Tougher than Hell With a Heart of Gold

She is physically deformed, an achondroplastic with legs like sewer mains and untenanted circles for eyes. Instead of parents, she has a fabulously wealthy foster father who dependably defaults whenever she needs him most. Nor has he ever given her an extra dime. Violence is her companion: in one three-month period, 75 acts of murder or mayhem were committed within her ken. But Little Orphan Annie is insulated against all misfortune by one priceless possession: eternal youth. This month in 350 newspapers all over the world, Annie reaches her 40th birthday looking no older than when she was born.

The creation of a onetime farm boy named Harold Lincoln Gray, Annie ranks as one of the most durable, reactionary, humorless and lucrative little brats in the history of the funnies. In 40 years she has poured nearly $5,000,000 into Artist Gray's pocket--a figure that does not, to be sure, put him in Daddy Warbucks' class; Daddy is several times a billionaire. Even today, despite evidence of a waning national interest in the comics, Annie still reaches a paid readership of 30 million.

Defectors. Annie does not really belong in the funnies. A more appropriate setting would be a political pamphlet--or possibly reform school. Annie has personally accounted for a fair share of her violent ambiance. Between murders, she inveighs against such evils as the federal income tax, the welfare state, Madison Avenue, most officialdom, and "left-wingers"--a term that Artist Gray applies to all Democrats.

Annie's incorrigible tendency to climb soapboxes has earned her a host of real-life enemies to match those who pursue her on the funny page. She has been castigated by the pulpit, educators, the National Lawyers Guild, and the American Association of Advertising Agencies. In 1956, an episode that seemed to glorify hoodlumism drew such a loud chorus of protest that some 30 newspapers suspended the strip. The high crime rate in Little Orphan Annie periodically produces other defectors.

Artist Gray defends both Annie's criminality and her far-righteousness as an accurate reflection of life. "Sweetness and light--who the hell wants it?" he says. "What's news in the newspaper? Murder, rape and arson. That's what stories are made of." As for Annie's philosophy, it is "just good, standard Americanism that people are brought up on. Annie is tougher than hell, with a heart of gold and a fast left, who can take care of herself because she has to. She's controversial, there's no question about that. But I keep her on the side of motherhood, honesty and decency."

In the Cave. Annie got her start on a summer day in 1906 when a youthful Harold Gray, pulling morning glories from the family cornfield near Chebanse, III., decided that there must be an easier living. He had been scrawling pictures as a hobby from childhood. So it was only natural that after graduating from Purdue in 1917 he should head for Chicago and talk his way into the art department of the Chicago Tribune. There, between lettering stints for the Tribune comic strip, The Gumps, Gray came up with a strip idea of his own, centered around a boy named Little Orphant Otto. With some misgivings, the artist presented Otto to Joseph Medill Patterson, then editor of the Tribune and an expert on the viability of comic strips. "The kid looks like a pansy, doesn't he?" said Gray. "Sure does," agreed Patterson. "Why don't you put a skirt on him?" Thus was Annie born.

Now 70, Gray divides his time between a home in Westport, Conn., and another in La Jolla, Calif. Annie thoroughly dominates his life, as she has for four decades. He says that he spends up to 70 hours a week drafting six daily strips and one for Sunday. Outside of transcontinental trips to take the pulse of U.S. conservatism, he professes no other compelling interests in life.

Age has banked Gray's polemic fire, and consequently Annie's too. "She's staying clean out of politics this year," said Gray last week. "Boy, this is murder! You'll get cut no matter which side you're on." Until after the November election, Artist Gray plans to put Annie in a cave. But she is in no real danger. Any girl that can pass 40 without so much as a wrinkle is obviously destined to live forever.

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