Editing Shmoo (section)

==Licensing history==
{{blockquote|Of course, it was merchandised to death. I think they even had shmoo toilet seats.|Al Capp, ''Cartoonist PROfiles #37'', March 1978}}

An unexpected—and virtually unprecedented—postwar merchandising phenomenon followed Capp's introduction of the Shmoo in ''Li'l Abner''. As in the strip, shmoos suddenly appeared to be everywhere in 1949 and 1950—including a ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' cover story. They also garnered nearly a full page of coverage (under "Economics") in the ''Time'' International section. Major articles also ran in ''[[Newsweek]]'', ''[[Life (magazine)|Life]]'', ''[[The New Republic]]'', and countless other publications and newspapers. Virtually overnight, as a ''Life'' headline put it, "The U.S. Becomes Shmoo-Struck!"<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_kgEAAAAMBAJ&q=life+magazine+shmoo&pg=PA46 |title=The U.S. Becomes Shmoo-Struck! |magazine=Life |date=20 September 1948 |accessdate=2012-12-10}}</ref>

===Toys and consumer products===
[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-S1207-501, Westberlin, Kind sitzt auf Care-Paket.jpg|right|thumb|A child in West Berlin holding a Shmoo-shaped [[balloon]] and sitting on a [[CARE Package]] (October 1948)]]
Shmoo dolls, clocks, watches, jewelry, earmuffs, wallpaper, fishing lures, air fresheners, soap, ice cream, balloons, ashtrays, toys, games, [[Halloween]] masks, salt and pepper shakers, decals, pinbacks, tumblers, coin banks, greeting cards, planters, neckties, suspenders, belts, curtains, fountain pens, and other shmoo paraphernalia were produced. A garment factory in [[Baltimore]] turned out a whole line of shmoo apparel, including "Shmooveralls". In 1948, people danced to the Shmoo [[Rhumba]] and the Shmoo [[Polka]]. The Shmoo briefly entered everyday language through such phrases as "What's Shmoo?" and "Happy Shmoo Year!"<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.essortment.com/all/alcappshmoo_rxvq.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090522213154/http://www.essortment.com/all/alcappshmoo_rxvq.htm |archive-date=2009-05-22 |title=Al Capp's Shmoo |website=Essortment.com |date=1986-05-16 |accessdate=2012-12-10}}</ref>

Close to a hundred licensed shmoo products from 75 different manufacturers were produced in less than a year, some of which sold five million units each.<ref>''Newsweek'', 5 September 1949; and ''[[Editor & Publisher]]'', 16 July 1949</ref> In a single year, shmoo merchandise generated more than $25&nbsp;million in sales in 1948 dollars (equivalent to ${{Inflation|US|25|1948|fmt=c}}&nbsp;million in {{Inflation-year|US}}).<ref name="deniskitchen.com">{{cite web|url=http://www.deniskitchen.com/docs/new_shmoofacts.html |title=The Shmoo Fact Sheet |first=Denis |last=Kitchen |publisher=Deniskitchen.com |year=2004 |accessdate=2012-12-10}}</ref>

{{blockquote|There had never previously been anything like it. Comparisons to contemporary cultural phenomena are inevitable. But modern crazes are almost always due to massive marketing campaigns by large media corporations, and are generally aimed at the youth market. The Shmoo phenomenon arose immediately, spontaneously and ''solely'' from cartoonist Al Capp's daily comic strip—and it appealed widely to Americans of ''all'' ages. Forty million people read the original 1948 Shmoo story, and Capp's already considerable readership roughly ''doubled'' following the overwhelming success of the Shmoo... |Denis Kitchen}}

The Shmoo was so popular it even replaced [[Walt Disney]]'s [[Mickey Mouse]] as the face of the Children's [[United States Treasury security#Nonmarketable securities|Savings Bond]], issued by the [[U.S. Treasury Department]] in 1949. The valid document was colorfully illustrated with Capp's character, and promoted by the [[Federal Government of the United States]] with a $16&nbsp;million advertising campaign budget. According to one article at the time, the Shmoo showed "Thrift, loyalty, trust, duty, truth, and common ''cents'' [that] add up to aid to his nation". Al Capp accompanied President [[Harry S. Truman]] at the bond's unveiling ceremony.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://fishinghistory.blogspot.com/2008/09/shmoo-part-i.html |title=The Shmoo Part I |first=T. E. A. |last=Larson |website=Fishing for History: The History of Fishing and Fishing Tackle |date=2008-09-10 |accessdate=2012-12-10}}</ref>

===Comic books and reprints===
''The Life and Times of the Shmoo'' (1948), a paperback collection of the original sequence, was a bestseller for [[Simon & Schuster]] and became the first cartoon book to achieve serious literary attention.<ref>{{cite magazine |url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,886491,00.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071023081440/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,886491,00.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=October 23, 2007 |title=The Miracle of Dogpatch |magazine=Time |date=27 December 1948 |accessdate=2012-12-10}}</ref> Distributed to small town magazine racks, it sold 700,000 copies in its first year of publication alone. It was reviewed coast to coast alongside [[Dwight Eisenhower]]'s ''[[Crusade in Europe]]'' (the other big publication at the time).

