Moon Mullins

Frank Willard's Moon Mullins (October 5, 1924)
Author(s)	Frank Willard, Ferd Johnson
Current status / schedule	Concluded
Launch date	June 19, 1923
End date	June 2, 1991
Syndicate(s)	Chicago Tribune/New York News Syndicate
Publisher(s)	Dover Publications, Whitman Publishing, Cupples & Leon
Genre(s)	Humor

Moon Mullins, created by cartoonist Frank Willard (1893–1958), was a popular American comic strip which had a long run as both a daily and Sunday feature from June 19, 1923 to June 2, 1991. Syndicated by the Chicago Tribune/New York News Syndicate, the strip depicts the lives of diverse lowbrow characters who reside at the Schmaltz (later Plushbottom) boarding house. The central character, Moon (short for Moonshine), is a would-be prizefighter—perpetually strapped for cash but with a roguish appetite for vice and high living. Moon took a room in the boarding house at 1323 Wump Street in 1924 and never left, staying on for 67 years.

Frank Henry Willard was born on September 21, 1893 in Anna, Illinois, the son of a physician, who early on determined to become a cartoonist. After attending the Academy of Fine Arts in Chicago in 1913, he was a staff artist with the Chicago Herald (1914–18), where he drew the Sunday kids' page Tom, Dick and Harry and another strip, Mrs. Pippin's Husband. He next wrote and drew The Outta Luck Club for King Features Syndicate (1919–23).

In The Comics (1947), Coulton Waugh described Willard's art style as "gritty-looking." In 2003, the Scoop newsletter documented the 1923 events that led to the creation of the strip:

Reportedly, the strip was originally intended as a rival for King Features' Barney Google, also about a lovable, banjo-eyed lowlife at home in the sporting world. It proved so popular that men named Mullins, born from about the 19-teens through the 1960s, were as likely as not to be nicknamed "Moon." Willard was in tune with the working class characters he created, as noted by David Westbrook in From Hogan's Alley to Coconino County: Four Narratives of the Early Comic Strip:

After Johnson took over, other colorful characters were added to the cast, including:

The strip was reviewed by Dr. Hermes in Dr. Hermes Retro-Scans: