Nowadays Disney comics are mainly associated with Donald Duck, but Disney's breakthrough at the time began with a different fictional animal. If we look at the broader context and compare it with other countries, we get a better idea of the impact of the mouse's arrival in Europe. There had been comic characters or series with considerable transnational distribution before, such as Charlie Chaplin, Bringing up Father, and Adamson, but Mickey Mouse would surpass them all... and that for a product derived from an animated film.
Never before has a single comic series had such an impact on the further course of numerous national comic developments. Mickey's arrival, followed by a plethora of American balloon comics, largely wiped out the old-fashioned European comics with captions and static visualisation, although in some language areas (including Dutch and German) old traditions proved stubborn and would only change after the Second World War. After this spectacular debut in the early 1930s, Mickey would face fierce competition from his own ‘stable’ and Donald Duck would take over. But by then, the little mouse had already made his mark…
How Mickey ended up in the newspaper
After Mickey Mouse's first public appearance in Steamboat Willie, a short cartoon from 1928, things took off incredibly quickly for this little character. Numerous cartoons followed, and soon the first merchandise appeared, some of it legal, some of it not. In 1929, the first Mickey Mouse Club was launched in California; barely three years later, these clubs, affiliated with a local movie theater, already had about a million members. This idea of clubs based on a character would later be picked up by comic book publishers: think of the Superman or America Club or Les Amis de Spirou.
The largest comic strip syndicate, King Features, quickly recognized the growing popularity of Mickey Mouse as an opportunity and contacted Ub Iwerks, the animator of the Mickey cartoons, to produce a daily comic strip for them. The director of the syndicate, Joseph Connolly, wrote to him on July 24, 1929:
“I think your mouse animation is one of the funniest features I ever seen in the movies. Please consider producing one in comic strip form for newspapers. If you can find time to do one, I shall be very interested in seeing some specimens.” (Gerstein 2011: 227)
Since in a country as vast as the US, almost all publications were regional, a syndicate such as King Features could offer the same comic strip series multiple times. Usually, the cartoonist had to give about half of the proceeds to the syndicate, but it remained a lucrative deal for both parties.
However, a syndicate was not a neutral conduit between author and audience. Quite often, a syndicate would try to push comic strip authors in a certain direction. For example, soon after the launch of the Mickey Mouse daily strip, King Features asked for it to be turned into more of an adventure story, rather than a gag strip with a thin storyline. After all, exciting serialized comics were becoming increasingly popular in the US at the expense of humorous comics, which had dominated the first three decades of the twentieth century. So, on April 1, the first real serialized story began, Mickey Mouse in Death Valley. It also marked the beginning of a new genre, the funny animal adventure story.
However, the power of a syndicate was limited if the author was already famous. The then Mickey Mouse author Gottfredson recalls a telegram at the end of 1932 in response to a scene in which Mickey is attacked by alligators. King Features asked for the entire sequence to be removed because it would shock women and children. As it was practically impossible to get this done in time, the author asked Walt Disney for advice, who replied:
“To hell with them! You forget it, and either I'll call them or wire them and tell them to go to hell.” (Andrae 2011: 11)
The sequence appeared unchanged.
Mickey as a daily comic strip
On January 13, 1930, the New York Daily Mirror started publishing a daily Mickey Mouse comic strip. In the first few weeks, the emphasis was – as mentioned – more on a gag per day, and there was minimal continuity between the strips. At the start, the comic was still written by Walt Disney himself and drawn by Ub Iwerks, but the latter left Disney shortly afterwards to set up his own studio. Win Smith took over the artwork, but when Walt insisted that he also write the scripts, he broke off the collaboration. The comic strip then passed into the hands of another employee, Floyd Gottfredson, who would become its main author until his retirement in 1975. It was he who initially developed the personality of the main character, because a long-running story could cover many more aspects than a cartoon lasting only a few minutes. Floyd would also provide the necessary adventure and accompanying excitement, so that readers would look forward to the next installment every day. As requested by the syndicate, it became more of a continuous adventure story, without forgetting the humor.
American newspaper comics from the early 20th century were simply more inventive and dynamic than what was usually created in Europe.
It didn't take long before the Mickey Mouse daily comic strip was also published outside the US. King Features tried to sell its material worldwide in order to get the maximum return from a product. Such a collaboration was also interesting for foreign buyers because, even with the costs of translation and lettering, purchasing an American comic strip was cheaper than having a local comic strip author create one themselves – assuming they could compete with the quality of the American material. American newspaper comics from the early 20th century were simply more inventive and dynamic than what was generally created in Europe. Nevertheless, it took until the late 1920s for international sales to really take off, but a few years later, translated American comics already dominated most national European comic markets.
