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Basil Wolverton (July 9, 1909 – December 31, 1978)
at the
Lambiek Comiclopedia Galerie Lambiek is a Dutch comic book store and art gallery in Amsterdam, founded on November 8, 1968 by Kees Kousemaker (, – Bussum, ). His son Boris Kousemaker has been the owner since 2007. From 1968 to 2015, it was located in the Ke ...

Archived
from the original on February 21, 2019.
was an American
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 ...
and illustrator known for his intricately detailed grotesques of bizarre or misshapen people. Wolverton was described as "Producer of Preposterous Pictures of Peculiar People who Prowl this Perplexing Planet." His many publishers included
Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...
and '' Mad'' magazine. His drawings have elicited a wide range of reactions. Cartoonist
Will Elder William Elder (born Wolf William Eisenberg; September 22, 1921 – May 15, 2008) was an American illustrator and comic book artist who worked in numerous areas of commercial art but is best known for a frantically funny cartoon style that helped ...
said he found Wolverton's technique "outrageously inventive, defying every conventional standard yet upholding a very unusual sense of humor. He was a refreshing original." However, there are some negative responses such as when
Jules Feiffer Jules Ralph Feiffer ( ; January 26, 1929 – January 17, 2025) was an American cartoonist and author, who at one time was considered the most widely read satirist in the country. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1986 for Pulitzer Prize for Editori ...
stated, "I don't like his work. I think it's ugly." He was posthumously inducted into the comic book industry's Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1991.


Biography


Early life and career

Born in Central Point, Oregon, he later moved to
Vancouver Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...
, Washington, and worked as a
vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France in the middle of the 19th century. A ''vaudeville'' was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a drama ...
performer and a cartoonist and reporter for the ''Portland News''. At age 16 he sold his first nationally published work and began pitching comic strips to newspaper syndicates. His
comic strip A comic strip is a Comics, sequence of cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often Serial (literature), serialized, with text in Speech balloon, balloons and Glossary of comics terminology#Captio ...
, ''Marco of Mars,'' was accepted by the Independent Syndicate of New York in 1929 but never distributed because it was deemed too similar to ''
Buck Rogers Buck Rogers is a science fiction adventure hero and feature comic strip created by Philip Francis Nowlan first appearing in daily American newspapers on January 7, 1929, and subsequently appearing in Sunday newspapers, international newspapers, b ...
,'' which debuted that year. ''Disk-Eyes the Detective'' and ''Spacehawks'' were published in 1938 in ''Circus'' comics. In 1940, '' Spacehawk'' (a different and improved feature) made its debut in '' Target Comics'', published by Novelty Press. It ran for 30 episodes (262 pages) until 1942. Other Wolverton characters include Scoop Scuttle, a newspaperman who ran as a backup feature in Lev Gleason Publications' ''Daredevil Comics'' and ''Silver Streak Comics''; and Mystic Moot and his Magic Snoot in Fawcett Publications' ''Comic Comics'' and ''Ibis The Invincible''. "Bingbang Buster and his Horse Hedy" was a three-page backup story in Lev Gleason's ''Black Diamond Western'' #16–28 (1950–1952).


