Winnie Winkle the Breadwinner
Winnie Winkle the Breadwinner
The comic strip Winnie Winkle the Breadwinner first appeared in newspapers on September 21, 1920. Created by former vaudevillian Martin Branner (1888-1970), it was the first of a genre of working girl strips that later inspired imitators such as Tillie the Toiler (1921-1959). A "new woman" of the 1920s, Winnie worked in an office and provided for her parents and adopted brother Perry. As the strip evolved Branner focussed on Winnie's search for a husband, the strip's central running theme until she married William Wright in 1937. By 1955—with Mr. Wright killed in a mine accident in 1950 after several near mishaps during World War II—Winnie became the chief executive of a fashion house. Branner's strip criticized the feminization of culture through the consumption of goods and services and the use of celebrity endorsements, and lamented the passing of vaudeville and its replacement by Hollywood movies. The last episode appeared July 28, 1956.
—Ian Gordon
Further Reading:
Gordon, Ian. Comic Strips and Consumer Culture, 1890-1945. Washington, D.C., Smithsonian Institution Press, 1998.