Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
Fury as vandals scrawl graffiti on iconic statue
MINDLESS yobs who vandalised the city’s iconic Desperate Dan stat ue h ave bee n slammed.
Graffiti has been scrawled on the cartoon character and mainstay of The Dandy comic which has stood proudly in City Square since 2001.
It is believed the statue of the character, who celebrated his 82nd birthday earlier this month, was targeted in the past few days.
The 8ft figure now has a love heart, a smiley face and the name Daisy etched on his chest.
The statue, which is located near H Samuel, has been a popular tourist attraction since it was installed.
Davie Knowles, from the West End, branded the vandalism “disgusting”.
The 48-year-old added: “I’m shocked to see this has happened.
“They’ve scrawled all over his chest – it’s disgusting that someone has done that.
“I know it has been a mainstay in the area for a while and I’ve never seen any graffiti on it before, nor have I seen any on the Oor Wullie statue at the opposite end of Reform Street.
“It is really popular with tourists and you usually see loads of folk taking pictures beside it.
“To see that written all over him doesn’t create a good image.
“There are a lot of cameras around here so the culprits may have been caught on CCTV.”
Matthew Elcombe, a biomedical science graduate at Abertay University, said it was fairly “brazen” to have targeted the statue.
He said: “I certainly hope they get it cleaned up pretty quickly.
“You can clearly see it is just mindless tags that have been drawn on it.
“It doesn’t create a great impression and the culprit must have been fairly brazen to have stood there and drawn that.”
One pensioner, who declined to be named, said he hoped the culprits would be named and shamed if they were found.
He added: “If they are caught I hope they are forced to come down here and clean it up.
“I’m a born and bred Dundonian and that is an absolute disgrace.”
Desperate Dan appeared in the first issue of The Dandy, published by DC Thomson, on December 4 1937 and was created by Dudley Watkins who also created Oor Wullie and The Broons.