Walter Crawford Kelly, Jr. was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. While he was still a child, his family moved to Bridgeport, Connecticut where his father worked in a munitions plant. After graduating from Warren Harding High School in 1930, Kelly worked a few odd jobs until landing a position as a crime reporter on the Bridgeport Post. There he took up cartooning and illustrated a biography of Bridgeport native P. T. Barnum.
Kelly is often associated with two other giants of the medium: Milton Caniff (Terry and the Pirates, Steve Canyon) and Al Capp (Li'l Abner). The three cartoonists were close personal friends and professional associates throughout their adult lives, and occasionally referenced each other in their strips. According to one anecdote, (from Al Capp Remembered, 1994) Capp and his brother Elliot ducked out of a dull party at Capp's home - leaving Walt Kelly alone to fend for himself entertaining a group of Argentine envoys who didn't speak English. Kelly retaliated by giving away Capp's baby grand piano. According to Capp, who loved to relate the story, Kelly's two perfectly logical reasons for doing so were: a. to cement diplomatic relations between Argentina and the United States, and b. "Because you can't play the piano, anyway." Capp said of Kelly, "Walt, when he chooses to be, is one of the funniest men in the world." (Playboy, December 1965)
Milton Caniff related another anecdote (from Phi Beta Pogo, 1989) involving Walt Kelly and Al Capp, "two boys from Bridgeport, Connecticut, nose to nose," onstage at a meeting of the Newspaper Comics Council in the sixties. "Walt would say to Al, 'Of course, Al, this is really how you should draw Daisy Mae, I'm only showing you this for your own good.' Then Walt would do a sketch. Capp, of course, got ticked off by this, as you can imagine! So he retaliated by doing his version of Pogo. Unfortunately, the drawings are long gone; no recording was made. What a shame! Nobody anticipated there'd be this dueling back and forth between the two of them..."
Kelly is often associated with two other giants of the medium: Milton Caniff (Terry and the Pirates, Steve Canyon) and Al Capp (Li'l Abner). The three cartoonists were close personal friends and professional associates throughout their adult lives, and occasionally referenced each other in their strips. According to one anecdote, (from Al Capp Remembered, 1994) Capp and his brother Elliot ducked out of a dull party at Capp's home - leaving Walt Kelly alone to fend for himself entertaining a group of Argentine envoys who didn't speak English. Kelly retaliated by giving away Capp's baby grand piano. According to Capp, who loved to relate the story, Kelly's two perfectly logical reasons for doing so were: a. to cement diplomatic relations between Argentina and the United States, and b. "Because you can't play the piano, anyway." Capp said of Kelly, "Walt, when he chooses to be, is one of the funniest men in the world." (Playboy, December 1965)
Milton Caniff related another anecdote (from Phi Beta Pogo, 1989) involving Walt Kelly and Al Capp, "two boys from Bridgeport, Connecticut, nose to nose," onstage at a meeting of the Newspaper Comics Council in the sixties. "Walt would say to Al, 'Of course, Al, this is really how you should draw Daisy Mae, I'm only showing you this for your own good.' Then Walt would do a sketch. Capp, of course, got ticked off by this, as you can imagine! So he retaliated by doing his version of Pogo. Unfortunately, the drawings are long gone; no recording was made. What a shame! Nobody anticipated there'd be this dueling back and forth between the two of them..."
No comments:
Post a Comment