Dan Martin is a 20th and 21st century American cartoonist. Martin, a St. Louis native, was graduated from Lindbergh High School. At age 16, He worked at Six Flags Over Mid-America as caricaturist. He joined the ''

St. Louis Post-Dispatch The ''St. Louis Post-Dispatch'' is a major regional newspaper based in St. Louis, Missouri, serving the St. Louis metropolitan area. It is the largest daily newspaper in the metropolitan area by circulation, surpassing the ''Belleville News-De ...

'' in 1980 out of the

University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, and several satellite campuses, research and educational centers, medical centers, and classes across the state of Kansas. T ...

. Martin draws the Weatherbird for the ''Post-Dispatch''. He is the sixth cartoonist to draw the Weatherbird, which debuted in 1901 and appears every day on the paper's front page. He is the second-longest serving Weatherbird artist (after

Amadee Wohlschlaeger Amadee Wohlschlaeger (December 3, 1911 – June 24, 2014) was a 20th-century American sports cartoonist in St. Louis. He was known professionally as simply "Amadee", which was how he signed his cartoons. He was a long-time sports cartoonist for ...

), having taken over the strip in 1986. "

Albert Schweitzer Ludwig Philipp Albert Schweitzer (; 14 January 1875 – 4 September 1965) was an Alsatian-German/French polymath. He was a theologian, organist, musicologist, writer, humanitarian, philosopher, and physician. A Lutheran minister, Schweit ...

, who was drawing the Bird at the time, told me he was planning to retire" Martin said. "After I had practiced for about a year, we took 10 Weatherbird drawings of mine mixed in with 10 of Albert’s and showed them to editor Bill Woo, who couldn’t tell the difference... So I got the job." In 1987, Martin eliminated the cigar which had been emblematic of the character since its inception, He also restored the bird's beak to some degree (previous Weatherbird cartoonists had atrophied the beak to the point of a flat-faced Weatherbird). It usually takes Martin about 45 minutes to create a Weatherbird cartoon. Martin also drew the weekly cartoon "Postcard From Mound City" for the ''Post-Dispatch'' editorial page ("Mound City" is a nickname for St. Louis, based on the nearby

Cahokia Mounds The Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site ( 11 MS 2) is the site of a pre-Columbian Native American city (which existed 1050–1350 CE) directly across the Mississippi River from modern St. Louis, Missouri. This historic park lies in south- ...

). Martin went into semi-retirement in 2023. He still draws the Weatherbird, but gave up additional cartooning duties.

Works

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References

External links

Lambiek Comiclopedia biography.
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with ''Feast Magazine'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Martin, Dan Living people St. Louis Post-Dispatch people American comics artists American comic strip cartoonists University of Kansas alumni Year of birth missing (living people) Artists from St. Louis