''Abbie an' Slats'' is an American

comic strip A comic strip is a Comics, sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often Serial (literature), serialized, with text in Speech balloon, balloons and Glossary of comics ter ...

which ran from July 12, 1937, to January 30, 1971, initially written by

Al Capp Alfred Gerald Caplin (September 28, 1909 – November 5, 1979), better known as Al Capp, was an American cartoonist and humorist best known for the satirical comic strip ''Li'l Abner'', which he created in 1934 and continued writing and (wi ...

and drawn by Raeburn Van Buren. It was distributed by

United Feature Syndicate United Feature Syndicate (UFS) is a large American editorial column and comic strip newspaper syndication service based in the United States and established in 1919. Originally part of E. W. Scripps Company, it was part of United Media (along ...

Publication history

''Abbie an' Slats'' was Capp's idea; he intended to start a second strip after the success of his popular ''

Li'l Abner ''Li'l Abner'' is a satirical American comic strip that appeared in many newspapers in the United States, Canada and Europe. It featured a fictional clan of hillbillies in the impoverished mountain village of Dogpatch, USA. Written and drawn b ...

''. Instead of drawing it himself, Capp recruited well-established freelance magazine illustrator Van Buren. Initially, Van Buren turned down Capp's offer, but he was lured by the prospect of steady work. The strip was widely syndicated to 400 newspapers, but it never equalled the popularity of ''Li'l Abner''. Capp abandoned the strip in 1945, turning the writing chores over to his brother

Elliot Caplin Elliot Caplin (December 25, 1913 - February 20, 2000) was a comic strip writer best known as the co-creator (with Stan Drake) of ''The Heart of Juliet Jones''. His name is sometimes spelled with one extra letter: Elliott A. Caplin. He was the youn ...

. Taking on Andy Sprague as an assistant in 1947, Van Buren continued to draw the strip, and it ended with his retirement in 1971. Van Buren continued ''Abbie an' Slats'' for 34 years, retiring in 1971. The

National Cartoonists Society The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...

named him to their Hall of Fame in 1979.

Characters and story

In 1937, the story began with stubborn, street-wise Aubrey Eustace Scrapple, aka Slats, recently orphaned in New York. Arriving by train in a small town of Crabtree Corners, where he was met by his older cousin, the spinster Abigail Scrapple, aka Abbie. Slats joined the household that also included Abbie's sister, the prim and proper Sally. Slats made an enemy of skinflint Jasper Hagstone when he drove into Hagstone's limousine while trying to avoid running over a dog. However, Hagstone's daughter, Judy, became the object of Slats' affection. Later, Becky Groggins became Slats' sweetheart. Becky's father, J. Pierpont "Bathless" Groggins, eventually became the central character of the

Sunday strip The Sunday comics or Sunday strip is the comic strip section carried in most western newspapers, almost always in color. Many newspaper readers called this section the Sunday funnies, the funny papers or simply the funnies. The first US newspap ...

Raeburn Van Buren and Abigail Van Buren

In 1984, Van Buren sent a gift to "

Dear Abby Dear Abby is an American advice column founded in 1956 by Pauline Phillips under the pen name "Abigail Van Buren" and carried on today by her daughter, Jeanne Phillips, who now owns the legal rights to the pen name. History According to Pauli ...

" columnist Abigail Van Buren ( Pauline Phillips). She wrote back on November 30, 1984, thanking him and then commented on the name similarity:

Reprints

Most books collecting vintage comic strips suffer a loss in reproduction because clippings from newspapers are the usual source, but two ''Abbie an' Slats'' books displayed a higher quality because they were compiled from original proof sheets by publisher Ken Pierce.

References

External links