I grew up on these mags…really helped develop my intellect and humor. It was more highbrow than people realize. Thanks, Mom, for always saying “yes” when I asked to but a Mad.
My mother was fully supportive of me reading Mad, And later on National Lampoon. Hell, she even bought them for me! She worked in sales her whole career, So she KNEW a healthy dose of skepticism and even some "snark" were good.
I’m a 70s kid and I used to love to go down to the bodega and pick up a Mad Magazine. Such strong memories! My favorite was Spy vs. Spy. My pops wouldn’t let me read it until after I finished my homework though. ❤️
Me, as well....a 70s kid. White spy vs. black spy was awesome! They were like the Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote only wayyyyy cooler! Another favorite of mine were all the songs they used to come up "sang to the tune of ". Good times! 🤣😂🤣
Age 66 here in 2024. Absolutely adored my MAD issues during my time. Much respect to all who were involved in its production. The artistry, the originality, the skewering, all beautiful to behold. It absolutely shaped me in so many ways, centering my outlook, shaping my attitudes. And to this day, I refuse to get the counseling that I’m told I need. Thank you, Alfred.
I grew up in the 60s and graduated High School in ‘74. I owe much of my literacy and sense of Humor to the fine people at MAD. I found it sad that my very favorite Cartoonist Don Martin was not mentioned in this story. He too was a MAD genius.
Snappy answers, that is! Haha! I once had a rare opportunity to actually use one of those in an office job when I was using the copier and a ditzy coworker asked the obvious question! I replied "No, I'm manufacturing paper airplanes! Some assembly required...! Haha! (I said it nicely, though to not actually hurt their feelings!)
That was probably my favorite part of MAD. Later on in life, using my own snappy answers to incredibly stupid questions was a great way to deal with the idiots of the world. Lol.
At about age ten, in 1967, my family visited a family cabin in northern Wisconsin. My brother and I came across a big stash of MAD magazines left by our older cousins. Although I was too young to appreciate a lot of the humor, I was still enthralled. After that, somehow my brother was able to get a subscription. I had no idea it lasted as long as it did.
As a kid growing up in the late 70's & 80's I absolutely loved MAD magazine! We were a fairly poor family so I didn't get to buy it very often but on the rare occasions I did I was over the moon & devoured it from front to back many, many times. Great memories.♥
There was a lot of "pass it around". Hardly anyone had a new copy. The back cover was usually well folded. And then everything changed when I got a paper route.
As a kid growing up in the ‘70s, I read it cover to cover each time. It made me laugh out loud for real. I was more mature for my age (and my parents didn’t exactly set the best boundaries) so I understood the humor in it for adults as well. My favorite was the inside back cover, of course. It always fascinated me the level of work and detail that went into the full page and then you folded it and there was a simple statement. I also loved the movie spoofs.
Over the decades, Mad has been a magazine as important to understanding our time as Time, Life, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Reports, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, National Review, The New Republic, The Nation and any others you can think of. And, lest we forget, unlike these other money-hungry magazine publishers, Mad always delivered its content to readers for a competitive price: Cheap!
1966, My Mom, sister and I were in a store, and my sister saw the Mad magazine and bought it, hiding it from my Mom! We devoured every page, laughing. I couldn't wait to do the fold-over on the back cover. Couldn't wait till the next issue came out. It was unique, and we loved that it was so anti-establishment!
I love what they did with your sunburst logo. I love everything they did from the spoofs, to the fold ins, to Spy v Spy, to the tiny non sequitur comic scenes they would have going on in the margins. Truly outside the box.
Born in '68, my artsy grandma showed me Mad in the early 70's. I didn't understand it all and that's why I liked it. I could totally feel the satire oozing out of this mag at like 6 or 7 years old. Iconic!
Thank you for running this piece CBS, with the Alfred E Neuman ending as a perfect exclamation mark! Fantastic illustrations and characteritures, gut wrenching humor….MAD Magazine will live on in our memories… …and I can’t look or think of King/Prince Charles without seeing him as Alfred E Neuman …someone should show that illustration to Prince Harry…I think at this point he might enjoy it….Long Live MAD…thank you for the laughs!
As a kid born in 1975, I remember finding my dad’s Mad magazines from the 50s and 60s and falling in love with Mort Drucker, Al Jaffee, Sergio Aragones, and the Usual Gang of Idiots. I kept every issue I bought for myself and still have my dad’s Mads. Loved this video and will always recognize Mad’s influence on my love of comedy, and on comedy in general. A significant American Treasure!!
I bought many issues in the ‘70s but remember one time not buying ‘cuz when I asked my small-town pharmacist how long to wait for my mom’s prescription he said “as long as it takes for you to read the latest Mad magazine”, which I did. No charge.
