A key to understanding the creation of the comic strip Winnie Winkle is World War I, which  proved that women could hold down jobs just as effectively as men. Winning the vote in the United States in 1920 just served to underscore women’s emerging equality. The Working Girl was a new stock figure in popular media, related to but not identical to the excitement seeking Flapper. That same year, Winnie Winkle the Breadwinner, debuted on newspaper funny pages across the country. The first working girl comic strip, Somebody’s Stenog had appeared the year before, Tillie the Toiler and Dixie Dugan following Winnie in 1921 and 1929.  Brenda Starr, Reporter would not appear until 1940, and featured a greater focus on action and physical threat.

Martin Branner, His Wife and Winnie Winkle

Winnie Winkle began her life as a breadwinner on the comic page at the tender age of 17, starting work as a stenographer to support her elderly parents, a ne’er do well father and a long suffering mother. Martin Branner, the writer and artist behind Winnie’s adventures, had met his own wife when she was just beginning a career as a vaudeville dancer at the tender age of 15. Branner, not much older at 18, supplied the choreography for her routine. A secret marriage soon followed.

But after more than ten years on the road, Martin and Edith began to tire of that life and wanted to start a family. Luckily Branner had more than one avenue of artistic expression. He also had a talent for drawing, and a good sense of humor to boot. Comic strips were becoming quite the money maker. The creation of Winnie Winkle would soon follow, with the head of the famous Chicago Tribune syndicate (features not gangsters), Joseph Patterson, serving as midwife.

As the story goes, Patterson came up with the basic concept of a working girl comic strip who would be named Winnie Winkle. The syndicate head was inspired by the increasing number of young women joining the work force. Patterson selected the now 31-year old Branner to bring the working girl concept to life. Branner modestly recalled that Patterson picked him because “I always could draw pretty girls.” Branner modeled Winnie after the flapper, an emerging image of the new “modern” woman. Branner’s wife Edith supplied all of the designs for Winnie’s extensive wardrobe, a significant contribution all its own.

What follows is a look at how this prototypical feminist figure evolved over some seventy years in the newspapers. Her various incarnations give clues to the cultural climates in which they flourished and ultimately fell out of favor. America’s favorite working girl is finally getting the first comprehensive consideration she’s long deserved.

Winnie Winkle’s Resume

Across a long and storied working life, some fundamental qualities of Winnie Winkle’s never changed. She remained an attractive, resourceful woman from start to finish, always fashionably attired. But Winnie’s aspirations and related work and life challenges changed considerably across the decades, as a period by period analysis reveals.

The following image is the first Winnie Winkle comic strip, published September 20th, 1920. This and other reprints of comic strips from the twenties and thirties are courtesy of the website:

Deep Dish: groovy gay pop culture, a pop culture website with a gay perspective.

Single Working Girl 1920-1937

Winnie Winkle’s beginnings were far more sedate than those of her creator. Her first and longest employer was one Barnaby Bibbs, an irritable but ultimately good-hearted safety pin manufacturer.
Winnie’s personality was an intriguing mix in those early years. She was clearly hard-working and industrious, certainly far more so than her feckless father, Rip Van Winkle. But she also put on airs, calling her working class parents “mothaw” and “fawthaw” and dressing well above her means. (Readers of the strip noticed and Martin Branner was forced to write a sequence that revealed that Winnie had a deal with a dress shop to model their clothes for free as a way to increase their business.) Winnie clearly aspired to an upscale life even as she realistically dealt with the realities of her own life situation. Some commentators on the early Branner narratives read them as providing sly commentary on consumerism and upper class wannabees.

Winnie’s romantic intrigues saw her being drawn to professional men (attorney  Robert Degan, physician Harold Sherwood, auditor Dick Darling, efficiency expert ) or men of wealth (high society twins Harry and Larry Tyler). Her more ardent suitors had considerably less finesse and yet were far more entertaining characters (roughneck Mike Mulligan came along first, followed a few years later by his identical cousin, Marty Mulligan). Like any single girl of the era, she had to weed out a few two-timing rogues (Kenneth Dare, Lowell Henshaw), pretentious bores (Ad Libb), and elderly letches (Old Man Ganzy). Her best friends (Patsy Dugan, Fanny Fitts and in the 1940s, Daisy Drip) also worked, but were consistently shorter, heavier, and more true to their working class roots.

(From left to right: Patsy Dugan, Mike Mulligan with bowler, Cornelius Cutting with top hat, twins Harry and Larry Tyler, Old Man Ganzy, Simon Konshus, Dick Darling, and Winnie–from the cover of a Winnie Winkle board game circa 1932)

A try at Hollywoood success in 1928 led a broke Winnie needing to work at various odd jobs (department store clerk, chorus girl, dictionary salesgirl, and manicurist) to earn her way back home and back to her job at Bibbs Safety Pin Company. But by 1933, Winnie lost that job as well. One imagines that Martin Branner felt a steady job made Winnie less sympathetic as a heroine when so many good Americans were losing theirs. For the rest of the thirties Winnie went from job to job and was often once again seen pounding the pavement.

Not that some of the gigs she landed weren’t glamorous. In 1934, Winnie was enlisted by the federal government to serve as Secret Agent W-13 to uncover a foreign saboteur. Having a sample of the unknown rogue’s handwriting, she went to an embassy sponsored dance and solicited many a man’s signature on her dance card. In this way, W-13 uncovered the spy. The storyline was clearly a pastiche of the popular new comic strip, Secret Agent X-9 that had debuted earlier that same year.

Through it all Winnie always remained loyal to the needs of her parents and her younger cousin and adoptive brother, Perry. Perry was adopted when Pa Winkle’s brother died in 1932. Perry inherited a fortune that Pa squandered. Perry Winkle was the star of the Sunday page of the strip, which was separate from the narrative of the Monday through Saturday installment. When Winnie and Perry were shown together, Winnie was typically trying to teach Perry to be more well behaved. Perry preferred running wild with the boys of his neighborhood, a harmless gang known only as the Rinkydinks. When Winnie earned a series of silent film shorts in 1926, Branner as the scriptwriter often focused on the slapstick antics of Perry and the Rinkydinks.

Winnie’s fashion sense was well received by female readers, enough so that a line of “Winnie Winkle” skirt ensembles debuted in department stores and dress shops in time for the holidays in 1924. The ads for the line suggested the dresses were aimed at the new modern woman, noting they provided a “jaunty costume for the uncorseted figure, designed in the flat silhouette.” Unfortunately the line appears to have been over priced and by the summer of the next year was showing up on bargain tables at drastically reduced prices.

Working Wife and Mother 1937-1953

After several disastrous romances, Winnie Winkle literally met Mr. Wright (William Wright), while he was surveying the street corner on which the Winkles live. Will saves the family from an unscrupulous land developer and quickly earned both Winnie’s trust and affection. Branner felt the comic strip needed a new focus and Winnie and Will quickly married on June 11, 1937. They struggled to manage things financially, made worse by Will’s gambling problem. Later, the two went on the road as professional dancers, Branner indulging his personal nostalgia for when he and his wife traveled the burlesque circuit as an elegant dance duo. In the comic strip, the Winkles’ agent is Nick Dymopolus, a diminutive Greek speakeasy owner who speaks in broken English. Winnie and Will’s adventures on the road are reprinted in Dell Comics’Winnie Winkle, issues 1-6, which can be found online. Branner’s storylines seem quaint today but were a little racier than some comic strip fare. Lingerie shots of Winnie preparing for shows were not uncommon. That said, Winnie’s virtue was never questioned or threatened.

