PIB COPENHAGEN · 100 - PIB Copenhagen A/S

USA som et skræmmende eksempel.
Det var derfor nødvendigt, at redaktørerne kunne
føle sig på sikker grund, hvis de skulle have en serie
til børn.
Fra en reklame for PIBs børnemateriale.
From an advertisement for material for children. The caption reads:
“Children and young people are the subscribers of the future”.
Den fik de via en skolelærer, der allerede havde
skabt sig et navn som fabulerende fortæller og
ekspert i aktiviteter til børn. Hans navn var Jørgen
PIB COPENHAGEN · 100
34
to watch what their children occupy themselves with,
but seldom have time to really look into it. Any
medium that’s considered “new” is therefore suspect,
and very vulnerable to any attack.
The first warning signs of trouble came in Denmark
in 1947 in the form of an article in Nationaltidende by
editor Eigil Steinmetz. He was, like so many before
and since, worried over what he saw as the press’
dwindling cultural influence, and used the American
comic strips’ popularity in the USA as a frightening
example.
It was therefore necessary that editors could feel that
they were on safe ground before they would buy a
strip aimed at children.
They got this guarantee from a school teacher who
had already made a name for himself as an
imaginative storyteller and expert in activities for
children. His name was Jørgen Clevin, and he had
debuted in 1945 with a picture book about Rasmus
the ostrich.
It developed eventually into a proper comic strip.
“Finally, there’s now an educational comic strip for
children and adults,” PIB wrote in a promotional
brochure.
Seen with contemporary eyes, Rasmus the Ostrich is
so politically incorrect that the word “educational”
should certainly not have been used in connection
with it. The heavily caricatured drawings of African
children in ragged clothes (children who also smoked)
will undoubtedly give rise to sharp protests today.
But that was another time and Jørgen Clevin’s Africa
was a fantasy world with no connection to the real
Africa. The strip about an ostrich named Rasmus was
praised from all parties and helped to turn Jørgen
Clevin into an institution to Danish children.
Clevin’s growing workload meant that he soon had to
give up the comic strip business in favor of a career
that encompassed schoolbooks, children’s books,