I once read a Mickey Mouse comic in Dutch I found it on a ship in Port Said Egypt. Also watched him on TV in a Barber Shop in Yokohama. That little rodent did get around
Purchased my first of many, many MADs secretly in 1970. (Mom & grandma disapproved.) Few years later my secret stash o'MAD started disappearing. Then, through thunder clouds of cigarette smoke, found my Dad hunched over the workshop bench giggling at my latest MAD i had not yet cracked the cover. Until i moved out of the house, he swiped my MADs. After he died there were MADs in the workshop he bought after i moved out of the house.
I LOVED Mad magazine, grabbed every issue I could. The new issue was always the hot topic among my friends the next day. I read it cover to cover always. Great stuff, always.
67 yo now. I was one of those GIRLS who can still sing a lot of the satirical songs, and will trot out a Horrifying Cliché once in awhile. At one time, I had 20, or so, paperbacks like Don Martin Drops Out, etc.
The whole gang filled my youth with sarcasm and snappy answers to stupid questions. When I got sick one year my mother bought me a couple of Mad paperbacks and I barfed laughing.
Wow, I think you totally nailed it - ties into my comment somewhere else in this thread that MAD itself is no longer needed because yes, indeed, the world has gone mad!
I was the only 12 year old girl in the early 90s that I knew of who was obsessed with MAD. Every week when my parents did the grocery shopping, they were checking out and I was at the magazine stand looking to see if it was a MAD issue my mom would let me keep. (She was just a concerned parent who wanted to know what her kid was reading, nothing extreme.) But it changed me - because I understood jokes and references nobody my age understood. I graduated to taking out the MAD treasuries from my local library to see the issues from the 60s and 70s and I learned so much from them! Between this and MST3K, satire and cultural references became the thing that formed my sense of humor.
I'm 66 and have the same experience spending hard earned $ on Mad. With no ads it was cover to cover art/humor/irreverence. Made childhood, growing up with the worlds insanity and hypocrisy, plausible. Best money I ever spent!
I saw Michael J Fox on the old Tonight Show back in the eighties, and he said he knew he hit the big time when he had seen Mort Drucker's caricature of him.
I remember , in the early 60's, proudly bringing my Mad Mag in my book bag, to my catholic school. What a rebel! I think that's part of why we have such fond memories of Mad. We got it and it was cool to be a kid who was welcomed into that world view.
We started getting Mad when I was about 8 years old in 1963. It didn't just shape my sense of humor and improve my draughtsmanship (copying Mort Drucker and Wallace Wood). What's really amazing is how much it broadened my education. Where else would I have learned about axolotls AND William Wordsworth (see the parody poem "I Wandered Lonely As a Clod", issue #43)? For years, I was able to fake my way through many of conversations about films and plays I'd never actually seen because I'd read the Mad parodies.
Bought many a MAD magazine back in the 60s and 70s and enjoyed the realistic caricatures that those great artists came out with every month. Great memories 👍👍
My favorite Spy vs Spy. And the witch at the auction bidding on a cauldron 😅 I still laugh and its a wonderful memory of me and my brother (who has past ) laughing when we read it. We poked out fingers in the air just to make each other laugh for years ,😊 Thanks so much ❤
I remember 'East Side Story' a UN take on 'West Side Story' and 'Voyage to See What's On The Bottom' a takeoff of the TV show "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea'. BTW, I'm almost 75.
I remember the James Bond treatments (James Bomb), especially the one that had 008 in it, a large very hairy woman. In that episodes he is going up against an organization named I.C.E.C.U.B.E. (ICECUBE, the International Conspiracy to Eliminate Contaminate and Undermine the British Empire). This groups plan was tie a rope around Great Britain and tow it the Arctic Circle and freeze it. Anyway the plan failed and on the way back from the Arctic GB missed its normal place on the globe and ended up on the equator with everyone running around in their underwear. One other aspect of this story was that James Bomb ran any figures out by 20 decimal points, such as weights or temperatures (something I started to do during my life). MAD magazine was a huge part of my upbringing and intellectual embodiment. It was pure genius.
Mad Magazine was wonderful. I still recall many of the movie and television parodies. Don Martin (Fester Bester Tester and Karbunkle) and Sergio Aragones comics (Spy vs Spy and the marginal scribbles). I especially remember the Star Trek phonograph record included in one issue.
Although, changing times, the internet, etc. may have contributed to MAD's decline, ever notice a common denominator in the demise of many things? Corporate takeovers...
I started reading it while JFK was president. A classmate did MUDD magazine. We worked on the elementary school newspaper. He went to Vietnam then UGA, then newspaper humorist in Augusta, GA. Memories.
When I was about age 10-11, in the late '60's, my best Friend Greg and I would order the Mad Paperback books such as SPY vs. SPY. We would anxiously check the mailbox every day even though we knew that it might take a few weeks for the books to arrive. When they finally were delivered we were overjoyed as if it were Christmas morning and we couldn't wait to "read" each book cover to cover. Mad Magazine and the companion Paperback books were a staple for kids my age and for Teens and Adults as well.
