MAD magazine in 1968:

[NameAlreadyTaken]

From the book "MAD About You"

[Walleye]

1. I've often said that. How do you say you love your country yet you hate over half the people in it

They must think of their country as just a piece of real estate. I guess that’s why they voted for a real estate scammer

[MineralMan]

2. There are two kinds of people who were alive in the 1960s.

There are those who regularly read Mad Magazine, and those who did not.

Those who read it can be found on places like DU. Those who did not are fond of Trump rallies.

That's my observation.

[CurtEastPoint]

4. LOVED my Mad!

[Cheezoholic]

7. I miss the little cartoons between the frames n/t

[IrishAfricanAmerican]

27. Yes! The brilliance of Sergio Aragones!

[speak easy]

38. ...

[CrispyQ]

16. The Mad Fold-in.

[calimary]

20. OMG! Do you remember the Beatles one?

Full open, it depicted them coming down one of those rollaway staircases used for airplane passengers. Lots of fans and cameras and big round lights surrounding them. Then you folded it up and noticed that those big round “lights” had been strategically placed. ‘Cuz the Fab Four were suddenly bald!

[speak easy]

45. ...

[calimary]

85. Yep! That's the one.

OMG! Both takes!

What a great find!

[CurtEastPoint]

17. One of the funniest cartoons was a large lady at the top of an escalator, exiting... and..well...

she got stuck and all of a sudden, she went flying and the accompanying sound was perfect: "POIT!"

[Codifer]

32. And "National Lampoon"

and The "Fabulous Fury Freak Brothers", "Freewheelin Franklin", Fat Freddys Cat" and. most especially, "Idyll".

On edit: That should be "Furry" vice "Fury"...... makes more sense considering the decade.

[Unknown Beatle]

49. Do you mean...

Fat Freddy Scat?

[Codifer]

68. As I recall

the cat would hide his scat. One panel had Fat Freddy looking in the usual spots (bed, shoes etc) while the cat was gloating about shitting in a planter hanging high on the wall. Freddy could smell it but could never find it.

[Unknown Beatle]

111. What I mean is this...

https://mycotopia.net/uploads/FFFB/The%20Adventures%20of%20Fat%20Freddys%20Cat%202.pdf

Go to page two. The top of the page reads: "Fat Freddy Scat's Little Known Events In Cat History"

[marie999]

67. What I remember about National Lampoon was an ad.

It was a picture of a VW Beatle floating on a pond. The caption was, "If Ted Kennedy drove a Volkswagen, he'd be president today.".

[Codifer]

71. The greatest treasure

(IMO) in National Lampoon was "Idyl" (yeah, only one "L&quot by Jeff Jones. It is well worth googling.

[reACTIONary]

80. +10 nt

[KS Toronado]

11. Couldn't wait for new issues to come out in the 50s,60's &70s

After the service didn't buy as many.

[LiberalLovinLug]

13. Ha ha. Yes, I regularily read Mad Magazine back in the day

It was actually quite a radical mag, especially geared towards young people. Mostly boys I'd say. If I'm allowed to say that.

It kind of gave me permission to think more radically. Also to not worship celebrity, movie stars, etc. The way those artists made them look like idiots. As every other magazine DID worship celebrity.

[soldierant]

22. Well, like everything else at the time (except "women's magazines"),

the "usual gang of idiots" was all male. But there was always plenty a young woman could appreciate. Where else could the progressive women in my generation have come from?

[LiberalLovinLug]

24. Touche

I guess i had my own prejudices as a boy too. I never saw a girl with one, or talk about it like I used to do with my male friends, so I just assumed it was one of those things that girls just didn't like or want to participate in. Like hockey.


We'd bring them to school and share it with friends and have a good laugh. But I forget how there really wasn't any other more gender balanced humour rags back then. The National Lampoon was pretty testosterone driven magazine too.

[wnylib]

29. I'm female. It was a female cousin who

told me about Mad Magazine when we were 11.

We were also fans of the Smothers Brothers.

I think there was less sharing of ideas between boys and girls then, but it doesn't mean girls were not discussing things among ourselves.

[LiberalLovinLug]

35. Understanding I was only a boy, with no political opinions developed at all.

And I based all my opinions of girls watching my two older sisters, and their friends. There were very strict definitions of what boys were to like, and what girls were to like. I just went along with it then, I was young, I didn't know any better.

