Pittsburgh City Paper to Debut New StrangeNews Column and Weekly Comic
may 18, 2016 01:26 pm
PITTSBURGH, PA — In the past 25 years, City Paper readers have used a lot of different words
to describe Pittsburgh’s premier altweekly; some complimentary and some, not so much. But one
word used a few times throughout the paper’s history is “weird.” Starting May 18, the word will
become a part of City Paper’s weekly vocabulary, with the launch of two new features: “Weird
Pittsburgh” and the syndicated cartoon, WaynoVision.
Starting Wednesday May 18, local freelance writer and City Paper contributor Nick Keppler will
debut a new feature called “Weird Pittsburgh,” focusing on regional news that’s odd, strange,
bizarre, unbelievable and, well, weird. City Paper editor Charlie Deitch says the idea for this
column has been in the works for some time.
Prior to 2014, the paper ran the nationally syndicated “News of the Weird” column. Then, Roland
Sweet’s “News Quirks” column ran weekly until the author died suddenly last August. Since then,
readers have been asking for a replacement, but Deitch says if a similar column were to come
back, it had to be different. Keppler is no stranger to adapting the format to cover local news. He
previously wrote a similar column for the Advocate/Weekly newspapers of Connecticut.
“Everyone enjoys reading these unbelievable and humorous news items. But frankly, the
syndicated columns can be found easily anywhere online,” Deitch says. “We like the concept —
always have — but we decided if we were going to devote space to a feature, it needed to be
original content. Nick brought this idea to us last fall and our new publisher, Vance Smith, loved
the idea, so we decided to go for it. There’s certainly no shortage of weird stuff going down around
here on a daily basis.”
The new page will also include “WaynoVision,” GoComics’ witty — and wacky — online cartoon
panel by Pittsburghbased cartoonist Wayno. Wayno was a gag writer, colorist and guest cartoonist
for Dan Piraro’s “Bizarro” for more than five years, contributing 150 gags to the daily panel,
before launching his online comic in 2014. He’s also a frequent writer for Hilary Price’s “Rhymes
With Orange” comic strip.
“Wayno’s strips are smart, totally weird and laughoutloud funny,” says City Paper’s art director
Lisa Cunningham. “We’re incredibly lucky to have him in Pittsburgh, and even luckier to be the
only paper in town to carry his strip.”
In addition to WaynoVision, City Paper will also continue to print nationally syndicated political
cartoonist Jen Sorensen’s strip in its news section.
