Madde (Albert Feldstein) - Mad Super Special #19 - 1976

There have been numerous parodies of Mad over the years but none are as good as the ones that Mad does of itself.  The first of these appeared in 1954 ("Cut Your Own Throat Department") wherein the editors showed the world how to copy the Mad style.  However, the most elaborate parody is this 24-page, half-issue that depicted the magazine as if it had been published in 1776.  The editors gave writer Lou Silverstone credit for the idea.  The parody was a bicentennial insert in the Mad quarterly special with reprints from 1972 regular issues.

Norman Mingo drew the front (Alf spilling ink on the Declaration of Independence) and back (Benedict Arnold recruiting traitors) covers.  Mort Drucker drew the Continental Congress (Larry Siegel's Jefferson called King George a "doody-head" in the first draft of the Declaration) on page four because there were no movies to parody.  Dave Berg looked at the "Lighter Side of Valley Forge" as if there was anything funny about that.  Kaputnik was there with his pipe.  Silverstone's primer explained the components of the Revolutionary War.  Don Martin poked fun at young George Washington and Paul Revere (three lamps for the British boats-on-wheels).  Frank Jacobs wrote some original poems ("A Madde Colonist Garden of Verses"). Antonio Prohias found some Revolutionary War spy action.  Historian George Woodbridge was really in fine form with his drawings of Benjamin Franklin interviewing a dysfunctional Minute Man.  And, of course, Al Jaffee ended the issue with a fold-in revealing an ill of the times (slavery).  There was even a running joke (Button Gwinett) and time-appropriate marginals by Sergio Aragones including the buggy with a spare horse, Betsy Ross mixing the stars & stripes, and a wooden teeth joke. 

I rarely bought the Mad specials because they were generally composed of reprints of issues I already owned.  However, this one was certainly worth the price ($1.00).  [JAM 7/6/2010]

Departments:
Inside-Ouche - A Madde Peek Behind the Scenes at the Continental Congress
Lost And Founder - Thou Knowest Thou Art in Troubled Waters When
The Frost Is on the Bumpkins - The Lighter Side of Valley Forge
Reading And 'Riting And Rebelling - The Madde Revolutionary War Primer
Madde's Maddest Artist - One Day in Virginia; One Night in Massachusetts
It's Abhor! - Don't Ye Hate ...
Yankee Ditties - A Madde Colonist's Garden of Verses
Cloake And Dagger - Spy vs. Spy
Militia's Mischief - Madde's Minute Man of the Year

Fold-In - Slave