The usual gang of faithful fans

IN one of life’s coincidences, I had just unpacked a box that contained some of the few things Katrina didn’t destroy when 12 feet of water took out my family home in New Orleans [“Born Under a Mad Sign,” March 18].

Among other things, there were my brother’s and my collection of Mad magazines from the late ‘50s to 1970.

I’ve been re-reading them in the evenings. Robert Lloyd was deadly accurate in his assessment of both the quality of the satire and the influence it had on susceptible minds, namely mine.

MICHAEL MESZAROS

Santa Monica

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I was about 7 or 8 when Mad magazine first came out, and I would buy it at the drugstore. But my parents would only let me read it on Saturday and Sunday. So since I woke up before either of them, I would start to read the magazine, and I laughed so loud that I would wake my father, who would walk into my room, take a look at what I was reading, look at me with a strange look, and then walk out.

I still have a few of those vintage copies somewhere around my house, and an Alfred E. Neuman badge from the time he ran against President Kennedy in 1960.

It did make a difference in how we thought about things. After all, “What, me worry?” became my battle cry.

CRAIG COHEN

Westlake Village

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IN the mid ‘60s my folks moved to South Orange Drive. I met my best friend, Andy Jones, on that street, and some of the fondest days of my youth were reading Mad at his house.

It seems like the Joneses had every issue, for the stack was several feet tall. I would show up at their door, knock, say hi to Mr. and Mrs. Jones, go down the stairs to the “boys’ room” (Andy had two older brothers) and just start reading, sometimes with Andy, sometimes by myself. Issue after issue went into my head and changed me profoundly. I am glad that there are others who feel the same way.

WILLIAM SCHUCK JR.

Bishop

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I was born early enough to know when televisions weren’t ubiquitous and reading seemed universal.

Parents had the daily newspaper. Kids had the comics. Before I ever received an allowance, I used to get my daily ration of comics at the corner store until the owner required me to buy something. When I had a dime, I’d get a bottle of Bubble Up and sit on the floor reading the latest issues of Superman or Batman and Mad magazine.

The genius of Mad was that it was political commentary/satire disguised as a comic book.

My diet of Mad continued through my teens before I ran out of time and discovered other pursuits -- like girls.

Then came college and the pseudo-war called Vietnam, marriage, family and career. My interest in Mad waned into oblivion. That is, until I read Lloyd’s column. Now retired, I have all the time in world to peruse the DVD, slobbering over the drawings and caricatures, laughing at the parodies and wondering what happened to my youth.

MIKE HIRANUMA

Long Beach