Thursday, November 17, 2005

 

Obscurity of the Day: Tode Tuttle


Here's an obscure little panel cartoon that ran from 1940 to 1946. It's distinguished, I think, from the kajillion other little panels of this type (Abe Martin, Country Parson, Aunt Het, etc) by the really nice crisp artwork of Ralph Kemp (of whom I know nothing except that he did this feature).

The feature started with the Jones Syndicate. They only had two features that I know of; this one and Dinky Dinkerton. The Todester switched away from Jones to General Features sometime around 1942-43, and Ralph Kemp apparently took a powder in 1945. In 1946 the panel was credited to Al Woods.

If anyone can supply more information on this feature or its creators I'd love to hear from you.

Labels:


Comments:
Allan,

Ralph Kemp was born near Lewis Creek, Shelby County, Indiana, in 1902. He moved around a lot as a child but managed to graduate from Morristown High School in the county of his birth. He had a varied career outside cartooning, working as a publicist, realtor, and operator of a resort and a couple of taverns. He died in Mazatlan, Mexico, in February 1964.

TH
 
Thanks for the bio TH!!

--Allan
 
Yesterday I bought a bag of items from a yard sale in Rushville, IN. There are several items, including Mr Kemp's obit and a letter to his wife, Crystal about it. She kept the obit and photos of herself with a large shark and a fish she caught in Florida from newspaper articles. I thought this might interest someone. Thank you, Nancy A Meiring
 
Post a Comment

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

Subscribe to
Posts [Atom]