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An early strip featuring (L to R) Daddy (Bill), Dolly, Billy, Mommy (Thel), and Jeffy. A fourth child, PJ, was introduced in 1962

The Family Circus (originally, The Family Circle) is a syndicated comic strip created and written by cartoonist Bil Keane and inked/colored by his son, Jeff Keane. The strip generally uses a single captioned panel with a round border, hence the original name of the series, which was changed following objections from Family Circle, the magazine of the same name. The series has been in continuous production since 1960, and according to publisher King Features Syndicate, it is the most widely syndicated cartoon series in the world, appearing in 1,500 newspapers [1]. Compilations of Family Circus comic strips have sold over thirteen million copies worldwide. Image File history File links Question_book-3. ... For other uses, see Author (disambiguation). ... Bil Keane (1922- ) is an American cartoonist best known for his work on the long-running strip The Family Circus, which began its run in 1960 and is still going strong. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... King Features 1951 Christmas card King Features Syndicate, a print syndication company owned by The Hearst Corporation, distributes about 150 comic strips, newspaper columns, editorial cartoons, puzzles and games to nearly 5000 newspapers around the world. ... The webcomic genres are the types of themes a webcomic can take. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Print Syndication is a form of syndication in which news articles, columns, or comic strips are made available to newspapers and magazines. ... This article is about the comic strip, the sequential art form as published in newspapers and on the Internet. ... Bil Keane (1922- ) is an American cartoonist best known for his work on the long-running strip The Family Circus, which began its run in 1960 and is still going strong. ... Jeff Keane is the son of Bil Keane, and currently inks and colors the syndicated comic strip The Family Circus. ... Family Circle is an American womens magazine published 15 times a year by Meredith Corporation. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... King Features 1951 Christmas card King Features Syndicate, a print syndication company owned by The Hearst Corporation, distributes about 150 comic strips, newspaper columns, editorial cartoons, puzzles and games to nearly 5000 newspapers around the world. ...

Characters

Family

The central characters of the Family Circus are a family whose surname is rarely mentioned. The parents, Bill and Thelma (Thel), are modeled after the author and his wife, Thelma Carne Keane. Their four children, Billy, Dolly, Jeffy, and PJ, are fictionalized composites of the Keanes' five children. With the exception of PJ, the characters have not aged appreciably during the run of the strip.

Bill (in the early years of the strip, named Steve) works in an office, and he is believed to be a cartoonist, most likely based on the writer of the strip because he draws big circles on paper presumably a cartoon version of the Family Circus. Bill is also a veteran of World War II. Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000...

Thel is a college-educated homemaker. The Los Angeles Times ran a feature article on the Thelma character when Keane updated her hairstyle in 1996. This just IN !!!:paris hiltons new dog. ...

The oldest child is seven-year-old Billy. A recurring theme involves Billy as a substitute cartoonist, generally filling in for the Sunday strip. The strips purportedly drawn by Billy are crudely rendered and reflect his understanding of the world and sense of humor. Keane modeled Billy after his oldest son, Glen, now a prominent Disney animator. Glen Keane (born 1954) is a lead character animator best known for work at Walt Disney Studios. ... Disney may refer to: The Walt Disney Company and its divisions, including Walt Disney Pictures. ...

Five-year-old Dolly is the only girl in the family. Dolly is modeled after Keane's daughter and oldest child, Gayle. Dolly was Gayle's pet name as a child.

Three-year-old Jeffy is named for Keane's son (and now assistant) Jeff Keane.

Youngest child PJ was introduced to the strip on August 1, 1962, and is the only character to have aged appreciably over the course of the strip. PJ was introduced as an infant and gradually grew to be about eighteen months old. PJ rarely speaks.

Extended family

Bill's mother (Florence, but usually called Grandma) appears regularly in the strip and apparently lives near the family. Bill's father (Al, called Grandpa by the kids and Bill) is dead but occasionally appears in the strip as a spirit or watching from up in heaven. Bill's father (as a spirit) plays a prominent role in the TV special Family Circus Christmas. The English word spirit comes from the Latin spiritus (breath). // The English word spirit comes from the Latin spiritus, meaning breath (compare spiritus asper), but also soul, courage, vigor, ultimately from a PIE root *(s)peis- (to blow). In the Vulgate, the Latin word translates Greek (πνευμα), pneuma (Hebrew (רוח) ruah), as...