John Anthony Brogan, head of international sales in New York, played a central role in the distribution of King Features. In the late 1920s, he set up various agencies or partnerships in Europe: for example, in France with Paul Winkler's Opera Mundi syndicate, and in Italy with the newspaper Corriere della Sera. The way American comics were published in Europe could differ considerably from their original publication. For example, outside the US, Mickey Mouse appeared not only as a daily comic strip, but also as a weekly comic strip or was immediately compiled in album form. Not all foreign publications treated the original with the same respect. While the French daily Le Petit Parisien and the Finnish Helsingin Sanomat published the comic in its original form, i.e. as a daily strip with speech bubbles, the Swedish Stockholms Dagblad removed the speech bubbles and replaced them with captions. Weekly magazines such as the German Kölnische Illustrierte Zeitung or the Italian Illustrazione del popolo retained the speech bubbles, but compiled several daily strips on one page, as one strip per week would have been a little meager for readers.
Finally, not all foreign Mickey comics at that time were of North American origin: in England, Mickey Mouse Annual was published, for which new material was created by the British artist Wilfred Haughton.
American balloons versus European captions
At that time, speech bubbles in comics were still quite unusual throughout continental Europe. Following the lead of conservative educators, publishers did not consider speech bubbles to be suitable for children and preferred captions, as these were more reminiscent of ‘real’ literature. After all, comics were supposed to serve as a stepping stone to that. In general, European comics looked old-fashioned and stiff until well into the 1930s. While Americans were already making full use of speech bubbles after the turn of the century, it took until the 1920s for a few comics in Europe to start using them:
- the German Fritz Gareis with Bilderbogen des kleinen Lebens (1924),
- the Frenchman Alain Saint-Ogan with Zig et Puce (1925),
- the Swede Elov Persson with Kronblom (1927),
- the Belgian Hergé with Tintin (1929),
- the Austrian Ladislaus Kmoch with Tobias Seicherl (1930).
But these European balloon comics remained the exception rather than the rule. Even when the French youth magazine Coeurs Vaillants published Hergé's first story, Tintin au Pays des Soviets, captions were added. This was a practice that had been used in continental Europe since the early 20th century for translations of American balloon comics.
Mickey's arrival in the Low Countries
In 1931, just over a year after the cartoon mouse made his debut in the US as a daily comic strip, a translated version appeared in a Dutch weekly magazine (Wereldkroniek). However, this did not last long, because seven months later, two Dutch daily newspapers (De Telegraaf & De Courant) took this comic strip series over. Remarkably, these Dutch newspapers did not start with the beginning of the story (Mickey Mouse and the Ransom Plot), but with episode 43, almost halfway through! The newspaper did provide a limited textual introduction: a very brief presentation of the main characters and the situation. Another problem was that, barely two weeks after the start, these newspapers decided to take drastic action: they removed the speech bubbles and added captions.
The places in a panel where a speech bubble covered decorative elements were sometimes partially redrawn (as in the first three panels), but decorative elements were also erased along with the speech bubbles. The result was an excess of ugly white spaces in originally well-filled pictures. The Dutch newspapers stubbornly persisted with this amputation until the beginning of May 1940 (the German invasion).
Belgian newspapers lagged somewhat behind their Dutch and other European counterparts. The French-language daily Le Vingtième Siècle, which already featured Tintin in its children's supplement, announced the arrival of Mickey at the end of October 1932, “exclusively for Belgium”! From November 1, 1932, Les aventures de Mickey appeared in this Brussels daily in their original form (i.e., with speech bubbles), which was not surprising given that Mickey appeared with speech bubbles in the French daily Le Petit Parisien and that their children's supplement already featured a speech bubble comic strip (Hergé's Tintin). Just like in Dutch newspapers, this newspaper did not start with the actual beginning of a story, but only with the 37th strip of The Great Orphanage Robbery! This story ended on January 25, 1933, and was followed on January 27 by Mickey Mouse Sails for Treasure Island. But that second story was never published in its entirety, as it stopped halfway through: on May 12, 1933, the last Mickey comic appeared, without further explanation, but probably to Hergé's relief, as it meant one less direct competitor.
Later that year, on October 24, the Walloon newspaper La Meuse started a new Mickey story (Pluto and the Dogcatcher): first under the title Pour nos jeunes lecteurs ('For our young readers'), later under Nos feuilletons dessinés ('Our illustrated serials'). This initiative lasted much longer, namely until May 1940.
While French-speaking Belgium mirrored France culturally, Flanders looked more to the Netherlands: the daily newspapers De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad therefore opted for the Dutch approach when they launched Mickey as daily comic strips in early 1933: the captions from De Telegraaf were simply copied verbatim, but in a different font. Until May 1940, this comic strip remained a regular feature in both Flemish newspapers.
