My sister sent me this link to an archived cartoon that ran 1907-1928, and I thought it was a peach.

It’s an unconscionably grouchy cartoon called “The Outbursts of Everett True,” and the set-up is so simple that modern cartoonists and cartoon-lovers are bound to feel jealous of what you could get away with in a simpler day.

The formula — virtually unchanging for its 21-year run — went like this:

1. Panel 1 — Our hero Everett True — a thick-set, middle-aged man about town — is offended or annoyed with rude person or persons while carrying out an everyday activity.
2. Panel 2 — Mr. True administers punishment to the miscreant(s). This can take the form of a sound drubbing or a tongue-lashing, and frequently it’s both.

May not sound like much, but I can imagine city-dwellers in the new century, annoyed constantly by the changing ethos of the era of traffic jams (horse and/or auto), lines at the market and relaxed rules of behavior, taking great solace and vindication as Everett True lets fly. The rest of us might have to sit idly by while the shopclerks compare notes on their boyfriends. But Everett True leaves them peeping from behind the counter amidst flying merchandise as he bellows:

Confound your gabble!! Does the owner of this store pay you cacklers to talk about your beaux and let customers stand around and wait till you finish? Get busy here before I wreck this establishment!!!!

Just reminds me that then, as now, the great challenge that all of us have to figure out is how in the world to stand each other, if we’re obliged to stand so infernally close together. If we can all survive the dense populations that we’ve chosen to live in, it’ll surely be a testament to the grace of God among us.

By the way, for those that love this kind of retro cartoon humor, James Lileks also has an archive of old 50’s bad comic strips and advertisement cartoons, all with some nearly-perfect commentary. Archives here. My guilty-pleasure favorite — Mr. Coffee Nerves — (which I have to rate PG-13 for a few coarse expressions) is here.