Harry Austin "Pete" Peterson (July 10, 1906 – June 11, 2015) was an American screenwriter, cartoonist, and radio program director.

Early life and career

Austin Peterson was born in

Palo Alto Palo Alto ( ; Spanish language, Spanish for ) is a charter city in northwestern Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. Th ...

, California, on July 10, 1906, to Harry and Lillian Peterson. His journalistic career began in the late 1920s, when he worked as a

cartoonist A cartoonist is a visual artist who specializes in both drawing and writing cartoons (individual images) or comics (sequential images). Cartoonists differ from comics writers or comics illustrators/artists in that they produce both the litera ...

for newspapers such as ''

San Francisco Call ''The San Francisco Call'' was a newspaper that served San Francisco, California. Because of a succession of mergers with other newspapers, the paper variously came to be called ''The San Francisco Call & Post'', the ''San Francisco Call-Bulleti ...

'' and ''

Los Angeles Herald The ''Los Angeles Herald'' or the ''Evening Herald'' was a newspaper published in Los Angeles in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Founded in 1873 by Charles A. Storke, the newspaper was acquired by William Randolph Hearst in 1931. It ...

''. Starting from 1933, he worked as a producer and writer for the now-defunct radio station KFRC. He also wrote for the show ''The Packard Show'', starring Hollywood actor and dancer

Fred Astaire Fred Astaire (born Frederick Austerlitz, May 10, 1899 – June 22, 1987) was an American dancer, actor, singer, musician, choreographer, and presenter, whose career in stage, film, and television spanned 76 years. He is widely regarded as the "g ...

. He was the program director of the Armed Forces Radio during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. Other jobs include working on the television show ''

The Colgate Comedy Hour ''The Colgate Comedy Hour'' is an American comedy-musical variety series that aired live on the NBC network from 1950 to 1955. The show featured many notable comedians and entertainers of the era as guest stars. Many of the scripts of the serie ...

''.

Later life and death

Peterson wrote an autobiography called ''Television is a young man's game? I'm 94. Why didn't somebody tell me?'', which was published in the year 2000. He also wrote a travel guide on several Pacific islands, including

Tahiti Tahiti (; Tahitian language, Tahitian , ; ) is the largest island of the Windward Islands (Society Islands), Windward group of the Society Islands in French Polynesia, an overseas collectivity of France. It is located in the central part of t ...

. His longevity was highlighted well into his centenarian years. He died on June 11, 2015, at the age of 108.

References

1906 births 2015 deaths American men centenarians American radio writers {{US-cartoonist-stub