFest, I will see if attendance is in my future! Sure hope it is! I would
love to meet a whole bunch of fellow Pogophiles. I live in Hawaii now, and
very few of my friends know of Pogo (philistines!) but I always sing a
rousing version of Deck Us All With Boston Charlie at Christmas anyway, and
now have a friend who not only knows, but loves Pogo, and many of the words
to DUAWBC as well! Now, thanks to you and the internet, I have the correct
words to all the verses!
I will be back to revisit the site soon, and will share the URL with
those who will appreciate it!
Mahalo (Many thanks),
Kate Schuerch
December 2001
Dear Ms. White:
As an Army brat in late 1951 I was four+ years old, my
father was in Korea and my mother bought the neighborhood's first television
to watch the political conventions. I was just learning to read and began
"perusing" the POGO books. Unfortunately, they didn't hold up well to
continual use and subsequent moves around the world but I never forgot Pogo,
Albert, Cherchez La Femme (sp?) et al.. When Nixon gave his Checkers speech
and accepted his subsequent nomination for the 56 election, I found him
strangely disturbing and creepy. I think it must have been his 5 o'clock
shadow. In any event, he reminded me of the "swampcat"? character (Wile?)
who was tall, ominous and carried and ax and a noose. It was only many years
later that I came to appreciate that character was actually Joe McCarthy
rather than Richard Nixon! LOL. The last Pogo I remember seeing was a comic
strip in the Sunday Washington Post featuring LBJ as a centaur with large
ears and a ten gallon hat in the early 60s. In any event, I grew up to
become a political junkie among other things and recently ran across an "I
Go Pogo" Election Pin, which led me to search for the books, which led me to
your website. Pogo is somehow connected to very fond memories of my
childhood and a lot of laughing, even though I didn't always "get" the jokes
at the time. Overall it was wonderful. I'm now interested in researching the
chronology of Pogo books (if there is such a thing) with an eye to
developing a collection for my kids and grandchildren. Thank you so much
for your efforts in keeping Pogo alive. I'm looking forward to thoroughly
exploring your website. Best regards.
Sincerely,
Tom Dineen (ELRRP)
November 2001
I have just seen the Pogo website, and I must confess
it recalled memories that brought tears to my eyes. My dad, who died about
4 years ago at age 88, loved Pogo, and I learned to love Pogo at his knee.
Daddy thought Pogo's wisdom ranked right up there with Aristotle, Voltaire
and "all them other furriners". Albert Aligator reminded us of some of our
relatives. Alas, Pogo reminded us of no relatives, either of his or of
mother's family. But I can still sing every word of "Deck Us All With
Boston Charlie", and vividly recall the campaign slogan, "I Go Pogo". Daddy
said he was the best of the field, and never could understand why Pogo was
not elected...
Thank you for the wonderful memories, and the tears,
and the smiles. You're doing a wonderful service, helping to keep Pogo alive
and well and living in the Okeefenokee Swamp. Maybe some year I will join
the Pogo Fest.
Sandra H. Pinyard-Richards.
October 2001
Miz B. --
When I was a boy, there was a small bookshelf in the
corner of my parents' bedroom. It sat down on the floor where I could reach
it easily, and it became one of my favorite resources when I wanted to visit
my friends in the Okeefenokee Swamp. For this little bookshelf held my Dad's
growing collection of Pogo books. Dad was (and still is) a fervent Pogophile,
and I also became a firm fan of The Possum even before I could read, and
well before I could appreciate Kelly's shrewd command of the English
tongue.
To this day, when I see any of the Pogo characters I
can again taste the innocence of my childhood and smell the delightful musty
odor of the older books in Dad's collection. Kelly's elegant brushwork
brought his characters to life in a way that was very real to me as a kid. I
could identify with Pogo's innocence, and the stuff he had to put up with
from loud-mouthed but well-meaning friends. I could feel a sense of menace
in those characters from the darker side of the swamp, even though I'd never
heard of Joe McCarthy, and was only vaguely acquainted with the names Nikita
Krushchev and Fidel Castro. I loved the poems, particularly "For The Mother
of Kathryn Barbara," and can still quote a few of them. I remember reading
Pogo strips in the St Louis Post-Dispatch, until the strip was dropped when
it became to politically hot to handle. Dad promptly cancelled our newspaper
subscription.