Thel's parents are both alive but apparently live several hundred miles away in a rural area. The family occasionally visits their farm for vacation.

Pets

The family pets are two dogs—a Labrador named Barfy and a cocker spaniel named Sam—and a cat, an orange tabby named Kittycat.

Gremlins

In April of 1975, Keane introduced an invisible gremlin named "Not Me", who watches while the children try to shift blame for a misdeed with a "not me". Additional gremlins named "Ida Know", (September 1975) "Nobody", "O Yeah!" and "Just B Cause" were introduced in later years. Not Me cameoed in Pearls Before Swine running by with a knife to kill Rat. Neither of these gremlins has appeared recently in the strip. Pearls Before Swine is an American comic strip written and illustrated by Stephan Pastis, formerly a lawyer in San Francisco, California. ...

Location

The Family Circus takes place in Scottsdale, AZ. They often visit a popular ice cream parlor named the Sugar Bowl, and Jeffy once went to St. Joseph's Hospital for a tonsillectomy. Thel was seen playing tennis with a racket marked "Scottsdale Racket." and Bill mentioned moving up to "B" class at Scottsdale Racket Club in a 1984 strip. Also, a sign for Paradise Valley, where Keane lives, is seen in one 1976 strip. However, the family has had snow in the strip. Bil Keane commented that he took scenes from his boyhood in Pennsylvania, such as snow, and added them to the strip. The family moved early in the strip, from an unknown area (perhaps Pennsylvania) to Scottsdale. However, there is a similarly named real-life town by the name of Scottdale, Pennsylvania. Ice cream (originally iced cream) is a frozen dessert made from dairy products such as cream (or equivalents), combined with flavourings and sweeteners. ... Throat with Tonsils Throat after tonsillectomy A tonsillectomy is a surgical procedure in which the tonsils are removed. ... This article is about the U.S. State. ... Scottdale is a borough located in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania. ...

The Family Car

For more than two decades, the family car had been a station wagon. In 1985, a year after the introduction of the Plymouth Voyager and the Dodge Caravan, the family is seen in a strip trading in its station wagon for a brand-new minivan, which they still get around in today. The family's minivan also bears a striking resemblance to the aforementioned Chrysler-branded vehicles, complete with the Chrysler pentastar logo on its hood. The Plymouth Voyager and Plymouth Grand Voyager were minivans marketed by DaimlerChrysler (they were sold by the Chrysler Corporation until 1998). ... It has been suggested that this article be split into articles entitled Dodge Caravan and Dodge Grand Caravan, accessible from a disambiguation page. ...

Other characters

• Morrie is a playmate of Billy's and the only recurring African-American character in the strip.
• Mr. Horton is Bill's boss.

Languages Predominantly American English Religions Protestantism (chiefly Baptist and Methodist); Roman Catholicism; Islam Related ethnic groups Sub-Saharan Africans and other African groups, some with Native American groups. ...

Format

Daily strip

The daily strip consists of a single captioned panel with a round border. The panel is occasionally split in two halves. One unusual practice in the series is the occasional use of both speech balloons within the picture and captions outside the circle. The daily strip does not generally follow a weekly arc, with the exception of family vacations. This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Sunday strip

The format of the Sunday strip varies considerably from week to week, though there are several well-known recurring concepts and themes. Among the most popular are the "dotted line" comics, showing the characters' paths through the neighborhood or house followed by a thick dotted line. (The earliest showing of the dotted line was on April 8th, 1962, though on February 25 of that same year, the first strip that had a path appeared.) This concept has been parodied by other comic strips, including Pearls Before Swine, For Better or For Worse, Mother Goose and Grimm, and Marvin. Year 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... In contemporary usage, a parody (or lampoon) is a work that imitates another work in order to ridicule, ironically comment on, or poke some affectionate fun at the work itself, the subject of the work, the author or fictional voice of the parody, or another subject. ... Pearls Before Swine is an American comic strip written and illustrated by Stephan Pastis, formerly a lawyer in San Francisco, California. ... For Better or For Worse is a comic strip by Lynn Johnston that began in September 1979. ... Mother Goose and Grimm is an internationally-syndicated cartoon strip by Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Mike Peters. ... Marvin may refer to: In music: Hank Marvin, member of British band, The Shadows Junior Marvin, Jamaican born guitarist Marvin Hamlisch, successful composer of film scores Marvin Gaye, popular soul and R&B singer, arranger, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and record producer In fiction: Marvin (horror host), 1950s Chicago area horror...

