So ever since I was a kid, I get a little thrilled when I see mentions of our area in popular culture or the press.

The earliest I can remember was from the “Tom Terrific” cartoons that ran as part of the venerable “Captain Kangaroo” show.

Yes, I’m reaching back quite a ways here, but fellow Baby Boomers will probably remember this with me.

The hero of the cartoons, one Tom Terrific, would use as an exclamation, “Holyoke, Massachusetts.” He would say it in an exaggerated manner: “Holy-oke.”

As a kid sitting at 104 Navajo Road in Sixteen Acres I was gob smacked. I knew where Holyoke was. I had been there. How did the people who made the cartoon know about Holyoke?

If I ever had the chance of asking Gene Dietch, the animation director who made the shorts, that would be the first question.

There have been plenty of other references. I recall watching one of the B movies made by the producing team of William Pine and William Thomas, “Wildcat,” an epic set in an oil field with Richard Arlen and Buster Crabbe. The hero’s sidekick was played by Elisha Cook Jr. and his nickname was “Chicopee.”

I recall wondering how did that name work its way into a script?

How about the “Resurrection of Peter Proud,” a movie set in Springfield and the Pioneer Valley? Much of the film was shot locally and I remember watching it at the old Eastfield Mall theaters, located where the food court is today.

I’ve not seen it since, but I distinctly remember a sequence on I-91 that had the lead characters traveling the wrong way to their destination, a scene that brought laughter from the audience. I also recall one of the female leads seeing a sign indicating an exit for Northampton and proclaiming, “Do you know what Northampton is famous for? Girls!” It’s an awkward reference to Smith College.

Quabbin Reservoir played a prominent role in the Stephen King book and then the movie “Dreamcatcher.” I never thought Quabbin was creepy before.

Last week I was surprised to see Zippy the Pinhead make his way to West Springfield and to the White Hut restaurant.

Now if you’re not aware of Zippy and his creator cartoonist Bill Griffith, all I can say is if you enjoy potent social and political commentary with a thick slice of the absurd, it’s your kind of comic strip.

Started in 1970 as part of the underground comics movement, Zippy has been for years syndicated to the mainstream through King Features, but that has not blunted Griffith’s focus.

I think Griffith is one of the best cartoonists working. His latest graphic novel, “Invisible Ink” is remarkable.

In the Jan. 19 strip – Griffith posts them to his Facebook page – Zippy apparently is mixing in the White House with the White Hut – for Zippy, a natural mistake.

I had hoped to talk with Griffith and ask him if he had been to White Hut, a must culinary stop in my book in Western Massachusetts, but I’ve not heard back. My friend Stephen R. Bissette, legendary cartoonist and a faculty member at the Center for Cartoon Studies, said he has been told that people send reference photos to Griffith, as diners are one of his favorite locations for the comic strip.

Perhaps that’s the case, but I prefer to think that Griffith, who lives in Connecticut, somehow found his way to White Hut for lunch.

It’s not the first time Zippy has been to Western Massachusetts. The Basketball Hall of Fame – the current one, not the previous two incarnations – has also made it into the strip.

Hmm, I could get a signed black and white print of the White Hut strip for just $65. Well, my birthday is a few months away!