That's what was great about it, they did not talk down to their readers and inspired us to look things up so as to get what we missed the first time round.
Thanks, I love this segment. I discovered MAD magazine from my older brother who had a stash of issues from 1961 thru the mid 60's. These were great classic MAD's in it's political satire heyday. I especially loved the movie, satire's. My favorite political movie satire, to this day, was "East Side Story" and satire of West Side Story from 1963 set at the UN with the two rival gangs the USA and USSR. Love it !! "When you're a Red you're a Red all the way from your first party purge to your last power play!"🤣🤣
I LOVED Mad Magazine in the late 70s and early 80s. Hours spent poring over those comics. I still think about the stories and laugh. I have a box of them up in the attic.
I read MAD and had a subscription in my formative years in the 1960's. It was one of the most educational publications out there and it would hard to overestimate how much I learned from those pages. It deserves more than a temporary exhibition - it belongs in the Smithsonian! (which would be totally antithetical to the spirit of it).
One of the things I liked about MAD was the 'sound effect' names that would be included in various frames of cartoons. To this day when I open a can of certain kinds of cream soup, the sound made by the product coming out of the can sounds like 'GLORP'!
Don Martin! A toilet goes "Fursh", an itch being scratched is "Shika Shika Shika", a brick falling on someone is "Fwap!" I even remember a whole string of sound effects ending with "Etc. etc. etc".
Mad influenced every detail of my life, but most especially, my writing. I literally diagrammed the Alfred Sez quotes on the contents page. I grew up to write natural language understanding platforms for AI. ; - P
Golly--what a great story; thank you Jane, CBS and all the "guys of Mad" I remember reading "The Poopsidedown Adventure." We understood a lot in the 5-6th grade. Thank you so much!!!
I was born in 1948 and when Mad Magazine came out in the 1950's my Dad would buy it and pass it on to me when he was done with it, we both devoured every page. My mother hated it, it stood against every value she ever had, it really struck a nerve with her. She may have had culture, but she never had a sense of humor.
My dad thought it to be a dumb comic book. We had to smuggle copies into the house. He preferred Pogo Possum who appeared to me to be part A E Neuman or vice versa
I didn't miss one of the regular 9 times a year issues for well over 20 years. Plus I bought many of the specials and pocket paperback reprints. My first introduction was The Mad Adventures of Captain Klutz by Don Martin. To this day, when thinking about something I often add in Don Martin style sound effects.
YEAH! MAD. I learned to read using MAD. My dad and I used to do readouts of Mort Drucker Movie and TV parodies on his reel to reel recorder when I was , like 6!! MAD was a fav of my Dad. Mort was my favorite artist. Dad got my brother and I "VOTE FOR ALFRED E NEWMAN" pins during the Kennedy/Nixon election. We wore them to school and they made us take them off! I LOVED MAD! No advertisers tainted their wonderfully satirical look at life! I'm so happy I grew up during its golden age. The Usual Gang of Idiots will live in my heart forever!
Grew up on the ones my older brother subscribed to and loved the fact that my other brother and I could get our hands on them first in the summer before he got home from work! Haha! So many great bits of pop culture and influence came from them that enriched my life! I even to this day make reference to how they could parody Americana by just the simple illustration of a hand throwing just about anything into the trash can!
I didn't get a good look at the MAD riff on Rockwell's self-portrait the first time around. Just noticed it has little pics of Jaffe and others, as well as Rockwell looking aghast on the top left cover! Excellent!
The ancient history of so many Dad Jokes can be traced to Mad Magazine. Example: First, "I'm getting a haircut today." Second, "Really? Which one?" I still recall laughing at that after reading it in 1962.
You are now reading MAD Magazine…..MAD! I still miss all those nostalgic memories of MADtv, in which the series was based on, as well as the classic characters, Antonia, the Vancome Lady, Stuart, Miss Swan, and Doreen Larkin, Lorraine, Uh-Oh HOT DOG!, Ty and Carl, John Madden, Bill Cosby, Dr. Phil, Oprah Winfrey, Ellen DeGeneres, Connie Chung, and also Spishak and CLOPS. Forever will hold those characters and moments near and dear to my heart. 1995-2009
@@MikeGrant-q7bWell, at least I liked Saturday Night Live in the 70s and 80s, and a little 90s, here and there. In Living Color, another great series, and SCTV, too, with such greats like John Candy, Martin Short, Andrea Martin, Eugene Levy, and Joe Flaherty. Yeah, all those shows from way back then would have much more class than what we would see on SNL, nowadays.
