Am I being a mite “touchy” here? I posted this http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=235456 earlier in the day, and got one decent answer and one well, useless one.
I don’t think the person set out to be a jerk, but it irritated me bit, since I felt the question was legit based on what I had heard in the news story.
Whatcha think?
Thanks
Q
It was just a joke. Lighten up.
And, actually, Olive Oyl’s brother IS named Castor Oyl. It’s Popeye canon.
Well, folks make jokes about stuff here a lot, Quasi. I, however, because I’m a boring old fart, took the serious tack, and offered a WAG answer based on a webpage. Hope it helps.
Sorry, Quasimodem, that you mistook my little pun for jerk-ism. Just trying an inventive way of disseminating information, and hoping someone[as jayjay did] would pick up on it. The brother’s name IS a bit esoteric, perhaps it’s related to my age. 
[hat in hand, bowing forwards, walking backwards from the room]
From what I was given to understand, the “Thimble Theatre” cartoon strip was an eminently forgettable strip of the 1920s with a host of humorously named characters, one of whom was Castor Oyl. The introduction of Popeye the Sailor and his romance with Castor’s sister Olive Oyl, who was apparently invented as a foil for Popeye, saved the strip and brought it to great popularity.
FWIW, a copyrighted AP story in today’s newspaper talks about life in Chester, Ill., in the early 20th century, which included four people of interest:
Frank Fiegel was a one-eyed man with a jutting chin who smoked a corncob pipe and had a tendency to get into fistfights. The owner of the local theater, J. William Schuchert, was enamored of hamburgers, and would send his employees out between performances to buy him some. Dora Paskel was a tall thin woman who wore her hair in a bun at the occiput. And Elzie Segar was a little boy who grew up to draw Thimble Theatre, Popeye, J. Wellington Wimpy, and Olive Oyl.
Geeze, you’ve been here since 2000 and only just now noticed there’s always wanna-be comedians who think their smartass answers are funny?
Sometimes, depending on my mood, I can be a little as I say, “touchy” and take things the wrong way. offers handshake and the obligatory slap on the shoulder.
Quasi
One of you owes Olive Oyl fans an apology. (I’ll leave it to you to sort out who it will be.)