So many years have passed since then... I'm now 45
years old, and Dad just turned 72. Yet Pogo is still with us in many subtle
little ways. Take for example my wife's good-natured aggravation with my Dad
when he insists on wording his e-mails to us in "Pogo English." (Requests
for assistance with their computer are usually titled, "He'p, he'p!")
Pogo-isms occasionally come up in general conversation, and are something of
an inside joke with Dad, my brother, and me. Nobody else understands...
Oh yes, Dad still has the books. The little bookshelf
fell apart years ago when the collection outgrew it, and it's a little more
difficult to get to them now, as my folks moved to Texas and we still live
in Missouri. But when we go down to visit them, I usually find myself
sequestered away in a quiet corner of their house with "Pogo's Sunday
Punch", "Uncle Pogo's So-So Stories," or one of the other gems that I
remember so well. Even though I've re-read the strips so many times that the
element of surprise has long gone out of the humor, I still love them. They
are one of the few memories of my childhood that hasn't disappeared outright
or changed beyond recognition.
Thanks very, very much for the effort you've expended
on this website. This Pogophile has enjoyed his stay here, and I've
bookmarked it for future reference.
Gryf Ketcherside
August 2001
Hi. Miz B
In the summer of 1952 I performed a reading of
Cinderella and the Three Bears at church camp. The results were so
gratifying that I redid it for my three best friends and we have called
ourselves the Furry Godmothers ever since.
Recently one of them, Charles H, got the itch to
locate this story and visited your website, among other doings. Last night
he sent me the site address and I checked it out. The #8 issue of Pogo
Possum fits the time frame but I wanted to check some things with you.
Firstly, the Cinderella character (Pogo) was called
Cinderola and I always thought that's what it was in the story title. Now,
just to make sure we're on the same track I'll relate the two things I
remember about it. Pogo is dressed in a slouchy little dress, befitting
his/her role. Owl appears, wearing a full length gown and with a wand, I
think, and loudly announces, "Cinderola! I is you Furry Godmother!"
Later in the tale Churchy asks whom is going to pull
the carriage/pumpkin and Owl says, "Yoom, that's whom!' And outraged Churchy
replied, "Moom? Why you goggle-gaited old gull, I couldn't pull a gnat's
tooth, much less a picnic size pumpkin full of passengers!'"
OK, the questions are: is this the right story in the
right comic and how correct are my remembrances? Also, what are the chances
of finding a copy of the comic or having someone run off a copy? Is that
legal? I appreciate your attention to these matters and if you have a reply
for them would you also copy it to the other FG's? Their e-addresses are
Thanks, BFG, Albert, & Me
The message above was followed by...
Dear Marilyn (Miz Beaver),
My friend Bob K forwarded your message, a reply
to his question about a story involving Pogo as "Cinderola" and Owl as a
"Furry Godmother". I should mention that I found a story in "Pogo's Sunday
Punch" that has Owl as a "Furry God momma". I also found the Cinderola story
you mentioned in "Pogo's Sunday Brunch". Neither of these stories has all
the story elements that Bob K. remembers from 1952. At our age I would
normally suspect 50-year-old memories, but Bob has an almost photographic
memory of things from our childhood.
Based on the Index to Pogo Comic Books in your site,
Pogo Possum #8 has a story "Cinderella and the Three Bears" which was later
redone for Sunday strips in the late 50's. We wonder if this might be the
story Bob remembers, and might have inspired both the "Sunday Punch" and
"Sunday Brunch" stories.
Please don't spend a lot of time on this, as it is
obviously not of earth-shaking importance. We will still go on calling
ourselves Furry Godmothers regardless (or maybe it should be Furry God
mommas).
By the way, it's a great site (do you do the HTML
yourself?). I found the Furry God momma story (in "Sunday Punch") by
searching your site for "furry", and the reference popped right up.
Thanks and regards,
Charles H.
(Note: Mr. Beaver takes credit for the appearance of
the site. It was created using MS FrontPage. And wouldn't Walt Kelly have
great fun with Bill Gates)
July 2001
Dear Miz Beaver,
What I always found amusing about Pogo was the way Walt
Kelly made such skillful use of stereotypes (without being unnecessarily
insulting) and mixed remarkably insightful and erudite analysis worthy of
Einstein with lowbrow slapstick stupidity that would make the Three Stooges
proud.
