Talk:George Herriman

Herriman's ancestry
To the anon editing from 70.22.210.31, what is the source of your information? Your change of Herriman's ancestry to being the son of "a French father and African-American mother" seems contradicted by census information listing both parents as "colored" or "mulatto". Wondering, -- Infrogmation 20:32, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm new to Wikipedia so I don't know if this is showing up right...

My source of information about Herriman's parents is reading on other Web sites; unfortunately I can't cite them right now. They said that his father was a French chef and his mother an African American. The reason I removed the item about his being "Creole" is that Wikipedia's own page on Creole (Louisiana) indicates that in the Louisiana/New Orleans context, "Creole" has nothing to do with race.

Furthermore... I really don't care how Herriman's racial identity is described, but before you go immediately undoing all of my edits, why don't you check the page on Lousiana Creoles for yourself? The way you wrote this makes Wikipedia internally contradictory. User:70.22.210.31


 * Thanks for the reply. I think the recent edits are okay; note the census designation of his family as "mulatto". The part of town he grew up in was predominently Creole at the time, and I'm not away of anything contradictary with the info in the Louisiana section of the Creole article. Yes, "Creole" was cultural, the desination "of Color" is the racial part, to use terms of the era. Cheers, -- Infrogmation 00:07, 12 December 2005 (UTC)


 * It's also possible that "French chef" didn't mean that he was from France, but rather that he was a specialist in French cuisine. --Jfruh 03:26, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Minor points
I'm not going to bother editing this page anymore, since all my previous attempts were immediately undone. I will make a few minor points, however:

The second sentence currently reads: "George Herriman was born in a light-skinned Creole of Color family in New Orleans, Louisiana, both of his parents were listed as "mulatto" in the 1880 census."

That's a run-on sentence.

Also, since Herriman is primarily remembered (for most people, I'd say only remembered) for his creation of Krazy Kat (which I personally believe to be the greatest cartoon strip ever)... wouldn't it make more sense to somehow introduce Krazy Kat much earlier in the article? Right now it's basically chronological, which throws the first mention of Krazy Kat quite far down. Wouldn't it make more sense to put that mention right in the first sentence somehow?

Another point: I think the discussion of racial identity in Krazy Kat is fine, but it might leave a reader with the misimpression that that's primarily what the strip was about. Actually, the racial theme was only one of many in the strip; I believe that the majority of the strips had nothing to do with race.

Also, there's no mention in the article that many people consider Krazy Kat to be the greatest (or one of the greatest) strips ever done, and no explanation of what made the strip so great. Perhaps this would be too 'point of view' for an encyclopedia, but it seems that without this, why should most people (not very familiar with Krazy Kat) even care about Herriman or realize why he's so special? User:70.22.208.84

How was he able to pass as white? he's clearly part black. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.7.249.68 (talk • contribs)


 * "Clearly" to who? Many who knew him at the time didn't know. -- Infrogmation 16:33, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

okay, I guess I can see how people thought he was Greek but he looks very black. He looks like a fair-skinned black man.198.7.249.68 05:18, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

last strip
The article currently reads: "On June 25, 1944, two months after Herriman's death, the last of his Krazy Kat strips was printed; An un-inked penciling of a Sunday page found on his drawing board at the time of his death."

What does this mean? It makes no sense. It should be either "On June 25, 1944, two months after Herriman's death, the last of his Krazy Kat strips was printed: an un-inked penciling of a Sunday page found on his drawing board at the time of his death." or "On June 25, 1944, two months after Herriman's death, the last of his Krazy Kat strips was printed. An un-inked penciling of a Sunday page was found on his drawing board at the time of his death."

In other words, was the un-inked Sunday page the last strip printed, or was it left unprinted on his drawing table?

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.22.236.220 (talk • contribs)


 * I interpret it as the first, otherwise it would be illogical to mention this following a "two months later"-piece of information (but accidents may happen during editing). You may be right in that a colon is the better choice to relate this. A source ought to be at hand to remove the doubt..  M URGH   disc.  10:38, 14 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The (partly) uninked item found on Herriman's drawing board was actually a sequence of six dailies, as verified in McDonnell's _Krazy Kat: The Comic Art of George Herriman_ (1985, reprinted 1999). The incomplete dailies themselves were reprinted in _McSweeney's Quarterly Concern_ issue 13, a hardback literary journal that focuse on comics in that issue.
 * Murgh, with all due respect I'll make the change to your sentence about the final strip(s), as it's still ungrammatical and a bit confusing for the reasons cited. Ramapith 16:17, 1 December 2007 (UTC)


 * I appreciate your concern. I actually hadn't edited it in the hope that someone informed would make the appropriate fixes. Looks good, I'll just restore the MoS-T italics for the strip title ;^) M URGH   disc.  23:56, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Is "mulatto" Black?
Maybe I just don't understand racial profiling deeply enough, but given that Herriman's parents were both mulatto, that would make Herriman a mulatto, too, wouldn't it? A mulatto is, by definition, someone who is mixed-race, right? So is it really appropriate to have him placed in the "African-American comics creators" category? Wouldn't that be like saying he was all black?  C üRly T üRkey  Talk Contribs 05:08, 28 September 2012 (UTC)


 * The traditional view in most of the U.S. is in one-drop rule, but things were more complicated in New Orleans... AnonMoos (talk) 01:40, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Well he had african ancestry, and he was american. You do the math.

