A Moustache of Consequence on yon bear, there...

Yus! "Rank has its moustaches!"

Probably the lit cigarette. Not a Good Idea!

Yes. I think that is the one item 'over the line' for the staffers to start taking action. One possible quick fix is the water spritzer-bottle behind the counter. But that may be too rude and embarrassing.

Having been attempting to finish up this image, I found more story lines keep appearing, but might take a whole sequence of panels to show: Too much money in the cute-kid's paw. He maybe has too much ambition in his large firecracker dreams. ("I want a dozen of the <9x9> six-inch salutes!" They may or may not know the older 'Cuz', with the ID card. They may or may not know her temper. The staff are willing to cut some slack for who-gets-what firecracker, if there is a close adult actually adulting. By 'Cuz' showing her own card, she is taking responsibility for the purchase & supervising her cousin. (Which is good.) She's walked up to the counter 'accidentally' keeping her lit cigarette out of sight. (Which is very bad for supervising & adulting credibility.) Is she a good 'bad Cuz' or a bad 'good Cuz'? The smell of the cigarette has convinced all 3 behind the counter that they are going to have to quickly do something, but they all know there are almost too many outcomes for any reaction they choose.

Perhaps I wanted to do a short comic strip around this fireworks stand, but that might have taken a Spontoonie noise-abaitment priestess to sort it all out. 8) Even the young girl sitting on the step would want to 'help' the situation. She's the young pyrotechnic tech genius, that the staff is keeping close instructing other kids, while she is out-front & within sight. (Bribed with the "Official R.I.N.S. Helper Sun-Hat") She's a safe 100 meters away from the actual firecracker range....

Lit cigarettes around a fireworks stand, that could possibly end badly.

Always the chance of broken fireworks, and gunpowder dust in the corners. Trails of leaking gunpowder on the counter. (They probably wipe the counters down with a wet rag. I'm thinking now (having drawn up the image) that a sturdy wood-frame, corrugated-metal-clad building isn't necessarily the best for a fireworks stand. Sturdy construction keeps out wind & rain, and slows fire; yet if there is an explosion, then there can be huge sections of building being massive chunks of shrapnel.... If there was an explosion, then there might be less injuries with a canvas tent: Canvas walls, canvas roof.

That got me thinking: Most substantial buildings on 1930s island have a telegraph key & sounder for communication. Less have old crank telephones and modern dial telephones. That would might all be disconnected in a fireworks stand (sparks in the electrical equipment). Even older electrical light-switches could spark. Maybe that is not so much of a problem with stray gunpowder (inclosed in wrappings & packages). Not as much danger as a location that would have inflammable gas leaks. Imagine doing 1930s wiring at a gas station or dry cleaners....

When I was a child and still living at 130 Kontiki St (Trade-winds was the neighborhood) a local FW stand lit up when a idjit tossed his cigar INTO the stand. Two deaths and three critical's, even with Wilford Regional Hospital just over a mile down Military Drive. This was back in 1962 of course, 4th of Brain Dead.

😼😿🙀

"No perch, no ducks"

Puns abound: Perch is a small food-fish that someone could toss into a water tank, but of course bird-anthros could 'perch' as well as sit. But the 'NO DUCKS' part of the banner came first. There was a local black & white semi-undergound furry comic book (NO DUCKS!) that came out in the 1980s, that was a humorous response to a whole series of comic books called "QUACK!". "QUACK" was also a small-press semi-underground black & white comic, anthology filled with funny-animal characters. "QUACK" was a response by pro-artists & writers to support the writer (Steve Gerber) of the Marvel comic "Howard the Duck", during a dispute with Marvel comics over 'creator's rights' to a comic book character.

Someone and their smog stick needs a nice cold bucket of H2O dumped on them

There are probably 2 full buckets of water directly behind the counter, plus a squirt-bottle (or 3) of water. Not to count the fire extinguishers. The lowest level of confrontation would probably be a small metal ashcan (with lid open) in one hand, and an obvious squirt-bottle in the other. Maybe even with the offer of a fresh, un-lit cigarette. The staff is all in the military, and understand obeying orders, but also are aware that they are friendly allies occupying a naval base on a foreign land. The staff would have more discipline than many civilians about open fires (and sparks) near explosives. In the civilian areas of 1930s Spontoon Island, during fireworks holidays it would not be unusual for even a non-smoker to be carrying a burning cigarette to use as a fuse-lighter.

