By: Dave Astor Comics might be shrinking in newspapers, but not at Gentry High School in Indianola, Miss. Students there have built an enormous 135x45-foot strip that will be displayed Saturday, June 7.
Indianola resident Mark Pett, who does "Lucky Cow" for Universal Press Syndicate, approached Gentry art teacher Sarah Miller about trying to set a Guinness record for the world's largest comic. The idea was originally suggested by a friend of Pett's.
The cartoonist drew a "Lucky Cow" strip, used his computer to separate it into 1,500 gridded rectangular fragments, and enlarged each fragment to a 2x3-inch size. After Dollar General donated 1,500 pieces of poster board, Gentry art students painted the pieces to match the fragments and taped them together. "There are about 140 kids involved," said Pett, who noted that the blown-up comic is 67,000 times bigger than the original!
Members of the public are invited to see the comic starting at 11 a.m. Central Standard Time Saturday in the Gentry parking lot. Pett, reached by E&P Online during a test run Thursday at the lot, noted that the wind was making the huge comic "billow like a parachute." But, he added, "We're solving that with weights and other strategies."
The June 7 event will be videotaped and photographed from a hot-air balloon. When the strip that was enlarged runs in newspaper comic pages later this year, Pett said he'd love for it to appear as it was photographed from the balloon. But he's not sure if that would be possible.
As a fundraiser for the Gentry art department, onlookers will be able to purchase pieces of the comic.
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