Other European distribution
During the 1930s, youth magazines featuring Mickey Mouse (or their own variation on him) as the title character appeared in numerous countries: first in Italy, then in France, Spain, Great Britain, Yugoslavia, Switzerland, Sweden, Poland... Most were fairly successful (for example, in Italy, with a circulation of 50,000 copies), but it was the French Le Journal de Mickey that made a huge impact. Paul Winkler, who had been running the Opera Mundi syndicate since 1928 and had obtained the exclusive rights to King Features comics, launched his own weekly magazine with the mouse as the title character, because no other publisher wanted to do so. Le Journal de Mickey not only published Disney comics, but also other American material (adventure comics) from King Features, which Winkler already had in his portfolio. It quickly reached a circulation of 400,000 copies. In Europe, no other magazine, all things considered, was as successful. Following in the footsteps of this weekly magazine, other youth magazines appeared with American work, i.e., with speech bubbles. European authors and publishers now had to adapt if they did not want to be completely pushed out of the market. In many European countries, we see new publications with American speech bubble comics.
Some examples are:
- in Italy Topolino (1933) and L'avventuroso (1934),
- in Serbia Strip and Crtani film (1934),
- in the Netherlands Doe Mee! (1936),
- in Belgium Bravo! (1936), Spirou / Robbedoes (1938)
- in France, among others, Jumbo (1935), Junior (1936) and Hop-là (1937)
The breakthrough of the speech balloon was a fact in most European countries by the end of the 1930s, but in some countries, such as Germany and the Dutch-speaking region, the old style was still used, even though they were already publishing their own speech balloon comics.
This spectacular development was thus blocked by the outbreak of World War II. After the war, Mickey would return as the title character of several magazines in France (Le Journal de Mickey) and Germany (Micky Mouse Magazin), among others. But in Belgium, Mickey Magazine, with both French and Dutch editions, only lasted four years.
Make way for the quacking duck!
Mickey's rise in continental Europe was not only halted by the outbreak of war, but he also faced stiff competition from within his own ‘stable’. After Donald Duck's first appearance in the short cartoon The Wise Little Hen (1934), Disney employees Al Taliaferro and Tom Osborne were able to feature him in their Sunday Page (a weekly comic strip in the Sunday supplement) Silly Symphonies in 1936. From 1938, the duck also got a daily comic strip, later followed by a Sunday Page and, from 1942, also in the new popular comic book format. But actually, just before the start of the American daily comic strip, an Italian (Federico Pedrocchi) had launched a Donald Duck comic strip in the new magazine Paperino e altre avventure, named after the Italian name for the duck.
Nowadays, comic books are often associated with superheroes, but in the 1950s, Walt Disney Comics was by far the best-selling monthly title (with 3 million copies), which Batman or Superman could not compete with. After the war, the comic book publication format would be adopted in several European countries. But unlike the US, where comic books tended to be published monthly, countries such as Italy, Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands opted for a weekly publication schedule for their Donald Duck magazines. Other comic books for young people were also published weekly. This difference in publication frequency meant that the supply of American material was quickly exhausted. In order to provide sufficient material for national weekly publication, local Disney studios were set up in the above-mentioned European countries. Over time, more Disney comics were produced by Europeans than by the American studio. From 2000 onwards, the Italian headquarters of Disney Publishing Worldwide even took over the management of Disney publications worldwide.
Unprecedented impact of the mouse
The arrival of Mickey Mouse, especially in the respectful version (i.e., with speech bubbles), had a decisive influence on the further course of European comic history. His introduction paved the way for the import of other American comics into the European press.
An example of this breakthrough can be found in the Walloon newspaper La Meuse. From October 1933, the daily newspaper published Mickey, as already mentioned, and this was apparently so successful that in 1936 the newspaper launched a veritable comic strip offensive: from then on, Mickey was joined every day by five other mainly American speech bubble comics (Popeye, Blondie, Secret Agent X, Tim Tyler's Luck) and one wordless French gag comic, Professeur Nimbus. La Meuse announced it as an unprecedented novelty, which it was, within the Belgian context. The editors placed these comics under the heading feuilletons dessinés ('drawn serials'), as the term bande dessinée did not yet exist at that time. This pattern was maintained until the German invasion.
The fact that the winds were changing in the late 1930s is also evident from the launch of new youth magazines in Belgium: Bravo! and Spirou / Robbedoes were partly filled with American work, but also with balloon comics by French and Belgian authors.
In France, too, American comics were hugely successful, especially in the new youth magazines, to such an extent that French press cartoonists themselves had less work. As early as 1936, their associations wrote a letter to the French government complaining about foreign competition and demanding measures, which would not be taken until 1949.
In the Dutch-speaking region, the transition to balloon comics was slower than in most European countries, and I suspect that the decision by Dutch and Flemish newspapers to use captions when publishing 'Mikkie' played a crucial role in this. New youth magazines such as Doe Mee! and Bravo! did start including American balloon strips in 1936, but most Dutch comic publications, especially in daily newspapers, stuck with captions.
