Other than the fact that it was people building hot rods that were in the same age bracket as those who would read Mad magazine, is there any other connection? Wikipedia says a similar character was used as nose art before Mad's use of him. My late buddy Don, had A.E.N. and "What, Me Worry?" on his cars and I was wondering if he was just weird, or if there were others that thought to put that image on their cars, like the Chevy sedan in Ryan's 57 Nationals Pt 2 story Oh and here's something classy for ya: http://www.nofear.org/Archives/2003/07/alfred_e_neuman.html
I always thought that the guy, Alan, who makes Ol Skool Rodz looks like the love child of Alfred E. Newmann and William Shatner...
I think I still have a 24" X 36" poster of the Mad presidential candiate from 1960 or 64. Not in great shape but all in one piece. He was a popular fellow back in the early 60's. I also liked the two spy characters (black and white) that usually had some kind of wild custom or hot rod.
i never was into mad magazine like all of my friends were but did look at their books all the time. they always had a twist to the pop scene and i uased to love the folding pictures at the end of the mag. but being the gearhead i always was i was more of a CARtoons kinda guy...................
When I was a kid I never missed the newest issue. My favorite was Spy vs Spy. Hadn't heard that song in a looooong time.
I was always going to get Alfred E Newman inked on the shoulder. Just figured it went along with my personality. I think there are probably a lot of us who never missed an issue. R&C and Mad Magazine were the two that I had subscriptions to when I was a little guy. Hotrods? Sure it seems to me that there was often some sort of a distorted car of some sort in there somewhere.
One of my funniest ones was the "Used car sale" abreveations ? Such as "PW.St.-- instead of power steering they said " Probably was stolen". The whole article was funny as shit.
An Alfred E Neuman winged deathshead with ''mad angels, what me worry '' rockers would be interesting,but just a little mad.
In one of the old magazines I got there is a 32 , I think, with a blank grille insert with Alfred and "What, me worry" under it. I use to wonder if Mad magazine was so popular in the fifties that you wouldn't think twice about painting it on your car, or if the guy was bragging about the fact that, "What , me worry" , had something to do with, he wasn't worried about anyone out running him. It would take me awhile to find the picture! My brother always got stuff like Mad magazine. I liked the fold together back covers the most, went straight to it!
I had ol' Alfred stenciled on the back of my old bug. "What, me worry?" was kind of the motto for that thing.
Mad and A E Neuman were icons of the time so it isn't a surprise that they found thier way onto cars. I still remember our schoolbus driver jumping my ass when I was in Jr. High for reading Mad. Said it was communist magazine. Guess I had very permissive parents, lol.
I used to have "It's A Gas" on a flexi-disc. I think the magazine it came in is still here somewhere but I sold to flexi to a collector for $35. That was at least 10 years ago. Spy vs. Spy was too cool. Mike
Don Martin Ruled.....I practiced doing his art for hours in Social studies class. I can still do a pretty good Martin cariciture.
Nobody mentioned the Collection on CD. Was it 1999 or 2000? Had every issue of MAD up to that date. Also had Spy vs Spy cartoons, and others and "It's a Gas" as the theme song when loading. It was like PDF format so you could zoom in on the little doodles in the margins and copy and paste them. Was I the only one that bought one?
The Jalopy Journal
