A seagoing superhero, Popeye was first seen in 1929 in E.C. Segar's Thimble Theatre. The comic strip itself had been running, dispensing fairly cockeyed mock-adventure continuities, since King Features Syndicate introduced it in 1919. Segar, however, did not get around to inventing his tough, spinach-eating sailor until almost ten years later. Already on board when the squint-eyed sailor entered were the quintessentially thin Olive Oyl and her diminutive and entrepreneurial brother Castor Oyl. J. Wellington Wimpy, whose fondness for hamburgers knew no bounds, entered the strip in 1931. By that time the crusty, two-fisted Popeye had long since become the undisputed star and the title had changed to Thimble Theatre Starring Popeye.

Never a master cartoonist, Segar compensated for his lack of drawing ability with a gift for audacious comedy. In his long, rambling comic continuities he kidded serious adventure narratives as well as current political and social activities at...