The vaudeville angle ended in 1941, when Nick managed to get a producer’s job in Hollywood and Will, now called Bill, enlisted in the Army engineering corps without telling Winnie. As the comic strip veered into melodrama, Winnie learned she was pregnant after Bill left on an overseas assignment. Bill was soon missing and thought to be dead, even as Winnie gave birth to twins, Wendy and Billy that same year. Winnie was forced to return home to live with her parents and once again found work with Barnaby Bibbs to make ends meet. The influence of Branner assistants, Max Van Bibber and Jack Berrill, who would later go on to create the comic strip Gil Thorp, began to be felt in the more serious content.

This was only the first of several disappearances by Bill Wright that Winnie would suffer through. Lost in 1941, Bill was found alive in 1942, sent back overseas early the next year, only to be declared missing in action a second time in 1944. Bill was found again, this time blind, in 1946. A surgery restored his sight the following year. The couple enjoyed a brief respite from such drama, though they once again struggled financially, now having two young children to support. Creator Martin Branner never seemed happy telling the story of Winnie and Bill as a couple, perhaps feeling comic strips like Blondie handled this territory more effectively. Bill was once again presumed dead after a deadly explosion at an engineering site in South America in 1951. This time it appeared as if he might really be gone for good.

Throughout World War II, Branner addressed life back home during wartime. The Winkles grew a victory garden and suffered blackouts. For her part, Winnie unsuccessfully tried to join the WAVES (turned down because she had young children), and went back to work for Barnaby Bibbs, whose pin company was now turned towards war production needs. Winnie noted how many men’s jobs women were doing in a comic strip published on June 21^st, 1943. Ma Winkle proudly responded it was now “a woman’s world” Pa Winkle, in a apron doing dishes, shakes a pan in disagreement!

Given her acute fashion sense, Winnie Winkle was hired as a model and then designer by fashion mogul, Edwin Bonnaz in 1949. With Bill’s disappearance, her work was once again critical for her survival, and that of her twins and parents. For all of that, humorous elements continue to be threaded throughout the narrative, as Winnie meets Bill’s charming conman relative, Uncle Roscoe, and is romanced by the wealthy but uncouth baseball star, Tootsie Rocket. Her new female confidant is Bonnaz’ elderly Aunt Bessie. True to Branner’s habit in portraying sidekicks, Bessie was pleasantly plump and short in stature.

Fashion Executive and Dating Widow 1954-1973

With Edwin Bonnaz’ death in 1954, a power struggle for control of his company emerges between fellow designers Winnie Winkle and Marsha Vogue. Winnie ultimately took over as CEO of Bonnaz Fashion beginning in January, 1955, though “Aunt” Bessie retained ownership.

Stories focused more seriously on the fashion business and its associated challenges from now on. Coworkers played increasingly important roles, including Winnie’s inevitably plumb secretary, “Birdie” Byrd, aggressive designer Stan Adams, and later Janie Plane, Bill Wright’s initially rather dowdy cousin. Big foot characters such as Tootsie Rocket and Uncle Roscoe were gradually phased out of the narrative with Paw Winkle remaining the lone survivor of an increasingly outmoded era. The more realistic drama of story strips such as Mary Worth, Mary Perkins, On Stage and Judge Parker were increasingly the order of the day. But Winnie’s stories never quite reached their level of realism, nor do I suspect Martin Branner intended them to. Characters’ roles in lighter storylines could still be readily identified sporting names like Vivian Vixon, Dick Valentine, and Plane. A grown-up Perry Winkle reappeared in 1960 (he had disappeared from the Sunday strip in 1954 along with the more serious focus), admirably filled out and handsome after a stint of military service. Winnie helped Janie with a beauty makeover and Janie and Perry were soon an item.

While Winnie’s career as an executive remained rather unique in newspaper comic strips, the comic strip could not exactly be considered a feminist treatise. Scheming and backstabbing female rivals, such as Vogue, Vixon, and Lottie Dah were unfortunately common and rather interchangable. Luckily the friendships between Winnie, Birdie and Janie demonstrated a more appealing picture of women in the workplace getting along.

The mixed picture of how female characters in comic strips in the early 1960s comic strips were portrayed is nowhere more apparent than in a 1962 storyline. In it, communist officers in Russia imprisoned Winnie and another women when they put on a fashion show in Moscow for allegedly trying to foment dissent in their women. Winnie’s communist captors denied the two women any make-up or anything other than prison garb for months, hoping to expose these Western women as just as plain as any Russian when they finally stand trial. But Winnie shows remarkable creativity to using everyday prison elements as make-up and makeshift fabric. The two women show up for trial looking fabulous! The communist middle men behind the scheme are humiliated and are forced, for reasons not entirely clear in the story, to let Winnie and the other woman to return home. Feminine ingenuity, woeful stereotypes, or some combination of both? The camp era of the mid-sixties had nearly arrived and it was beginning to show on the funny pages.

Martin Branner suffered a stroke in 1962 and his longtime assistant, Martin Van Bibber, took over the art chores. Assistants Henry Raduta and female journalist and social worker Jean Sparber handled the writing chores for the rest of the sixties. Stories, however, didn’t change discernably, though the new writers did see to it that Birdie finally had a romance of her own with a hunky Polynesian with the unlikely name of Tutu Johnson. And Wendy and Billy, now in their teens, started to be featured in their own adventures. Every five years or so, Winnie would wonder if she had caught a glimpse of her long lost husband, but this never turned out to be the case, at least throughout the fifties, sixties and seventies.

In 1967, Aunt Bessie sold Bonnaz Fashion to Armand Gilt (a greedy businessman, could you guess?), who unceremoniously fired Winkle. Winnie gained positive work experience on her own, ultimately cobbling together enough finances to buy back Bonnaz, with Bessie acting as intermediary. Winnie’s business acumen was more clearly portrayed than ever before. And for the first time, Winnie had total control of her business.

The Queer Saga of Billy Wright, and Other Stories 1973-1985

In 1973, the authorial chores of Winnie Winkle were handed over to Henry Raduta, who hadn’t written the strip since 1966. He had most recently ghost written the comic strip Little Orphan Annie for a brief time after the death of Harold Gray in 1968. Jean Sparber was not an option, having died unexpectedly in 1972. She was only 48.

Raduta attempted to explore more contemporary themes. In a pastiche or Aristotle Onassis’ romance of Jackie, Raduta introduced Gregory Kontos, an arrogant and unscrupulous Greek tycoon who twice pursues obsessive schemes to marry Winnie. Then there was Omar Jabar, a Middle Eastern oil magnate with dark plans for Winnie’s life. Ultimately, though, Raduta felt there was more emotionally interesting territory to explore if Winnie were to finally find her lost husband after nearly thirty years. Bill spent the next several years struggling to get back on his feet with business partner TuTu Johnson. A Colombian girl named Consuelo shows up not long after, claiming to be Bill’s daughter sired during his lost years.

But by far the most interesting developments under Raduta’s authorial reign was his treatment of Billy Wright, Winnie’s son, post high school. Billy had never been portrayed as having a girlfriend, unlike Wendy who had already enjoyed several romantic entanglements. Raduta had Billy pursue ill-advised friendships with a series of other young men, including the Chameleon, aka Joey Dell, a pen pal of Billy’s from the state correction institution and a master of disguise!

But no friendship was quite as inexplicable as Billy’s with one Russ Miller, a handsome fellow just a few years older than Billy. In 1977, Miller stopped his car to give Billy, a fellow he’s never met, a lift. Next thing you know he’s offering Billy a job. “While there wouldn’t be much of a salary involved, I can provide you with living quarters over the garage and you can take your meals with me.”