Gotcha on that. I've had to deal with public and others about smoking over the years and have had to put out quite a few ash tray and trash can fires caused by said people. Amazing how many folks will dump hot ashes and a lit butt in a trashcan when there is a nice ashtray right next to it.
I've used my share of small cigars for lighting fireworks in the past - my youth in Texas. Last time I shot off anything was getting rid of a shoebox full of bootleg M80s in an old rock quarry in Winona AZ. Fireworks weren't legal in the state at the time and with the drought and wildfire issues I figured put the box in the bottom of the quarry, use a long fuse into some sparklers and get back and watch the show. Was interesting and I got out of the area before the Sheriff Dept could arrive.

I hadn't remembered anything about the origin of M80s until a few months ago. (A military 'teaching aid' during infantry training, to provide a simulated flash-and-bang of an artillery shell?) And so any Army soldier probably knew about them. It's not surprising that there would be knock-offs and counterfeits. Of course, I heard about them as a teenager, as well as 'cherry bombs' and local legendary attributes. Looking back, I'm surprised about how most of the stories would include second-hand (or even first-hand) warnings about the dangers of the things. "We had been looking forward to having fun with these, but then we saw what they could actually do!" The teenagers could imagine what injuries could be like, and could imagine the damage to people younger & more naive.

Well the non DOT class C ones - the bootlegs have very short water proof fuses and are well known for having a fast fuse too. I tended to use sparklers as extended delay fuses for them. Set one off in a dome top charcoal grill once - the lid flew onto the roof of the house / one story. I had fun getting it off the roof before the folks got home. Weighted wit a rock or tire weight - lighted and dropped in the local creek made for one heck of a splash of water and fish floating to the surface. They could shred a hand if you were to hold one too long or ran into some fast fuse. Knew someone in Junior High who lost fingers.

Now skyrockets and bottle rockets, those you could fire fairly safely if you used a section of steel fence pipe. Fashion a pair of legs for it from scrap lumber - looks a bit like a mortar. Bend fuse of rocket about 90 degrees - place in the muzzle of the tube - let the fuse hold it in place. Light and step back. Fuse burns, rocket drops down tube then ignites - flies straight due to being guided by tube - plus it made a neat noise on ignition

!Pelegro!
!No Fuimar!
Maybe she understands that?

A good observation! That could be part of the reason that the staff was reluctant to react abruptly. There are visitors passing through Spontoon Island that are not English speakers. Those on seaplane flights as passengers are likely to be upper-class & rich. Maybe even touring with family. The large passenger ships stopping in on trans-Pacific journeys are going to be upper-class and some upper middle-class individuals or families. There are travelers from the Philippine Islands and countries in Central and South America crossing the Pacific Oceans.

Also, the local regional islands in the Spontoon Archipelago are going to include many islands where not many of the population speak English, and most only speak variations of Polynesian languages.

"Weliweli! ʻAʻohe Puhi!"

I love all the detail you work into these! It takes me longer to take in the image than it does to read your desctiption, and still I have to go back and find stuff. Aces, man just aces.

Thank you! It is kind-of my default setting when doing cartooning. It's often world-building.

Smoking around fireworks??!
Nah it'll be fine! ;D

Same mentality as those pilots who smoked around their fuel dumps during the war! It won't happen to ME! :D

Beautiful work as always Ken! LOVE the detail of everything! :D

I remember as a kid watching uncles and cousins casually smoking while opening a pack of firecrackers. Then they would used the cigarette to light a firecracker (or a 16-pack at a time). The wise/cautious/experienced ones would take the cigarette out of their mouth & hold it between 2 fingers before lighting the fuse. The very inexperienced cousins would forget to take a draw on the cigarette to get some hot coals on the end before touching the fuse... and then would have to take a couple of extra seconds to make sure the fuse was lit....

There's a story I read (about Lindbergh?), who was doing a route-scouting flight for airlines in the early 1930s (?). He was flying a hot single-engine floatplane, and at a stop was on a city harbor beside a pier that was covered solid with spectators. He was on the water below the pier, down on the floats of the airplane helping 2 or 3 others refuel the airplane from 5 gallon cans of aviation gasoline. One of the fuelers spilled a partially full can of fuel into the water below the airplane. The pilot looked up, and noticed that out of the crowd on the pier, a large number were smoking! "No Smoking! There's gas on the water!" Every smoker in the crowd immediately put out their cigarettes... including the dozen or so who quickly flicked their lit cigarettes into the water around the floatplane. (The gas on the surface did not ignite. The gas fumes did not ignite. Lucky pilot.)

