Number 632
Billy Dollar
This is the second World War II-era strip I've posted with a theme of buying U.S. War Bonds. The first is here. Someone at the U.S. Department of Propaganda probably approached comic book publishers and asked them to encourage the kiddies to spend their money on savings stamps or bonds.
After you read this story by Walt Kelly from Our Gang Comics #6, 1943, I'll tell you something about War Bonds.
OK, back again, are we. Here's what I just read from the Associated Press on Sunday, October 25, 2009: War Bonds matured after 40 years. By the 1980s, when the 40 years were up, many bonds had been lost, destroyed, forgotten, the owner had died, were sitting unclaimed in safety deposit boxes or at the bottom of landfills. The U.S. government made no announcements, they made no effort to inform or find original owners of these bonds, so according to a lawsuit filed by several states, $16.7 billion is owed by the federal government as unclaimed property on unredeemed bonds. The states figure they are owed the money. Huh. Well, I guess they can try to get it.In the 1940s and 1950s there was always a push to get kids to buy savings stamps every week. I never bought in. I guess I'm just not very patriotic, or I didn't want to wait 40 years to get my money out. (Too bad. The forty year maturation period would have been up for me years ago and I could've cashed in!)
Interesting to note that copyright is attributed to Lebeck and Kelly rather than to Dell. Also, is Lebeck's name misspelled here or in a hundred Net articles by people who should know better?
ReplyDeleteOskar Lebeck is the spelling he used. I assume he knew his own name better than lazy spelling-challenged bloggers who have misspelled it for years.
ReplyDeleteLebeck was a packager for Western Publishing who produced the comic book line for Dell. He provided finished comic books, Animal Comics, Fairy Tale Parade among them, under his own copyright.
What an awesome post! Love the Waly Kelly/ Lebeck patriotic propaganda, dad dibble dee dang it!
ReplyDeleteBut that is a sad statement about the war bonds and the...shall we say, integrity and honesty...of our wonderful gummint! How many impressionable and trusting kids were tricked into giving the government the nickels and pennies...if it really helped win WW2, then, dab dang it, I guess it was worth it, but...how many billions of dollars are ...missing?
and I can imagine what that Bugs Bunny cartoon was banned for, Mammy...er I mean Pappy!
Thanks for this one!
The rate of return on the various Federal debt instruments advertised to the public wasn't very good anyway. You probably did better, in terms of your sense of satisfaction, spending that money on consumer goods.
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