I would trudge miles to the local Thrifty to buy my issue of Mad and then come home and devour it! Thank you for this piece. It brought back fond memories 👍🏻🙏👏🏻✌🏻🤙🏻
Ahh. PRAISE The Gods of Sanity!! We're not worthy... we're not worthy... Mort Drucker helped my art career, Don Martin shaped my understanding of the world, David Berg guided my insights into human idiocy, William Gaines helped me understand publication law... the list goes on
Mad had a lot of integrity. Running a profitable magazine with no advertising was no small feat. And they were willing to put their money where their mouth was. In the early '80s, they decided to take a page out of National Lampoon and put their name on a movie. The movie was the notoriously bad Up the Academy, and when Bill Gaines and company saw it, they paid thousands of dollars to have the Mad name removed from the movie and all the advertising.
First time I read MAD was on a Boy Scout campout over fifty years ago! I thought it was something adult and I shouldn't tell my parents. A few years later I found out THEY had read MAD around the time it became a magazine instead of a comic book!
I have a stack of MAD's from my childhood. I even have a number of the special issues with records inside and still have the records. I did play one of them and it actually played, that was the All In The Family record. MAD was great for any kid surrounded by nonsense and idiotic adults. It let me know that I'm not alone thinking the way I think about things.
All praises to William Gaines! The very reason MAD even exists was due to the Comics Code initiative that sought to censor the great works of Gaines' previous success...... HORROR COMICS. Yup, he was the man who gave us EC COMICS, and a little gem called TALES FROM THE CRYPT. We have Mr. Gaines to thank for the comics, the HBO anthology series, and a certain hedonistic host!😂❤
I have many issues from that era, including the one with the "Patton" parody and the Mad updated Christmas Carols which I still sing in church every Christmas Eve! What, me worry?
I grew up in the peak era. I had a life size poster on my bedroom door in the early sixties. I believe it help me form satire,irony,hypocrisy ..yeah ‘what me worry?’ 😛
I grew up on these mags…really helped develop my intellect and humor. It was more highbrow than people realize. Thanks, Mom, for always saying “yes” when I asked to but a Mad.
Yes! Both the intellect and humor. Hone the funny bone whilst training the brain.
My mother was fully supportive of me reading Mad, And later on National Lampoon. Hell, she even bought them for me! She worked in sales her whole career, So she KNEW a healthy dose of skepticism and even some "snark" were good.
Same! My folks didn’t have a lot of money but they always were willing to finance my monthly issue of MAD! ❤️
*buy
Pretty much any time I went with my mom to the grocery store she bought me either the latest issue of Mad or one of their paperback books.
Thank you MAD for keeping me sane.
Al Jaffee, Dave Berg, and Sergio Aragones. Such talent; loved all their work!
I read MAD every week in my youth.
Don’t forget Mort Drucker!
Also, don't forget Jack Davis.
What about tom bunk
Love how they made the CBS Sunday Morning sun Alfred E. Neuman😎
I’m a 70s kid and I used to love to go down to the bodega and pick up a Mad Magazine. Such strong memories! My favorite was Spy vs. Spy. My pops wouldn’t let me read it until after I finished my homework though. ❤️
Me, as well....a 70s kid. White spy vs. black spy was awesome! They were like the Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote only wayyyyy cooler! Another favorite of mine were all the songs they used to come up "sang to the tune of ". Good times! 🤣😂🤣
Spy vs. Spy was my favorite too...ahh the childhood memories.
Age 66 here in 2024. Absolutely adored my MAD issues during my time. Much respect to all who were involved in its production. The artistry, the originality, the skewering, all beautiful to behold. It absolutely shaped me in so many ways, centering my outlook, shaping my attitudes. And to this day, I refuse to get the counseling that I’m told I need. Thank you, Alfred.
I grew up in the 60s and graduated High School in ‘74. I owe much of my literacy and sense of Humor to the fine people at MAD.
I found it sad that my very favorite Cartoonist Don Martin was not mentioned in this story. He too was a MAD genius.
Joe Fonebone and Fester Bestertester
Don Martin Department always had my attention
I graduated high school in 1972, and I know that my love of irony and satire was shaped by reading Mad.
They should have included Sergio Aragonés in the interview. One of the last greats from MAD still living.
so true
Yes, amazing how he made a comic strip and told a story without any words.
"Stupid answers to stupid questions" - sheer brilliance and for a kid "HELL YAAASS!!!" permission to point out the obvious. Thank you MAD.
Snappy answers, that is! Haha! I once had a rare opportunity to actually use one of those in an office job when I was using the copier and a ditzy coworker asked the obvious question! I replied "No, I'm manufacturing paper airplanes! Some assembly required...! Haha! (I said it nicely, though to not actually hurt their feelings!)
I learned when ppl ask me ..can I ask you a question…yes obviously and you did it very well, then walk away. Haaa
That was probably my favorite part of MAD. Later on in life, using my own snappy answers to incredibly stupid questions was a great way to deal with the idiots of the world. Lol.