Other recurring concepts include a single picture surrounded by multiple speech balloons, representing the children's response to the given scenario, although the speaker of any given speech balloon is never explicitly shown (This format began on May 30, 1965). Year 1965 (MCMLXV) was a common year starting on Friday (link will display full calendar) of the 1965 Gregorian calendar. ...

Religious themes

One distinguishing characteristic of the Family Circus is the frequent use of Christian imagery and themes, ranging from generic references to God to Jeffy daydreaming about Jesus at the grocery store. Keane states that the religious content reflects his own upbringing and family traditions. Keane is Roman Catholic, and in past cartoons the children have been shown attending Catholic schools with nuns as teachers and attending Catholic church services. [2] Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ...

In other comics

Billy guest-starred in the 75th anniversary party of Blondie and Dagwood in the comic strip Blondie.

Television

The Family Circus has inspired three television specials: A Special Valentine with the Family Circus (1978), A Family Circus Christmas (1979), and A Family Circus Easter (1982).

Parody

For a list of sites containing Family Circus parodies, see Dysfunctional Family Circus#External links

The Family Circus has been widely parodied or satirized in film, television, internet media, and other daily comic strips. In an interview with the Washington Post, Keane insists that he is flattered and believes that such parody "...is a compliment to the popularity of the feature..."[3] The official Family Circus website contains an archive of syndicated comic strips from other authors which parody his characters. Mommy, why does my cereal taste like bitter almond? (Example from Strip #1 of Dysfunctional Family Circus; fair use) The Dysfunctional Family Circus is the name of several long-running parodies of the syndicated comic strip The Family Circus, featuring either Bil Keanes artwork with altered captions, or (less... 1867 edition of Punch, a ground-breaking British magazine of popular humour, including a good deal of satire of the contemporary social and political scene. ... ...

Of particular note is the now-defunct Dysfunctional Family Circus website, which paired Keane's illustrations with user-submitted captions. While Keane claims to have found the site funny at first, reader feedback coupled with a trend towards double entendre and vulgarity inconsistent with Keane's Catholic values prompted him to request the site be discontinued. Mommy, why does my cereal taste like bitter almond? (Example from Strip #1 of Dysfunctional Family Circus; fair use) The Dysfunctional Family Circus is the name of several long-running parodies of the syndicated comic strip The Family Circus, featuring either Bil Keanes artwork with altered captions, or (less...

On Amazon.com and related sites some of the highest rated reviews for Family Circus merchandise are parody reviews.[4]. Though Amazon regularly purges many of these reviews for vulgar content, the Family Circus books on Amazon maintain a higher rate of false reviews than most of its catalog. A recurring sentiment is that author Bil Keane is evil or megalomaniacal. Amazon. ... Bil Keane (1922- ) is an American cartoonist best known for his work on the long-running strip The Family Circus, which began its run in 1960 and is still going strong. ...

J. Robert Lennon wrote The Funnies, a 1999 novel about a family whose late patriarch drew a cartoon similar to The Family Circus. John Robert Lennon (born 1970) is an American author of several works of fiction, including a number of short stories and four novels to date. ...

References in popular culture

Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.