And I lived in a very conservative home. In fact I voted Conservative, here in Canada, in my first election when I was 18 and so excited to vote for the first time. I had no political education. There was no internet of course. And only voted for the party that my Dad assured me was the proper choice. I never voted for them again.

I've gone through a lot of "evolving" over the decades.

[wnylib]

40. Young people in the US were

political back then, first on civil rights, then Vietnam. My oldest brother was conservative. The one closest to my age was radical.

[ShazzieB]

74. Some U.S. young people were political, but plenty weren't.

I didn't know too many other kids who were concerned about the issues of the day. At least they didn't talk about if they were.

College brought out that side in a lot of people, including me. High school (where I lived) was all who was dating whom, which team was going to win the football game on Friday night, and trying to copy the "popular" girls' clothes, makeup, and hair in the hopes of becoming one of them. It...sucked.

[wnylib]

93. I graduated from high school in 1967.

There wasn't a lot of political activism in my school. Most kids fell into the pattern you described. But we were all aware of what was going on nationally with the civil rights marches and Vietnam. We talked about it among ourselves. Some kids wore political buttons to school during the 1964 presidential campaign. Popular music began to reflect the issues as far back as Peter, Paul, and Mary with Blowin' in the Wind in the 1950s. In 1966, there was Janis Ian with Society's Child. At my senior prom there was an interracial couple who had not been previously dating. They went as a couple to make a social/political statement.

In 10th grade, when we studied ballad poetry in English class, the teacher gave us an assignment to write a ballad. I wrote about a man killed in Vietnam. We had to read them to the class and mine got applause, not because it was good (it was pretty mediocre), but because of the topic.

Some girls talked about marrying their boyfriends after graduation to keep them out of the draft. (A few actually did it.) One guy that I dated had researched the age of marriage without parental consent and suggested running off to another state to elope after he dropped out of college and lost his draft deferment. I was still a high school junior. When I didn't do it, he married another girl soon afterward.

Then there was the girl in my classes who was a very active Young Republican.

The kids about 2 years behind me were more active in both civil rights and Vietnam protests.

[Silver Gaia]

31. Hey, when I was in high school, I read MAD regularly and loved it!

I also helped write an "underground" newsletter that we sold on the sidewalks around the school for a nickel a copy. (We weren't allowed to SELL them on school grounds, so we gave most of them away in the halls later, but the nickels helped us pay for printing.)

I wasn't like most girls in my high school, though. Most of them, however, turned out to be right-wingers.

[LiberalLovinLug]

37. Very cool!

[Crunchy Frog]

55. I read it when I was a kid in the 70's, and

my mom read it when she was a teen in the late 50's.

I guess I wasn't old enough to realize that it was mainly meant to appeal to boys.

[electric_blue68]

83. My mom made me the progressive I am today ...

My dad too. But she was even more so, and I was around her much more.

And I loved MAD Magazine, too!

[soldierant]

90. I wasn't meaning to undercut my mother's influence

As a widow who was the sole support of me and her mother, she knew as much about injustice as a white person could likely learn in the 50's and 60's.

I was really thinking of kids who didn't have radicalized mothers.

[electric_blue68]

92. Got it...

My mom a first generation Greek-American was an amazing woman, with some amazing experiences in her earlier life including being very cognizant of racism Southern and Northern.

She had a sports acquaintance in HS. My mom was a tennis player, her acquaintance who was black was a runner. It's possible that since my mom also played basketball in HS perhaps her runner pal also was on the team.

Anyway she saw on TV (while I was yet not watching TV News) the Bull Conner response to Civil Rights peaceful protesters among other terrible things. But she'd also occasionally hear stuff from other moms in the park as I was running around playing.

Going out and about in NYC as a professional and non-job stuff she'd run into African-Americans here and there. Since she'd already had positive experience she saw them just going about their days just as she was.

As she learned history, and seeing the difference between being welcomed as a first generation American contrasted with a people who'd been here 300 - 400 years, and usually couldn't catch a break she decided this was very unfair.

So she started to point stuff out to me about down South, BUT also what was said to her from other white mother's in the park. So she raised me right. My dad didn't usually talk about it per se but I had some black friends from 5th grade on and they welcomed them into our house, and I could go over to their homes too. My dad was also one for fairness.

