Barney Bulldog

BARNEY BULLDOG scooped front-cover status in SPARKY comic issue 211, taking over the coveted position vacated the previous week by the notorious 'Sparky' character. The bulldog was unleashed late on in 1968on the back page,--by former the Moonsters pensman Bill Ritchie: the early title given to the strip was the very patriotic-sounding John Bull Dogg, however the more consumer-friendly 'Barney Bulldog' moniker was introduced to readers in time for the Feb '69 revamp of the comic.

Appealling, wholesome, and [usually] well-meaning, the strip may have been a bit less intruiging than Ritchie's previous MOONSTERS offerings, however the layout and presentation of this coverstrip boded well with the bright-outlook of SPARKY during this period, and the lightly-slapstick capers and domestic cavortings still look pleasing and readable today. The strip often finished off with a large 'punch-line' frame, illustrating the play-on-words or ironic outcome of that week's particular episode.

Barney was often accompanied by youthful young pup sidekick BEN, an innocent young scamp who acted as a secondary backup character neccessary for the character interplay. The early years of the strip saw the stories recounted in traditional three rows of panels format, but come 1973, changes were afoot within the comic, which included seeing this strip mutate into a single-image, large single cartoon [usually without dialogue] with Barney at the centre of an ironic gag. This period also saw different-themed covers by John Geering alternating Page One slot with the bulldog, who was eventually freed from his SPARKY leash sometime in 1974.