I have always thought of Popeye as a cartoon character originating in my youth who started life as muscled, spinach-eating hero who always ended up with Olive Oil while rejected Bluto sat in the wings.

Not so.  He was basically a spinoff from a cartoon series that started way back in 1919, about the time my father was born.  He was a minor character who appeared in a couple panels and disappeared, but popular acclaim brought him back.   He’s been around ever since.

That 1919 series, published by King Features Syndicate, was called “Thimble Theatre,” the creation of cartoonist Elzie Crisler Segar, who was born in the Mississippi River town of Chester, Illinois. He was born in 1894 and died in 1938.   

He moved to Chicago to follow his dream.  There he created two strips with newspapers before hooking up with King Features and moving to New York.

Segar was 25 in 1919 when “Thimble Theatre” started.  It featured slacker Harold Hamgravy, his flapperish girlfriend Olive Oyle and her brother Castor Oyle, and a variety of comedic misadventures.  It wasn’t a widely distributed comic strip but did OK.

A full ten years later, in 1929, the Popeye character made an appearance.  He was a mariner hired by Castor Oyle to sail him and Olive and Hamgravy to a crooked gambler’s island casino.

That adventure ended and Popeye exited the series.  But readers liked the guy, they wanted him back and they let King Features know.  He was brought back and as his role became larger the strip was picked up by more and more papers.

A star was born.  Popeye ended up with Olive Olye, Harold Hamgravy disappeared, and Popeye’s been a ubiquitous fixture in our culture ever since.

Chester has certainly done its bit to keep the character alive.  The annual Popeye Picnic and Parade the weekend after Labor Day draws folks from all over the world.  They can take the Popeye and Friends Character Trail, a series of statues of various “Thimble Theatre” characters.  The trail started in 1977 with a bronze of Popeye in a park by the river and now includes 16 figures around town.

Chester resident Frank “Rocky” Fiegel (1868-1947), a bartender and day laborer, was Segar’s inspiration for the Popeye character and William “Windy Bill” Schuchert, owner of the Chester Opera house, was the model for Wimpy.

Here are some photos from around town. Just click on one to see larger images.

In the Saving The Best For Last category, there is one final Chester claim to fame: 

It was a stop for yours truly in 2003 on my solo canoe trip down the Mississippi River. 

On the afternoon of October 6, I put ashore at the town’s Water Street boat ramp and walked up the steep incline to the railroad tracks at the top of the hill, expecting to find a town.

There wasn’t one. 

Repeated floods over the years had forced the town to abandon its 1800 riverside location and move further up the bluffs.  About all that remained near the river when I dropped in was the only part of the original town still standing, an 1830 building called the Landmark. 

In 2003, Pam Haley and her husband operated Ye Olde Landmark Inn in the building.  (It’s now the home of St. Nicholas Landmark, the second location of the St. Nicholas Brewing Company, headquartered in Du Quoin, Illinois.)

It was a Monday and the place was officially closed, but the river gods were with me. 

Pam was inside, doing some paperwork, and once she knew I was a river traveler she happily opened a couple beers, cooked me a great ribeye dinner, and insisted I use the small grassy patch behind the building to set up my tent for the night.

So I got to drink, eat and sleep in the only building left standing from the Chester of the 1800s!  As a bonus, Pam and her husband came by in the morning to make me some coffee and see me off.

Here are some photos of the building and surrounding area:

One last Popeye tidbit before I wrap this up.  “The Popeye” was a dance craze in the 1960s, one that fortunately I was completely unaware of.  

It originated in New Orleans around 1962 and was performed, according to Wikipedia, “by shuffling and moving one’s arms, placing one arm behind and one arm in front and alternating them, going through the motion of raising a pipe up to the mouth, and alternate sliding or pushing one foot back in the manner of ice skating, similar to motions exhibited by the cartoon character.”

I am glad I missed it.