This is an in-universe article with out-of-universe material.
Scribbly #4 is an issue of the series Scribbly (Volume 1) with a cover date of March, 1949.
Synopsis for "Scribbly"
Snoony tries to ply Scribbly into talking about his cool adventures he has at his job, but Scribbly coolly says that he has to get to the office, since the paper doesn't go out without him! Mrs. Jibbet leans out the window and calls him “Mr. Brains” for forgetting his lunch. He complains that a bagged lunch isn't dignified and she coldly points out copy boys don't have to worry about their dignity. He loudly points out he's a cartoonist, a columnist and a reporter and she casually listens. He starts to walk off grumbling about it, but she calls for a copy and he instinctively dashes back to her to get his lunch again. Later, Scribbly heads in hoping no one sees his lunch, only for the receptionist to tell him that his mom already called to say she forgot his apple and will drop it for him at noon. Scribbly begins to obsessively measure his desk and tries to tell the receptionist not to let his mother in quite yet so he can convince her that he has a great big desk like he's habitually lied to her about. She says she has work to do and gets back to it. He heads into O'Hara's office and finds he has a 72” desk and just casually steals his desk and chair while he's shouting at someone over the phone about deadlines. He soon steals some mail from Mr. Birdnest's desk and snips scissors, thinking he'll steal some telephones. He does so, making the art department go insane since no one can answer phone calls coming in on the ringer and claims to O'Hara that O'Hara told him to do a telephone inventory. He answers a ton of phones and shouts at people in performative fury when Mrs. Jibbet shows up until O'Hara comes in to shout at him. Everyone realizes he stole all their stuff and take it back, leaving Mr. Jibbet handing Scribbly his apple at his tiny desk 2” desk. That night, Mrs. Jibbet tells her husband, Wilton, about what happened and Wilton becomes furious that he cut all the telephone wires in the office, but Mrs. Jibbet says that's not the point, since he didn't get fired for it, meaning he actually must be important to the paper and says perhaps a bagged lunch isn't dignified. Scribbly dashes out now that he thinks he won't get a spanking and will get a dignified packed lunch from his mother… who instead surprises him with a yellow basket with his name on it in cursive and touting small red ribbons on it!
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Synopsis for "Scribbly (2)"
O'Hara is furious that Scribbly drew a gangster in his comic strip to look like actual known gangster Harry-the-Heel, who is demanding an apology and will likely sue them for libel. Red tells O'Hara he could just prove that Harry-the-Heel is a gangster if he's really a “big-time city editor!” O'Hara says that's what editors in movies do, so he's putting out a retraction until he sees the Klieg lights. He soon sends Scribbly down to the engraving department to print a nicer picture of Harry-the-Heel in the paper with the retraction and Scribbly instead leans on his extendable phone, making it hit O'Hara in the face and making him tear the picture. O'Hara tells Scribbly to instead go to the drugstore and get him some headache pills instead, wondering aloud if working there is even worth it if he spends his whole salary on headache pills…
A man in a purple jacket asks if Scribbly means Pilso's Headache Pills when he asks for some and accidentally wins a contest making him “King-for-an-Hour!” and that he just has to make a wish and it'll be his. Scribbly is unnerved and disturbed by this offer and tries to leave, saying everyone at a paper works for the editor. The Pilso Man says that he intends to make him the Editor then (which he didn't wish) and encourages loudly into a microphone that is somehow live (despite not being plugged in…) that they can do anything they want to! The Pilso Man soon tells O'Hara that Scribbly is Editor for one hour and Mr. Birdnest calls him to say that Pilso is their top sponsor and to do as he is told. In this time, the engravers come up to get the picture of Harry-the-Heel to go with the retraction and apology, but Scribbly instead draws one of him in prison clothing holding a knife and a revolving, saying he's taking a hardline stance against gangsters at the Morning Bugle, managing to push it through to print in an hour's time, then demands O'Hara sweep up. O'Hara swallows his internal fury as the Pilso Man and soon Red enter and agree that this is the best headline ever. The hour ends and O'Hara chases him around his desk with intent to kill. The Pilso Man bids them adieu as he says they've also won a 10 lb carton of Pilso's Headache Pills. Scribbly says to give them to O'Hara, since he won't have a head for much longer!
