Groucho Marx

Much has been written about the famous American comedian and film star Julius Henry “Groucho” Marx. He was a star of the vaudeville, Broadway, Hollywood, radio and television.

Here are some of my favorite Marx one-liners :

A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five.

I have had a perfectly wonderful evening, but this wasn’t it.

I never forget a face, but in your case I’ll be glad to make an exception.

Outside of a dog, a book is a man’s best friend. Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.

Well, art is art, isn’t it? Still, on the other hand, water is water! And east is east and west is west and if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does. Now, uh… now you tell me what you know.

Wives are people who feel they don’t dance enough.

Women should be obscene and not heard.

Jacques Heim

Jacques Heim is one of coolest mu’f*ckers ever. Why? ‘Cuz he invented the mu’f*ckin’ bikini. As a result, the majority of my teenaged bonerials on the beaches of Florida where I grew up were thanks to this man’s work!

Heim introduced the bikini in Paris on July 25, 1946 – a day that needs to be recognized annually.

All women should be made to wear bikinis on that day – even Eskimo women!  Fat and octogenarian women may be excused, unless they have really awesome round boobie boobs.

Anyway. . . I , like, snapped into my own ‘Nam there for a sec. Sorry.

Heim named the piece after Bikini Atoll, a site used for nuclear weapon testing just a few days before. Heim knew that the burst of excitement the bikini would cause in pubescent boys would be akin to the nuclear device!

Hans Christian Anderson

I’m back after a week off – and today I bring you Danish author Hans Christian Anderson.  Anderson is most famous for his fairy tales “The Snow Queen”. “The Little Mermaid”, “The Ugly Ducking”, and others.

He visited Charles Dikens once in England and overstayed his welcome – despite constant hints to leave, Anderson freeloaded for five weeks! Dickens’ daughter said of Andersen, “He was a bony bore, and stayed on and on.”

Anderson was dyslexic, and bisexual.

SCAD-Savannah 24 Hour Comics Day

Hey I might not be doing any sketching today, but over 70 students here at SCAD’s 24 Hour Comics Day event are drawing 24 completed comics pages in 24 hours!  Check it out:

Mary Shelley

Okay, Mary Shelley was the sh*t. She dropped the novel Frankenstein when she was only 19 yrs old. What the f*ck were you doing at 19?!? I bet you weren’t writing a great work of Western literature.

Suck-ass slackers, one and all.

Despite her mad skills, Mary Shelley’s life wasn’t all that awesome. Her mom died 10 days after she was born, and later in life her husband, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, porked the snot out of Mary’s stepsister Claire on a regular basis – in their own home, while she was there.

He drowned in a storm at sea at 29, Mary lived until the age of 59, but her kids dropped young like f*ckin’ flies.  That kinda sucks.

Jackie Brenston

Jackie Brenston of Clarksdale, Mississippi and his Delta Cats are credited with recording the first rock n’ roll song ever, “Rocket 88.”  The song was recorded by the legendary Sam Phillips, and reached #1 on the R&B charts.

Later, Brenston became an alcoholic and a truck driver.  He died of a heart attack at the age of 49.

I have a question, since black folk were so key in the development of rock, why don’t more black people play these days?  I wish they would – I think a new black rock movement as a responce to hipster indie rock we find on Pitchfork would be cool.

Rock Trivia: The Delta Cats, in actuality, were Ike Turner and his the Kings of Rhythm.

Bon Scott

In 1974 Bon Scott was working as the driver for emerging Austrailian rock band AC/DC when he asked if he could be their drummer. Angus Young said, “We don’t need a f*cking drummer, we need a new singer!” Young was pissed cuz their current front man was acting too much like a glam rocker – so they fired him and Bon Scott took over.

However, Scott died in the back seat of a car on February 19, 1980 after a night of heavy drinking – but how cool is this shiznit: the official cause of death was listed “death by misadventure.”

How cool is that!?!

Production note: I totally f*cked up his nose and face, but a minute is a minute.

Alexander Hamilton

Born in the British West Indies, Alexander Hamilton went on to do a lot of shiznit for the United States.  This dude was an Army officer, lawyer, Founding Father, political theorist, author, and the first Secretary of the Treasury.

The only problem was that Hamilton was a bit of a bitch.

Everyone, including George Washington, thought he was too hot headed and emotional to be president.  So, Hamilton founded the Federalist pary in opposition to Thomas Jefferson’s posse – who were more agricultural and less industrialist.

