The Ambassador (comic strip)
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The Ambassador is a short-lived newspaper comic strip created by Otto Soglow, known as "the placeholder" of The Little King.
[edit] Publication history
Since 1931, Soglow published his successful strip The Little King in The New Yorker, and it emerged that newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst was determined to see The Little King syndicated in his own King Features Syndicate, but contractual obligations prevented the transfer of the strip. Soglow solved this by selling Hearst a temporary, near-identical strip titled The Ambassador.[1]
When Soglow's contract with The New Yorker expired in 1934, The Little King was able to immediately resume as a King Features Sunday strip on September 9 of that year, only a week after the final New Yorker publication. Having outlived its purpose, The Ambassador was cancelled.
[edit] Format
A forerunner for the King's arrival in the form of an Ambassador, the similar wordless format was used, and the differences between the two strips were subtle. When the time came to change the title from The Ambassador to The Little King, the reader could not be certain if it was the Little King who had arrived into Hearst syndication, or the Ambassador who had removed some disguise.[2]
[edit] References
- Don Markstein's Toonopedia. The Little King.
- Footnotes
- ^ Time Magazine (September 17, 1934). Old King, New Kingdom.
- ^ Gardner, Jared, The Comics Journal (October 29, 2007). Otto Soglow and The Ambassador (excerpt). from The Comics Journal #286
