Button 067: United Cartoon Workers of America [generic]

67. United Cartoon Workers of America [generic] (1975).

The concept of a cartoonist labor union, even a symbolic one, was downright intoxicating to many artists and writers slaving away in lonely garrots. At this point in time (1975) only two U.C.W.A. "locals" were formally recognized on buttons: San Francisco and Milwaukee (see #2-A and 7-A) Seven years later five other cities were formally added (see #136, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141 & 157). Many cartoonists outside the two charter cities requested their own regional U.C.W.A. button.

Union chief and publisher (conflict of interest?) Denis Kitchen answered the demand by producing this "generic" button with the white stripe intentionally blank. When a cartoonist from, say, Skokie, requested a button, Kitchen himself would often hand-letter "Skokie, IL" with his crowquill pen on a blank and then the button was assembled on a punch press type machine. Sometimes an assistant would type the town name in the stripe and sometimes the buttons were sold with the line blank and the artist would tape his/her own local over the mylar of the finished button. Consequently many one-of-a-kind variants based on this template made it into artist's studios.

We are selling only "blank" generic versions of button #67, though custom requests are sometimes considered (when Denis is in a good mood he will still pull out his crowquill lettering pen and India ink and personalize a requested town or name on the remaining blank templates). 2.25 inch diameter. $2.00 (blank version)

One note, for serious button collectors, you may want to read the KSP BUTTON TEXT which explains the numbering systems for identifying the various buttons produced over the last 30 years, or see the COMPLETE KSP BUTTON LIST. The list is VERY long, so be patient while it loads.