• Mr. Show with Bob and David episode "Who Let You In?" introduces Imminent Death Syndrome, a disease in which the sufferer is constantly on the brink of death and as such is told by others that they are talented in an effort to make them feel good during their final moments. "The guy who draws the Family Circus" is listed as a sufferer of the disease among many other celebrities who presumably owe their entire careers to IDS in spite of their lack of talent. On his comedy album "It's Not Funny" David Cross also cites a "Family Circus" strip in which PJ mispronounces "spaghetti" and "meatballs" as "pasghetti" and "meatbulbs" during a bit about electric scissors in which someone must miss an Evanescence concert because cutting out the "Family Circus" strip with regular scissors takes too long.
• In the 1999 film Go Todd Gaines (Timothy Olyphant) tells Clair Montgomery (Katie Holmes) that he hates the Family Circus as he reads a newspaper. He says it's just sitting there in the bottom left corner of the page, "waiting to suck".
• In the episode of The Simpsons, "Homer Simpson, This is Your Wife", Homer collects all 40 years of the comic strip The Family Circus, and then (with an indifferent "eh") throws it in the fire.
• In the Chris Elliott series, Get a Life (TV series), Elliott refers to the Family Circus as being "fall down funny".
• In episode 424 of Mystery Science Theater 3000, Joel invents a device called the Cartuner that takes two newspaper strips and synthesizes them into one. When he combines The Family Circus with The Far Side it produces a comic with Billy being chased by jackals, accompanied by the familiar dotted line.
• The Pinky and the Brain episode "The Pink Candidate" centers around Pinky writing to a newspaper editor over his concern about The Family Circus' lack of humor and becoming elected president after a long string of misunderstandings and manipulation by Brain, only to be removed from office after Bil Keane finds evidence of Brain's world-domination plans.
• The online comic The Perry Bible Fellowship featured a Family Circus parody in a strip entitled Way Too Much.
• Comic strip Pearls Before Swine has a story arc which had the Family Circus characters sheltering Osama bin Laden. In an August 13, 2006 strip, Pearls Before Swine involved Pig and Rat musing on comic strip characters who never age. The last panel shows Dolly and Jeffy as adults, with Jeffy being drunk and wanting a martini badly. In 2007 "Pearls Before Swine" character "Rat" is almost beaten up by "Family Circus" fans for nasty parodies of "Family Circus". Rat is let go only after allowing "Family Circus" characters to crossover to "Pearls before Swine".
• In the October 8, 2000 strip of Kevin and Kell, a dotted line is traced around the Dewclaws' yard, and names of various species are posted along the route. At the end, it is revealed that Coney, a carnivorous infant rabbit, traveled that route and ate all eight species there, and apparently, the "Not Me" gremlin.
• MAD Magazine ran a week's worth of strips in a feature entitled "The Dysfunctional Family Circus," hinting at adultery, various forms of abuse, alcoholism and other problems within the family. The Family Circus is often parodied in other contexts, such as versions of it involving The Sopranos and George W. Bush's family.
• In 8-Bit Theater Fighter sometimes laughs at random times while thinking of the Family Circus.
• On Late Night with David Letterman during the 1980s, a recurring segment involved the show's senior writer, Gerard Mulligan, coming onstage with an album of Family Circus cartoons that he clipped and saved. He and Letterman would then read a few selections and engage in banal chit-chat, usually explaining the joke of each clipping despite it being fairly obvious. The skits would usually end with a non sequitur punchline, such as a girder falling from the ceiling and knocking Mulligan unconscious.
• In the Drawn Together episode "Xandir and Tim, Sitting in a Tree," Billy is shown having murdered his entire family, a Family Circus-style dotted line tracing the path of his rampage. When Spanky Ham, a hostage negotiator, tells Billy that "Mommy says God will decide who should pay for the sins of the world," Billy replies, "Mommy will live inside me forever!" He then eats Thel's heart just before shooting himself in the head. As Spanky goes home, a newspaper is shown saying "'Not Me' Blamed", even though he was shown burned alive among Billy's other victims.
• One of the final story arcs of the Bloom County comic strips (Berke Breathed) included a going-away party, in which Opus learned from each of the other characters where he or she would be going. They included Portnoy and Hodge Podge working as janitors backstage at Marmaduke; Steve Dallas joining the cast of Cathy; and Milo Bloom with a snake swallowing him head first and appearing Tuesdays in The Far Side. Also moving on was the young African-American character Oliver Wendell Jones, who was re-drawn to imitate Bill Keane's artistic style of illustration (i.e., squashed ovoid head, round eyes, short stature), and who told Opus that he'd joined "The Family Circus" and would be bused in.
• In the Family Guy episode "E. Peterbus Unum," when Stewie Griffin uses newspapers as diapers, he gladly defiles The Family Circus, referencing Not Me.
• In his webcomic "Nothing Nice to Say," Mitch Clem references The Family Circus in two separate strips (I Hate Bill Keane and I Hate Bill Keane II).