Harry-the-Heel soon enters with a hand in his jacket and O'Hara immediately fingers Scribbly as the Editor, holding Red's mouth as he ushers her out of his office so she won't spill the beans. Harry-the-Heel leans on the extendable phone and outside, Red calls O'Hara a coward again and says she'll rescue Scribbly if she has to! O'Hara muses that it's too late now as there are sounds of a struggle. Scribbly leans out the door and tells O'Hara to fix the extendable phone, since it flung out again, hit him in the face giving him two black eyes, then knocked out Harry-the-Heel entirely (figuring he isn't as hard-headed as Scribbly.) O'Hara points out he can sue them for damages. Scribbly rights points out that Harry-the-Heel pulled a gun on him, threatened him and also dropped his little black book full of all the evidence needed to put him away forever! Red kisses Scribbly on the cheek for a job well done and O'Hara calls up Pilso Drug Co. to ask where his headache pills are already!
Appearing in "Scribbly (2)"
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- Harry-the-Heel
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Synopsis for "Littul Snoony"
Snoony and his unnamed dog find a boy with a blue Jughead hat and giant suspenders, leaning back and forth dramatically. He claims to be new in town and also a clock. He begins tick-tocking in the background as Snoony calls him crazy, since he's not a clock. The Clock offers he can tell him the time and then does so, saying it's 2pm. Snoony is confounded by this and runs into Sisty, dragging her over to see the Clock. Sisty tries to find out the time from him and hears it's still two and runs off to find a clock in town. She finds it's actually 5pm and runs back to tell him… but he says he is still a clock… he's just slow as he begins waving much faster!
Appearing in "Littul Snoony"
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Synopsis for "Scribbly (3)"
Scribbly turns in his latest strip of The Light-Finger Kid where O'Hara is portrayed as the strongest sheriff in town, who is forcing Red to marry him. Two cowboys, Widow-Maker and a dog all say that O'Hara is too strong to be stopped and the last guy who stood up to him is lying down now! This apparently grows to more than a strip as the story continues with the Light-Finger Kid saying he'll stand up to O'Hara any day of the week (and twice on Sundays!) shocking him. He tells O'Hara to fill his hand and he complains he has lumbago. Scribbly wittily offers that he can outdraw O'Hara even with his hands tied and even when O'Hara insists that he needs to be blindfolded too. When O'Hara tries to draw on him though, Scribbly unties himself, draws both guns and shoots O'Hara's pistols to pieces and gets a kiss on the cheek from Red as O'Hara is kicked out of town by the cowpokes. O'Hara points out that it's clear that he's being framed as the villain here, but Mr. Birdnest appears and says that O'Hara is a villain people love to hate, so he won't remove it. Scribbly asks if he's mad at him and O'Hara pretends he isn't, instead making a front page headline days later that reveals that Light-Finger Kid is based on Scribbly Jibbet and he'll even do his famous shooting trick in real life at the office at any time anyone wants to come see him do it.
Further, he's bought all the equipment Scribbly needs to do the trick and there's a large group of approximately several children including Clover Cooley. He does so and asks if Mr. Birdnest can sit next to him. Mr. Birdnest does so as O'Hara explains that Scribbly will shoot a bullseye somehow despite all this. Scribbly leans over and tells Mr. Birdnest that O'Hara calls him a meathead when he's not around and Mr. Birdnest spits so hard that he fires his cigar out of his mouth and through the bullseye! Everyone is impressed that he actually did it and O'Hara is forced to write 5,000 times “I must not call Mr. Birdnest meat-head—I must not,”… though he isn't sure how he found out!
Appearing in "Scribbly (3)"
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Synopsis for "Liz"
Liz finds her boyfriend Freddie has a trashed out bright purple car with ugly seating. She thinks it's for a gag, but Freddie admits he paid $80 for it, promising it rides fine and he can prove it (or at least that he can fix it if it breaks.) He rides the car all the way out past the city limits and it stalls out three miles out of town, infuriating Liz. He reasons it'll only take two hours to disassemble the engine and fix it and Liz walks home, hurting her feet from the effort of it. The next day, Freddie returns and says he did fix his car, but realizes that she won't want to trust that and offers they walk instead. She says she did a lot of walking yesterday, but he encourages that walking is good for you! She agrees... but 15 mins later, she complains that she wants to sit down as her feet are definitely hurting already! She does so and a nerd, Merwin, in a loud jacket pulls up in a far more ginchy sedan. Freddie calls foul at this, but she says it's square: yesterday, she walked home from a ride with him... and today she's riding home from a walk with him!
