Back to the Drawing Board
When I was a kid - and bear in mind how much I love New Hampshire - I harbored a secret wish that one day my family would move to Riverdale.
I wanted to hang out with Archie.
You know, Archie Andrews, like in the comic book.
Yes, Archie, that eternally boyish, perpetual high school junior who proved on a daily basis that Riverdale was better than a male Fantasy Island in that the women there - Betty and Veronica in particular - actually fought over the men.
(For the record - and this is a pivotal, soul-baring, either-or choice that provides more definitive insight into the individual male psyche than any Rorschach test could ever reveal - I would have chosen Betty.)
All the better that this idyllic village of Riverdale was the vision of Bob Montana, the Manchester Central High School graduate (1940-A) who never lost the ability to convey the sense of joy and wonder - and absurdity - that is high school.
"To me, Bob Montana and 'Archie' are Manchester's best-kept secrets," said syndicated cartoonist Larry White.
If so, the secret will be out on Thursday. That's when the Manchester Historic Association will hold a commemorative presentation of Montana's work, including original strips, early samples of his drawings and a discussion featuring Larry White and long-time Montana collaborator Jeff Cuddy.
"It was a real privilege to work with him,' Jeff said, "because he taught me everything I know about comics. When I was learning his technique, I would stand and his shoulder and watch him and he was just so deft. He could just make those characters come alive."
In many ways, they're still alive.
So pervasive is the "Archie" influence in America that in the formative years of our most cutting-edge source of information - the Internet - programmers came up with a tool for searching archives.
Naturally, they named it "Archie."
Just last September, Archie and Veronica (that vixen!) wound up on the cover of "Yahoo," a leading Internet magazine. Now comes word that filmmaker Tommy O'Haver - a big hit at the most recent Sundance Film Festival - is set to write and direct a musical comedy based on Archie & Company.
Not bad for characters who've been around since 1941.
That's when they were first liberated from Montana's imagination. With an alleged nudge from MLJ publisher John Goldwater, Bob's vision of the typical American teenager made a near-simultaneous debut in two comic books - "Pep" (#22) and "Jackpot" (#4) for you collectors out there - and by the fall of 1942, the comic book had Archie's name on top.
Of course, by that time, Montana was serving with the U.S. Army Signal Corps. Upon his discharge in 1946, at the behest of King Features Syndicate, he moved "Archie" from comic book to newspaper strip - the reverse of the normal order - on the road to global renown.
At its peak, "Archie" appeared in more than 700 newspapers worldwide, and that's not counting the proliferation of comic book spin-offs like "Archie's Joke Book" or "Archie's Pal, Jughead" or "Archie's Girls, Betty and Veronica" and so on and so on.
"Since it caught hold, 'Archie' has been the largest selling non-super hero comic in the world," White said. "It's always been a good, clean comic that's been safe for the kids but adults enjoyed it so much they even came out with a series of miniature books so it wouldn't look like they were reading comic books."
Such concern for appearances would not have troubled Montana, who was delightfully non-conformist. Perhaps that's to be expected from a man who - as the son of traveling vaudevillians - was born in the proverbial footlocker. His mom was a Ziegfeld girl named Roberta Pandolfini and his father was a banjo player named Ray Coleman who took, as his stage name, "The Great Montana."
The name stuck with the son.
So did the entertainer's mindset.
And when fate brought him to Manchester from Haverhill, Massachusetts, the Granite State simply became the confluence for rivers of talent and timing.
Naturally, such genius cannot function in a vacuum. Once established in the post-war era, Montana settled in Meredith, but his palette was continually enriched by family globetrotting. Prolonged stays in Mexico and Spain and Italy provided him with fresh ideas for the strip, as did the family itself.
"He had four children," Cuddy said, "and he told them, anyone who has an idea, put it on the refrigerator and I'll give you a quarter."
Certainly Montana struck a more lucrative arrangement with his assistant, Ruth Harding, the Maine native who not only lettered the strip, but offered situations and notions for the characters that Bob would then flesh out.
By 1962 - after creating an "Archie" mural in the Manchester eatery called the Deli-Rama that delighted Montana - Jeff was added to the mix as an inker and finish artist. That threesome thrived until Bob Montana's sudden death - he suffered a heart attack while cross-country skiing at the age of 55 - in 1975.
In an effort to keep the strip in New Hampshire, Cuddy picked up the mantle, but after a few weeks, he graciously bowed out.
"Bob was a genius," he said. "I couldn't keep up."
Who could? Over the years, the demands of this demanding trade have grown exponentially. With "Garfield" creator Jim Davis now presiding over a team of 35 artists and writers, one can only marvel at Montana's singular ability to create such a memorable stable of characters.
Bet you still remember them.
In addition to the headliners we've already mentioned, there's the oleaginous Reggie Mantle, the lunkhead Moose Mason, goofy Big Ethel Muggs, the crotchety Miss Grundy, the balloonish and buffoonish principal, Mr. Wetherbee, and who could forget the prototypical cafeteria crone, Miss Beazly?
(Juts to prove no good deed goes unpunished, when the American Society of Dietitians begged Montana to replace Miss Beazly with a more attractive character, he complied. He was then besieged by readers who wanted him to restore his less-than-comely creation. Eventually, he bowed to the wishes of the majority.)
In the end, however - at least in these parts - Bob Montana's most enduring creation may have been Bob Montana himself.
