Mad Magazine - A brief history

[Astronuc]

Mental Floss - A Brief History of Mad Magazine
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/648353/mad-magazine-history

In the 1960s, songwriter Irving Berlin and others went after Mad in court. Mad had printed a collection of joke lyrics to be sung to the tunes of popular songs, and the music industry felt this was copyright infringement. The United States Court of Appeals disagreed and sided with Mad, saying that parody and satire were deserving of substantial freedom both as entertainment and as a form of literary and social criticism.

That is a powerful proclamation, which Mad may or may not have been thinking about when they decided to print a middle finger on the cover of their April 1974 issue. Some stores refused to stock it, which prompted William Gaines to issue a letter of apology—one of the many Mad has been forced to issue over the years.

The first was addressed to newsstand dealers in 1953, when Gaines published his biography in the magazine describing himself as a Communist, pyromaniac, and dope dealer. Then, in 1957, Gaines invited the wrath of the Federal Bureau of Investigation when the magazine printed a game in which the reader could earn a draft-dodger card they were supposed to request from FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. When three readers actually wrote to Hoover asking for their card, the FBI visited the Mad offices in New York. Gaines was conveniently not in, but art director John Putnam promised they would never make fun of Hoover again. Gaines then wrote a letter saying how very sorry he was.

And in June 1961, the FBI got upset when Mad offered advice on writing an extortion letter that several kids used as a template to demand money. The FBI wanted the Attorney General to investigate since they felt the magazine was urging people to violate federal laws.

They didn’t get their wish, but in 1967, Mad did get a visit from the U.S. Treasury Department after printing what was obviously a fake $3 bill. The problem was that some of the first change machines in the country couldn’t tell a legitimate bill from one bearing Alfred E. Neuman’s face; the machines were giving out change when people inserted the fake money into the slot. How that was the fault of Mad was never really explained, and they ultimately wound up not getting in trouble for the accidental counterfeiting.

By the early 1970s, Mad had a circulation of over 2 million readers and was increasingly seen as a vital voice in the counterculture movement. Alfred E. Neuman set his sights on everything from Vietnam to Watergate. Even Harvey Kurtzman returned briefly in 1985 to help spoof Rambo.

in the end . . .

Faced with dwindling circulation, editors at Mad took some drastic steps. In 1994, they allowed Alfred E. Neuman to become a spokes-idiot for a Syquest computer memory device. By 2002, he was appearing in catalogs for Land’s End and a Got Milk? ad campaign. The magazine itself had also started accepting ads. Both of these steps were a big deal. William Gaines had stopped taking ads in 1957. Gaines, who passed away in 1992 shortly before Kurtzman, felt that Mad couldn’t parody consumerism if they were profiting from advertising. In 2001, ads helped pay for the magazine’s switch to color printing.

But by 2002, Mad was selling just 200,000 copies a month. Eventually, the magazine faced the same critical decision that a lot of print publications had to make. In 2019, DC Entertainment, which had long-ago acquired Mad, decided to stop publishing new issues. For now, the magazine mainly offers reprints of classic stories both in print and online, with some rarer new material sprinkled in.

A related thread

Thread 'Goodbye Mad Magazine: A Tribute to a Generation of Cynics and Satirists'

Jul 7, 2019

I just learned that the August issue of Mad Magazine will be its last. Like many of us growing up in the fifty and sixties Mad magazine provided use with a different outlook of the world from that which was being foisted on us by the establishment.

Remember someone running into your dorm room yelling "Did you see the latest issue of Mad" Yep. I lost contact with it in the 70's. However it did create a whole generation of cynics and satirists which continue with it main objective of exposing the hypocrisy and subterfuge of our society.

"What me worry?" No, at least not...

• gleem
• Replies: 12
• Forum: Art, Music, History, and Linguistics

• 

How Mad Magazine Changed Comedy & Angered the FBI​

 

[.Scott]

I recall "spy vs spy", "Voyage to see whats on the Bottom", and the fold-in page. I believe I was about 11 or 12 when I had a subscription. Some teachers would say that reading anything was good - and Mad magazine was a common example of "anything".

 

[symbolipoint]

The "parady & satire" section of the discussion is interesting. But very brief in its content.

 

[Hornbein]

potrezebnie

 

[renormalize]

potrezebnie

Actually, I think that's potrzebie. And let's not forget veeblefetzer!

 

[sbrothy]

[...]Faced with dwindling circulation, editors at Mad took some drastic steps. In 1994, they allowed Alfred E. Neuman to become a spokes-idiot for a Syquest computer memory device. [...]

That was indeed drastic. Making Alfred E. Neuman the spox for anything sounds deranged!

EDIT: Your link there is out of order from here. Not more than it can be edited to work with little effort though. So I guess no biggie. Funny link too.

 

[.Scott]

potrezebnie

I would say very "potrzebny".

 

[gmax137]

I remember their parody of William f Buckley, "often contumacious but never revocatory" lol

 

[robphy]

possibly useful:
https://www.madcoversite.com/allthumbs.html
https://www.madcoversite.com/covers.html

https://archive.org/search?query=mad+magazine ( however, the contents of many of the issues may not be accessible )

 

[AlexB23]

Nice stuff. I was a little too young for Mad Magazine (not sure if they still sell it), but the Cartoon Network folks had a TV series called Mad TV on Dish Network with parodies of cartoons, sci-fi, and sitcoms. My parents ditched Dish in late 2012, so I enjoyed it from 2011-2012.

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt1718438/