Billy has reservations. “Hmm…” he smiles, “sounds too good to be true.” But he agrees to the arrangement. Miller doesn’t tell Billy his new job is as a male escort to women. Billy is about to split with that realization, but it emerges that Russ is only doing the escort business as as he has a sick mother to support and is trying to fund a film documentary. Hmm, single, handsome, and devoted to Mom…

In 1981, Miller summons Billy back to California for an unnamed project. Was Miller more than a friend? Billy makes a special holiday visit home with Russ for Christmas in 1983 to “tell her something important.” It looks as if he’s about to come out, but declares his love for an older woman—39-year old Marge Dugay, instead. It was later revealed that the syndicate that owned Winnie Winkle nixed the writer’s plans for Billy to come out and the coming out panels were rewritten. It never did quite make sense why Miller had come along for that particular revelation.

Winnie and the Twins: High Fashion, Film, and Murder 1985-1996

The final phase of Winnie Winkle’s story began when Frank Bolle was hired to take over the comic strip in 1985. The challenge for Bolle, who had drawn several comic strips in the past, was that he was not a writer. For that aspect of the production of the comic strip, he enlisted talented Leonard Starr, a skilled writer and artist whose biggest claim to fame was as creator of the acclaimed story strip, Mary Perkins, On Stage. While the stories featuring Winnie Winkle by no means matched the work Starr had done on Mary Perkins, the storylines did take on a more realistic and darker air. This was kicked off by a story apparently begun just before Bolle’s takeover, in which Bill Wright once again was apparently killed on foreign soil, in an accident apparently arranged by his scheming, millionaire brother, Orville.

Under Starr’s guidance, characters no longer had names that suggested their character. Winnie became an increasingly astute business woman, countering several of Orville’s schemes largely on her own. She could even be occasionally ruthless if such a stance was absolutely necessary. Her new romantic interest was Pierre Saville, a French fashion magazine publisher. Now pursuing careers of their own, Winnie’s children also largely operated in Europe, Billy as a film editor and then a fledgling movie producer, and Wendy as an increasingly successful actress.

The increasingly sophisticated stories and locales were too little, too late, and Tribune Media Services, the owners of the feature, cancelled the comic strip in 1996, admitting that “the Winnie Winkle character was not recognized as a contemporary role model for the 90s.”

Mark Carlson-Ghost

 