Force of habit. They were putting out their cigarette the way they always did. You may have seen that. That's one standard 1930s way of putting out a cigarette if you are a smoker beside a lake or the sea, toss it into the water.

I think the detail comes partially from reading all those old MAD magazine comicbook stories. There was always a small sign in the background that you found when re-reading. Also, I was a model railroader as a teenager. Thank you!

Wow, a 'Pep!' shirt- I only know about that cereal from the old Superman radio shows on SciFiRadio.com.

I think they used to include Pep cereal in the little cereal box assortments in the 1960's.

Mayhap, that was before my time.

That's the only time I saw that brand, too. 8)

My Mom used to but those and the Post cereal groups too, I suspect when they were on sale.

The shirt was going to say "PUP", but then I thought he might object to wearing a shirt that said "BABY". So "PEP" was a quick fix... could be based on his formal name, or because he was full of 'PEP'... with the added benefit that he wouldn't likely know what the word meant. 8D

Ahh, I thought it was a ref to the radio show ads.

But that is right in the time period. And it could be a PEP cereal t-shirt. That's something the cereal company might do. And it is something that a family might repurpose for a family t-shirt!

It does fit, ayuh.

Yep!

I love this sort of detailed line art! And, it's probably totally obvious to everyone else, but not to me: why is "9.5" written on the tower?

That "9.5" was only obscure world-building. This is part of a Navy base, so they might identify some structures by letters or numbers ("Over at Building B.") Water towers might be similar, for getting water for fire-fighting. Then I thought maybe the local government would want to do that for the whole island, if they had reservoirs for water, interconnected piping, hydrants, and local water storage towers. Most of the towers might be relatively small so their could be a number of towers. I decided that 9 would be the number of the individual tower, and maybe the 5 would be the reservoir district. For some reason I didn't want to put the symbol "#" on the tower, or "No." So, big numbers and a small dot. Not all of that is necessarily logical, but it was a good excuse for big enigmatic numbers on the side of the tower. 8)

Ah yes, there's so much to look at!

That's why, pound for pound, a Ken Fletcher drawing is your best entertainment value.

😋🐺

the detail in this is incredible... I love the expressions...

V.

Thank you!

This is some of my favorite kind of art. Detailed without unintentional visual clutter. Solid draftsmanship with an intuitive grasp of perspective.

Thank you! Influenced by some of the MAD magazine artists. (Of course, after the image is 'done' I can see all the small mistakes!)

Early or mid-to-late 1933?

There are Spontoonie 'fireworks' holidays on May Day, Rain Island Independence Day in June, Spontoon Island Speed Week the last week of August. Hoopy Jaloopy celebrating the end of tourist season in September. Pumpkin Harvest doesn't emphasize fireworks. Winter Solstice & New Years (especially) can have fireworks. 'Moon Calendar' New Years would have fireworks.

I felt compelled to show leaves being blown off some of the trees from wind gusts. So maybe this is late in the year. (Spontoon Island does have a 'rainy season' short 'Winter' in December, January, February. Mild weather, but cooler than usual. There can be days of long drizzling rains. Some of the broad-leaf trees lose their leaves.) So this is showing probably Winter Solstice/New Years. Late 1933.

So firmly within the mid-1930s range.

That's the intention, but I don't always have the research chops to hit a year with costumes and hardware. But a setting in the middle of the Pacific does allow for some slosh in tech-level and fashions. A lot of the locals are going around in bits of 1920s clothes & accessories, and flying seaplanes from 1925. The 1930s are slowly working out from the Great Depression, and its possible to see 1930s movies on YouTube and get the looks of things and see and hear stories of people reacting to their world & culture. By 1937 or so world events are starting to get ominous. Most of the major nations were starting to modernize their military... preparing for World War 2, whether they admit it or not. By the time we get to 1940, the new world war has started, and the world cultures have World War 1 as a reference to how bad it might be. Even with spies, 1930s allow some optimism and picnics on a semi-tropical beach (as seen in adventure movies).