''They'll Do It Every Time'' is a single-panel newspaper

comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

, created by

Jimmy Hatlo James Cecil Hatlo (September 1, 1897 – December 1, 1963), better known as Jimmy Hatlo, was an American cartoonist who in 1929 created the long-running comic strip and gag panel ''They'll Do It Every Time'', which he wrote and drew until his d ...

, which had a long run over eight decades, first appearing on February 5, 1929, and continuing until February 3, 2008. The title of the strip became a popular

catchphrase A catchphrase (alternatively spelled catch phrase) is a phrase or expression recognized by its repeated utterance. Such phrases often originate in popular culture and in the arts, and typically spread through word of mouth and a variety of mass ...

Publication history

Hatlo, a sports cartoonist, created the panel to fill space on the comics page of the '' San Francisco Call-Bulletin''. Hatlo kept producing the panel, and before long readers were sending fan mail."Jimmy Hatlo: Man of Many Hats," ''Hogan's Alley'', 2010
/ref> The feature proved so popular that it was eventually syndicated by

King Features Syndicate King Features Syndicate, Inc. is a American content distribution and animation studio, consumer product License, licensing and print syndication company owned by Hearst Communications that distributes about 150 comic strips, columnist, newspaper c ...

beginning in 1936, with a Sunday panel added on July 4, 1943.

Characters and story

The gags illustrated minor absurdities, frustrations, hypocrisies, ironies and misfortunes of everyday life. These were displayed in a single-panel or two-panel format. If two panels, the left-side panel showed some deceptive, pretentious, unwitting or scheming human behavior, with the second panel revealing the truth of the situation. Hellish scenes were the subjects of his topper strip, ''The Hatlo Inferno'', which ran with ''They'll Do It Every Time'' from 1953 to 1958. An occasional feature of ''They'll Do It Every Time'' was "Hatlo's History" which enabled the cartoonist to satirize memorable moments from earlier centuries. In its early decades, a timid man named Henry Tremblechin was a recurring victim of the strip's observations. Tremblechin's bratty daughter,

Little Iodine ''Little Iodine'' is an American Sunday comic strip, created by Jimmy Hatlo, which was syndicated by King Features and ran from August 15, 1943 until August 14, 1983. The strip was a spin-off of ''They'll Do It Every Time'', an earlier Hatlo cre ...

, appeared so often she graduated into her own comic strip (Aug 15, 1943 – Aug 14, 1983), comic book (1949–62), a 1946 movie and a 1988 animated cartoon show.

A tip of the Hatlo hat

Ideas and gags usually came from suggestions by readers, who were credited with a small acknowledgment box with a tiny drawing of Hatlo tipping his hat. Hatlo continued working on ''They'll Do It Every Time'' until his death in 1963 when the team of Al Scaduto and Bob Dunn took over the strip. The readers continued to be credited for their suggestions, but the drawing of the "Hatlo hat" was dropped. After Dunn's death in 1989, ''They'll Do It Every Time'' was written and drawn by Scaduto, who died December 8, 2007, at age 79. King Features announced that the strip would not continue with another cartoonist and ceased publication on February 2, 2008. At the time of Scaduto's death, King Features was distributing the panel to more than 100 American newspapers.

Awards

The strip, as well as Bob Dunn, received the

National Cartoonists Society The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...

's Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1968, 1969 and 1979 (with Al Scaduto), plus the

Reuben Award The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...

for 1975. Al Scaduto won the Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1991 and 1997 for his work on the strip.

References

External links

''They'll Do It Every Time'' at Don Markstein's ToonopediaNational Cartoonists Society Awards
{{King Features Syndicate Comics American comic strips 1929 comics debuts 2008 comics endings Gag cartoon comics Gag-a-day comics Quotations from comics Comedy catchphrases 1920s neologisms