  Two dimensional QCD coupled to fermions in the adjoint representation of the
gauge group $SU(N)$, a useful toy model of QCD strings, is supersymmetric for a
certain ratio of quark mass and gauge coupling constant. Here we study the
theory in the vicinity of the supersymmetric point; in particular we exhibit
the algebraic structure of the model and show that the mass splittings as one
moves away from the supersymmetric point obey a universal relation of the form
${M_i}^2(B)-{M_i}^2(F)=M_i\delta m+O(\delta m^3)$. We discuss the connection of
this relation to string and quark model expectations and verify it numerically
for large $N$. At least for low lying states the $O(\delta m^3)$ corrections
are extremely small. We also discuss a natural generalization of QCD$_2$ with
an infinite number of couplings, which preserves SUSY. This leads to a Landau
-- Ginzburg description of the theory, and may be useful for defining a scaling
limit in which smooth worldsheets appear.