At about age ten, in 1967, my family visited a family cabin in northern Wisconsin. My brother and I came across a big stash of MAD magazines left by our older cousins. Although I was too young to appreciate a lot of the humor, I was still enthralled. After that, somehow my brother was able to get a subscription. I had no idea it lasted as long as it did.
As a kid growing up in the late 70's & 80's I absolutely loved MAD magazine! We were a fairly poor family so I didn't get to buy it very often but on the rare occasions I did I was over the moon & devoured it from front to back many, many times. Great memories.♥
There was a lot of "pass it around". Hardly anyone had a new copy. The back cover was usually well folded. And then everything changed when I got a paper route.
As a kid growing up in the ‘70s, I read it cover to cover each time. It made me laugh out loud for real. I was more mature for my age (and my parents didn’t exactly set the best boundaries) so I understood the humor in it for adults as well. My favorite was the inside back cover, of course. It always fascinated me the level of work and detail that went into the full page and then you folded it and there was a simple statement. I also loved the movie spoofs.
Over the decades, Mad has been a magazine as important to understanding our time as Time, Life, Newsweek, U.S. News & World Reports, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, National Review, The New Republic, The Nation and any others you can think of. And, lest we forget, unlike these other money-hungry magazine publishers, Mad always delivered its content to readers for a competitive price: Cheap!
1966, My Mom, sister and I were in a store, and my sister saw the Mad magazine and bought it, hiding it from my Mom! We devoured every page, laughing. I couldn't wait to do the fold-over on the back cover. Couldn't wait till the next issue came out. It was unique, and we loved that it was so anti-establishment!
I loved MAD. Always enjoyed how Murphy Brown had covers of the magazine framed on her office walls (yes, Candy Bergen was a fan.)
I love what they did with your sunburst logo. I love everything they did from the spoofs, to the fold ins, to Spy v Spy, to the tiny non sequitur comic scenes they would have going on in the margins. Truly outside the box.
I grew up reading MAD mag in the 1960's and 1970's. Loved it.
Born in '68, my artsy grandma showed me Mad in the early 70's. I didn't understand it all and that's why I liked it. I could totally feel the satire oozing out of this mag at like 6 or 7 years old. Iconic!
I was obsessed with MAD as a kid, and always tried to draw like Mort Drucker and Jack Davis.
Amazing artists.
Me too mort was unreal and wally wood whoa what an artist nothing like mad today that's the trouble with kids no mad and no zap comic !
Thank you for running this piece CBS, with the Alfred E Neuman ending as a perfect exclamation mark! Fantastic illustrations and characteritures, gut wrenching humor….MAD Magazine will live on in our memories…
…and I can’t look or think of King/Prince Charles without seeing him as Alfred E Neuman …someone should show that illustration to Prince Harry…I think at this point he might enjoy it….Long Live MAD…thank you for the laughs!
My brother loved this mag. I grew up with it in my house. I am 60. I remember they always satired 'the Waltons'😂🤭
Grew up in the 60's and always bought the new "MAD" when it came out! "What, me worry"?
The fold-in art on the back inside cover always blew my mind.
As a kid born in 1975, I remember finding my dad’s Mad magazines from the 50s and 60s and falling in love with Mort Drucker, Al Jaffee, Sergio Aragones, and the Usual Gang of Idiots. I kept every issue I bought for myself and still have my dad’s Mads. Loved this video and will always recognize Mad’s influence on my love of comedy, and on comedy in general. A significant American Treasure!!
I grew up reading MAD! So many features - like Spy vs Spy, Don Martin gags and of course the movie parodies were the best!
Spy vs Spy, my Fav, I understand was about the Cold War.
MAD Magazine kept me very happy when I was much younger.
I bought many issues in the ‘70s but remember one time not buying ‘cuz when I asked my small-town pharmacist how long to wait for my mom’s prescription he said “as long as it takes for you to read the latest Mad magazine”, which I did. No charge.
Mad Magazine was a great comedy piece. It was a guilty pleasure reading each new issue that was published when I was younger.
I’m a 70yo woman from the Netherlands and bought MAD in the seventies.
So, do you still smoke pot while you're turning tricks in Amsterdam? ;-P
@@igorschmidlapp6987 of course, every day since then. 😉
@@igorschmidlapp6987wow, you sure are 1 classy dude 😝
I once read a Mickey Mouse comic in Dutch I found it on a ship in Port Said Egypt. Also watched him on TV in a Barber Shop in Yokohama. That little rodent did get around
@@DonMason-cv6og Sounds like you do too!
Love love this magazine.... literally the liturgy of my childhood...❤
My older brother bought Mad Magazine regularly in the 1970s. It was a major influence in my life as a kid.
Purchased my first of many, many MADs secretly in 1970. (Mom & grandma disapproved.) Few years later my secret stash o'MAD started disappearing. Then, through thunder clouds of cigarette smoke, found my Dad hunched over the workshop bench giggling at my latest MAD i had not yet cracked the cover. Until i moved out of the house, he swiped my MADs. After he died there were MADs in the workshop he bought after i moved out of the house.