Appearing in "Liz"
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- Liz
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- Freddie
- Merwin
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Synopsis for "Scribbly (4)"
Miss Loomis starts up a pop quiz while Clover daydreams of Scribbly fighting pirates. She asks Clover who was the first American naval hero, but she panics and says Scribbly Jibbet. Miss Loomis chides her and says that she knows he's no naval hero, since he was in her class last year and to daydream at home next time. Other kids begin to harass her about her supposed (but real) crush on Scribbly. Her friends enter and are somehow impressed of her dating Scribbly, talking over her to the point where she can't admit she doesn't. They are interrupted by snooty blond Claudia Birdnest and dares Clover to come with Scribbly to her New Year's Eve Party and her friends rashly bet ten weeks' allowance that Clover can definitely do that. She tries to correct them, angering her friends and proving Claudia right… but she instead lies and says that she can't come to the party because she's going to the Newspapermen's Club Dinner and Dance that night! Claudia scoffs that her father, OP Birdnest, is the President of the Newspapermen's Club so she can definitely see her, since these are the same party! Claudia leaves them with the bet and Clover tries to dissuade her friends, who leave confident in her for no reason. Clover wonders how she'll get Scribbly to go with her, since he barely even talks to her, no less would take a date!
Meanwhile, Snoony borrows a trash can lid, feather duster, a broom and a bucket to play knights, but arrives late to playing with Sisty, who demotes him from being Sir Lancelot until he complete a mission. She consults her book on King Arthur (played by Sisty, of course) and offers he go on a Crusade, but worries that since these take 100 years, it may take too long. They reason that dragon slaying is also a hard ask, since “they discontinued production on dragons long ago.” She offers he find a fair damsel in distress and rescue her and then has to explain that means an attractive girl, which Snoony seems too eager to be off doing. Sisty decides to follow him and mounts her invisible horse with her youngest cousin, Throckmorton. Snoony runs into Clover and asks how he can help. She tells them off, but it's clear Snoony doesn't understand the idea of rejection. Sisty overhears and gets the word down. Clover also points out she doesn't know if Scribbly is even invited to the Newspapermen's Club. Sisty calls these petty details and that they can figure this out as Knights of the Round Table, ushering her to go home and change into something nice as she whistles for her cousins.
At the Morning Bugle, Miss Jones turns on Mr. Birdnest's PA to hear O'Hara loudly complaining about how Scribbly has been invited to the Newspapermen's Club Dinner and Dance. Mr. Birdnest says he hadn't, but now he'll do so just to spite O'Hara for annoying him. We soon find that Sisty was somehow imitating O'Hara as Mr. Birdnest tries to find O'Hara, who Scribbly says has been in the composing room all morning. He gives Scribbly the ticket and says to make sure O'Hara sees it. Even more strangely, O'Hara legitimately doesn't care that Scribbly got invited. However, he loudly shouts to not let him bring Clover Cooley! Mr. Birdnest angrily says that he'll invite her too and we see Snoony was also somehow imitating O'Hara perfectly. The two argue until Snoony accidentally gets caught up in the argument and they reveal him. O'Hara correctly presumes this is somehow related to Scribbly, much to Mr. Birdnest's rage. When he offers to bet $10 on it, Throckmorton pops out of a wastepaper basket and says he'll take that bet, but another “knight” pops out of the water cooler and says this is Scribbly's brother, so he needs to pay Throckmorton now. O'Hara shouts for Scribbly, who has found Sisty's Merlin and another kid in his desk drawers. O'Hara calls foul that Scribbly is manipulating his way to the Newspapermen's Club and Snoony caves, explaining everything to prove his brother's innocence. To make up for it, Mr. Birdnest says to invite all the kids involved, now that he knows his daughter is wrapped up in this. Soon, Clover and her friends each get an invitation to the Newspapermen's Club Dinner and Dance. Therein, Claudia finds there's no place for her to sit… so Mr. Birdnest pointedly seats her at the kid's table with Snoony, Sisty and the other kids, saying she can go home at nine with the rest of them while the other grown-ups stay up! Snoony and the other kids are just happy to be up until nine and getting free food.
Appearing in "Scribbly (4)"
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- Claudia Birdnest
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- Clover Cooley
- Throckmorton
- OP Birdnest
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Notes
- This issue also includes:
- A one-page Jerry the Jitterbug story by Henry Boltinoff.
Trivia
- Clover Cooley is revealed to be a year younger than Scribbly
- Mr. Birdnest is apparently named "OP Birdnest," similar to Scribbly's former Principal, OP Jenkins
See Also
Links and References
