This article is about the comic series. For its title character, see John Sappo.
Sappo or The Five Fifteen or Sappo, the Commuter or Professor Wotasnozzle or Sappo and Wotasnozzle and Myrtle is a comic strip begun in 1920 by E. C. Segar (as The Five Fifteen), then renamed after protagonist John Sappo as early as 1923. The strip was made into the "topper", or complementary strip, to Segar's better known Thimble Theatre (later Popeye) in its Sunday edition. Sappo characters sometimes have supporting roles in Popeye stories.
Plot and history[]
Created by Segar in response to King Features' dissatisfaction over his tendencies to leave work early, Sappo launched on December 24, 1920 as The Five-Fifteen, a daily strip initially revolving around diminutive everyman John Sappo's everyday misadventures, chiefly the struggle to catch the 5:15 train. By November 1921, Segar introduced Sappo's significantly larger, more domineering wife Myrtle, thus increasingly centering the strip on domestic humor. The strip continued with this basic format (save for an eventual shift in name to Sappo, the Commuter around 1923) until February 17, 1925, upon which the strip ceased publication for unknown causes. Segar would, however, soon revive the strip as a Sunday-only feature (with its plot and characters essentially unmodified), the first example of which, now merely titled Sappo, saw publication on February 28, 1926.
By the turn of the decade, Segar began to increasingly cast John Sappo as a would-be inventor, thus gradually gravitating the strip away from its domestic roots in favor of more outlandish imagery and plotlines. On May 8, 1932, the strip's tonal transition was completed upon the Sappos renting out a room to eccentric inventor and self-described genius O. G. Wotasnozzle, whose bizarre antics rapidly enabled him to become the strip's new star. However, John still retained much protagonism as the testing of the Professor's inventions usually involved his participation and invariably ended in luridly bizarre disaster. Stories of experiments gone awry would be continued from Sunday to Sunday (aside from a period when Segar retooled the strip as a series of drawing lessons). At one point, Wotasnozzle himself also got married, but the two protagonists' wives eventually stopped appearing altogether.
Comic book version[]
Sappo was subsequently published in the line of Popeye comic books begun in 1948 with story and art by Bud Sagendorf. Aside from giving protagonism to Ham Gravy and other secondary characters such as Wimpy for the book's supporting tales, and employing new characters like Sherm! and Axle and Cam, Sagendorf adopted Sappo in this capacity beginning in 1949, later to become the back-up feature of choice. Renamed again, this time bearing Professor Wotasnozzle's name, the strip became a mainstay of Popeye comic books in short, self-contained episodes.
In later years, IDW Publishing would likewise add a supporting feature starring John and Wotasnozzle to their Popeye comic series.