Fantastic story!
I LOVED Mad magazine, grabbed every issue I could. The new issue was always the hot topic among my friends the next day. I read it cover to cover always. Great stuff, always.
67 yo now. I was one of those GIRLS who can still sing a lot of the satirical songs, and will trot out a Horrifying Cliché once in awhile. At one time, I had 20, or so, paperbacks like Don Martin Drops Out, etc.
The whole gang filled my youth with sarcasm and snappy answers to stupid questions. When I got sick one year my mother bought me a couple of Mad paperbacks and I barfed laughing.
I was a faithful subscriber in the early 70s. They also published paperback books of compiled “articles”.
We live in Mad Magazine.
Wow, I think you totally nailed it - ties into my comment somewhere else in this thread that MAD itself is no longer needed because yes, indeed, the world has gone mad!
Can you imagine how MAD would make fun of todays world? Or Covid? We will Miss you MAD Magazine!
There was and is nothing funny about covid. NOTHING. 😠
I was the only 12 year old girl in the early 90s that I knew of who was obsessed with MAD. Every week when my parents did the grocery shopping, they were checking out and I was at the magazine stand looking to see if it was a MAD issue my mom would let me keep. (She was just a concerned parent who wanted to know what her kid was reading, nothing extreme.) But it changed me - because I understood jokes and references nobody my age understood. I graduated to taking out the MAD treasuries from my local library to see the issues from the 60s and 70s and I learned so much from them! Between this and MST3K, satire and cultural references became the thing that formed my sense of humor.
I spent a lot of lawn mowing money on Mad Magazine's...and Mr.Drucker was the Best Caricature Artist on the planet...💯
I'm 66 and have the same experience spending hard earned $ on Mad. With no ads it was cover to cover art/humor/irreverence. Made childhood, growing up with the worlds insanity and hypocrisy, plausible. Best money I ever spent!
I saw Michael J Fox on the old Tonight Show back in the eighties, and he said he knew he hit the big time when he had seen Mort Drucker's caricature of him.
@@Nhamp2000 Very cool, would luv to find that clip...
I remember , in the early 60's, proudly bringing my Mad Mag in my book bag, to my catholic school. What a rebel! I think that's part of why we have such fond memories of Mad. We got it and it was cool to be a kid who was welcomed into that world view.
We started getting Mad when I was about 8 years old in 1963. It didn't just shape my sense of humor and improve my draughtsmanship (copying Mort Drucker and Wallace Wood). What's really amazing is how much it broadened my education. Where else would I have learned about axolotls AND William Wordsworth (see the parody poem "I Wandered Lonely As a Clod", issue #43)? For years, I was able to fake my way through many of conversations about films and plays I'd never actually seen because I'd read the Mad parodies.
Bought many a MAD magazine back in the 60s and 70s and enjoyed the realistic caricatures that those great artists came out with every month. Great memories 👍👍
My favorite Spy vs Spy. And the witch at the auction bidding on a cauldron 😅 I still laugh and its a wonderful memory of me and my brother (who has past ) laughing when we read it. We poked out fingers in the air just to make each other laugh for years ,😊 Thanks so much ❤
Mad was such a big part of my growing up. Not only was it hilarious, it was also very informative and I learned a lot from it
I remember 'East Side Story' a UN take on 'West Side Story' and 'Voyage to See What's On The Bottom' a takeoff of the TV show "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea'. BTW, I'm almost 75.
Yes, 'East Side Story' take on 'West Side Story' is still my favorite!! 🥰
"Voyage to See What's On the Bottom" and "The Mary Tailor Made Show" have stuck in my head all these years'
I remember the James Bond treatments (James Bomb), especially the one that had 008 in it, a large very hairy woman. In that episodes he is going up against an organization named I.C.E.C.U.B.E. (ICECUBE, the International Conspiracy to Eliminate Contaminate and Undermine the British Empire). This groups plan was tie a rope around Great Britain and tow it the Arctic Circle and freeze it. Anyway the plan failed and on the way back from the Arctic GB missed its normal place on the globe and ended up on the equator with everyone running around in their underwear. One other aspect of this story was that James Bomb ran any figures out by 20 decimal points, such as weights or temperatures (something I started to do during my life). MAD magazine was a huge part of my upbringing and intellectual embodiment. It was pure genius.
Mad Magazine was wonderful. I still recall many of the movie and television parodies. Don Martin (Fester Bester Tester and Karbunkle) and Sergio Aragones comics (Spy vs Spy and the marginal scribbles). I especially remember the Star Trek phonograph record included in one issue.
Although, changing times, the internet, etc. may have contributed to MAD's decline, ever notice a common denominator in the demise of many things? Corporate takeovers...
