Yesterday, Steven Heller wrote about the Toronto Public Library’s challenge to update its wartime posters for the COVID era. After the article went live, we caught wind of Victory Over the Virus and Welcome to the Pause, which have been publishing their own spins on vintage calls to arms—as well as a satirical series based on the Ripley’s Believe It or Not! newspaper columns of yore. (Robert Ripley’s column launched in 1918, and the company claims it is the “oldest continuously run comic panel in history” … but you might fall into the “or Not!” category if you’re familiar with The Katzenjammer Kids, which debuted in 1897.)
Collectively, the “Can You Believe?” comics offer some needed levity—and a reminder of how profoundly the virus has changed the world that was only a few months ago, but so often feels a world away.
Here are 10 installments.
