Jack Callahan (cartoonist)

John Thomas "Jack" Callahan (December 14, 1888 – August 24, 1954), was a noted cartoonist during the early decades of the 20th century, being also credited for drawing the diagram for the first American crossword.

Biography

Apart from growing up in Brooklyn, New York, little else is known about his early life. In the early 1910s he began working for the ''New York World'', first at the art department before becoming the paper's "crossword artist". By the middle of the decade he was doing editorial cartoons and a handful of comic strips such as ''Flivvers'' and ''When You Were a Boy'',Obscurity Of The Day: When You Were a Boy
Strippers Guide. Retrieved September 7, 2016 both running between 1916 and 1917.
Lambiek. Retrieved September 7, 2016

During 1917 he moved to the Hearst organization, where he worked until 1940. That year he started the comic strip ''Over Here'', which described common situations from different points of view. By 1918, the initially sparse collection of characters was settled on the Piffles, which were a typical American family of the time.The Washington (D.C.) Times, September 2, 1918, page 14
Chronicling America. Retrieved September 7, 2016 Among them were "Calamity Jane", who was permanently pessimistic; "Comedian", who had a penchant for bad jokes; "Willie" the trouble-making kid, and love-struck couple "Hon" and "Dearie", who became the feature's titular characters between 1919 and 1921, when it became ''The Piffle Family''.

Callahan's other strip beginning around 1922 was ''Freddie, the Sheik'', centering on a young college graduate and his attempts to court women and make money. This quickly became Callahan's most successful work: By 1923–24, the strip merged with ''The Piffle Family'' and gained a Sunday page, being also featured in some Wrigley's chewing gum ads with other popular King Features characters.Wrigley's Sunday Comic Strip Ads -- Part III
Stripper's Guide. Retrieved September 10, 2016 In spite of ''Freddies popularity, in 1928-29 Callahan replaced it with ''Clarabelle's Cousin'' in order to cash in with the "pretty girl" melodrama strip boom. By late 1930 however it became a crime-adventure strip for a few months until ending in early 1931. Both strips' Sunday editions ran a topper called ''Dizzy's Eating House'', about a low-rate diner and its scheming owner.

Chic Young briefly worked for Callahan as an assistant around 1923 after being hired by KFS. Callahan's style proved influential on Young, who further developed it with his own strips ''Dumb Dora'' and '' Blondie''.

After a stint as an editorial cartoonist, Callahan revived the Piffle family format with ''Home, Sweet Home'', which ran between 1935 and 1940. After a period as a freelance artist, he found employment in the comic book industry for Dell Publishing (where he worked on ''Tillie the Toiler'' stories) and DC Comics.

Callahan died in 1954 of a heart attack while playing tennis. He was survived by his wife Helen Carr (m. 1926) a former showgirl who performed diving stunts.

References

External links

Comic book credits for Jack Callahan
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Callahan, Jack
1888 births
1954 deaths
American comic strip cartoonists
Artists from New York City