Collaborating cartoonists have been on my mind recently. Who are they, why do they do it? Does it double the fun? A spate of collaborations in The New Yorker within the past year caused me to dig into the subject and ask a few questions. To begin with, here’re a few words on the subject, written sixty years
Read moreTag: Harold Ross
Scudder Middleton, New Yorker Cartoonists Hand-Holder and More
Does the name Scudder Middleton mean anything to you? It meant a little something to me, but no so much…until recently when I decided to look a little deeper into his association with The New Yorker’s art department. I’d seen his name on memos while sifting through the magazine’s archives in The New York Public
Read morePeter De Vries, Cartoon Doctor
Ink Spill occasionally takes a look at New Yorker contributors who weren’t cartoonists but whose work at the magazine was so intertwined with cartoons and/or cartoonists that it would be just plain silly not to look at them. Peter De Vries, a New Yorker staffer from 1944 through 1986, fits the bill perfectly. De Vries, who died in 1993, moved
Read moreWho was Russell Maloney and What Did Harold Ross Say About Him?
In May of 1935, New Yorker founder and editor, Harold Ross sent a six word memo to Wolcott Gibbs, at one time the artists so-called hand-holder, i.e., the middleman between the cartoonists and the editors: “Best ideas lately come from Maloney.” “Maloney” was Russell Maloney, a Harvard graduate, who peppered the New Yorker with so many
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