Winnie Winkle Timeline

Comic strip published: 9/20/20-7/28/96

Martin Branner narratives

1920    Mr. Bibbs hires Winnie. She meets Patsy Dugan and Old Man Ganzy.

1921    The secret of Winnie’s wardrobe is revealed. Mr. Ganzy persists.

1922    Winnie is romanced by twins, Harry and Larry Tyler. The Winkles adopt Perry.

1923    Kenneth Dare’s secret is exposed. Perry introduces Mike Mulligan to Winnie.

1924    Mike Mulligan enrolls in college to improve his chances with Winnie.

1925    Lawyer Robert Degan and physician Harold Sherwood vie for Winnie’s love.

1926    Degan rescues Winnie from Old Man Ganzy’s blackmail marriage plot.

1927    Mike Mulligan and Patsy get married. Winnie wins a trip to Hollywood.

1928    Winnie’s star turn is sabotaged by her director boy friend, Lowell Henshaw.   

1929    Ad Libb picks Winnie as Bibbs’ Pin Girl and modeling offers flood in.

1930    Marty Mulligan, a boxer and Mike’s identical cousin, begins wooing Winnie.

1931    Is handsome auditor Dick Darling married? Ad Libb starts rival pin company.

1932    Spoiled rich girl, Babs Bibbs, tries to steal Dick Darling away from Winnie.

1933    Winnie locates missing Mike and Patsy Mulligan. Pa trains Mike as a boxer.

1934    Winnie is enlisted by Army intelligence and briefly becomes agent W-13.

1935    Winnie is in a romantic triangle with boxers Marty Mulligan and Steve Strong.

1936    Efficiency expert Cornelius Cutting proposes marriage to Winnie.

1937    Winnie meets Bill Wright and the two are married. Bill’s older brother opposes it.

1938    Bill hides gambling losses from Winnie and she leaves him when she finds out.

1939    Winnie and Bill hit the road as dancers, agented by Nick Dymopolus.

1940    Winnie and Bill move into a theatrical boarding house. Hollywood beckons.

1941    Winnie gives birth to twins days. Bill, who enlisted, is declared missing in action.            

1942    Warren Wright wants custody of the twins. Dan Manley loves Winnie, finds Bill.

1943    Bill recovers then goes back to war. The Winkles plant a victory garden.

1944    Susie Cue joins Winnie and Daisy Drip at Bibbs Pin Co. Bill is missing again.    

1945    Winnie continues to work with Daisy, Susie and Mr. Bibbs. The war ends.

1946    Winnie is hired by newspaper editor Al Adams. Bill returns, alive but blind.

1947    An operation restores Bill’s sight. Bill and Winnie build a house.

1948    Money is short but worries are few. Foolish Bill raises roosters for the eggs.

1949    Enter Bill’s Uncle Roscoe. Winnie is hired by fashion mogul Edwin Bonnaz.

1950    Bill is apparently killed (again). Roscoe Wright attempts to con Bessie Murtagh.

1951    Star baseball player Tootsie Rocket tries to romance the widowed Winnie.

1952    Pa helps out of shape Tootsie—still smitten with Winnie—to lose weight.

1953    Warren Wright, Bill’s older brother, tries to gain custody of the twins.

1954    With Ed Bonnaz’ death, Marsha Vogue and Winnie spar. Perry no longer seen.

1955    Winnie is new head of Bonnaz Fashion, hires Birdie and romances Brad Dunham.

1956    Marsha Vogue returns to steal a lucrative television contract from Bonnaz.

1957    Brad Dunham marries another. Tootsie and Pa get entangled in gambling scheme.

1958    Winnie and Birdie search for Bill. Janie Plane, his cousin, gets a makeover.

1959    Roscoe Wright cons some con men in order to help Winnie out of a jam.

1960    Enter scheming Vivian Vixon. Perry Winkle returns home all grown up.

1961    Winnie wonders if Wendy’s science teacher might be her long lost husband.

1962    Winnie is jailed for months in Moscow. Stan Adams marries Diana Dove.

Max Van Bibber narratives

1963    Marsha Vogue, Winnie’s “arch enemy,” schemes to take over Bonnaz fashion.

1964    In a desperate final gesture, Marsha Vogue hires a hit man to kill Winnie.

1965    Hunky Polynesian Tutu Johnson falls for Birdie. Perry and Janie Plane marry.

1966    Birdie and Tutu are also married.

1967    Winnie falls for Prince Jim of Beguilia Island, who suffers serious accident.

1968    Recovered King Jim returns home. Perry and Janie Winkle have twins.

1969    Winnie rescues blackmailer “Snake” Hyde from a beating to ill effect.

1970    Armand Gilt buys Bonnaz Fashion and promptly fires Winnie.

1971    Gilt actively undermines Winnie’s efforts to re-establish herself

1972    Winnie enjoys romance with Hal Martins and helps visiting Birdie lose weight.

Henry Raduta/Max Van Bibber narratives

1973    Tutu’s equally hunky younger brother Mano makes a play for Winnie.

1974    Birdie leaves Tutu who doesn’t know she’s pregnant, but it all works out.

1975    Greek tycoon Gregory Kontos attempts to woo Winnie with his fortune.

1976    Kontos returns to try and ruin Winnie’s business so she’ll be more vulnerable.

1977    Russ Miller offers Billy a job. Tutu is presumed dead when lost at sea.

1978    Billy friendship with Russ deepens. Tutu found alive and speaks of a hermit…

1979    Winnie travels to the South Seas and discovers an amnesiac Bill.

1980    A disguised Vivian Vixon tries to destroy Winnie. Bill and Tutu start a business.

1981    Is Consuelo actually Bill Wright’s daughter, sired during his long absence?

Henry Raduta/Frank Bolle narratives

1982    Bill’s older brother returns, now called Orville Wright but still up to no good.

1983    Is Billy more than just close friends with Russ Miller? Seems so but then again…

1984    Billy’s relationship with older woman Marge proves to be nothing but trouble.

Leonard Starr/Frank Bolle narratives

1985    Orville arranges Bill’s death. Bessie is killed. Enter Pierre and Martine Saville.

1986    Orville begins a scheme to destroy Tutu’s company with Carl Danton’s help.

1987    Winnie gives Tutu key help. Martine Saville, Pierre’s scheming ex-wife, returns.

1988    Trager explores whether the mysterious Cicatraz could be Bill Wright.

1989    Orville Wright romances one of his top executives, Hartley Strang.

1990    Orville Wright hatches another scheme. Billy close to directing his first movie.

1991    Pierre Saville returns. Orville and Martine team-up. Martine ends up dead.

1992    Pierre’s arrested, but once free proposes to Winnie. Pa suffers a stroke.

1993    Winnie and sleazy Orville bring down Zebulon Zander James. Pierre disappears.

1994    The deranged actions of Pierre’s secretary, Solange Blum, are uncovered.

1995    Billy falls under the spell of actress Marc Stryker. Thorne’s “security” is deadly.

1996    Wendy’s new movie debuts. Serial killer’s ID is revealed. Winnie to marry Pierre.

Creative Talent

Martin Branner, writer and artist of record until his stroke, 1920-1962.

Max Van Bibber, assisted on artwork, 1938-1962; artist 1962-1981.

Jack Berrill, assisted on stories and artwork, 1941-1958.

Henry Raduta, ghost writer on stories, 1959-1966; writer, 1973-1985.

Jean Sparber, ghost writer for Van Bibber during the “sixties,” c1966-c1972?.

Joe Kubert School, artwork 1981-1982.

Frank Bolle, artist, 1982-1996.

Leonard Starr, ghost writer for Bolle, 1985-1996.

 

 

Winnie Winkle’s Family

Pa and Ma Winkle. Pa’s full name is Ripley Van Winkle. Pa Winkle is a generally good hearted if shallow conniver who is always attempting to make a fast buck. He is also always in favor of Winnie marrying for money. His schemes often inadvertently entangle Winnie. Mae is his long-suffering, sweet wife, though her name is rarely mentioned.

Perry Winkle. Perry is Winnie’s cousin and adoptive brother, taken in when Rip Winkle’s wealthy brother passes away. Pa Winkle soon squanders the accompanying fortune but looks after young Perry thereafter. Initially Perry largely appears in the humorous Sunday strips as a mischievous boy who is good friends with Denny Dimwit. Once the humorous Sunday strips are dropped in 1954,  Perry disappears from the narrative. When he finally returns six years later, Perry is portrayed as a handsome, young man with short brown hair who has been in the military. He almost immediately has a conflicted chemistry with Janie Plane, a cousin of Bill Wright’s who has been staying in his room during his military service. After several romantic misadventures, Perry ultimately marries Janie in 1965. Perry is portrayed as a loving, if often irritated husband. The couple have a pair of twins four years into their marriage. 2/2/22-x/54, 2/60-

William “Bill” Wright. Will and Winnie meet when he is surveying the corner that the Winkles live on. He saves the Wrights from being swindled out of their property by Preston Price. Will proposes to Winnie on April 1^st and the two are married on 6/11/37 but only after Will escapes from having been kidnapped by his wealthy brother. Will’s gambling problem soon trouble them. From 1938 to 1941 they try to make it as professional dancers, coming across many a lowlife along the way. Bill, while his judgment isn’t always the best, is capable of defending Winnie with his fists. He joins the army, becoming a lieutenanat, without tellings Winnie and leaves for overseas without Winnie telling him she’s pregnant. His plane is shot down a few months later and he is declared missing in action and presumed dead. Wealthy Dan Manley uses his resources to help rescue an injured Bill and bring him back home in September of 1942. Once Bill has enjoyed time with his children and recovered from his injuries, he rejoins the Army. In November of 1944 he was once again is declared missing in action and by May 1945 Winnie is receiving posthumous honors on his behalf. Bill turns up again in December 1946, this time having purposely kept himself hidden from his family. A “physical wreck, he decided to stay out of his wife’s life for fear of being a burden.” He and Winnie struggle financially, but are happy until his third disappearance in early 1950, in an apparently fatal South American mine accident, lasts for decades. Winnie unsuccessfully pursues a lead that suggests Bill might still be alive in 1958 and again in 1965. Bill reappears in 1978 and the two are happy for awhile until Orville Wright arranges for another accident in 1985. A Latin American revolutionary named Cicatraz that Winnie encounters in a new search may or may not be Bill. 2/37-5/9/41, 9/15/42-     , (declared missing in action 11/44 and killed in action 5/45), 12/46-x/51, 1/78-2/78, 1/79-1/85, possibly 2/88-5/88 (see Cicatraz). Bill and Winnie’s early marriage years on the road are reprinted in Winnie Winkle 1-2, 4-6 (Dell).

Wendy Wright. Winnie’s daughter and twin sister to Billy. Initially known as Little Winnie, the girl is renamed Wendy in 1959 as a headstrong adolescent. Wendy gradually grows up to be an attractive and independent if spoiled and emotionally impulsive young woman. Later dramas of the series revolve around her struggle to establish herself as an actress and ill-fated love affairs with men like Guy Floyd, retired race car driver. 5/21/41-7/96.

Billy Wright. Winnie’s son and twin brother to Wendy. Billy’s growing closeness to Russ Miller (1977-1983), away from the family in California, appears to be a gay relationship, but Billy establishes a relationship with an older woman instead. He gradually establishes himself as a film editor and then as a director beginning in 1991, most often in Paris, and there has romances with actresses Yolande L’éclair and Tami Smith. He is able to help his sister’s career but never establishes a stable relationship with a woman. 5/21/41-7/96.

Winnie Winkle’s Friends and Associates

Barnaby Bibbs. Winnie’s first boss, a safety pin manufacturer, for whom she worked as a stenographer. She worked for him off and on until 1949, when he introduces her to Edwin Bonnaz, a fashion mogul, who was impressed by her fashion work for him on an Easter season promotion. x/20-9/33, 7/41- 7/42, 10/42, 8/43-2/47, 2/48-7/49.

Patsy Dugan. Winnie’s friend and co-worker, Patsy is short, chubby and doesn’t aspire to the same social graces as Winnie. Nonetheless the two are loyal friends. In 1927 , Patsy marries Mike Mulligan. 10/6/20-6/27, 9/28, 5/33-7/33.

Denny Dimwit. Perry’s intellectually slow best friend and offensive stereotype. Played for lowbrow humor, Denny disappears from the comic strip permanently in 1954.

Harry and Larry Tyler. Wealthy socialite twins who are both interested in romancing Winnie, who has a hard time telling them apart. Harry is the one who proposes, however, and the Tyler family agree he is the one who should marry her. Unfortunately, Larry is the twin who keeps trying to be the one that Winnie falls for, going so far as impersonating his twin at his Winnie’s wedding. The disastrous result is shown below. The wedding, while never actually finalized, did have some notable guests, including the Gumps, the Wallets from Gasoline Alley, and Harold Teen. Harry and Tyler briefly return later in 1922 to compete with Old Man Ganzy for Winnie’s affections. They pop up from time to time for a few years thereafter. 2/27/22-4/22, 7/22-8/22, referenced 12/22, 1/23, 12/25, referenced 1/37.

