Here’s something I didn’t know. For the past year cartoonist Mort Walker (or, more likely, his son) has been publishing a magazine of cartoons, ads, and household hints, called The Best of Times. The formatting of the page at that link is a bit messed up, but clicking on the pictures works to bring up PDF copies of the issues.
When Walker isn’t in Florida he lives in Wilton, Connecticut, next to Norwalk, where I grew up. In fact, I used to ride my bike through Wilton, on my way to buy comic books. My two regular stops were in the same shopping center — a stationary store, and a drug store. Click the picture to see a map of my bike route. I made that trip many, many times between the spring of 1966 and the fall of 1968, weather permitting. Two miles exactly. I don’t believe Hillcrest was there 40 years ago. If it had been I probably wouldn’t have taken it anyway, as I preferred to avoid Route 7, which was a very busy and fast stretch of road. When I was older, living in Massachusetts, it was painful to realize that in Fairfield County I had been surrounded by many of the cartoonists and illustrators who I idolized.