Musical Mose illustration
Seems to be in article twice... AnonMoos (talk) 01:41, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * You probably saw the article right in between edits. It's only there once now.  Curly Turkey (gobble) 02:27, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Top Importance?
There's a discussion on which comic-related articles should be listed as "Top Importance" on the importance scale, and I feel this article should not be included. If any user disagrees or wishes to contribute, please do so there. Argento Surfer (talk) 14:45, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Possibly interesting source
It looks like Ronald Paulson has interesting things to say about Herriman/Krazy Kat. Does anyone have access to this book? Curly Turkey (gobble) 23:56, 21 February 2013 (UTC)

Salary?
Article says he was paid $2/hour to do art for the paper. In 1897 that was a phenomenal income; Henry Ford in 1912 broke wage lines by paying $5/day to skilled workers. Should this perhaps be $2/day? Or is it $2/hour in 2013 money?
 * It may be that the source got the numbers wrong, but it would be a mistake to compare the wages of labourers and cartoonists. Especially at the time, cartoonists were in high demand and commanded a respectable income.  Their duties at included all the illustrations of a newspaper that today would be handled by photographs—and in 1897 there were as yet few comic strips. Curly Turkey (gobble) 21:59, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I can try to check the source myself, but if someone has it handier than I do, did the source itself cite a source? Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:06, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I've got the source, but I've just started work for the day, so it'll be a while before I can get home and check it. Curly Turkey (gobble) 23:13, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
 * $2 per week, not $2 per hour. He was 17 or so, and it was 1897.
 * That notwithstanding, I just want to say that this is a fantastic article. A lot of main page featured articles strike me as a bit marginal, but this one sets a high standard.  Fascinating and extremely educational, even to someone who had already read several books about Herriman and Krazy Kat.  John M Baker (talk) 23:32, 28 October 2013 (UTC)
 * If only Michael Tisserand could get around to getting his book published, the article could be even better. Tisserand went and dug up lots of information on the Herriman family in New Orleans, among other things.  I wonder what's holding the book up? Curly Turkey (gobble) 01:44, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

Tisserand here. Never tried to write on wiki before. But wanted to let you know that HarperCollins is publishing my Herriman bio in fall 2016. Lots of family and New Orleans info indeed. 72.204.168.46 (talk) 20:30, 21 January 2016 (UTC) Michael Tisserand

"Personal history"
"Personal history" seems like an odd choice of term for the opening section. Should we change the title of the section to "Biography"? 850 C (talk) 18:42, 16 October 2015 (UTC)
 * The whole article's a biography. Curly Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 21:29, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

Michael Tisserand's book provides earlier ancestry documentation - January 2017
Here's a link to a New York Times book review of Krazy: George Herriman, a Life in Black and White. The content in the review (12 January 2017), accessible online, can be used to update the page. -- Deborahjay (talk) 20:52, 16 January 2017 (UTC)
 * I've got the book ordered and will get around sometime to updating the whole article. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 21:23, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

External links found that need fixing
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 * Remember you added to the page, that IABot is only leaving messages on the talk page for this page.— CYBERPOWER  ( Chat ) 12:48, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Cyberpower678: right, thanks a lot! I've been meaning to do a major update to the article ... sould get on that one of these days ... Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 13:14, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Have you considered removing those tags again? IABot’s formatting engine has improved since last we spoke.— CYBERPOWER  ( Chat ) 14:52, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
 * Cyberpower678: You're right! It even readded the whitespace that had been stripped out by another bot at I Never Liked You.  Thanks a lot! Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 00:19, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

External links found that need fixing
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External links found that need fixing
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External links found that need fixing (April 2019)
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External links found that need fixing (August 2019)
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External links found that need fixing (December 2019)
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George Herriman III?
Because his grandfather was George Herriman Sr. and his father was George Herriman Jr., should the George Herriman of this article be referred to in some sections as George Herriman III? 172.250.44.165 (talk) 18:30, 12 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Not necessarily. If his middle name was different from theirs, he technically wouldn't be the third. (Also, nearly all of the places we call him "George Herriman" are direct quotes. In the context of the article he's just "Herriman" .) -Jason A. Quest (talk) 19:25, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

External links found that need fixing (December 2022)
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