[cayugafalls]

14. I still subscribe to MAD...

after all these years.

[AZ8theist]

18. What? Me worry?

[mitch96]

28. I had a love hate relationship with MAD.. Loved the mag, hated that when a teen I looked like

Ol' Alfred E... Just put on wire frame spec's and it's me.. sad to say..
m

[AZ8theist]

63. Oh, snap you shouldn't be down on yourself...Alfred E. Neuman was a cool dude!!!!

[reACTIONary]

81. The definition of cool is...

... not givimg a shit... eg, What, me worry?

[mitch96]

84. Looking like him in HS did work out well with the opposite sex. Good thing I grew out of it..

Looking like Alfred E, not reading MAD.......
m

[live love laugh]

36. +1

[Oldem]

19. I loved "Scenes You'd Like to See"

I'd like to see the Turtle get up for a speech and all the Democrats rise and one and boo him till he gives up and sits down. Same every time Qraham, Qruz, QHawley speak.

[aggiesal]

23. My favorite was Spy .vs. Spy n/t

[soldierant]

69. I was just thinking about Spy V Spy -

because gender came up earier, and Spy V Spy was the closest thing to genderless that there was in Mad.

[aggiesal]

77. Remnants of the cold war ...

2 completely idiotic characters that was very well done and extremely funny.

[soldierant]

78. So anonymous that they really were a yin/yang.

[fwvinson]

25. Yep, and here I am.

[MineralMan]

26. Satire Stimulates Critical Thinking Skills

That's why Mad Magazine was influential.

[PutGramaOnThePhone]

58. Wow...

this is a revelation for me in thinking about satire, and to be able to communicate more concisely about it. And jibes so much with your earlier “there are two kings of people...” post

[MineralMan]

100. I'm glad I was able to put that thought into your mind.

Critical thinking is essential in today's world, I think.

[LiberalLovinLug]

105. Yup. It showed you that you could think outside the box

Making Hollywood stars and politicians look like idiots.

Even Spy vs. Spy which was so popular. I think because the white spy was just as good/bad at his job as the black spy. One time one would win and then next the other. There was no "good" side and "bad" side.

And of course it was FUNNY.

[live love laugh]

34. Mad fan here!

[riversedge]

42. Probably true true true!

[niyad]

46. Ummmmm. . .I did not read Mad. Was reading Austen and Tolstoy and Ibsen and Fanon and

Last edited Mon Mar 8, 2021, 07:51 PM - Edit history (1)

Dreiser. But here I am anyway. May I stay, even Without reading the great Mad?????

[MineralMan]

56. I was reading those, too.

It's a joke, see?

[niyad]

64. Oh, I know. Was just giving you a difficult time.

[Tommymac]

52. I read every copy I could get my little hands on.

[jmowreader]

57. You don't happen to actually have that issue, perchance?

If so, could you post the poem "A CBS-TV Summer Memo to the Smothered Brothers"?

[Tommymac]

60. Sorry, just posted the image from an internet search.

[DBoon]

66. I actually remember the "Superpatriot"

After 50 years, Mad left an indelible mental imprint

We live in the post-Mad era now

[ShazzieB]

73. Well, I certainly loved loved MAD back then.

And now here I am at DU.

Theory checks out.

[electric_blue68]

86. Oh, this gal read Mad Mag back in the mid-'60s!

I remember the piece you posted!

I forget the overarching name for the reoccurring feature-
the one where they're comparing one group to another for the same behaviors.
Mad Mag's readership may have been mostly male but this particular version of this feature opened my eyes even more to sexism (maybe unintended on their part):
a male boss being loud to his underlings -"authoritative" "take charge", while a woman boss doing the same thing was called - "shrill", "bossy" .

Mad Mag made me a Mets fan!
I grew up in Washington Heights, and if you drew a straight line from our street into The Bronx it'd land a little south of Yankee Std. One of my Uncle's was a serious Baseball/Yankees fan, and my dad liked baseball, too. I liked sports so I became a Yankee fan, and went to games with my family.

Well, Mad Mag made so much fun of Manager Casey Stengel and his Mets that I started to feel sorry for them. My mom often in general terms rooted for the underdog.
That influenced me, as well. So over a long period of the me I became a Mets fan.
Now out of our city I root for either the Yanks, or Mets to get into the World's Series. When at home for the Subway's Series I got the Blue and Orange! 😁

The movie parodies were great. Spy vs Spy was clever.

