William Charles Nolan (June 10, 1894 – December 6, 1954) was an American

animated cartoon Animation is a filmmaking technique whereby still images are manipulated to create moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Animati ...

writer, animator, director, and

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating the work of art. The most common usage (in both everyday speech and academic discourse) refers to a practitioner in the visual arts o ...

. He is best known for creating and perfecting the rubber hose style of animation and for streamlining

Felix the Cat Felix the Cat is a cartoon character created in 1919 by Otto Messmer and Pat Sullivan (film producer), Pat Sullivan during the silent film era. An anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic young black cat with white eyes, a black body, and a giant grin, ...

.That Crazy Cat Bill Nolan
/ref>

Early life and education

Nolan attended La Salle Academy and Classical High School in Providence, Rhode Island.

Career

Nolan first began his career in 1913 as a newspaper cartoonist, then worked for Raoul Barre and Kings Features until 1918. He joined the United States Navy in June 1917 at the Navy Recruiting Station at

Fort Lafayette Fort Lafayette was an island coastal fortification in The Narrows of New York Harbor (New York Bay), built offshore from nearby Fort Hamilton at the southern tip of what is now the Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, Bay Ridge neighborhood in the New York City ...

, New York."Nolan, William Charles", service number 124-29-00, Connecticut Roster 1917-1920 Plainfield, page 2343 in the ''Connecticut WWI Service Rosters'' on Fold3 by

Ancestry.com Ancestry.com LLC is an American genealogy company based in Lehi, Utah. The largest for-profit genealogy company in the world, it operates a network of genealogical, historical records, and related genetic genealogy websites. It is owned by The ...

."U.S. Veterans Bureau Form 7202 Index Card" for Nolan William C, "United States Government, Veterans Administration Master Index, 1917-1940" database, National Archives and Records Administration, St. Louis, Missouri, available through

FamilySearch FamilySearch is a nonprofit organization and website offering genealogical records, education, and software. It is operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and is part of the Church's Family History Department (FHD). The Fami ...

. He served at Headquarters,

3rd Naval District United States Naval Districts is a system created by the United States Navy to organize military facilities, numbered sequentially by geographic region, for the operational and administrative control of naval bases and shore commands in the Unit ...

in New York and the Brooklyn Naval Hospital, New York. He was discharged in June 1921 as a Chief Yeoman. From 1924 to 1926, he animated and designed Felix the Cat. He then moved to Winkler to animate on Krazy Kat again. Nolan went to the Walter Lantz Studio from 1929 until 1935, where he animated and briefly voiced

Oswald the Lucky Rabbit Oswald the Lucky Rabbit (also known as Oswald the Rabbit, Oswald Rabbit, and Ozzie) is an animated series, animated cartoon character created in 1927 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks for Universal Pictures. He starred in several animated short film ...

. Nolan would later leave Lantz to start out Mayfair Productions to produce '' Skippy'' cartoons, but only one "The Dog Catcher" was released for

United Artists United Artists (UA) is an American film production and film distribution, distribution company owned by Amazon MGM Studios. In its original operating period, it was founded in February 1919 by Charlie Chaplin, D. W. Griffith, Mary Pickford an ...

. Nolan also worked at

MGM Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. (also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures, commonly shortened to MGM or MGM Studios) is an American Film production, film and television production and film distribution, distribution company headquartered ...

on '' The Captain and the Kids'' series based on the comic strip ''

The Katzenjammer Kids ''The Katzenjammer Kids'' is an American comic strip created by Rudolph Dirks in 1897 and later drawn by Harold Knerr for 35 years (1914 to 1949).Fleischer Studios Fleischer Studios () was an American animation studio founded in 1929 by brothers Max and Dave Fleischer, who ran the pioneering company from its inception until its acquisition by Paramount Pictures in 1942, the parent company and the distri ...

where he worked on

Popeye Popeye the Sailor Man is a fictional cartoon character created by E. C. Segar, Elzie Crisler Segar.Gulliver's Travels ''Gulliver's Travels'', originally titled ''Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships'', is a 1726 prose satire by the Anglo-Irish writer and clerg ...

. 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 ...

, Nolan was in the

Navy A navy, naval force, military maritime fleet, war navy, or maritime force is the military branch, branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral z ...

drawing technical manuals with

Timm Aircraft The O.W. Timm Aircraft Company was an American aircraft manufacturer founded by Otto Timm, Otto William Timm, based in Los Angeles, California. History Between 1911 and 1922 Otto Timm, O.W. Timm built several aircraft with varying success befo ...

. In 1949, after the war, he formed Willam-Nicholas Productions with Nick Nicholas. He moved his company in 1954 in

Madison, Wisconsin Madison is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. It is the List of municipalities in Wisconsin by population, second-most populous city in the state, with a population of 269,840 at the 2020 Uni ...

, where he died in December.

References

External links

* *
Cartooning Self-Taught
' by Bill Nolan, published in 1936. {{DEFAULTSORT:Nolan, Bill 1894 births 1954 deaths Animators from Connecticut American animated film directors La Salle Academy alumni Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio people Walter Lantz Productions people Fleischer Studios people United States Navy chiefs