Mickey Finn (comics)

Mickey Finn was an American comic strip created by cartoonist Lank Leonard, which was syndicated to newspapers from 1936 to 1976. The successful lighthearted strip struck a balance between comedy and drama. It was adapted to a 400-page Little Big Book and was reprinted in several comic book series throughout the 1930s and 1940s.

Distributed by the McNaught Syndicate, cartoonist Lank Leonard's Mickey Finn debuted as a daily strip on Monday, April 6, 1936. The Sunday strip, which eventually focused on the supporting character of Uncle Phil, began on May 17 of that same year.

Leonard was assisted by Tony DiPreta (from 1945–50) and by Mart Bailey from 1950 in New York. In 1952, Bailey moved to Miami to help Leonard with the strip until July 1959. After Leonard retired in 1968, Morris Weiss continued the strip, though under Leonard's byline.

Morris Weiss, Leonard's assistant from 1936 to 1943 and again from 1960 on, took over following Leonard's illness in 1968. Weiss continued through the final Sunday strip on December 21, 1975 and the daily strip's finale on July 31, 1976. Other 1940s assistants were Ray McGill, John Vita, Allie Vita and Larry Tullapano. Early in his career, DiPreta did the strip's lettering.

The storyline centered on likable Irish-American police officer Michael Aloysius "Mickey" Finn in suburban Port Chester, New York. Leonard based the character on Port Chester policeman Mickey Brennan after watching Brennan helping children cross the street.

Like other police strips, it surfaced in the wake of the blockbuster Dick Tracy, but Mickey Finn was more analogous to the popular 1970s television program Barney Miller, focusing on humor and character rather than on action or mystery. Historian Tom Whissen found it "one of the few comic strips ever to portray a city policeman in a manner that avoided either sentimentality or sensationalism."

...
Wikipedia