''Shoe'' is an American comic strip about a motley crew of newspapermen, all of whom are birds. It was written and drawn by its creator, cartoonist

Jeff MacNelly Jeffrey Kenneth "Jeff" MacNelly (September 17, 1947 – June 8, 2000) was an American editorial cartoonist and the creator of the comic strip ''Shoe''. After ''Shoe'' had been established in papers, MacNelly created the single-panel strip '' Plu ...

, from September 13, 1977 until his death in 2000. MacNelly's last strip was dated July 9, 2000; it has since been continued by Chris Cassatt, Gary Brookins, Ben Lansing, and Susie MacNelly (Jeff's widow). While not politically oriented in the style of strips such as ''

Doonesbury ''Doonesbury'' is a comic strip by American cartoonist Garry Trudeau that chronicles the adventures and lives of an array of characters of various ages, professions, and backgrounds, from the President of the United States to the title character, ...

'', ''Shoe'' often pokes fun at various social and political issues of the day (especially when Senator Batson D. Belfry makes an appearance). Although not particularly well known outside the U.S., ''Shoe'' was in fact granted its own monthly comic book in

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...

for a brief time in 1987 under the name "Sjur," which consisted of reprints from newspapers. The magazine reached a total of six publications. Later on, in 1989, ''Shoe'' did a brief comeback to Norwegian readers, this time under the name "Krax," appearing as an extra-feature in the then brand-new

Calvin & Hobbes ''Calvin and Hobbes'' is a daily American comic strip created by cartoonist Bill Watterson that was Print syndication, syndicated from November 18, 1985, to December 31, 1995. Commonly cited as "the last great newspaper comic", ''Calvin and Hobb ...

magazine. The strip won MacNelly the National Cartoonists Society's

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 the year 1979.

Characters and setting

Shoe deals with the day-to-day foibles of a group of newspaper employees and their families, all of whom are portrayed as anthropomorphized birds, in the fictional locale of Treetops, East Virginia. During hunting season, "hunting dogs" (hounds with rifles, a visual pun on the sharp-sniffing canines that hunters use to track game) are occasionally featured.

Collections and reprints

(All titles by Jeff MacNelly) * ''The Very First Shoe Book'' (1978) Avon * ''The Other Shoe'' (1980) Avon * ''Shoe Extra'' (1980) Yaffa Publishing (Australia) * ''The New Shoe'' (1981) Avon * ''On with the Shoe!'' (1982) Holt, Rinehart & Winston * ''A Shoe for All Seasons'' (1983) HRW * ''The Shoe Must Go On'' (1984) HRW * ''The Greatest Shoe on Earth'' (1985) HRW * ''One Shoe Fits All'' (1986) HRW * ''How Many Next Years Do You Get in Baseball?: Shoe Goes to Wrigley Field'' (1988) Bonus Books * ''Too Old for Summer Camp and Too Young to Retire'' (1988) St. Martin's Press * ''A Cigar Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry'' (1989) St. Martin's Press * ''Shake the Hand, Bite the Taco'' (1990) St. Martin's Press * ''Apply a Little Hardware to the Software'' (1991) Quark Prods. * ''The Athletic Shoe'' (1991) St. Martin's Press * ''Out to Lunch: A Brand New Shoe'' (1993) Tribune Publishing * ''New Shoes'' (1994) Contemporary Books * ''Play Ball! All I Ever Learned I Forgot by the Third Inning'' (1999) Triumph * ''From Couch Potato to Mouse Potato: Success Tips for the Technically Impaired'' (1978) Triumph * ''27 Years of Shoe: World Ends at Ten, Details at Eleven'' (2004) Andrews McMeel

References

External links

*
''Shoe''
at Don Markstein's Toonopedia
Archived
from the original on June 3, 2017. {{King Features Syndicate Comics American comic strips Gag-a-day comics Satirical comics 1977 comics debuts Comics about birds