View source for Wee Ben Nevis

{{Short description|British comic strip}}
{{refimprove|date=November 2024}}
{{Use British English|date=September 2015}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2015}}
'''Wee Ben Nevis''' was a British [[gag-a-day]] comic, published in the comic book magazine ''[[The Beano]]'', first appearing in issue 1678, dated 14 September 1974,<ref name=mclaughlin>{{cite book |last1=McLaughlin |first1=Iain |title=The History of the Beano |date=21 April 2022 |publisher=White Owl |isbn=978-1-5267-7786-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=G33GEAAAQBAJ&dq=%22wee+ben+nevis%22&pg=PT100 |access-date=5 November 2024 |language=en |via=Google books}}</ref> and continuing until 7 May 1977. It was drawn by [[Vic Neill]],<ref name=mclaughlin /> and replaced ''[[The McTickles]]'', another Scottish themed strip by the same artist.

==Concept==
Wee Ben Nevis was a fictional [[Scottish Highlands]] boy of superhuman strength. In the first storyline, Wee Ben is sent by his father (Big Ben Nevis) to Pudding College in England. On arriving, he meets the headmaster Prof. Egwell Fryd, who instructs him to "tidy up the classroom". Unfortunately, Wee Ben's idea of "tidying up" involves stuffing all the other students into cupboards. For the next few years, he brought chaos to staff and students alike. Much of the humour stemmed from the fact that Wee Ben never realised (or at least never anticipated) his own strength.

His name is a pun on the Scottish mountain [[Ben Nevis]].

[[Auberon Waugh]] described the feature as having "strong undertones of Scottish Nationalism by its untrue suggestion that Scotsmen have superhuman strength despite their diminutive stature".<ref name="cook">{{cite book |last1=Cook |first1=William |title=Kiss Me, Chudleigh: The World according to Auberon Waugh |date=14 October 2010 |publisher=Hodder & Stoughton |isbn=978-1-4447-1151-6 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yMnos35Wy9YC&dq=%22wee+ben+nevis%22&pg=PT43 |access-date=5 November 2024 |language=en |chapter=17 June 1976 |via=Google books}}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

{{D. C. Thomson Comics}}
{{Beano}}

[[Category:Beano strips]]
[[Category:British comics characters]]
[[Category:1974 comics debuts]]
[[Category:Comics characters introduced in 1974]]
[[Category:1977 comics endings]]
[[Category:Fictional Scottish people]]
[[Category:Comics characters with superhuman strength]]
[[Category:Comics set in schools]]
[[Category:Male characters in comics]]
[[Category:Child characters in comics]]
[[Category:Comics about children]]
[[Category:Gag-a-day comics]]
[[Category:Comics set in Scotland]]


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