Knapp's special section: Knapp´s in the comics

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On Dec. 6, 2007, the nationally syndicated comic strip "Zippy the Pinhead" prominently featured the Lansing´s Knapp´s Department Store building.

In the first panel. the curved northeast corner of the Knapp´s building is clearly visible under the name Undico, an underwear manufacturer in the fictional town of Dingburg.

In nearly 40 years of drawing weekly and daily strips, "Zippy" creator Bill Griffith has featured hundreds of unusual American buildings and roadside oddities, often suggested by readers. Many of his strips take place in vintage diners, where his characters philosophize, consume "toroidal glucose delivery systems" (donuts) and use excessive taco sauce.

Griffith was delighted to hear that Knapp´s has been renovated instead of being torn down. He gave City Pulse permission to reprint the strip and added the following comments.

"I like to draw beautiful and/or interesting buildings in my comic strip — Art Deco department stores, streamlined diners, any building with a lot of character. It´s not just fun to draw them, but it just might make readers notice that they stand out from the ´big box´ humdrum architecture all around them — and, even better, appreciate their charm.

"We tear down too much of our cultural heritage – and live to regret it later. By including the gorgeous Knapp´s building in my Zippy strip, I hope I pointed out not just how cool it looks (and, to some degree, how enter taining it is to look at), but how important it is to preserve places like this so we don´t wake up one day and discover we´re all living in one gigantic strip mall."

- Lawrence Cosentino

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