Yard sales are a great place for cheap history lessons. Recently, I browsed at a community yard sale in my local area and came across a book by a Canadian cartoonist who was hitherto unknown by me.
    The book was a 1959 reprint of "Herbie!", by William Garnet "Bing" Coughlin, published by Nelson and Sons from 1946. The material in the comics seems best suited for those with military background and inclination, so most of the humor went over my head. I was a bit surprised at the raciness of some of the cartoons, but understand cheesecake images were a large part of military newspapers, or other documents printed for military digestion in this time.
    William G. "BING" Coughlin was born in Ottawa on October 7, 1905 and when his widowed mother remarried, moved with the family south of the border to Philadelphia in 1923. There, he enrolled in the Pennsylvania School of Industrial Art, graduated and entered the world of advertising art. He met and married Margaret "Peg" White, then returned to Canada to enlist wih the Canadian military.
     Promoted to Sergeant, Coughlin served with the 4th Princess Louise Dragoon Guards, stationed in Sicily, during the Italian campaign.
     In 1944, veteran newspaperman J. Douglas McFarlane sought him out to contribute a comic feature to the "Maple Leaf", the official daily newspaper of the Canadian military. Coughlin's work appeared with cartoons by such Canadian cartooning legends as Les Callan and Merle "Ting" Tingley, both of whom went into editorial cartoons following the war.
     It is alleged that it was at detailed advisal by McFarlane that Coughlin's legendary character "Herbie" was both created and named. He suggested Coughlin draw one soldier, give him a name, and thus, an identity. McFarlane suggested "Herbie" be the title, Herbert being a hated middle name given McFarlane at birth, that he later removed.
     As a character, Herbie had a very simplistic look,  bearing a strong resemblance to "Kilroy", of the "Kilroy was here" graffiti of the time. It should be noted that a Kilroy-looking, toque-wearing, mustachioed French-Canadian character made common appearances alongside Herbie in Coughlin's panels. The cartoon became very popular in the war years and the term "Herbie" is still applied to Canadian military figures even today. Besides the "Maple Leaf", Herbie ran in 30 non-military Canadian newspapers.
     In 1946, Coughlin was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) for his war cartooning and unlike Callan and Tingley, steered clear of political cartooning in the post-war years. Coughlin did advertising art for the Canadian National Exhibition, until 1950, when he returned to Philadelphia and worked as a designer of exhibits. He died at age 85 in Springfield, Pennsylvania, survived by five children . While not very well known, "Herbie" was the subject of a 2007 publishing effort by Algrove publishing of Almonte, Ontario.
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     I wondered how I could miss such a valuable piece of cartooning history, but perhaps not being involved, or even remotely connected to the military, I guess it simply eluded me. Such cartoons occupy as valid a place in the history of cartooning in Canada as any other contributors at the time and while his training and much of his life was spent south of the border, I am proud of the career of "Bing" Coughlin and how he helped shape our Canadian cartooning industry.