1950’s Street art

Gilbert Shelton’s first character, Poddy Passumquoddy was created in the 1950’s when Gilbert was a teenager. The squat character running left to right holding a 23¢ coin was inspired by cartoonist Virgil Partch's illustrations in the New Yorker, which was in turn parodying Picasso.

Under the cover of darkness he would paint the squat character with checkered pants around Houston, TX with the slogan, “Poddy Rules the World!”. Soon, other teenagers around Houston began to see Poddy and his campaign of global conquest began.

Here is the story of one Randy Y. who was inspired by Poddy and took it upon himself to expand Mr. Passumquoddy’s sphere of influence.