There was a one-off where there were imaginary pills for ?socio-political-cultural events, conditions...
I'm not sure if I'm putting these two things together correctly but there was a "bomb" pill and if you took too many you'd get "too high" and that was represented by a literal Mushroom on the horizon - representing a real Atomic Bomb.

[oldsoftie]

106. Oh come on. I didnt know ANYONE growing up who didnt read MAD!

Especially the "special" editions.

[MineralMan]

107. Many people didn't read it. Most people didn't read it.

You apparently knew only smart people.

Truly.

[oldsoftie]

108. Why thank you! (I've still got a box of 'em from the 60s-70s)

[Hortensis]

3. :) 1968 and it managed to leave off women on the march?

I'm surprised. Seriously. The Second Wave was upending centuries of traditional roles. That threat to the very foundations of society was a huge source of RW anxiety. It's not incidental that men of all races could vote a half century before any woman.

Or that people are still lead to believe by male-dominated institutions (including non-white) that equality among men is far more threatening to white men than is equality of women. But gender-role anxiety is something most conservative and liberal men tend to have in common, to widely varying degrees of course.

But the result is that the movement for equality is incredibly more focused on race than on gender, even though women are over 50% of all Americans and all races. Equal pay for women would enrich all racial and ethnic groups, and notably America's children.

[NameAlreadyTaken]

30. and gays...

[niyad]

48. Since this is International Women's Day, would you consider posting this as its own OP for

visibility, and recs? And would you consider cross-posting in Women's Rights And Issues? Thanks in advance.

[OAITW r.2.0]

5. I think I actually remember this.

Could be I saw it years ago on some internet post, but 1968 would have been the time was I was avidly reading MAD, cover to cover. I particularly remember this caricature of the "super-patriot".

[rickyhall]

6. How things change but stay the same.

How did they know what Lindsay Graham would look like old in 68?

[Mickju]

9. I bought my first Mad Magazine back in the late 50s or early 60s when I was a young teenager.

When it was folded over it looked just like a Readers Digest except it was called "Readers Disgust." I thought it was the funniest thing I had ever seen.

[rickyhall]

12. They were at the barber shop when I was a kid. I loved Spy vs. Spy.

[calimary]

21. Yes! And all those little drawings along the margins and in the corners.

Drawn by Sergio Aragones (I think?).

LOVED it all! AND “the usual gang of idiots”!

[mezame]

8. Kilroy Lives!

[Jopin Klobe]

10. Looks Like H.L. Hunt ...

... reads like H.L. Hunt ...

... and the rest of the filthy rich ...

[Mickju]

15. H.L. Hunt's son, Lamar was the owner of the Dallas Texans football team.

Lamar was spending a million dollars a year to keep the team going. A reporter asked his father, H.L., how long his son could keep that up. H.L. replied, "about a hundred years." Back then a million dollars was a lot more money than it is today. Of course the team ended up moving to Kansas City.

[malaise]

33. Is that before or after the eagle attacked him?

[bdamomma]

75. Must be

bald eagle telepathy. The eagle knew.

[Bo Zarts]

39. My favorite MAD Magazine cover ever (2006)!

[Ferrets are Cool]

54. +1

[DinahMoeHum]

41. I remember the song parodies. . .

. . .and of course Spy vs Spy. . .

[LudwigPastorius]

43. Theodor Geisel, 1941

...speaking about things that don't change.

[bucolic_frolic]

47. The only thing he like is making money off the 93%

Yup same as today

[AllaN01Bear]

50. fits right in with todays world. i too subbed mad and loved it .

that is all.

[paleotn]

51. Archie Bunker lives!

[Ferrets are Cool]

53. Super Patriot MAGA(t)

[twodogsbarking]

59. Alfred E. helped shape us into

whatever the fuck we are.

[virgdem]

62. What me worry!

[PatrickforB]

61. We all used to read MAD all the time.

Blast from the past!

[Poiuyt]

65. I got my username from MAD Magazine

[TomWilm]

94. I must have been only 8 years old ...

... when I got this in my mailbox.
MAD has kept me for going sane for all those years since!

[bdamomma]

70. Mad Magazine

Last edited Mon Mar 8, 2021, 09:39 PM - Edit history (1)

it's a classic. I remember my older brother used to get that magazine, never appealed to me, a strange magazine. but i liked the covers.