Training the next generation of comic strip authors
For young readers in the 1930s, Mickey Mouse was a revelation. It was appealing for various reasons: not only because of its popularity from the cartoons, but also because of its own qualities as a modern comic strip: dynamic, exciting storytelling, speech bubbles... A number of readers from that period developed a taste for creating such comic strips themselves. This is evident from the testimonies of a number of well-known authors:
The Frenchman Albert Uderzo (of Astérix, Tanguy et Laverdure, among others):
"For me, Mickey was above all the hero of the first comic strip I ever read. He first appeared as a modest but daily comic strip in Le Petit Parisien. Then, from the start, I became a reader of Journal de Mickey.
During that period, I started telling stories through my drawings. I was about ten years old. I was strongly inspired by Walt Disney. I loved the grotesque style. My characters looked like gnomes with enormous noses and exaggeratedly large feet." (translation from French quote Philippsen & Uderzo 1985: 19)
Belgian André Franquin (Spirou & Fantasio, Gaston Lagaffe, among others):
"Walt Disney, wow, what a pleasure we owe him! The Mickey Mouse albums from the Hachette collection were my favorite books; we threw them away, but I bought them again long after. It's moving to rediscover what we saw when we were little. (...) And when I rediscovered those albums, I realized that I had learned my craft from them..." (translation from French quote Sadoul 1986:20)
Franquin found that there was a great deal of expression in the eyes and gestures, and learned useful techniques such as a shadow cast by a character on the floor.
These are just two testimonials, but they are not insignificant, because countless others would be inspired. The importance of Disney's mouse in the early 1930s cannot be underestimated.
Sources
next to online data bases such as Delpher, de KBR en I.N.D.U.C.K.S., Lambiek Comiclopedia the following publications:
- Andrae, Thomas (2011) ‘Of Mouse & Man, Floyd Gotfredson and the the Mickey Mouse continuities’, In David Gerstein & Gary Groth (eds) (2011). Walt Disney’ Mickey Mouse “Trapped on Treasure Island” by Floyd Gottfredson, Fantagraphics Books, pp. 8-13.
- Beccatini, Alberto (2016). Disney Comics: The Whole Story, BearManor Media.
- Gerstein, David (2011) ‘Starting the Strip’, In David,Gerstein & Gary Groth (eds) (2011). Walt Disney’ Mickey Mouse “Race to Death Valley” by Floyd Gottfredson, Fantagraphics Books, 227-230.Goddin, Philippe (2007). Hergé, lignes de vie : Biographie. Editions Moulinsart.
- Groensteen, Thierry (2000). ‘Why are Comics Still in Search of Cultural Legitimization?’ In: Anne Magnussen & Hans-Christian Christiansen. 2000. Comics & Culture. Analytical and Theoretical Approaches to Comics. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press.
- Haver, Gianni, & Meyer, Michaël (2016). ‘Paperinik, ou comment les Italiens sont parvenus à mettre des pantalons à Donald Duck.’ Marc Atallah & Alain Boillat (eds). BD-US: les comics vus par l’Europe, 59-78.
- Lefèvre, Pascal (2006). ‘The Battle over the Balloon, The conflictual institutionalization of the speech balloon in various countries,’ Image (&) Narrative, Online Magazine of the Visual Narrative, N° 14, online. https://www.imageandnarrative.be/inarchive/painting/pascal_levevre.htm
- Lefèvre, Pascal, Aerts, Kim, Caenepeel, Tim, & Minet, Dieter (2011). ‘De doorbraak van de strip als populair medium in de Vlaamse pers van de jaren dertig,’ Tijdschrift voor Mediageschiedenis, Vol. 14, N° 1, juni 2011, p. 5-24,
- Philippsen, Christian, & Uderzo, Albert (1985). Uderzo de Flamberge à Astérix, Philippsen, p. 19.
- Sadoul, Numa (1986). Et Franquin créa la Gaffe. Entretiens avec Numa Sadoul, Distri BD, p. 20.
- Scholz, Michael F. (2017). ‘US-Comics erobern Europa: Zur Geschichte eines Kulturexports von der Jahrhundertwende bis zur Mitte der 1930er Jahre.’ In: Matthias Harbeck, Linda-Rabea Heyden, & Marie Schröer (eds) Comics an der Grenze: Sub/Versionen von Form und Inhalt, Berlin: Christian A. Bachmann Verlag , 2017, 1, pp. 31-47.
- Weber, Patrick (2014). La Grande Histoire du Journal de Mickey, de 1934 à nos jours. Glénat.
- Zanettin, Ferderico (2017: 7-9). ‘Translation, censorship and the development of European comics cultures.’ Perspectives, 1-17.