Mike Mulligan. Unsophisticated country boy interested in Winnie. His younger brother was friends with Perry Winkle, who is persuaded to introduce their siblings. Something of an uneducated brute, Mike is often seen physically intimidating Winnie’s other suitors, such as Ad Libb. Mike enters college late in 1923, hoping education will help his chances with Winnie. Mike returns in 1925, a wealthy and more polished man. He claims to be an interior decorator but disappears on their wedding day. It emerges a few months later that Mike was arrested, having actually made his money as a bootlegger. He left Winnie at the altar when his illegal operations resulted in his arrest.. Mike ultimately finds happiness with a woman named Patsy Dugan, whom he marries in June, 1927. They fall on hard times in 1933, now trying to support their young daughter Mary, and Winnie helps them get back on their feet—a task that involves Mike fighting as the Masked Marvel and ends up fighting his cousin Marty in another mask. Years later, in 1941, Sgt. Mulligan finds a picture of Winnie in the tent of Lieutenant Bill Wright. Without knowing Bill is married to her, Mulligan comments on how beautiful she is and how they used to date. A fist fight ensues, though afterwards all is forgiven and the two establish a short-lived friendship. 5/14/23-1/24, 4/24-9/24, 11/25-4/26, 7/26-9/26, 3/27-6/27, 9/28, 5/33-7/33, 4/41-5/41.

Robert Degan. An attorney who represents Winnie after an auto accident leaves her temporarily wheelchair bound. He is also in a romantic rivalry with Harold Sherwood for her affections, Pa rooting for him and Ma rooting for Sherwood. Degan briefly reenters Winnie’s life to rescue her from marriage to the blackmailing rogue Old Man Ganzy. 3/30/25-12/25, 10/26-11/26.

Dr. Harold Sherwood. A physician who treats Winnie after her auto accident (see above). Sherwood is in a romantic rivalry with Robert Degan. Ultimately Winnie rejects them both, explaining on 12/4/25, “My feeling for both of you is one of deep gratitude for all you’ve done for me! I’m aftraid I don’t love either of you enough to marry you, so let’s just be good friends instead!” The reentry a newly polished and wealthy Mike Mulligan into her life may also have influenced her decision. 3/30/25-12/25.

“Ad” Libb. Advertising man and salesman hired by Mr. Bibbs to increase sales. Ad promptly enlists Winnie to be the Bibbs’ Pin Girl, and tries to date her. Initially put off by his fast talking ways, Winnie gradually warms to him, occasionally dating him and even investing in an ill-fated rival venture, Twin Pin Company, in 1931. Ad returns to work with Mr. Bibbs and is last seen when Winnie leaves Mr. Bibb’s employ. When Winnie returns to work for Bibbs after the disappearance of her husband, Ad alienates Winnie in 1942 by signing a contract for the twins to appear in ads for Bibb’s stickless pins with Pa Winkle without Winnie’s knowledge or consent. Ad is skinny, sports a thin mustache and wears a loud, plaid suit. 4/29-9/33, 7/41-5/42.

Marty Mulligan. Mike’s identical cousin, an aspiring boxer who  also becomes interested in Winnie, naturally. He returns briefly in 1931 after enlisting in the Navy. In 1933, he returns to the narrative unknowingly boxing against his cousin as the Masked Marvel. After inadvertently involving Winnie with foreign zealots, he is shipped out to the South Pacific due to Naval orders. Marty wins the heavyweight championship in 1935, but Winnie loses respect for him when he loads up on commercial endorsements, calling him a “big sissy.” 2/4/30-5/30, 9/31, 7/33-8/33, 5/35-6/35, 6/36-10/36.

Dick Darling. Handsome auditor Barnaby Bibbs hires with the stipulation that he be married to avoid romantic entanglements at the office. Winnie is immediately drawn to him and Ad Libb is suspicious. It turns out that Darling lied to get the job he badly needed. Winnie argues against his firing. Bibb’s spoiled daughter Babs starts working for her father in 1932 and tries unsuccessfully to steal Dick away from Winnie. Dick and Winnie’s romance cools thereafter and the two only occasionally date thereafter. 1/31-9/33, 7/41-5/42.

Fanny Fitts. A short and chubby show girl who performs under the stage name Kitty Kelly. Her show biz career is short lived, but she helps Winnie get a job at and advertising firm where they must deal with efficiency expert Cornelius Cutting. Winnie and Fanny work at another company thereafter before Fanny falls on hard times and the Winkles put her up for a time. Fanny finally decides to return home to live with her family and exits the narrative. 3/20/35-1/37.

Steve Strong. Handsome heavyweight champion of the world who loses his title to Marty Mulligan, blames Winnie for the loss (she rooted for Marty) and swears off women. He returns a year later hoping to make inroads with Winnie, after buying the house next door and turning it into a Health Institute. Winnie enlists Marty as an uneasy business partner, but the Health Institute fails and both men disappear from the narrative. 5/15/35-6/35, 6/36-10/36.

Cornelius Cutting. An efficiency expert hired by the advertising firm Winnie works for, Cutting is conservative, proper, and fond of chastising slow employees with old proverbs. A slender, older man, Cutting defies convention and starts dating Winnie. Winnie is jealous of a younger woman she catches him with, who turns out to be his daughter Camilla. After proposing to Winnie, who accepts, Cutting somewhat inexplicably ends up marrying a woman closer to his own age, a Mrs. Jennings, who also just happens to be very wealthy. Showing some redeeming qualities in the end, Cutting finds Winnie a new job at a different company, as Winnie feels she can no longer work there, and also one for Fanny Fitts, who quit in solidarity with Winnie. 10/35-4/36.

Nick Dymopolus. Diminutive Greek speakeasy owner and hires Will and Winnie as his dancing entertainment. Nick is a charming figure who speaks in broken English. There enjoyable alliance is ended in 1941, when Nick get’s a producer’s job in Hollywood, Bill joins the Army, and Winnie gives birth to twins. 7/39-3/41. Reprinted in Winnie Winkle 1-2, 4-6 (Dell).

Dan Manley. The best man at Bill and Winnie’s wedding and a wealthy man with government connections, Dan twice goes on missions to try and rescue Bill if he’s still alive, the first time in December 1941 gaining intelligence from the co-pilot held with Bill that makes it almost certain that Bill is likely dead. Dan begins to look after Winnie and the twins and falls in love with her, even proposing marriage. But when he gets word that Bill may be alive after all, he returns to South America and brings him back alive but wounded. Dan also was involved in a subsequent 1947 rescue of Bill. 8/18/41-9/41, 12/41, 3/42-9/42, 1/47.

Daisy Drip. A short and chubby co-worker at Bibbs Pin Company, Daisy is unlucky at love. In 1944, tired of Winnie and Susie Cue’s luck in that department, Daisy pretends to have a boy friend named Hector Heartake. Daisy is Winnie’s best friend at work. 8/43-2/47, 2/48, 7/48.

Susie Cue. Curvacious new typist at Bibbs Pin Company. Winnie and Daisy are initially wary but Susie soon becomes one of the girls, but continues to draw considerable male attention. 1/27/44-2/47, 3/48.

Al Adams. Handsome newspaper editor with whom Winnie works for a time during one of Bill’s numerous absences. 2/46-6/46.

Edwin Bonnaz. Fashion tycoon who hires Winnie to work for him after seeing some of her fashion designs for a local Easter season promotion. For a time, presumably after Bill’s death, he is also her suitor. Bonnaz is the nephew of Winnie’s adoptive “aunt,” Elizabeth “Bessie” Murtagh. When Bonnaz dies unexpectedly in 1954, Bessie asks her to run the business. Though it takes nearly twenty years, in 1971, Winnie finally becomes the owner of Bonnaz Fashion. 7/49-    , 10/54.

