Big Boy's Author Bids Farewell
May 10, 2011
In September, Palm Beach illustrator Putman Sizemore will publish his last issue of ``Adventures of the Big Boy.'' The monthly comic book, distributed by the Big Boy restaurant chain, will continue with a revamped Big Boy character -- but without Mr. Sizemore. As many as a million comic books a month are given away at the restaurants, and young readers write about 200 letters a week to Big Boy at Mr. Sizemore's Palm Beach post office box. But soon those letters will go to a designer in Peekskill. ``It's amazing the number of letters Big Boy has gotten over the years,'' says Mr. Sizemore, ``but kids feel that he's real.'' Mr. Sizemore, 79 years old, created the character in 1950 for the chain, which now has some 800 restaurants world-wide. A chubby lad clad in suspenders and red-checkered pants, Big Boy began appearing in a comic book in the late 1950s. Story lines have do-good themes like ``A Lesson in Fairness.'' Earlier this year, Elias Brothers Restaurants Inc. of Warren, Mich., which owns the chain and the rights to the character, decided that Big Boy needed a '90s makeover. The company told Mr. Sizemore that the character he created would be redesigned. But postal workers beware. Mr. Sizemore says he is talking to other companies about creating new characters, possibly with comic books. --Jacquelyne Wicker