The original book and its sequel, ''The Return of the Shmoo'' (1959), have been collected in print many times since—most recently in 2002—always to high sales figures.<ref name="deniskitchen.com"/>

There was also a separate line of [[comic book]]s, ''Al Capp's Shmoo Comics'' (featuring Washable Jones), published by the Capp family-owned [[Toby Press]].<ref>{{cite web|last=Thompson |first=Steven |url=http://fourcolorshadows.blogspot.com/2012/05/super-shmoo-al-capps-shmoo-1949.html |title=Super Shmoo – Al Capp's Shmoo – 1949 |website=Four-Color Shadows |date=26 May 2012 |accessdate=2012-12-10}}</ref> Comics historian and ''Li'l Abner'' expert [[Denis Kitchen]] recently edited a complete collection of all five original ''Shmoo Comics'', from 1949 and 1950. The book was published by [[Dark Horse Comics]] in 2008. Kitchen edited a second Shmoo-related volume for Dark Horse in 2011, on the history of the character in newspaper strips, collectibles, and memorabilia.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://superitch.com/?p=11296 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716164811/http://superitch.com/?p=11296 |archive-date=2011-07-16 |title=The Oddly Compelling Interview: Denis Kitchen |date=6 August 2010 |website=I.T.C.H. |accessdate=2012-12-10}}</ref>

===Recordings and sheet music===

Recordings and published [[sheet music]] related to the Shmoos include:
[[Image:Shmoo78rpm.jpeg|thumb|right|150px|Shmoo 78rpm disc]]
* ''The Shmoo Sings'' with Earl Rogers (1948) 78 rpm / Allegro
* ''The Shmoo Club'' b/w ''The Shmoo Is Clean, the Shmoo Is Neat'' with Gerald Marks and Justin Stone (1949) 78 rpm / Music You Enjoy, Inc.<ref name=muldavin>{{cite book |title=The Complete Guide to Vintage Children's Records|first=Peter|last=Muldavin|publisher=Collector Books|location=[[Paducah, Kentucky]]|year=2007|isbn=9781574325096|pages=134–135}}</ref>
* ''The Snuggable, Huggable Shmoo'' b/w ''The Shmoo Doesn't Cost a Cent'' with Gerald Marks and Justin Stone (1949) 78 rpm / Music You Enjoy, Inc.<ref name=muldavin />
* ''Shmoo Lesson'' b/w ''A Shmoo Can Do Most Anything'' with Gerald Marks and Justin Stone (1949) 78 rpm / Music You Enjoy, Inc.<ref name=muldavin />
* ''The Shmoo Song'' (1948) Composed by [[Jule Styne]] & John Jacob Loeb / Harvey Music Corp.
* ''Shmoo Songs'' (1949) Composed by [[Gerald Marks]] / Bristol Music Corp.
* ''The Kigmy Song'' (1949) Composed by Joe Rosenield & Fay Tishman / Town and Country Music Co.

===Animation and puppetry===
Originally, shmoos were meant to be included in the 1956 [[Broadway theatre|Broadway]] ''[[Li'l Abner (musical)|Li'l Abner]]'' [[musical theatre|musical]], employing stage [[puppetry]]. Reportedly, the idea was abandoned in the development stage by the producers, however, for reasons of practicality. A variation of the character had appeared earlier as a [[marionette]] puppet on television. "Shmoozer", a talking shmoo with an anthropomorphic human body, was a recurring [[sidekick]] character on ''[[Fearless Fosdick]]'', a short-lived puppet series that aired on NBC-TV in 1952.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0389616/fullcredits|title=Fearless Fosdick (TV Series 1952– )|via=www.imdb.com}}</ref>

After Capp's death in 1979, the Shmoo gained its own [[Animated television series|animated series]] as part of ''[[Fred and Barney Meet the Shmoo]]'', which consisted of reruns of ''[[The New Fred and Barney Show]]'' mixed with the Shmoo's own cartoons; despite the title the two sets of characters didn't directly "meet" within the show. The characters ''did'' meet, however, in the early 1980s Flintstones [[spin-off (media)|spin-off]] ''[[The Flintstone Comedy Show]]''. The Shmoo appeared, incongruously, in the segment ''Bedrock Cops'' as a police officer alongside part-time officers [[Fred Flintstone]] and [[Barney Rubble]]. Needless to add, this Shmoo had little relationship to the ''L'il Abner'' character, other than a superficial appearance. A later [[Hanna-Barbera]] venture, ''[[The New Shmoo]]'', featured the character as an (inexplicably) shape-shifting mascot of Mighty Mysteries Comics, a group of teens who solve ''[[Scooby-Doo]]''-like mysteries. In this series the Shmoo could metamorphose magically into any shape at will — like ''[[Tom Terrific]]''. None of these revisionist revivals of the venerable character was particularly successful.