Powerhouse Pepper and Lena the Hyena

Wolverton's humor feature '' Powerhouse Pepper'', about a superstrong if none-too-bright boxer, appeared in various comic books published by
Timely Comics Timely Comics was the common name for the group of corporations that was the earliest comic book arm of American publisher Martin Goodman (publisher), Martin Goodman, and the entity that would evolve by the 1960s to become Marvel Comics. "Timely P ...
, the 1930s and 1940s precursor of
Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...
, from 1942 through 1952. The strip was characterized by alliterative, rhyming dialogue,
screwball comedy Screwball comedy is a film subgenre of the romantic comedy genre that became popular during the Great Depression, beginning in the early 1930s and thriving until the early 1950s, that satirizes the traditional love story. It has secondary charact ...
and throwaway gags in background. The Timely titles, such as '' Joker Comics'', ''Gay Comics'' and '' Tessie the Typist'', debuted a number of his spin-off characters and features, including Flap Flipflop, The Flying Flash (who later appeared in
Charlton Comics Charlton Comics was an American comic-book publishing company that existed from 1945 to 1986, having begun under a different name: T. W. O. Charles Company, in 1940. It was based in Derby, Connecticut. The comic-book line (comics), line was a divi ...
' ''Jack in the Box'' #13), Leanbean Green, "Cartoon Crime Mystery" featuring Inspector Hector the Crime Detector, Doc Rockblock, "Picture Poems about Peculiar People", "Funny Boners", Dauntless Dawson, "Hothead Hotel", "Bedtime Bunk", "Foolish Faces" and more. Five issues of a '' Powerhouse Pepper'' comic book were released in 1943 and 1948 by Timely, but not all the covers were by Wolverton and many interior pages were also not devoted to Wolverton strips. In 1946, Wolverton won a contest to depict "Lena the Hyena", the world's ugliest woman, a running gag in
Al Capp Alfred Gerald Caplin (September 28, 1909 – November 5, 1979), better known as Al Capp, was an American cartoonist and humorist best known for the satirical comic strip ''Li'l Abner'', which he created in 1934 and continued writing and (w ...
's ''
Li'l Abner ''Li'l Abner'' was a satirical American comic strip that appeared in multiple newspapers in the United States, Canada, and Europe. It featured a fictional clan of hillbillies living in the impoverished fictional mountain village of Dogpatch, ...
'' newspaper strip where Lena remained unseen beneath an editorial note stating her face had been covered to protect readers. Capp, responding to popular demand, announced a contest for artists to submit their interpretations. Among 500,000 entries, Wolverton's was the winner; it appeared in a ''Li'l Abner'' daily and ''
Life Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, Structure#Biological, organisation, met ...
'' magazine. Wolverton's fame briefly led to ''Life'' and '' Pageant'' printing his caricatures. The Lena portrait typified the unique "spaghetti-and-meatballs school of design" style he employed regularly thereafter. In the 1950s, Wolverton produced 17 comic-book horror and science-fiction stories for Marvel and other comic-book publishers, including one story by author Daniel Keyes, which led to him being "hailed for creating uniquely grotesque monsters". Among these tales were "The Brain-Bats of Venus" for '' Mister Mystery'' #7 and "Where Monsters Dwell" in Marvel's '' Adventures into Terror'' #7, the title of which was later used for a 1970s Marvel reprint series.


''Mad''

Wolverton first appeared in '' Mad'' with a single panel in #10, drew ''Mad Reader!'' for #11 and also contributed an iconic Lena-like image to the cover of #11, which was billed as the "Beautiful Girl of the Month". Although Wolverton contributed sporadically to the title—appearing in just nine issues over two decades—his work was memorable enough that, in 2009, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' dubbed him "The Michelangelo of Mad Magazine". E.C.'s other humor title, ''Panic'', edited by Al Feldstein (who later became ''Mads editor for 30 years) also used Wolverton's art on a ''Panic'' cover, though publisher William M. Gaines was not a fan of Wolverton's work. Other humor magazines from other companies such as '' Cracked'', ''From Here to Insanity'' and ''Cockeyed'' also featured Wolverton's work, as did an issue of ''Ballyhoo''.


