Art Sansom created The Born Loser after spending 20 years churning out the illustrations on his syndicate's serious strips. He originally titled it The Loser, but under the urging of the syndicate, renamed it The Born Loser. The dailies started May 10, 1965 while the Sundays premiered on June 27. Initially, the strip had no recurring characters but now focuses on the Thornapple family and the few people in their lives.
Characters
Main characters
Brutus P. "Thorny" Thornapple – As the name of the comic implies, he's a born loser. He simply can't get a break, whether it involves his job, his family, or just plain every day life. He's rather old fashioned, perhaps explaining why the modern times seem to be running him over. His birthday is November 29, 1951, though the May 10, 2011 edition proclaimed it to be his 46th birthday. Gladys "Hornet" Thornapple – Brutus's wife, she's even more old fashioned than Brutus and doesn't seem to be very bright, especially with popular culture or technology. Taller than Brutus, with blond hair, she's rather similar to Edith "Dingbat" Bunker. She can be a bit scolding of Brutus, and often gets into fights with him that he simply cannot win. Nevertheless, their relationship always seems to be intact. Wilberforce Thornapple – The son of the Thornapple family, he's a very curious boy who looks up to his father and often turns to him for advice. He is friends with his neighbor Hurricane Hattie, and enjoys baseball, but he's not very good at it. He currently wears his blond hair in a crew cut but in the 1970s, when boys and men tended to wear much longer hair, he wore his hair in sausage curls, and wore sailor-type suits with shorts. His appearance looked much more boyish with the new hairstyle as his wardrobe was updated with jeans, sweatshirts, and tennis shoes.
Secondary characters
Rancid W. "Rank" Veeblefester – Brutus's boss, a rich tycoon. A very cranky, unpleasant man, he works in an office surrounded by money bags and doesn't seem to do any real work. He always scolds Brutus for being incompetent and seems to enjoy tormenting him. He loves to give a seemingly nice remark to Brutus to get his hopes up, and then turns it around as an insult. It's often a wonder how Brutus, who dubs him "Chief," manages to escape being fired by him; this implies that Rancid is satisfied with Brutus' work and simply enjoys terrorizing him. Even in their home lives, nothing changes. Deserves to be dragged out into the street and shot, by way of his sadistic nature. His wife's name is "Lividea", a play on the word "livid"; presumably she is as unpleasant as her husband. The character's name is a variation on veeblefetzer, a word popularized in the 1950s by Harvey Kurtzman in early issues of Mad. Ramona Gargle – Gladys's mother. A stereotypical mother in law, she often visits to pepper Brutus with insults and emotional anguish. However, Brutus does occasionally gets his own jibes back at "Mother Gargle". Hurricane Hattie O'Hara – The mischievous girl next door, she delights in menacing pretty much any adult she encounters, namely Brutus and her teacher. Other characters regularly featured are the Thornapple family dog, Kewpie; Miss Fungus, Wilberforce and Hattie's school teacher; and Wastrel P. Gravesite, a bum who regularly hounds Brutus for money. Kewpie the Dog Voice of reason, basically the Thornapple version of Garfield.
