At 75, Blondie's more modern now, but still ageless

She was a gorgeous blonde. He was a bumbling playboy. When they fell in love and married, his billionaire father promptly disinherited them. Undaunted, the couple settled into middle-class life, she as a homemaker and mother, he as the long-suffering employee of an irascible boss, Mr. J.C. Dithers.

The rest is comic-strip history. Ever since cartoonist Chic Young created Blondie and Dagwood Bumstead in 1930, their domestic comedy has won readers' hearts by playing on four universal themes: eating, sleeping, raising children, and earning a living. Today, 75 years later, they reign as the most famous cartoon couple in history.

On Sunday, to celebrate 75 years in the funny pages, the Bumsteads will host a gala anniversary party. When readers open to "Blondie" that day, they'll find a mythical extravaganza that includes such beloved characters as Beetle Bailey, Hagar the Horrible, Garfield, Dennis the Menace, and Dilbert. Even President and Mrs. Bush will be portrayed in the party scene.

It's being called the biggest event in comic-strip history. And no wonder. "Blondie" appears in more than 2,300 newspapers in 55 countries and is translated into 35 languages. An estimated 250 million people see it. It is consistently among the five most popular newspaper comics.

The first "Blondie" strip ran on Sept. 8, 1930. When Dagwood gave up his inheritance to marry Blondie in 1933, his choice offered a rich story line, says Kathleen Turner, professor of communications at Davidson College in North Carolina. "It meant that Chic Young could now have the penniless but infatuated young couple reassure readers that with love, humor, and perseverance, the American dream was still possible."

After Mr. Young's death in 1973, his son, Dean, took over. With artist Denis Lebrun, he produces seven strips a week from a studio in Clearwater Beach, Fla. In a telephone interview, he refers to his father as "my daddy, the genius, who created this wonderful cast of characters to work with."

Over the decades, Young has updated the Bumsteads. They now talk on cellphones. Blondie runs a catering business and owns a laptop. Dagwood uses a computer at the office. Instead of racing to catch a bus to work, he carpools. "The bus deal became old-fashioned," Young explains.

Was it hard to turn the Bumsteads into a dual-career family? "I debated a long time before I did it," Young says. "I wasn't sure what business I wanted Blondie to go into. Catering was perfect. The eating business was real close to home."

Some things haven't changed. Dagwood's unspoken motto remains: When in doubt, take a nap. "That's still his favorite sport," Young says. "He loves napping and eating. He has a black belt in buffets. And he still can't get that raise from his boss. All those things are constants."

Dagwood also still specializes in making the mile-high sandwiches that earned him a place in the dictionary. But he doesn't really cook. As for cleaning, Young says, "He's not good at it, but he will do it. Sometimes he can help clear the dishes from the table, scrape the dishes off, and get them into the dishwasher."

That kind of traditional behavior draws fans and critics.

"Those who don't like it complain of the same-old, same-old: stale conceptions of marriage set in stale story lines, in which Daisy the dog has the most interesting expressions of the entire crew," says Professor Turner, who studies images of women in comic strips.

"It surprises me that 'Blondie' has been so popular for so long," says Scott Coltrane, a sociologist at the University of California, Riverside, who grew up reading the strip. "The pejorative depiction of men as lying on the couch does not play as well with men who are trying to do more. However, it still plays well with women, because many men still do so little compared with their wives."

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