The main characters, Pogo, Albert, Churchy LaFemme,
Beauregard Hound Dog, Howland Owl, and Porky come across as Southern
simpletons. They are generally down to earth and decent. One particularly
interesting tidbit came in Prisoner of Love when Owl, speaking about the
national anthem, says "I kinda likes the old one". At which point, Churchy
jumps up and says "Dang right! What's wrong with Dixie!!??"
The implication, of course, is that the characters
thought of Dixie as the real national anthem which is not terribly different
from the attitude of a whole lot of Southerners, even today considering the
flaps over the Confederate Battle Flag. There's also a frame in Instant Pogo
in which Churchy says "I thunk Grant was on the fifty". Beauregard angrily
says "Grant!!?? Jus whose side was your daddy on anyways??!!"
Kelly also had the gun-slinging redneck Wiley Catt, the
dishonest Baptist minister Deacon Mushrat (always talking in scripture), the
incurable con-man Seminole Sam, the Communist Cowbirds (parasites), and, of
course, the original feminists Miz Beaver and Miss Sis Boombah, long before
feminism was in vogue. P.T. Bridgeport and Tammanany Tiger were obvious
pokes at political power brokers who weren't welcome anywhere (Kelly was a
bit before his time here). The tiger was a none-too-subtle poke at Tammany
Hall in New York.
Walt Kelly was in some ways quite courageous by
satirizing Joe McCarthy at the height of McCarthyism in 1952. I especially
laughed my head off at the antics of Wiley Catt, Sarcophagus MacAbre, and
Seminole Sam with their suspicion campaign aimed at Churchy - nothing but a
campaign to make him into turtle soup.
Deacon talking about the book "I was an ex-member of
the underground" being so secret that the book had to be composed of
entirely blank paper had me in hysterics. At the same time, there was a
very serious message - that it was all to easy to whip up hysteria based on
doubletalk and innuendo with no basis in reality.
Importantly, Kelly skewered with equal opportunity. He
took obvious swipes at right-wing conservatives like McCarthy, George
Wallace, Agnew, J. Edgar Hoover, and Nixon but also satirized left-wingers
with his portrayal of Russians as pigs, of Castro as a goat, and the
American Communist Party represented by the cowbirds - sophisticated people
would recognize that Kelly regarded Communists as no-good parasites just
like cowbirds. It was heartening to see the Russian "Mr. Pig"
imploring the swamp denizens to change from the American electoral system to
the Russian system only to be steamrollered as the Okeefenokee citizenry
proclaimed its love of voting.
Unfortunately, it would appear that no comic strip
today would or could combine intelligence and slapstick to the degree of
Pogo and almost none would be brave enough to use stereotypes so
effectively.
TR
Dear Miz Beaver,
I went looking on the web for a copy of the "We have met...." poster and found your web site. It brought tears to my eyes just looking at your web
site! It's beautiful, great, etc.
I'm a physicist at a nuclear power plant in SE TN., graduated from Oregon State and lived most of my life in north eastern Oregon. I loved the Pogo
comic strip and, like you, had a collection of Pogo books and several scrapbooks of the Pogo comic strips from the Sunday Paper in Portland. That's
all gone and my kids and grandkids don't even know who Pogo was. Your web site will help correct that.
Thanks for the web site and all the things Pogo. I'll be a regular visitor from now on.
John P. Stewart
Chemistry Group
Sequoyah Nuclear Plant
How About This...
4/11/01
Hi Miz Beaver:
A few years ago I had a source of shirts that included Pogo with a daisy
logo. I procrastinated until, when I ordered, the company had vanished.
I have saved their literature, but cant find them anywhere. Do you
have such a thing? I even cut an Albert
and Pogo from an old shirt and sewed them on my white sweatshirt in
desperation.
If I didn't know better, my brother and I could have written your
introduction. Mom always read Pogo aloud, and the memories of the laughter still
ring. Playing checkers with cookies has been a family thing ever since. Talking
about marbles in the jam giving it a "crunchy tangyness"; spelling
Albert wrong, and words that don't or do have an "UM" in them.
I am so delighted to find you, I can't wait to get home a call my brother.
Or, maybe I will just surprise him with a shirt or hat.
He was always "Pogo" to my dad. My name is, of all things,
MUDGE. How does that strike you?
Marlene Mudge, at the Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History
Jamestown, New York
This one is quite interesting...
