Even growing up in the 70s as I did,
there were still comic strips around which were hangovers from the golden age
of the 40s, 50s and 60s. Sports stories were one mainstay of these – with the
football based strip “Roy of the Rovers” being the most famous. I was never a
fan of the adventures of the eponymous Roy Race, but I did really like a strip
called “The Tough of the Track”, which chronicled the adventures of working
class amateur athlete Alf Tupper. Alf Tupper was a sometime welder, sometime
plumber, whose training methods consisted of not a lot more than a quick run
around the block, and a diet of fish and chips. He was in a running battle with
the ‘posh’ authorities in the Amateur Athletic Association, and the posh but
inferior runners they selected to represent Great Britain ahead of indomitable
Alf. The strip ran for about 40 years, all told, until the early 90s. It was
drawn by many hands at different times, but is most closely associated with
Peter Sutherland. Peter Sutherland joined the staff of D.C. Thompson in Dundee
after serving in World War II, and he remained working at a prolific rate on a
wide variety of strips until just before his death in 1977. He’s best
remembered for “The Tough of the Track”, though.
No comments:
Post a Comment