The Bell Syndicate, launched in 1916 by editor-publisher John Neville Wheeler, was an American syndicate that distributed columns, fiction, feature articles and comic strips to newspapers for decades. It was located in New York City at 247 West 43rd Street and later at 229 West 43rd Street. It also reprinted comic strips in book form.[1]
History
Antecedent: the Wheeler Syndicate
In 1913, while working as a sportswriter for the New York Herald, Wheeler formed the Wheeler Syndicate to specialize in distribution of sports features to newspapers in the United States and Canada. That same year his Wheeler Syndicate contracted with pioneering comic strip artist Bud Fisher and cartoonist Fontaine Fox to begin distributing their work.[2] Journalist Richard Harding Davis was sent to Belgium as war correspondent and reported on early battlefield actions, as the Wheeler Syndicate became a comprehensive news collection and distribution operation. In 1916, the Wheeler Syndicate was purchased by S. S. McClure's McClure Syndicate, the oldest and largest news and feature syndicate in America. (Years later, Wheeler's company would in turn acquire the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.)
Foundation of the Bell Syndicate
Immediately upon the sale of his Wheeler Syndicate, John Neville Wheeler founded the Bell Syndicate, which soon attracted Fisher, Fox, and other cartoonists.
Ring Lardner began writing a sports column for Bell in 1919.
In 1924, Wheeler became executive editor of Liberty magazine, and served in that capacity while continuing to run the Bell Syndicate.
In 1930, Wheeler became general manager of North American Newspaper Alliance (NANA), established in 1922 by 50 major newspapers in the United States and Canada which absorbed Bell, both continuing to operate individually under joint ownership as the Bell Syndicate-North American Newspaper Alliance. That same year, Bell acquired Associated Newspapers, founded by S. S. McClure's cousin Henry Herbert McClure. Keeping Associated Newspapers as a division, at that point the company became the Bell-McClure Syndicate.[6]
In 1933, just as the concept of "comic books" was getting off the ground, Eastern Color Printing published Funnies on Parade, which reprinted in color several comic strips licensed from the Bell-McClure Syndicate, the Ledger Syndicate, and the McNaught Syndicate,[7] including the Bell Syndicate & Associated Newspaper strips Mutt and Jeff, Cicero, S'Matter, Pop, Honeybunch's Hubby, Holly of Hollywood, and Keeping Up with the Joneses. Eastern Color neither sold this periodical nor made it available on newsstands, but rather sent it out free as a promotional item to consumers who mailed in coupons clipped from Procter & Gamble soap and toiletries products. The company printed 10,000 copies, and it was a great success.[8][9]
The Bell Syndicate was one of the many syndicates that rejected Jerry Siegel in 1934 when he proposed a Superman comic strip. The syndicate stated, "We are in the market only for strips likely to have the most extraordinary appeal, and we do not feel that Superman gets into that category."[11] (Superman's subsequent debut in Action Comics #1 in 1938 was a huge success.)
The Bell Syndicate-North American Newspaper Alliance acquired the McClure Newspaper Syndicate in September 1952 — making it the second McClure-family-owned syndicate to be acquired by Bell — with Louis Ruppel installed as president and editor.[12]
The syndicate's greatest success with comic strips was in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. The company had some strips in syndication through the 1950s but the only ones to have success into the 1960s were Uncle Nugent's Funland, Hambone's Meditations and Joe and Asbestos.
In 1964, the publishing and media company Koster-Dana Corporation was identified as controlling both North American Newspaper Alliance and the Bell-McClure Syndicate.[13] and by 1970 the syndicate was no longer distributing comic strips.
Final years
In 1972, United Features Syndicate acquired NANA / Bell-McClure and absorbed them into its syndication operations.[14]
Bell Syndicate / Bell-McClure Syndicate strips and panels
Beauregard by Jack Davis (1961) — never successfully syndicated and soon dropped[15]
Beautiful Babs by Chic Young[16] (July 15, 1922–c. Nov. 1922)
Ben Webster's Career by George Storm[17] (1925–1926)
Henry M. Snevily was the firm's president. Kathleen Caesar was the Bell Syndicate's editor. Film critic Mordaunt Hall was a Bell copy editor, and he also contributed articles. In 1964, Will Eisner was appointed president of NANA and Bell-McClure, replacing Harry Spiess.[33]
Late in life, after moving over from the Ledger Syndicate, Elizabeth Meriwether Gilmer wrote the Dorothy Dix advice column, which ran in 160 newspapers, until her 1951 death, when Muriel Agnelli took over the column. In 20 newspapers it appeared under the byline "Muriel Nissen," Agnelli's maiden name. Born in Manhattan, Muriel Agnelli attended Hunter College and also studied journalism and psychology at Columbia University. After marrying Joseph P. Agnelli in 1929, she began editing Bell's four-page children's tabloid, The Sunshine Club, and she later wrote a column about postage stamps and stamp collecting. Joseph Agnelli was the Bell Syndicate's executive vice-president and general manager.
The syndicate also distributed James J. Montague's column More Truth than Poetry, as well as many other articles and light fiction pieces, from about 1924 until his death in 1941. The liberal Washington columnist Doris Fleeson wrote a daily Bell political column from 1945 to 1954.[34]Drew Pearson's Washington-Merry-Go-Round column (moving over from United Features Syndicate in 1944) was carried in 600 newspapers until Pearson's death in 1969.[35]
^"United Feature Syndicate Buys Metropolitan Service From Elser: Both Firms Will Retain Separate Identities, With Elser Remaining as Vice-President — Monte Bourjaily to Direct Both Organizations," Editor & Publisher (March 15, 1930). Archived at "News of Yore 1930: Another Syndicate Gobbled,"Stripper's Guide (May 4, 2010).
^Booker, M. Keith. "United Feature Syndicate," in Comics through Time: A History of Icons, Idols, and Ideas (ABC-CLIO, 2014), p. 399.
^Astor, Dave. "Goldberg To Retire From United Media,"Archived 2017-12-07 at the Wayback MachineEditor & Publisher (December 17, 2001): "The executive joined United in 1972 when it bought Bell McClure Syndicate and North American Newspaper Alliance, where Goldberg was president."
^"1962 Timeline: July 23. A Bullwinkle newspaper strip by Al Kilgore, based on the animated series, makes its debut." American Comic Book Chronicles: 1960–64 by John Wells. TwoMorrows Publishing, 2012, Page 77.
^Ron Goulart, The Encyclopedia of American Comics. New York : Facts on File,1990 (p.124)
^Bell Syndicate, Sunday color supplement, The San Bernardino Daily Sun, San Bernardino, California, Sunday 17 June 1945, Volume 51, page 22.
^ abcdRon Goulart,The Funnies: 100 Years of American Comic Strips (Holbrook, Mass.: Adams Publishing, 1995). ISBN094473524X, pp. 87-88, 104, 106, 124, 200.
^Phil Hardy at Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on April 16, 2012.
^Tack Knight entry, Who's Who of American Comic Books 1928–1999. Accessed Nov. 1, 2018.
^Hubert H. Crawford, Crawford's Encyclopedia of Comic Books. Jonathan David Publishers, 1978 (p. 408).
^Maurice Horn, The World Encyclopedia of Comics. New York : Chelsea House, 1976. (p. 638)
^"Nueva" to "Nukunuku," Michigan State University Libraries Special Collections Division: Reading Room Index to the Comic Art Collection. Accessed Jan. 1, 2019.