A little known fact about the early days of Tick Tock Tom is that Kenneth Gallant was offered the character with no strings attached. Kenneth would be free to do whatever he wanted with Tom (get your minds out of the gutter, degenerates).
Another little known fact is that he not only turned it down but, became a walrus!
Of course, I mean that figuratively. Kenneth did not become an actual walrus (odour aside). It was just a nickname. How did he get it? Well, he wore a vest one day that reminded Chetan of the Beatles and, because we were all juvenile and immature, his nickname became Walrus Boy.
However, it didn’t stop there. That nickname kicked off an avalanche of friendly ribbing about Kenneth and the Walrus Boy character. The early issues of the mini comic are packed with stories of the Walrus Boy and make-believe advertisements like the one below.
Now that we’re all older and more mature (seriously, some of Chetan’s shirts have collars now), we can place that time in proper perspective. The fact is that Kenneth is a talented writer and artist and his nickname should have been “Good Sport Boy”.
Now if you’ll excuse me I have to go hose him down and feed him his daily bucket of fish.