[Dr. Skull]

72. Read This in 1968

I had to go to a friend's house to read MAD, and I remember reading this back then and feeling a little scared.

[Darkstar53142]

76. My parents forbade me from reading Mad Magazine...

...a childhood friend lived across from a junkyard and found a box of old Mad Magazines.
We would read them from cover to cover. I had to crotch them when I brought them home like they were Playboys. Then I would have to sneak read them either at night with a flashlight or hidden in another magazine.

I'd have to say now that my entire life is based on the teachings of Mad Magazine.

[LeftInTX]

79. I also wasn't allowed to read Mad Magazine or watch Laugh In

We were almost banned from the Smother's Brothers but they let us watch that one after we complained. (I think my parents didn't have anything else to watch anyway)

[reACTIONary]

82. My story exactly... Found a paper bag of them....

... in a junk pile. One of the greatest treasures ever!

[Rhiannon12866]

87. My Dad subscribed to MAD Magazine for a lot of years

My brother and I read them, too!

[Blue Owl]

88. MAD's been delivering the goods for over half a century!

[Lokilooney]

89. The 1960's mind you

[90-percent]

101. Cracked actually has well done humor on FB

https://www.facebook.com/cracked

In High school art class in 1972, Missy Simon's dad was editor of cracked. I was socially retarded back then with a debilitating shyness problem, so I doubt I ever spoke to her more than twice the entire semester.

My 10 years older sister and 10 years older cousin read it. I remember all the fascinating artwork back then, and later on in the mid sixties also bought all the paperback re-issues with art by wallace wood, jack davis, norman mingo, Harvey kurtzman, will elder, etc.

My interest in Mad was overtaken by National Lampoon. Excellent and mature writing and illustration, plus the spin off into SNL. I saw the play Lemmings before snl was on tv and chevy chase, john belushi and jane curtan were some of the players I saw live.

Mad was real big on exposing madison avenue scams and other forms of acceptable corruption scams which continue almost unchecked to this day and a lot more excessive and predatory than fifty years ago!

And, as a fifty year Zappa fan, I was thrilled about this article;

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/294915475573332086/


-90% Jimmy
To quote DU'er Darkstar53142; "I'd have to say now that my entire life is based on the teachings of Mad Magazine."

-90% Jimmy

[RocRizzo55]

95. Mad Magazine was one of my favorites growing up

My parents didn't like me reading it, but my grandparents said that if it got me to read, it was good.
Little did they know, I guess that it added to my radical political tilt later on.
Oh, and Mad was one of the very few magazines that had no advertisements, until recently. Then they went out of business. So sad. It was a legend in its own time.

[RVN VET71]

96. William Gaines and the Usual Gang of Idiots

were all true American patriots and heroes, IMHO.

Talented, thoughtful, caring people, caring about the country and, especially, about its youth. I love that Mad ruined me for the Republican Party and its bullshit.

[The Wizard]

97. I must have been 11

when I got hooked on Mad, The back cover had an ad for Salem cigarettes. It was an illustration of people sitting by a stream putting packs of Salem in the stream with the caption "Salem, don't inhale 'em."

[malthaussen]

98. Love the town, hate the people

In a parody of spaghetti westerns in Playboy I read 'way back in the seventies, after he wipes out an entire town, the hero says he loves the town -- loves the rocks, the trees, the buildings, but hates the people.

-- Mal

[Buns_of_Fire]

109. Sort of like MAD's parody of the The Rifleman ("the Rifle, Man!")

Mark: ...and you get in fights and shoot people because you believe in honor and justice and fighting for what's right, ain't that right, Paw?

Lucas: No, son, I believe in killing people.

[malthaussen]

99. What was far-out satire in 1965 is normal in 2020.

MAD gets more prophetic every year.

One of my MAD memories is a strip they did 'way back in the Fifties sometime, with baking companies making their products smaller and smaller, and putting cardboard dividers in their packages, so they could sell the "same" product at the "same" price and still beat inflation. That one definitely came true, but the companies ended up raising their prices anyway.

-- Mal

[turbinetree]

102. K&R..........

[Initech]

103. Holy crap that's seriously prophetic!

[BobTheSubgenius]

104. What a find. Funny this hasn't been aired long before this.