Sad Sack and Dagwood Bumstead

I can remember as a boy when someone would say about someone else – “He sure is a sad sack!” Or in another way it was asked, “Are you a sad sack today?” And – “I feel like such a sad sack.”

I knew that it meant that things weren’t going real well – or some bad stuff had happened and this was something that someone used as a term to describe the misfortune of others.

We all used it – but had not idea why.

Then in a restaurant setting and reading the menu of years gone by – Dagwood Sandwich was listed and the price indicated that it was bigger than the other sandwiches offered in that place.

Some things in our language are strange.

Now if you are my age or older you may remember hearing these terms – if you are younger by 20 years – you will not remember. It is new information for you.

Sad Sack was a misfit soldier in World War II. Everything that could go wrong to a person – went wrong for Sad Sack. The character was drawn by a man named George Baker who was a cartoonist for Disney and was drafted into the army just after the Pearl Harbour attack happened. From his military experiences he drew the character – and from hearing the stories of others.
When the military found out what he did for work they used him to draw for them. He had a huge following in the Military to say the least. When the war was over he developed the syndicated comic Sad Sack.

The name of this hapless soldier entered our language in the years following the war.

But some how if some one was to say today, “He sure is a Harry Potter!” it wouldn’t make sense.

This small side adventure in the last few days with Sad Sack led me to other oddities of the language of English. We adopt all kinds of strange ideas.

That was where the Dagwood Sandwich came into my thoughts. But it didn’t stop there.
Dagwood Bumstead first appeared in sometime prior to Feb 17, 1933.

Dagwood was a bumbling fool that always wanted to sleep on the couch when his wife and others wanted him to do something else. He is kind of an icon for many husbands that just want to rest after a week’s hard work…. Who always have a Blondie driving them nuts!!!

But did you know that he was an heir to a fortune as his family owned the Bumstead Locomotive Fortune? He lost all that fortune when he married a Flapper by the name of Blondie. His family felt that Dagwood had married below his class and thus disinherited him.

Blondie’s full name was Blondie Boopadoop and she was known as a Flapper. But when you read/follow the Cartoon – Blondie is amazing and wise and steady and solid and a good mother…

A Flapper is defined as follows…
“The term flapper in the 1920s referred to a "new breed" of young women who wore short skirts, bobbed their hair, listened to the new jazz music, and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered acceptable behaviour. Flappers were seen as brash for wearing excessive makeup, drinking, treating sex in a casual manner, smoking, driving automobiles and otherwise flouting social and sexual norms.”

Maybe that was the hidden humour that those of us under 85 now – didn’t get when we were younger.

I think… my granddaughter Emma has a nickname of Boobadoop or is that Booaloo? She is blonde… but she is not a Flapper… I hope…

As I have mulled over the many different terms I hit on a few that make no sense at all… and others that are amazingly useful… like Gung Ho… Toad Face… going Whole Hog… Simultaneous…. Clicker…

And the list goes on…

Have a good one today… I hope it is not a Sad Sack day.

~ Murray Lincoln ~
http://www.murraylincoln.com/

Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sad_Sack
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagwood_sandwich
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagwood_Bumstead
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flapper