3/5/01
When I were a young thing, mom had a songbook I adored. She taught my
brother & I songs from it, and when I turned 7 or 8, in '69 or '70 she
gave me a paperback copy of the book for my very own. For the next few weeks,
my brother & I danced around the house, singing these songs & in
general just annoying the devil out of our grandpa. We also read the strip
regularly, as my grandpa got both of the Pittsburgh news papers & that was
the only thing interesting to read in either of them as far as my brother
& I could see.
I hadn't thought about that in ages, don't know why it popped in my head,
but it did, so i typed "go pogo" (one of my faves) into search,
& here you were! This is a wonderful place, so much info & even things
to buy! And what nice contributors.
In 1990, Mom's place burnt down, she lost everything. Then in 1991, my
darling baby brother passed on. I've been hunting around since then trying to
find a hard cover version of songs of the pogo, to replace mom's & help
heal her soul, but I've had no luck. So here on your site in the message
board, A kind lad has offered to copy his lp onto cds & I think I'll email
him to see if the offer still stands.
So I'd like to thank you, for giving me a place to come, to remember the
things I hold so dear & miss so very much. I'm going to go find my
paperback songbook now, and have a good cry.
I'm a professional writer and photographer and I wanted to use the "met
the enemy," quote in an article I'm writing and in my search I stumbled
across your site. Great Job!
I'd like to list your site in my article.
It's for (gasp, choke, but don't really because the magazine is NOT THAT
BAD) Soldier of Fortune. I've been
writing for the magazine for more than 20 years and the article I am writing is
about suddenly discovering how I was exposed to Agent Orange in Vietnam, and how
we were deceived by a lot of people and Vietnam vets are still dying from
cancers as a result of the war but their names (my brother's (perhaps a total of
three in the end) and maybe myself, will not go on the wall but are we any less
dead if we die from cancer or diabetes thirty years after the war?!
So, you can see the use of the Pogo quote, but I'd like to add your web site.
Okay?
Thanks,Galen L. Geer
Fergit Miz Mamselle Hepzibah! It was Miz Beaver who always
had the simple wisdom that saved the day. I have LOVED the possum since I was
knee-high to Grundoon. In my formative years (when I could say GRS to the fish)
my birthday treat consisted of having my mom drive me to Newark Airport, where
stood the only bookstore (at least to my knowledge at the tender age of 9 in
1956) where I could find the latest Pogo collections. She would buy me the one
or two that were new, we'd watch the super constellations takeoff for a while
and return home, because by then I was hopping from one foot to another like I
was in need of satisfying a bodily function but which was merely a manifestation
of my desire to read my latest excursions into the Okefenokee.
The point of this ramble? Thank you for caring enough about
the genius of Walt Kelly to do this page. For years, I've treasured my complete
set of original edition Pogo books (said completeness confirmed by your
bibliography!). Now, after years of not finding anyone capable of discussing
their finer points, I'm delighted to find a swampful of devotees, brought
together by you.
I have seen your name on e-bay a few times and, now that I am
computerized, I thought I'd look around in Pogoland and stumbled upon your site. And a handsome and tidy sight it
is. Well planned. Easy access. And lots of the real stuff. I am in
admiration.
Pogo has been part of my 49 years on this planet. I, too,
had a renaissance after my first child was born in 1972, sadly enough, at about
the time Walt had to leave. But my son now 28,has been properly polluted and it is a great area forums to share. As you
know, there are not many of us. But I was in a comic book store the other day and the
proprietor is a Pogo fan and his kid is 2. I told him to start now. He'll thank
himself later and someone will take Walt's legacy a bit deeper into this millennium
than you or I. I'll stop by again when I have more time and am a bit more
organized.
I haven't had this computer all that long and I knew it had to be good for
something. Just for the heck of it I typed Pogo Possum in my Yahoo window and
there you were.
I'm from the generation of boys who sat on the front porch with stacks of
comic books, two or three of us reading and trading in the days before kids'
lives became super-organized. I think we learned to read more from comics
than from school. Like maybe a million other people, I always identified
with Pogo. Still do. Maybe I'll come back to your website and order
something. I could use a little Pogo statuette to set on the bookshelf
above this computer, and another for my desk at work so people could ask, What's
that? Thank you for being there.
After checking out the email about being in the Atlanta
Journal, this is what we found in their on line edition:
Thanks Jack Warner and the Atlanta Journal for the
recognition. As Albert would say, "I is quietly proud."