Elizabeth “Bessie” Murtah/Murtagh. Winnie’s adoptive “aunt” who hires her to work for and ultimately run the fashion operation she inherits with the death of her nephew, Edwin Bonnaz. Overwhelmed at the prospect of running a fashion business, Bessie appoints Winnie as CEO. Bessie foolishly marries Winnie’s brother-in-law and ends up being killed in March, 1985 by a gunman who is attempting to kill Orville. 9/49-1/51, 4/51-7/51, 9/52-1/56, 7/57-10/57, and on and off through 3/85.

Tootsie Rocket. Star baseball player for the Central City Rums whose infatuation with Winnie initially threatens his ball play though he and his team ultimately win the pennant. Tootsie is something of a palooka: strong, a little dense, good-hearted but also quick-tempered. He once paid for Paw Winkle to visit him in training camp just to inquire about Winnie’s well-being. Paw is particularly invested in Rocket’s romance with his daughter given the ball player’s wealth. 5/51-11/51, 3/52-8/52, 5/53, 3/57-5/57.

Professor Kirk Davis. Handsome college professor whose romance with Winnie Pa Winkle ruins on behalf of the far wealthier Tootsie Rocket. 2/53-4/53, 2/54.

Dr. Bob North. Physician whose interest in Winnie leads him to propose despite the obsessive opposition on his high society sister, Lenore. 9/53-2/54.

Stan Adams. Stockholder and employee of Winnie’s new fashion company, Adams initially attempts to undermine Winnie but ultimately comes around to respect and support her. He marries a lovely young dark-haired woman named Diana Dove in 1962. He often is put in charge when Winnie travels or is otherwise absent. 10/54-6/62, 8/69-12/69, others.

Big Bill Stentor. Sexist and crude womanizing stockholder and employee of Winnie’s new fashion company. 11/54-2/55, 10/55-11/55.

“Birdie” Byrd. Winnie’s supportive and somewhat overweight secretary in her new role as CEO of Bonnaz Fashion. Birdie marries a sweet and handsomely well built Polynesian man named Tutu from the island of Pago Pago in 1966. When she returns to visit Winnie in 1972 she is severely overweight and Winnie helps her lose a good part of it. Winnie visits Birdie in 1973 and the following year an insecure and pregnant Birdie briefly leaves her husband and seeks Winnie’s advice. Birdie returns in 1977 with her son Timmy, believing that Tutu was killed in plane crash over the ocean. She returns to work as Winnie’s trusted right hand and, happily, Tutu is discovered alive in 1978. Birdie remains Winnie’s office manager for the renamed Winnie Winkle Fashions for the rest of the narrative. 1/55-2/66, 10/67-1/68, 4/72-6/72, 5/73-7/73, 3/74-5/74, 5/77-x/96.

Brad Dunham. Handsome fashion executive, Brad initially romances Winnie pretending to be a ski instructor at his wealthy father’s lodge. This is Winnie’s first serious romance since her husband’s death. Overcoming a brief separation, in which Winnie contemplates what she really wants, the two are reunited by happenstance and their romance takes root. Brad’s father disinherits Brad and blacklists him in the industry. Planning on marrying on Valentine’s Day, 1956, their wedding is ultimately derailed by Brad’s inability to manage all the obstacles his father puts up. Winnie later chooses not to interfere with Brad’s burgeoning romance and pending marriage with a woman named Linda. 2/55-4/55,10/55-2/56, 1/57-3/57.

Janie Plane Winkle. A dark-haired, “Plain Jane” office girl receives a makeover by Winnie and the Bonnaz gang. She is ultimately revealed to be Bill Wright’s younger cousin and is invited to live in the Winkle home. She seems to alternate in drawing men into romantic interludes with the somewhat older widow Winnie. Professionally, Janie becomes Winnie’s most trusted business associate. When Winnie’s younger brother, Perry, returns to town in 1960 all grown up, the two fall in love and ultimately marry in February 1965. Janie is portrayed as a loving, if somewhat scatter-brained wife. In December 1969, Janie gives birth to twins, Tommy and Tammy. Perry and Janie play a shrinking role in the narrative thereafter. 1/58-  .

Dick Valentine. Dark-haired, handsome and fit, Valentine is a cowboy hat-wearing Western resort owner Winnie meets on vacation and whom she considers a possible romantic interest for a time. The two become engaged in 1963, but the loss of his resort from a bad fire makes him financially unable to support Winnie and he breaks off the engagement, though Winnie continues to refer to him as her fiancé. The two are close enough that Dick hosts Winnie’s children for the entire summer of 1964, though what happened during the summer is never told. Ultimately Dick decides to focus on other women after he comes to visit Winnie in 1965 and finds her gone on one of her periodic wild goose chases in search of her lost husband. 9/60-10/60, 5/61-6/61, 2/63-4/63, (letters from 11/62, 6/64, referenced 10/63, 4/64, 12/64 as her fiance), 10/65-11/65.

Bill Williams. Wendy’s science teacher, Williams looks just like Bill Wright. Winnie suspects he may be her lost husband suffering from amnesia but the clues leading her in that direction are all coincidences. 1/61-2/61.

Tutu Johnson. Hunky Polynesian man from the island of Pornacopia (!) later designated by the more sedate name Pago Pago. TuTu falls in love with Birdie and shortly after their initial romance travels to the United States to ask her to marry him. While there, he takes a crash course in hotel management in order to support her when they move back to the South Pacific after their February 1966 wedding. He later appears to own his own hotel located on one of islands ruled over by Prince Jim. Tutu and Birdie receives a visit from Winnie in 1974 and discovers his wife is pregnant in 1974. His son Timmy is born. Tutu is presumed dead in 1977 when his body is never found after his plane crashes into the Pacific. Happily, he is found alive in 1978 and he speaks of a hermit he spent time with who turns out to be the long lost Bill Wright. Tutu relocates to the United States to be with his family. By 1980 he and Bill have started a company of their own called T & B Decorators, featuring attractive Polynesian concepts based on Tutu’s designs. Winnie and Tutu remain close after Bill disappears once again and in 1987 she helps save his now successful business from Orville Wright’s designs on it. 4/65-6/65, 12/65-2/66, 11/67-1/68, 6/73-7/73, 4/74-5/74, 12/77, x/78-x/79, 8/79-1/84, 7/86-6/87.

Prince Jim. Handsome royalty of Beguilia Island, located in the Pacific. Prince Jim is interested in Winnie but is hamstrung by a malignant arranged marriage with Princess Gloriana. Jim ultimately becomes king and, in 1968, is nursed back to health by Winnie. 1/67-3/67, 7/67-4/68.

Hal Martins. The head buyer for the prestigious Excalibur department store chain, Martins falls in love with Winnie when she seeks him out to sign on with Bonnaz when he is vacationing in the Bahamas. In early 1972, Winnie learns he has lost his job and is now broke, a state which he feels negates his ability to marry her. after regaining his financial footing, Martins is killed in an auto accident. An  engagement ring is found in his pocket. 12/71-1/72, 3/72-4/72, 2/73-3/73, (news of his death 8/73).

Mano Johnson. Tutu’s equally handsome and muscular younger brother, Mano becomes infatuated with the significantly older Winnie, who is tickled by but ultimately rebuffs his advances given her commitment to Hal Martins. 6/73-7/73.

The Chameleon. AKA Joey Dell, a pen pal of Billy’s from the state correction institution and a master of disguise. One of several of friendships that Billy seems to make with seeming bad boys. 11/74-2/75.

