Kate Carew was quite the big-time New York celebrity in the first decades of the 20th century. In addition to her cartooning, she did a lot of feature writing for newspapers, and her byline was always displayed prominently (much as today's sample strip does). The multi-talented Carew specialized in feature stories about celebrities and bigwigs, usually accompanied with Art Nouveau-influenced caricatures.
Carew's only continuing comic strip series known to me is The Angel Child, though OSU also credits her with a 1903 strip titled Handy Andy which I've not seen (anyone have a sample or know where it ran?). The Angel Child was a fairly typical mischievous kid strip, with the minor deviation that the little girl always ended up getting praised for the unintended positive consequences of her pranks. The final panel always had the child being offered a treat by her parents, and our sample strip is particularly interesting because the treat tendered is a can of sardines -yum! No chocolate cake for me, thanks, I'd rather have the salted chum.
The Angel Child had a healthy run in the Sunday comic section of the New York World. The feature ran 4/27/1902 - 2/19/1905.
Here's an excellent page that has a capsule bio and interview with Carew.
I looked all over your blog and it says in more than a few places things like " I'd love to hear from you!" and "please contact me." but I can't find an email address anywhere.
ReplyDeleteHow do I contact you?
arnomation@verizon.net
You contacted me by posting a comment. I read and respond to all comments. I'm not crazy about putting my email address on the blog as it acts as a spam magnet, but I've added my email address (stripper@rtsco.com) to the "About Me" section. We'll see what effect it has on my junk mail volume...
ReplyDelete--Allan
For a minimal (one panel) sample of Handy Andy, see http://cartoons.osu.edu/finding_aids/sfaca/html/401-500/0488.html. (Some?) publication dates are listed at http://cartoons.osu.edu/finding_aids/sfaca/pdfs/701-800/0701.pdf
ReplyDeleteHi Fram --
ReplyDeleteNot much of a sample, and the cited dates don't appear to work for it being from the World (too bad their listings don't tell us the paper!). Although the film of the New York World is missing many 1903 Sundays, I was able to supplement the Pulitzer info based on a good run in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch film. That film had all the Sundays in September-October and none of them included this strip. So the problem remains -- where did this strip run?
--Allan
--Allan
mdwilliams713@gmail.com
ReplyDeleteI just found out that she was my great great aunt......blown away. Amazing woman.
ReplyDelete