Trouble started for Hamilton when he put his pecker in James Reynolds’s wife a coupla times.   He was subsequently blackmailed,  and forced to resign from office in discrace.  Later, he and President Aaron Burr had some Biggy/2Pac-type drama which resulted in a dual along the bank of the Hudson River.

Hamilton got gakked.  1-8-7.

Homo erectus

Homo erectus is an extinct species of the genus Homo. H. erectus originally migrated from Africa during the Early Pleistocene and then dispersed throughout most of the Old World!

He had mad tools, but likely no fire.

Grigori Rasputin

Behold religious mystic, wanderer, faith healer, and superf*cker Grigori Rasputin!

Rasputin attained notoriety for supposedly “healing” the son of Tsar Nicholas II, who like many inbred aristocrats, was a hemophiliac – if the little sh*t fell down and got a bruise, he’d bleed for days. Supposedly, through a combination of hypnosis, prayer, and sound advise like “Don’t let the doctors bother him too much,” and ” Don’t use the leeches on him,” Rasputin healed the young Tsarevich time and again. The royal family pretty much thought he was, like, super powered by God – and did anything he told them.

Rasputin’s religious views included the belieft that the body was a sacred gift from God – attaining divine grace through sins of the flesh was the only way to go! This was one of the chief doctrines that he preached to (and practiced with) his inner circle of society ladies, but eventually the aristocratic dudes got sick of his foolishness and planned to kill him.

First they got the Mad Monk drunk and fed him cakes laced with enough cyanide to drop an elephant. Rasputin remained unaffected! Determined to finish the job, one of the would-be killers got impatient, ran upstairs, got a gun, and shot him in the back.

Rasputin fell, and the group left for awhile.

The dude who shot him apparently forgot his coat and when he went back in to get it Rasputin jumped up, screamed “You bad boy,” and choked the mu’f*cker! Rasputin then ran out the mu’f*ckin’ house fast as f*ck but the conspirators, now joined by a British secret agent shot him three more times! Rasputin still struggled so they clubbed his head, bundled him up, and dropped him in the freezing river.

Why would the British want to whack him? Cuz Rasputin was insisting that the Tsar withdraw his troops from WWI – if that would’ve happened the British woulda been f*cked.

You are under his power now. . .get naked!

Rochambeau

Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau was a Marshal of France that participated in the American Revolution!  Rochambeau was given the rank of Lieutenant General, the command of 5,000 troops, and joined Washington’s forces during the siege of Yorktown.  On September 22, 1781, they hooked up with their homie Lafayette and forced the British comander Cornwallis to surrender.

Americans celebrate Rochambeau largely because of his behavior – he placed himself COMPLETELY under Washington’s command and handled his troops as part of the Continental Army.

Rochambeau had no sh*tty French attitude.

At Yorktown, Cornwallis tried to surrender to Rochambeau as a “f*ck you” to Washington.  Rochameau said “no way f*cker” and directed his punk ass to ol’ Georgie.

Jack Kirby

I’ll keep this brief.

KIRBY = POWER!

Geek Bonus: New meets old – that’s actually Baby Cakes in the Galactus costume today.

George Rapp

Production note:
Today’s text is courtesy of Mr. Tim Rutherford – banjo player, life coach, and lover of old f*ckers everywhere. I, as always, supplied the sweet-ass sketch. Think of it as, like, a history gang bang today.

In the early 1800s, George Rapp founded a small town in Indiana called New Harmony.  He built a labyrinth outta hedges.  He also made wine and whiskey, and grew hemp for rope. . .yeah, right.

Rapp founded a religious sect called the Rappites and his followers were expected to be celibate. Husbands and wives who joined the club were expected to live as “brother and sister.”

Yeah, right, only like brothers and sisters from neighboring Kentucky. . .

Supermboy

BONUS RANDOM SKETCH

This sketch is not historical in nature, nor is it of a real person.

But it does rock.

Behold Supermboy!

Hugo Ball

A special thanks goes out to Tonyefa Oyake for suggesting that German Dada artist Hugo Ball be today’s f*ckin’ rockin’ history sketch!

Hugo Ball was an actor at the Cabaret Voltaire and wrote the Dada Manifesto in 1916, speaking out about the deplorable state of society.  Ball is most famous for his phonetic poem Karawane, which consists of nonsensical words.  He believed that poetry should follow the same route as art; where the human figure had progressively disappeared because it represented something which had become ugly and unworn. What Ball was suggesting was that poetry should disregard language and start again unblemished.

Here’s my sketch followed by a birthday card featuring ol’ Hugo that Tonye made for me on Friday.