Russ Miller. Russ stops his car to give Billy Wright, a fellow he’s never met, a lift. Next thing you know he’s offering Billy a job. “While there wouldn’t be much of a salary involved, I can provide you with living quarters over the garage and you can take your meals with me.” Billy has no reservations. “Hmm…” he smiles, “sounds too good to be true.” He doesn’t tell Billy his new job is a male escort to women. Billy is about to split with that realization, but it emerges that Russ is only doing so as he has a sick mother to support and is trying to fund a film documentary. The two maintain a business partnership for several years, in 1978 it appears as if Russ is involved with something illegal, during which time Billy has minimal romance with women. In 1981, Miller summons Billy back to California for an unnamed project. Was the darkly handsome Miller, just a few years older than Billy, more than a friend? Billy makes a special holiday visit home with Russ for Christmas in 1983 to “tell her something important.” It looks as if he’s about to come out, but declares his love for an older woman—39-year old Marge Dugay, instead. (It was later revealed that the syndicate that owned Winnie Winkle nixed the writer’s plans for Billy to come out.) 2/77-5/77, 4/78-7/78, 10/81, 12/83-1/84.

Consuelo. Also called Connie, this Colombian girl genuinely believes she is Bill Wright’s daughter, sired during his lost period. She becomes a model, develops anorexia and appears to steal Wendy’s boy friend, but really doesn’t. Connie is later deported as an illegal alien as part of a scheme by Orville Wright to tear all of Winnie’s emotional supports from her side. 1/81-8/82.

Detective Trager. Handsome, dark-haired police detective who sports a stylish mustache. He is first seen investigating the death of Bessie Wright. Given his harsh treatment of Orville Wright, Wright sees to him being kicked off the police force. In 1987 Trager returns as a private detective investigating the mysterious Cicatiz and whether he might actually be Bill Wright. Trager appears romantically interested in Winnie, but nothing develops between them. Before they part for a final time, Trager warns her that Orville Wright may be behind Bill’s disappearance, as well as many other nefarious deeds. 3/8/85-6/85, 11/87-5/88.

Pierre Saville.  Publisher of a French fashion magazine, Paris Chic, and gradually begins to find his way into Winnie’s heart after yet another apparent death of Bill Wright. Pierre and Winnie are engaged after he is cleared of charges of the murder of his ex-wife, Martine Saville, a perennial obstacle to his new relationship. Pierre is declared missing throughout much of 1993 until Wendy, apparently more concerned than Winnie, follows his suspicious secretary—Solange Blum—until she finds him hospitalized and brain injured in a small French hospital under the name of Pierre Blum. It ultimately turns out that a jealous Solange tried to kill him by forcing his car off a dangerous stretch of road. Once she discovered he wasn’t dead, Solange kept feeding him hallucinagins to keep his mind from clearing. Pierre struggles with stabilizing his language and overall mental health even after he is rescued from the hospital. In 1996, by the end of the narrative, Pierre is well enough to propose marriage to Winnie. 3/25/85-8/85, 11/85-12/85, 12/86-3/87, (letter from 12/87), 3/91-5/92, 2/93-3/93, 12/93-7/96.

Drusilla Jones. With a Ph.D. in Comparative Religions, Drusilla is well equipped to pose as a witch, pretending to cast a spell on Winnie (actually a close friend) to fall in love with Orville Wright. It is all part of a scheme that finally allows Winnie to wrest control of Wright Enterprises from her missing husband’s brother. 7/88-8/88, 11/88.

Hartley Strang. Attractive business woman hired to be treasurer of Wright International. Orville Wright attempts to romance her, but she threatens to report Orville to the Feds unless he returns money she realizes he stole from Winnie. A sub-plot involves a secret son named Dewey Smith whom Orville is jealous of. 1/89-4/89.

Yolande L’éclair. Young French actress with whom new film director Billy Wright becomes infatuated. For a time the two are romantically involved, but the romance cools when Billy is unable to say that he loves her. 5/91-9/92, 12/92.

Guy Floyd. Former race car driver who retired from competition due to a leg injury. Guy is always under the shadow of rumors that he purposely caused another racer’s death in the same car crash that mangled his leg. Wendy falls for him but the two have difficulty committing, complicated by Guy’s brief interest in the manipulative Tami Smith. Guy is briefly suspected of being the driver that ran Pierre Saville off the road, causing his serious injuries, but is later is cleared of all suspicion. 1/94-x/95.

Winnie Winkle Enemies and Antagonists

Adrian Ardsley. Handsome painter whom Winnie meets while at a secluded cabin. Ardsley wants to paint her portrait and proves to be obsessed with Winnie, not to mention mentally unhinged. 6/56-9/56.

Armand Gilt. Unscrupulous businessman who buys Bonnaz Fashion and soon unfairly fires Winnie. From then on, until she buys the company herself, Gilt is an ongoing thorn in Winnie’s efforts to reestablish in the fashion world, going so far as have her innovative fashion designs stolen. 10/70-12/70, 10/71-11/71.

Barbara “Babs” Bibbs. Spoiled daughter of Barnaby Bibbs and a recent college graduate, Babs decides she should work for her father. Once there, however, she orders around male staff, goes on a date with Ad Libb to defy her father’s wishes, and tries to steal Dick Darling away from Winnie. 1/32-3/32.

Carl Dantan. Untrustworthy sales consultant seeks to give Tutu’s burgeoning business bad advice, secretly in the employ of Orville Wright. 7/86-10/86, 3/87-6/87?

Cicatraz. An unhinged gun runner operating out of Central America who has a scarred face and just happens to cut his food just like William Wright. He saves Winnie’s life, who later leaves the region, convinced he isn’t her husband. 2/88-5/88.

Colonel Nicola Nokkov. Communist military officer infatuated with the Countess von Saber, a Winnie Winkle look alike. Winnie is enlisted by the O.S.I. to serve American interests by pretending to be the Countess in order to undermine communist interests in the region. 7/55-9/55.

Gregory Kontos. Arrogant and unscrupulous Greek tycoon obsessed with marrying Winnie. The handsome billionaire ultimately plots to secretly ruin Winnie’s company so she’ll be more vulnerable to his marriage proposal. 7/74-9/74, 2/75-6/75.

Kenneth Dare. A handsome and wealthy stockbroker, Dare attempts to marry Winnie, even though he is already married. His real wife outs the scoundrel at Winnie and Kenneth’s unrealized nuptials. 10/22-1/23.

Lenore North. Beautiful and wealthy, Lenore is the sister of her physician brother, Bob. Lenore wears beautiful Asian-styled dresses and smokes cigarettes from a cigarette holder. Obsessed with a sense that Winnie is unworthy of her brother, she hires a criminal to frame Winnie for a series of crimes. 9/53-2/54.

Lone Wolf Willie. AKA Bruce Williams, notorious jewel thief with whom Winnie has a romantic flirtation. 2/51-3/51.

Lottie Dah. Ambitious, savvy and unscrupulous dark-haired beauty tricks her way into being hired as Winnie’s private secretary. She proceeds to undermine Bessie Murtagh’s confidence in Winnie, presenting herself as the person keeping Bonnaz afloat. 10/69-12/69.

Lowell Henshaw. Movie director Lowell Henshaw is asked by his boss to star Winnie in his next movie, after Winnie rescued the son of the president of Perfection Pictures from getting run over by a car. As Henshaw had planned to feature his own girl friend, Juanita Delmonte, he romances Winnie to gain her trust and then misdirects her to insure her movie debut is a colossal failure. Winnie must work her way across America to find her way bak home. 1/28-2/28.

Marc Stryker. Attactive brunette actress who manipulates Billy Wright, but secretly has ulterior motives with a secret lover. 10/95-x/96.