Later career

In 1958, Wolverton serialized a comic strip version of The Old Testament stories in the magazine The Plain Truth, under the title ''The Bible Story'', further serialized in another magazine, Tomorrow's World, from 1969 on as ''The Story of Man''. From 1961 on, Wolverton's biblical comics were also published in book format. In 1968, Wolverton did the ''Ugly Posters'' series of
trading card A trading card (or collectible card) is a small card, usually made out of paperboard or thick paper, which usually contains an image of a certain person, place or thing (fictional or real) and a short description of the picture, along with other t ...
s for
Topps The Topps Company, Inc. is an American company that manufactures trading cards and other collectibles. Formerly based in New York City, Topps is best known as a leading producer of Baseball card, baseball and other sports and Non-sports tradi ...
, displaying his trademark twisted headshots. In 1973, he returned to mainstream comics, illustrating several covers for
Joe Orlando Joseph Orlando (April 4, 1927 – December 23, 1998) was an Italian Americans, Italian-American illustrator, writer, editor and cartoonist during a lengthy career spanning six decades. He was the associate publisher of ''Mad (magazine), Mad'' and ...
's satiric '' Plop!'' at
DC Comics DC Comics (originally DC Comics, Inc., and also known simply as DC) is an American comic book publisher owned by DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery. DC is an initialism for "Detective Comics", an American comic book seri ...
. '' Comix Book'', a joint production of
Marvel Comics Marvel Comics is a New York City–based comic book publishing, publisher, a property of the Walt Disney Company since December 31, 2009, and a subsidiary of Disney Publishing Worldwide since March 2023. Marvel was founded in 1939 by Martin G ...
and
Denis Kitchen Denis Kitchen (born August 27, 1946) is an American underground cartoonist, publisher, author, agent, and the founder of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. Early life Kitchen grew up in Wisconsin, attending William Horlick High School, Raci ...
's
Kitchen Sink Press Kitchen Sink Press was a comic book publishing company founded by Denis Kitchen in 1970. Kitchen Sink Press was a pioneering publisher of underground comics, and was also responsible for numerous republications of classic comic strips in hardcov ...
, featured two strips by Wolverton, "Calvin" and "Weird Creatures".


Personal life

In 1934, Wolverton married his Vancouver High School classmate Honor Lovette (class of 1927). They remained married until his death. Wolverton was baptized into Herbert W. Armstrong's Radio Church of God in 1941 and was
ordained Ordination is the process by which individuals are Consecration in Christianity, consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorized (usually by the religious denomination, denominationa ...
as an elder in 1943. As a board member of that church, he was one of the six people, including Armstrong and his wife, who reincorporated the church in 1946 when it moved from its original headquarters in Oregon to California. Wolverton died on December 31, 1978, at age 69. Wolverton's son, editorial cartoonist Monte Wolverton, has worked for ''The Plain Truth'' and contributed to ''Mad''.


Bibliography


Books

Books by Wolverton or collecting his work include: * ''The Bible Story'' (1961) * ''Wolvertoons: The Art of Basil Wolverton'' (1990) () * ''Wolverton in Space'' (1997) () * ''Basil Wolverton's Powerhouse Pepper'' (2001) () * ''The Basil Wolverton Reader Vol.1'' (2003) () * ''The Basil Wolverton Reader Vol.2'' (2004) () * ''Basil Wolverton: Agony & Ecstasy'' (2007) () (reprints from ''The Bible Story'') * ''The Original Art of Basil Wolverton'' (2007) () * ''The Wolverton Bible'' (2009) () * ''The Culture Corner'' (2010) () * ''Spacehawk'' (2012) () * ''Creeping Death from Neptune: The Life and Comics of Basil Wolverton Vol. 1'' (2014) () * ''Brain Bats of Venus: The Life and Comics of Basil Wolverton Vol. 2'' (2019) () * ''Scoop Scuttle and His Pals: The Crackpot Comics of Basil Wolverton'' (2021) ()


References


External links

* * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Wolverton, Basil 1909 births 1978 deaths 20th-century American illustrators American comics artists American fantasy artists American science fiction artists American horror artists American humorists Christian comics creators People from Vancouver, Washington Churches of God Christians Golden Age comics creators Mad (magazine) cartoonists People from Central Point, Oregon American vaudeville performers Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame inductees EC Comics