IMAGE: Steve Canyon Sunday comic strip, August 22, 1954 — Copyright 2014 the Milton Caniff Estate.

Miss Mizzou in the comic strip was somewhat of a nightclub entertainer, but what kind of music did she sing? Cartoonist Milton Caniff dropped a lot of song references in the “Steve Canyon” comic strip, so I thought I’d explore some of the songs mentioned during Miss Mizzou’s 1952 and 1954 appearances:

• August 16, 1952 — Mizzou sings part of  “Wait Till The Clouds Roll By.“
• August 25, 1952 — Mizzou mentions “Rose Marie.”
• August 09, 1954 — Mizzou apparently sang “Home on the Range.”
• August 11, 1954 — Mizzou’s singing “I Dream of Jeanie” in the first panel. The second panel includes requests for “Mother Machree,” “Melancholy Baby,” and “Deep Night.”
• August 14, 1954 — Mizzou gets a request for “In the Gloaming.“
• August 22, 1954 — Mizzou sings part of “Love’s Old Sweet Song.”

A lot of these songs are what could be termed “old standards” that have been covered by many people over the years. I tried to link to versions of these songs that were made pre-1950s so you might be able to hear versions of these tunes that could have possibly been influences to Caniff.