Mad taught me two reed and rite.
You sound like the European guy who learned Englis from watching the Beverly Hillbillies talk about an unusual accent
Among other things in MAD, the parodies were hysterical!
I started reading it while JFK was president. A classmate did MUDD magazine. We worked on the elementary school newspaper. He went to Vietnam then UGA, then newspaper humorist in Augusta, GA. Memories.
When I was about age 10-11, in the late '60's, my best Friend Greg and I would order the Mad Paperback books such as SPY vs. SPY. We would anxiously check the mailbox every day even though we knew that it might take a few weeks for the books to arrive. When they finally were delivered we were overjoyed as if it were Christmas morning and we couldn't wait to "read" each book cover to cover. Mad Magazine and the companion Paperback books were a staple for kids my age and for Teens and Adults as well.
Was a Mad Magazine subscriber during the late 1970s while at college, loved it !!!
Started reading Mad in my youth. I thank my mother for not making me throw out those "stupid" magazines. It was pure genius.
That's what was great about it, they did not talk down to their readers and inspired us to look things up so as to get what we missed the first time round.
I grew up with Mad Magazine in the house. It certainly shaped my sense of humor. I still use an occasional “snappy answer to a stupid question.”
Thanks, I love this segment. I discovered MAD magazine from my older brother who had a stash of issues from 1961 thru the mid 60's. These were great classic MAD's in it's political satire heyday. I especially loved the movie, satire's. My favorite political movie satire, to this day, was "East Side Story" and satire of West Side Story from 1963 set at the UN with the two rival gangs the USA and USSR. Love it !! "When you're a Red you're a Red all the way from your first party purge to your last power play!"🤣🤣
I LOVED Mad Magazine in the late 70s and early 80s. Hours spent poring over those comics. I still think about the stories and laugh. I have a box of them up in the attic.
How did I survive Catholic school in the 1960s? MAD!!!!
I’m with you!
My Mad Magazine collection is one of my prized possessions.
I have too
Loved all the Star Bleech series in MAD, especially when Mort Drucker was the cartoonist.
I always felt disappointed when it wasn’t Mort Drucker doing that month’s parody especially if it’s a tv series or film I liked.
I read MAD and had a subscription in my formative years in the 1960's. It was one of the most educational publications out there and it would hard to overestimate how much I learned from those pages. It deserves more than a temporary exhibition - it belongs in the Smithsonian! (which would be totally antithetical to the spirit of it).
Thank you for all the wonderful laughs
I marvel at how much I read in Mad, that I still remember and can quote, decades later.
I was born in '99. I used to read MAD when I was a kid.
I was born in 1950. I used to read MAD when I was a kid, too!
Started reading in the 1950s. .15 cheap. Formed my sense of humor for life. What, me worry?
One of the things I liked about MAD was the 'sound effect' names that would be included in various frames of cartoons. To this day when I open a can of certain kinds of cream soup, the sound made by the product coming out of the can sounds like 'GLORP'!
Don Martin! A toilet goes "Fursh", an itch being scratched is "Shika Shika Shika", a brick falling on someone is "Fwap!" I even remember a whole string of sound effects ending with "Etc. etc. etc".
Been a fan since forever.
A big part of my childhood.
Mad influenced every detail of my life, but most especially, my writing. I literally diagrammed the Alfred Sez quotes on the contents page. I grew up to write natural language understanding platforms for AI. ; - P
OMG!
Golly--what a great story; thank you Jane, CBS and all the "guys of Mad" I remember reading "The Poopsidedown Adventure." We understood a lot in the 5-6th grade. Thank you so much!!!
I was born in 1948 and when Mad Magazine came out in the 1950's my Dad would buy it and pass it on to me when he was done with it, we both devoured every page. My mother hated it, it stood against every value she ever had, it really struck a nerve with her. She may have had culture, but she never had a sense of humor.
My dad thought it to be a dumb comic book. We had to smuggle copies into the house. He preferred Pogo Possum who appeared to me to be part A E Neuman or vice versa
My dad introduced me to MAD! His favorite part was Spy vs Spy. To bad it's gone.😕
Yes, I read MAD too. I’m glad they addressed the origin of Alfred E. Neuman as mascot.
I didn't miss one of the regular 9 times a year issues for well over 20 years. Plus I bought many of the specials and pocket paperback reprints. My first introduction was The Mad Adventures of Captain Klutz by Don Martin. To this day, when thinking about something I often add in Don Martin style sound effects.
YEAH! MAD. I learned to read using MAD. My dad and I used to do readouts of Mort Drucker Movie and TV parodies on his reel to reel recorder when I was , like 6!! MAD was a fav of my Dad. Mort was my favorite artist. Dad got my brother and I "VOTE FOR ALFRED E NEWMAN" pins during the Kennedy/Nixon election. We wore them to school and they made us take them off! I LOVED MAD! No advertisers tainted their wonderfully satirical look at life! I'm so happy I grew up during its golden age. The Usual Gang of Idiots will live in my heart forever!
