The emergence of the term “dad joke” comes from a 1987 column in The Gettysburg Times, titled, “Don’t Ban the ‘Dad’ Jokes; Preserve and Revere Them.” In the plea, editor Jim Kalbaugh defended dad jokes after an unspecified comedian on an unnamed late-night show called for the banning of them. Kalbaugh told the story of a dad driving by a cemetery who turned to his kids in the backseat and chortled, “How many dead people are in there? All of them.” Kalbaugh called the wholesome punnage “one of the great traditions of fatherhood.”
The Dad Dork is keeping that tradition alive in the era of social media as he unleashes a new dad joke on TikTok every few days. Some of them require a high production value — a few of his paternal puns necessitate props and costumes to get the full effect (he’s a real Carrot Top in that way). There are also different categories of Dad Dork videos, depending on where they’re filmed — “Driveway Dad Jokes” are different from “Doorbell Dad Jokes,” which are entirely dissimilar to “Messing w/ Kenny,” a series involving some neighborly pranks on the Dad Dork’s friend from across the street.
@thedaddork
The running theme in all of the Dad Dork’s videos is a giddy devotion to fun and a refusal to take one’s self seriously. A few of the videos include appearances from the Dad Dork’s sons, but dad jokes aren’t about kids — they’re about dads. The Dad Dork is the star of his own show, and his love for laughter and groans is dangerously infectious.
In fact, we think the Dad Dork gave us a disease which makes us unable to stop telling airport jokes. The doctors say it’s terminal.