Image File history File links Broom_icon. ... The logo Mr. ... Its Not Funny is David Cross 2004 stand-up comedy album, released on Sub Pop Records. ... David Cross (born April 4, 1964) is an Emmy-winning American comedian, writer and actor. ... Evanescence is a Grammy Award-winning American alternative rock band founded in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1998 by singer Amy Lee and former guitarist Ben Moody. ... Go is a 1999 film directed by Doug Liman, with three intertwining plots that happen to involve one drug deal. ... Timothy David Olyphant (born May 20, 1968) is an American actor. ... Kate Noelle Katie Holmes[1] (born December 18, 1978) is an American actress who first achieved fame for her role as Joey Potter on The WB television teen drama Dawsons Creek from 1998 to 2003. ... Simpsons redirects here. ... Homer Simpson, This is Your Wife is an episode of The Simpsons, that aired on March 26, 2006. ... Chris Elliott (born May 31, 1960 in New York City) is an American comedian and the son of comedian Bob Elliott. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Mystery Science Theater 3000, often abbreviated MST3K, is an American cult television comedy series created by Joel Hodgson and produced by Best Brains, Inc. ... Joel and the bots. ... This article is about the comic strip. ... This article describes both the animated television series, and the characters from that series. ... The Perry Bible Fellowship (or PBF) is a newspaper comic strip and webcomic by Nicholas Gurewitch. ... Pearls Before Swine is an American comic strip written and illustrated by Stephan Pastis, formerly a lawyer in San Francisco, California. ... Osama bin Muhammad bin Awad bin Laden (Arabic: ‎; born March 10, 1957[1]), most often mentioned as Osama bin Laden or Usama bin Laden, is a Saudi Arabian militant Islamist and is widely believed to be one of the founders of the organization called al-Qaeda. ... is the 225th day of the year (226th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Pearls Before Swine is an American comic strip written and illustrated by Stephan Pastis, formerly a lawyer in San Francisco, California. ... Look up cast pearls before swine in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... CrossOver (before version 6. ... This article or section contains a plot summary that is overly long. ... Harvey Kurtzmans cover for the first issue of the comic book Mad Mad is an American humor magazine founded by publisher William Gaines and editor Harvey Kurtzman in 1952. ... This article is about the television series. ... George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is the forty-third and current President of the United States of America, originally inaugurated on January 20, 2001. ... 8-Bit Theater (also spelled 8-Bit Theatre) is a popular[1] sprite comic created and launched by Brian Clevinger in March 2001 that won the Web Cartoonists Choice Awards for best fantasy comic in 2002[2]. In its feature on gaming webcomics, 1UP.com described 8-Bit Theater... Late Night with David Letterman was a nightly hour-long comedy talk show on NBC hosted by David Letterman. ... Drawn Together is an American animated television series that uses a sitcom format with a TV reality show setting. ... Xandir and Tim, Sitting in a Tree is the eighteenth episode of the animated series Drawn Together. ... Spanky Ham is a fictional character in the animated series Drawn Together. ... Bloom County was a popular American comic strip by Berke Breathed which ran from December 8, 1980 until August 6, 1989. ... Berkeley (Berke) Breathed (last name rhymes with method) is a cartoonist, childrens book author/illustrator, director and screenwriter, best know for his comic strip Bloom County, a 80s era cartoon-comic strip which dealt with socio-political issues, as seen through the eyes of highly exaggerated characters, and humorous... Look up Opus in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Portnoy is a character in Berke Breatheds comic strip Bloom County. ... A Marmaduke cartoon from September 13, 2006 Marmaduke is a newspaper comic strip drawn by Brad Anderson from 1954 to the present day. ... Steve Dallas was a fictional unscrupulous lawyer in the 1980s comic strip Bloom County, by Berke Breathed. ... 1984 collection Cathy is a daily comic strip drawn by Cathy Guisewite. ... Milo Bloom Milo Bloom was a central character in the American comic strip Bloom County. ... This article is about the comic strip. ... Oliver Wendell Jones was the most recurring African American character in Bloom County, a comic strip by Berkeley Breathed. ... Family Guy is an Emmy Award-winning American animated television series about a dysfunctional family in the fictional town of Quahog, Rhode Island. ... “E Peterbus Unum” is an episode from the second season of the FOX animated television series Family Guy. ... Stewart Gilligan Stewie Griffin is a fictional character in the animated television series Family Guy. ... Nothing Nice To Say is a webcomic, touted as the worlds FIRST online punk comic and is created entirely by Mitch Clem. ...

External links

• The Family Circus Official Homepage
• The Family Circus at King Features
• Toonopedia
• Amazon reviews on Family Circus books… - a blog post analyzing reviews from Amazon.com that have since been removed from the site.
• - Washington Post interview with Bil Keane (2002)