Marsha Vogue. Described at one point as Winnie’s “arch enemy,” Vogue is originally the assistant to fashion mogul Edwin Bonnaz. With Bonnaz’s death, Vogue attempts to fraudulently take control of the company by tampering with his will. Winnie uncovers her deception and becomes the head of the company he left behind instead. Vogue later returns to seek revenge on Bill Stentor, Birdie, and most especially Winnie. She beats out Bonnaz Fashion for a lucrative television fashion contract by way of blackmail and fraud. In 1963, Vogue returns with a scheme to use Bessie’s husband’s gambling habit as a vehicle for taking over Bonnaz Fashion. By 1964, her own efforts at Fabian Fashions are showing declining sales in the face of Bonnaz’ success, so much so that Vogue hires a hit man to “rub out” Winkle—unsuccessfully, of course. 10/54-12/54, c10/56-12/56, 5/63-7/63, 9/64-11/64.      .

Martine Saville. Scheming ex-wife of Pierre Saville. She is shown to be increasingly mentally unhinged, willing to fund a movie for Billy to edit only to sabotage it in hopes of causing Winnie pain. After this latest scheme, in which she joined forces with Orville Wright, she turns up dead. 7/85-8/85, 2/87-3/87, 9/91-11/91.

Old Man Ganzy. Full name, Gabriel Ganzy. Initially Ganzy is portrayed as a persistent, but seemingly harmless lecherous old man of considerable wealth who wants to date Winnie. In a darker moment, after lending his houseboat to the Winkles and Pa wrecking it, Ganzy blackmails Winnie into a prospective marriage or he will ruin the family financially. Robert Degan rescues Winnie at the last possible moment. Ganzy is portrayed as elderly with a very long white beard. 11/20-1/21, 5/21, 10/21-1/22, 7/22-5/23, 8/23, 12/23-2/24, 12/24-2/25, 4/25, 12/25, 8/26-11/26, 9/28.

Omar Jabar. Middle Eastern oil magnate with aspirations to romantically take over Winnie’s life. 12/81-4/82.

Preston Price. The son of a banker, Preston befriends Winnie all the better to get the Winkles to sell their house to him before they learn of a proposal that will be make the street corner they live on a far more valuable property. Luckily an engineer named William Wright who is surveying the intersection uncovers the scheme and insures that the Winkles aren’t cheated. In this way, Bill and Winnie’s romance begins.  1/37-3/37, 5/37.

Princess Gloriana. Murderous, horse-faced fiancé of Prince Jim. Gloriana used a trade agreement with her country that the prince desperately needed for his, to blackmail him into marrying her. 9/67-1/68.

Roscoe Wright. Bill and Jamie’s good-natured, con-man uncle. In 1950, Roscoe attempts to cheat Bessie Murtagh out of $3000, all of the money she has in her fashion business, to purchase an oil well supposedly worth a million dollars, but actually non-existent. In 1953, Roscoe blackmails Warren Wright into returning custody of the twins to Winnie, despite the fact that dirt he had on his nephew might helped him financially at a later date. Roscoe assists Winnie by conning some gentlemen far more sinister than he is in 1959. 10/49-12/49, 10/50-12/50, 8/53-9/53, 1/59-3/59, others.

“Snake” Hyde. When Winnie happens upon a couple beating up a skinny, balding older man, she comes to his rescue. Lauded as a hero in the press, she later learns that the man she rescued is a blackmailer extorting Dolly and Fulton Fear with incriminating information he has on their son, Fred. Their accusations don’t stick initially and they, not Snake, are arrested, free to remain a threatening presence. 4/69-6/69.

Solange Blum. Longtime secretary of Pierre Saville, whose hard work helped his fashion magazine succeed. The older French woman hid him in a hospital after a serious car accident caused him severe physical injuries. It emerges that, jealous over her boss’ romance with Winnie, she was the one to run him off the road. When Solange failed to kill him, she sought to keep him from Winnie and regularly gave him doses of LSD to keep his mental state in flux. When Winnie and Michel Collard, an old friend of Pierre’s from his French Legionnaire days, uncover her actions, she tries to cause a fatal car accident for them as well. Upon her capture, on 10/2/94, Blum explained her motive: “He was fond of me doing all the work in the magazine while he chased after that filthy rich American. 11/93-10/94.

Tami Smith. Beautiful blonde actress with Farrah Fawcett feathered hair. Tami seeks to use Billy Wright’s attraction to her for professional advantage. In 1993, their relationship is complicated by Cain (no first name), a man from her past with criminal ties. Cain forces Tami to secretly marry him and out of jealousy threatens Billy’s life. When Cain turns up dead in July, Billy is suspected as his killer. Tami uses this to her advantage, trying take control of the movie she’s in and which Billy is directing. For some time Billy actually suspects Tami of Cain’s murder, but still is unable to totally divorce his emotional interest in her. In 1994 Toni threatens to seduce Wendy’s boy friend, Guy Floyd, away from her unless Billy directs her next movie. 9/92-3/94, 6/94-9/94, x/95-x/95.

Thorne. Unscrupulous and macho owner of a security firm that Winnie hires to her later regret when a tuck of her product is hijacked. It turns out Thorne killed a police officer nicknamed “Patch” Patchek who Winnie knew and liked. 2/95-11/95.

Victor Ventura. Handsome con-man who solicits financial backing from a wealthy married friend of Winnie’s as they tour Europe to support the writing of a nonexistent novel. 8/64-9/64.

Vivian Vixon. The sleekly attractive, dark-haired Vixon gets herself hired as Winnie’s secretary while Birdie is briefly incapacitated and proceeds to try to sabotage Winnie’s every effort and ingratiate herself with Bessie Murtagh, the owner of Bonnaz, so she could see Winkle fired and gain a foothold in the company. A later tangle with Winkle leads to Vixon’s imprisonment. Vixon returns years later in disguise, seeking revenge and the utter financial destruction of her adversary. 10/60-11/60, 7/80-12/80.

Warren/W. Wayne/OrvilleWright. Will’s wealthy and disapproving older brother, who will stoop to any length to keep his sibling and Winnie apart. When Bill is presumed dead in South America, Warren and his mother attempt to gain custody of the twins in 1942 and again in 1953 by manufacturing evidence against Winnie’s parenting and claiming as a working Mom she is not a suitable parent. In 1958, he sends Winnie and Birdie on a futile search for his brother. When Bill’s brother returns in 1983 he goes by the name of Orville, but the narrative suggests that he has clashed with Winnie before. Thereafter he is a near constant thorn in Winnie’s side, at various times trying to marry her. He marries Winnie’s Aunt Bessie, a courtship that results in the latter’s death in 1985 when Orville pulls Bessie in front of him to take a bullet intended for him. 4/37-6/37, 6/42-9/42, 5/53-9/53, 4/58, 3/82-12/82, 7/83-8/85, 12/85, 9/86-10/86, 2/87-6/87, 11/87-2/88, 6/88-11/88, 4/90-6/90, 6/91-11/91, 2/92-5/92, 2/43-4/43, 11/93-12/93, others?

Zebulon Zander James. Orville introduces a business associate, Zander James, to Winnie. It turns out that Zander was Bill’s roommate in college. The opportunity to learn more about Bill before they met is a draw. Zander’s ex-wife informs Winnie that he had always been jealous of Bill and over the years used his wealth to try to undermine everything that Bill tried to achieve. Taking Bill’s widow as a wife would feel like the ultimate triumph. Though Orville and Zander were in cahoots, Winnie pressures Orville into helping her cripple his business empire instead. 2/93-12/93.

Winnie Winkle comic strip stories from 1938-1941 were reprinted in a six issues of Winnie Winkle comic books published by Dell. Electronic versions of these comic books can be viewed free of charge at the Digital Comic Museum website. The Digital Comic Museum is a great resource for viewing old comic books published before 1960 and in the public domain. Many of these comic books contain reprints of old comic strips. I heartily recommend you check it out.