Desperate Desmond

{{Short description|Comic strip by Harry Hershfield}}

{{for|the baseball player|Desmond Beatty}}

File:Desperate Desmond (sawmill, chloroform).png

"Desperate Desmond" was a comic strip by Harry Hershfield, published in the New York Journal[https://www.lambiek.net/artists/h/herschfield_h.htm Harry Hershfield], at Lambiek; retrieved April 6, 2019 between March 11, 1910, and October 15, 1912.[https://strippersguide.blogspot.com/2009/11/obscurity-of-day-desperate-desmond.html Obscurity of the Day: Desperate Desmond], by Allan Holtz, at Stripper's Guide; published November 25, 2009; retrieved April 6, 2019

A parody of melodrama, it depicted a stereotypical villain named Desmond who continually tried to capture a damsel in distress named Rosamond, which brought him into conflict with her and her paramour Claude Eclaire;[https://archive.today/20150404112158/http://toonopedia.com/desmond.htm DESPERATE DESMOND], at Don Markstein's Toonopedia; published 2004; retrieved April 6, 2019 Hershfield ended the strip by having Claude and Rosamond marry, which meant that Desmond could no longer pursue her.[https://archive.today/20150404112315/http://toonopedia.com/durham.htm DAUNTLESS DURHAM OF THE U.S.A.], at Don Markstein's Toonopedia; "Desmond (...) was idle because his former antaonist{{sic}}and love interest, Claude Eclaire and the fair Rosamond, had eluded him by marrying"; retrieved April 6, 2019

Coulton Waugh described it as one of the first strips to include genuine suspense; [https://books.google.com/books?id=fm8mRsBP3YkC&dq=%22DESPERATE+DESMOND%22&pg=PA65 The Comics], by Coulton Waugh; first published 1947; 1991 edition published by University Press of Mississippi similarly, R. C. Harvey has mentioned its early use of daily continuity.[https://books.google.com/books?id=sb374j7kI1sC&dq=%22DESPERATE+DESMOND%22+harry+continuity&pg=PA11 The Art of the Funnies: An Aesthetic History], by Robert C. Harvey; published 1994 by University Press of Mississippi

Don Markstein noted that it was a "probably a response" to the presence of a similar character in C. W. Kahles's earlier strip "Hairbreadth Harry"; Maurice Horn, however, called it a "direct imitation" of Kahles's work, but felt that it "showed greater ingenuity and wit".World Encyclopedia of Comics, by Maurice Horn, published 1976 by Chelsea House