Skippy was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 comic strip

Comic strip

A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....

 written and drawn by Percy Crosby

Percy Crosby

Percy Leo Crosby was an American author, illustrator and cartoonist best known for his popular comic strip Skippy. Adapted into movies, a novel and a radio show, Crosby's creation was commemorated on a 1997 U.S. Postal Service stamp...

 that was published from 1923 to 1945. A highly popular, acclaimed and influential feature about rambunctious fifth-grader Skippy Skinner, his friends and his enemies, it was adapted into movies, a novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

 and a radio show. It was commemorated on a 1997 U.S. Postal Service stamp

Postage stamp

A postage stamp is a small piece of paper that is purchased and displayed on an item of mail as evidence of payment of postage. Typically, stamps are made from special paper, with a national designation and denomination on the face, and a gum adhesive on the reverse side...

 and was the basis for a wide range of merchandising

Merchandising

Merchandising is the methods, practices, and operations used to promote and sustain certain categories of commercial activity. In the broadest sense, merchandising is any practice which contributes to the sale of products to a retail consumer...

 that includes Skippy peanut butter

Peanut butter

Peanut butter is a food paste made primarily from ground dry roasted peanuts, popular in North America, Netherlands, United Kingdom, and parts of Asia, particularly the Philippines and Indonesia. It is mainly used as a sandwich spread, sometimes in combination as in the peanut butter and jelly...

.

An early influence on cartoonist

Cartoonist

A cartoonist is a person who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is usually humorous, mainly created for entertainment, political commentary or advertising...

 Charles Schulz and an inspiration for his Peanuts

Peanuts

Peanuts is a syndicated daily and Sunday American comic strip written and illustrated by Charles M. Schulz, which ran from October 2, 1950, to February 13, 2000, continuing in reruns afterward...

, Skippy is considered one of the classics of the form. In Vanity Fair

Vanity Fair (magazine)

Vanity Fair is a magazine of pop culture, fashion, and current affairs published by Condé Nast. The present Vanity Fair has been published since 1983 and there have been editions for four European countries as well as the U.S. edition. This revived the title which had ceased publication in 1935...

, humorist Corey Ford

Corey Ford

Corey Ford was an American humorist, author, outdoorsman, and screenwriter. He was also friendly with several members of the Algonquin Round Table and occasionally ate lunch there....

 described it as "America's most important contribution to humor of the century", while comics historian John A. Lent wrote, "The first half-century of the comics spawned many kid strips, but only one could be elevated to the status of classic... which innovated a number of sophisticated and refined touches used later by Charles Schulz and Bill Watterson

Bill Watterson

William Boyd Watterson II , known as Bill Watterson, is an American cartoonist and the author of the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes...

..." Comics artist Jerry Robinson

Jerry Robinson

Jerry Robinson is an American comic book artist best known for his work on DC Comics' Batman line of comics during the 1940s.He was inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2004.-Career:...

 said,
Skippy started in 1923 as a cartoon in Life

Life (magazine)

Life generally refers to three American magazines:*A humor and general interest magazine published from 1883 to 1936. Time founder Henry Luce bought the magazine in 1936 solely so that he could acquire the rights to its name....

 and became a syndicated

Print syndication

Print syndication distributes news articles, columns, comic strips and other features to newspapers, magazines and websites. They offer reprint rights and grant permissions to other parties for republishing content of which they own/represent copyrights....

 comic strip

Comic strip

A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....

 two years later through King Features Syndicate

King Features Syndicate

King Features Syndicate, a print syndication company owned by The Hearst Corporation, distributes about 150 comic strips, newspaper columns, editorial cartoons, puzzles and games to nearly 5000 newspapers worldwide...

. Creator Crosby retained the copyright

Copyright

Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...

, a rarity for comic strip artists of the time.

Characters and story

The strip focused on Skippy Skinner, a young boy living in the city. Usually wearing an enormous collar and tie and a floppy checked hat, he was an odd mix of mischief and melancholy who might equally be found stealing from the corner fruit stand, failing to master skates or baseball, complaining about the adult world, or staring sadly at an old relative's grave ("And only last year she gave me a tie").

The syndicated strip was enormously popular, at one point guaranteeing Crosby $2,350 a week, an enormous sum in those days. Always Belittlin and other topper strips ran above Skippy on Crosby's Sunday page.

Grosset & Dunlap

Grosset & Dunlap

Grosset & Dunlap is a United States book publisher founded in 1898.The company was purchased by G. P. Putnam's Sons in 1982 and today is part of the British publishing conglomerate, Pearson PLC through its American subsidiary Penguin Group....

 published Crosby's Skippy novel in 1929. There were Skippy dolls, toys and comic books. The strip was adapted as a movie by Paramount. A success, it won director Norman Taurog

Norman Taurog

Norman Rae Taurog was an American film director, and screenwriter.Between 1920 and 1968, Taurog directed over 140 films, and directed Elvis Presley in more movies than any other director...

 the Academy Award for Best Director and boosted the career of young star Jackie Cooper

Jackie Cooper

Jackie Cooper was an American actor, television director, producer and executive. He was a child actor who managed to make the transition to an adult career. Cooper was the first child actor to receive an Academy Award nomination...

. Crosby disliked the film, and though he had to allow a previously contracted sequel (Sooky) to be made the next year, he never let another Skippy movie be made.

During the WWII years, Crosby's conservative

Conservatism

Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism...

 politics increasingly intruded on the strip, and it began to lose readers. Negotiations on a new contract failed, and Crosby ended Skippy in 1945. His final years were tragic; he was unable to find steady work and drifted into alcoholism. After a 1949 suicide attempt, he was placed in the asylum at Kings Park, New York

Kings Park, New York

Kings Park is a census-designated place in the town Smithtown, Suffolk County, New York, United States, on Long Island. The population was 17,282 as of the 2010 census....

, where he died in 1964, unable to secure release.

Trademark conflict

"Skippy" was first used as a trademark

Trademark

A trademark, trade mark, or trade-mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or...

 for peanut butter by the Rosefield Packing Co., Ltd.

Joseph L. Rosefield

Joseph Louis Rosefield was a California food businessman who invented modern, nonseparating peanut butter in 1922 – 1923. His family business, the Rosefield Packing Company, was based in Alameda. His new production process was licensed to another company to make Peter Pan peanut...

, of Alameda, California

Alameda, California

Alameda is a city in Alameda County, California, United States. It is located on Alameda Island and Bay Farm Island, and is adjacent to Oakland in the San Francisco Bay. The Bay Farm Island portion of the city is adjacent to the Oakland International Airport. At the 2010 census, the city had a...

, in 1933. Percy Crosby had the trademark invalidated in 1934, but Rosefield persisted after Crosby was committed to an asylum, and its successor companies, including Unilever

Unilever

Unilever is a British-Dutch multinational corporation that owns many of the world's consumer product brands in foods, beverages, cleaning agents and personal care products....

, were granted rights to the trademark over the objection of Crosby's heirs. There has been much litigation on this point, some of which has continued into the 2000s.