5:09, MAD Magazine didn't need ads. The magazine sold itself.
Grew up on the ones my older brother subscribed to and loved the fact that my other brother and I could get our hands on them first in the summer before he got home from work! Haha! So many great bits of pop culture and influence came from them that enriched my life! I even to this day make reference to how they could parody Americana by just the simple illustration of a hand throwing just about anything into the trash can!
I was born in 1953,..by 1957, Mad Magazine was always, hidden in my comic book shelf.
I didn't get a good look at the MAD riff on Rockwell's self-portrait the first time around. Just noticed it has little pics of Jaffe and others, as well as Rockwell looking aghast on the top left cover! Excellent!
The ancient history of so many Dad Jokes can be traced to Mad Magazine. Example: First, "I'm getting a haircut today." Second, "Really? Which one?" I still recall laughing at that after reading it in 1962.
You are now reading MAD Magazine…..MAD!
I still miss all those nostalgic memories of MADtv, in which the series was based on, as well as the classic characters, Antonia, the Vancome Lady, Stuart, Miss Swan, and Doreen Larkin, Lorraine, Uh-Oh HOT DOG!, Ty and Carl, John Madden, Bill Cosby, Dr. Phil, Oprah Winfrey, Ellen DeGeneres, Connie Chung, and also Spishak and CLOPS.
Forever will hold those characters and moments near and dear to my heart. 1995-2009
I loved MADtv!!
Way funnier than SNL
@@MikeGrant-q7bWell, at least I liked Saturday Night Live in the 70s and 80s, and a little 90s, here and there. In Living Color, another great series, and SCTV, too, with such greats like John Candy, Martin Short, Andrea Martin, Eugene Levy, and Joe Flaherty.
Yeah, all those shows from way back then would have much more class than what we would see on SNL, nowadays.
@@chrisfinch8637SCTV was FANTASTIC, utterly brilliant humor & satire & so much better than SNL!
I have always loved MAD, even before I understood it. But there's no way I could get to Massachusetts to see this exhibit. Oh well.
Born in 1957, grew up with Mad Magazine. Our dad even liked it.
I would trudge miles to the local Thrifty to buy my issue of Mad and then come home and devour it! Thank you for this piece. It brought back fond memories 👍🏻🙏👏🏻✌🏻🤙🏻
This is a fantastic story about a magazine I grew up on. Thank you.
Ahh. PRAISE The Gods of Sanity!! We're not worthy... we're not worthy... Mort Drucker helped my art career, Don Martin shaped my understanding of the world, David Berg guided my insights into human idiocy, William Gaines helped me understand publication law... the list goes on
I laugh just looking at the price listed on the front cover. They feel compelling to include "Cheap!" under the price. LOL
Mad had a lot of integrity. Running a profitable magazine with no advertising was no small feat. And they were willing to put their money where their mouth was. In the early '80s, they decided to take a page out of National Lampoon and put their name on a movie. The movie was the notoriously bad Up the Academy, and when Bill Gaines and company saw it, they paid thousands of dollars to have the Mad name removed from the movie and all the advertising.
Sergio Aragones’ ‘marginals’ were the first thing I searched for when I got a new issue.
(To the tune of On Top of Old Smokey) “I’ve got to stop smoking, my doctor has said. Or else when I’m seven, I’ll surely be dead”
One of iconic Magazines in the world❤❤❤❤❤
Mad made me what I am today, but please don’t hold that against it.
First time I read MAD was on a Boy Scout campout over fifty years ago! I thought it was something adult and I shouldn't tell my parents. A few years later I found out THEY had read MAD around the time it became a magazine instead of a comic book!
I have a stack of MAD's from my childhood. I even have a number of the special issues with records inside and still have the records. I did play one of them and it actually played, that was the All In The Family record. MAD was great for any kid surrounded by nonsense and idiotic adults. It let me know that I'm not alone thinking the way I think about things.
I grew up with MAD Magazine...
I didn’t grow up - and it’s all MAD’s fault!
All praises to William Gaines!
The very reason MAD even exists was due to the Comics Code initiative that sought to censor the great works of Gaines' previous success......
HORROR COMICS.
Yup, he was the man who gave us EC COMICS, and a little gem called TALES FROM THE CRYPT.
We have Mr. Gaines to thank for the comics, the HBO anthology series, and a certain hedonistic host!😂❤
I have many issues from that era, including the one with the "Patton" parody and the Mad updated Christmas Carols which I still sing in church every Christmas Eve! What, me worry?
I grew up in the peak era. I had a life size poster on my bedroom door in the early sixties. I believe it help me form satire,irony,hypocrisy ..yeah ‘what me worry?’ 😛
Alfred is now Govenor in Florida.
What an insult to Alfred.