Number 1389: Enter Albert and Pogo

Any ardent Pogo fan can tell you Walt Kelly’s familiar character did not spring forth from his creator’s forehead fully formed. Rather he was developed over time. As you can see in this, the first appearance of both Albert Alligator and Pogo Possum in Animal Comics #1 (1942), they were hardly recognizable as to what they would someday become. No matter. The Kelly humor is here, and while the Pogo characters went through an evolution, Kelly was as talented in his beginnings as he was at the end of his career, which came with his death in 1973.

I’m also showing another Kelly strip from the same issue of Animal Comics. “Muzzy and Ginger,” is a more typical funny animal strip.