Mad's Alfred E. Neuman?

I loved reading Mad comic books growing up, and still look back at the old issues every now and then. It's a great comical satire on today's television and movies. There are spoofs on just about anything in the entertainment business and let's face it, it's a formula that has always worked. It's a great comic book type magazine that I'm sure you've picked up once or twice in your life.

One of Mad's main faces is that of, Alfred E. Neuman, the "what, me worry?" mascot of the magazine.

Mad comic books didn't have Alfred as a poster boy for the first couple years of the magazine. The origin of Alfred E. Neuman is something in the blury past, and that took shape over decades while the character transformed into Mad's most famous celebrity. There was controversy over the use of the image but one thing is for sure, Alfred E. Neuman is a Mad icon that stays on top of today's stupidity, in a good way.

Although the origin of Alfred E. Neuman is not set in stone it is believed to be influenced from early images from the 19th century like, The Yellow Kid.

One of the first uses of this imagery is traced back to this image, The Yellow Kid, from 1897.
These early charactures were from Richard F. Outcault's strip, Hogan's Alley.

The Yellow Kid was used in various ads and had it's own comic strip.

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In the Nineteenth century, Irish immigrants were sometimes portrayed in publications with stereotypical ideas of the time. The use of exaggerated imagery in facial features created not so flattering images. The propaganda of the time was to portray the Irish immigrants as a creten and complaisant with poverty.

In the 20th century illustrators such as Joseph Keppler and Frederick Opper developed an Irish couple who lived in poverty but were content with their condition. These less threatening caricatures were soon adopted by advertisers to promote a variety of products. It had become common place and began showing up in commercial advertisements, like this dental ad from 1908. You can see the striking resemblence to Alfred E. Neuman, who wasn't used by Mad until 1954.

The images were used in mostly medical advertisements about hormone imbalances and deficiency diseases.

resource page, wikipedia

Before he was, Neuman, this face was also used in a negative way in politics , as the opponents "supporter".

It goes back as far as Franklin Delano Roosevelt's third-term reelection bid in 1940 by his opposers handing out cards with the character saying,"Sure I'm For Roosevelt.

The image was also reported around the same time as portraying a Jewish cariacture, as the "idiot". This was reported in Carl Djerassi's autobiography claims that in Vienna after the Anschluss, he saw posters with a similar face and the caption Tod den Juden , which means, "Death to the Jews".Resource Credit

Neuman's likeness has recently been used by, The Nation magazine, depicting Alfred E. Neuman and Bush. A similar take was also created using Neuman and President Obama's likeness in '08, by Mad.

The name was picked up from the music arranger, Alfred Newman, during 50's. He was well known for a production of The Black Swan from 1942 and also the catchy 20th Century Fox Intro that you've heard a million times.

The name "Alfred E. Neuman" came from comedian Henry Morgan's "Here's Morgan" radio series on both, ABC and NBC. There was a character on that show that was named Alfred Newman which was a character with a very short spot on the show.

One of the early Mad writers decided to change the spelling of Newman to Neuman, to avoid any legal problems. Mad was sued though by a woman claiming to have rights to the image, Mad fought back saying that they had created the image from publications dating back to 1911. This pre-dated the womans claims and the image has been property of Mad Magazine ever since.

Harvey Kurtzman, first noticed the image of Alfred supposedly in 1954, and said that he looked as if he didn't have a care in the world, except mischief. Neuman has been on over 500 issues of Mad since then and still continues to inspire culture and society.

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