The White Editor Be Keeping A Brother Down! (or "A Token of my Appreciation")

The #83 Archie Pals 'n' Gals Double Digest was published in May of 2004 according to the indicia page. I'm glad they let me know because I might have guessed a few years earlier.

 
Maybe 40 years earlier. Ah-so, my squinty-eyed, buck-toothed Japanese friend with the soup-bowl haircut, I take it they thawed you out recently. The last time I saw something this offensive I had drawn it!

But that's not the reason for this post. The focus of this post is on the only Colored family in Riverdale.

 
Here we see Chuck and his mother as they begin a new day. Chuck's Father is the gym coach at Riverdale High. And it must be a good job to allow his wife to stay at home.
 She may be moonlighting though. She has the arms and hands of a professional (male) wrestler or pugilist.
He shouldn't argue with her, but Chuck is not a hat guy. Y'know, his Scandanavian blood keeps him from getting cold like other black people. So... I guess there was no winter in Riverdale prior to this or Chuck would surely know that ears get cold.  Either that or Chuck is the largest and  most advanced newborn on record.


He hates hats so much that the thought of one being on his head for even one second has transformed him into Luke Cage! But only for a second as he realizes that it is pretty cold outside. Good thing he's still close to home so he can go back and get the hat, right?

 
Of course not! Chuck hates hats, remember! Hates 'em! He would prefer to walk to school with one hand covering one exposed ear at a time. Good thinking Chuck, you do the race proud! Fortunately for him Archie notices that his hands, which have been covered by gloves the whole time, look frostbitten. Time to visit the Nurse!

"Obviously you wore a hat, or your ears would have frozen too!" Or not, Chuck just has to put one gloved hand to his ears at a time. This somehow gives his hands frostbite, while protecting even the exposed ear from harm.  She then admonishes him to get a pair of gloves. Not a hat mind you,  but yet another pair of gloves. Whoa, hold on! Reality is bending!


The nurse drops a dime on Chuck and alerts his Father, who looks like his night-job is slaying vampires!
"No gloves? Almost frostbitten?" The coach is pissed. Without fingers Chuck will never be able to serve the good white people of Riverdale like he has!

Surely Chuck will straighten this out. Right? Right?
 
Of course not! Rather than ask his vampire-slayer/gym coach Father for a hat he will walk home with a pair of catcher's mitts taped to his head.

Thus ends the journey of Chuck in Winterland. Will he conquer his phobia and get a hat of his own? Will he again forget that Winter is cold? Will he someday move to a town with a few more black people in it? Well, that is a story for another time... but the answer is probably "no" for all three.