Comics: Just a Kid in a Big White House

A new comic being offered to U.S. dailies may not be enjoyed very much by the adult occupants at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. But Miss Caroline—the story in single cartoon panels of a little girl who lives in a big white house—has already been sold to 13 dailies,* and will doubtless pick up more before its scheduled debut in comic pages in November.

Miss Caroline is the whimsical, affectionate brainchild of Gerald Gardner, 34, the former Manhattan adman who soared to publishing success of sorts last year with his bestselling, cartoon-like picture paperback Who’s In Charge Here? Teaming up with Artist Frank Johnson, 32, Gardner began tinkering with the Miss Caroline cartoon idea last autumn, gave it a trial run with a 128-page paperback of single cartoon panels, which has sold 250,000 copies since it was published last January, and then showed samples to newspapers.

Gardner did not check his idea with the White House, and confidently expects no trouble. Indeed, his new character is drawn not to resemble any specific little girl by the same name, and whenever “Miss Caroline” is with her parents, they are pictured only from the neck or waist down. But when her creators have her plowing up her vegetable garden because Daddy tells her there is a surplus, or throwing down a newspaper because “Walter Lippmann doesn’t understand me,” there is no chance of mistaken identity.

* Including such prominent newspapers as the Boston Globe, Washington Daily News, Cleveland Press, Indianapolis Star.