Posts
Darrell McLure was not the first illustrator of Little Annie Rooney, but he was the best. His mother was California painter Ethel Jameson Docker. McLure was born in Mendocino County 25 February 1903, and his first cartoon was published at 10 years of age in the Ukiah Republican Press. He studied under Harold Von Schmidt and Clarence Mackey. He also studied under the famed George Bridgeman at the Art Student’s League in New York. McClure worked as a lumberjack and sailor on commercial freighters in the Pacific before joining King Features drawing Little Annie Rooney. When he retired from comics he took up painting until his death on 27 February 1987.
*Original artwork courtesy Don Kurtz.
Wow, Little Annie Rooney does a nude scene, too! (Little OA beat her to it in the 20s.) Gives me the wim-wams. Can you imagine what'd happen if an artist did this today?
ReplyDeleteI greatly admire McClure's work. Not only was his Rooney terrific, he also did some wonderful sport-sailing-related cartoons and illustrations in his later years.
I knew his mother, and have one of her paintings,. stayed at their house in mendocino 1963.Ethel and her husband Harry Docker,.
ReplyDeleteHarry married my dads mom, and my dad was his step son,
my dads mom died 1932, he later met and married Ethel.
mike hoaglan
topock arizona,.
Miss comic strips like this. Something that gives you the feeling of looking out your window on a starry night and imagining that you're living in such places where the comic strip reality exists.
ReplyDelete