Walter George Ball (7 April 1911 18 February 1995) was a Canadian cartoonist. Ball was noted for the comic strip feature '' Rural Route'', which became a familiar fixture in the ''

Star Weekly The ''Star Weekly'' magazine was a Canadian periodical published from 1910 until 1973. The publication was read widely in rural Canada where delivery of daily newspapers was infrequent. History Formation The newspaper was founded as the ''Toronto ...

'' between 1956 until the publication's demise in 1968. He was born in

Essa, Ontario Essa is a township in Ontario, Canada, west and south of the city of Barrie in Simcoe County. It is bounded by County Road 90 to its north, County Road 27 to its east, and Ontario Highway 89 to its south. The township is about from Toronto. Th ...

. Ball, who grew up on a farm near

Cookstown, Ontario Innisfil is a town in Ontario, Canada, located on the western shore of Lake Simcoe in Simcoe County, immediately south of Barrie and north of Toronto. It has historically been a rural area, but due to being geographically sandwiched in between ...

, originally looked at electrical engineering as a career, but it was his application to the ''

Toronto Daily Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and par ...

'', with only a few sample correspondence school art lessons, that got him hired as a graphic artist in 1932. Early in his tenure at the ''Star'', Ball (not yet a cartoonist) befriended legendary Canadian artist

Jimmy Frise The Canadian cartoonist James Llewellyn Frise (, 16 October 1891 – 13 June 1948) is best known for his work on the comic strip ''Birdseye '' and his illustrations of humorous prose pieces by Greg Clark. Born in Scugog Island, Ontario, ...

, who accepted a more lucrative offer from the ''

Montreal Standard The ''Montreal Standard'', later known as ''The Standard'', was a national weekly pictorial newspaper published in Montreal, Quebec, founded by Hugh Graham. It operated from 1905 to 1951. History The Standard began publishing in 1905 as a Saturda ...

'' in the late 1940s. When the Star Weekly made a format change from broadsheet to tabloid in 1956, an editor asked Ball if he knew a cartoonist interested in creating a comic feature for the new publication. Ball suggested some names, but having always had a desire to enter the field, worked concurrently on his own strip. It was quickly accepted and one month into the new format, a reader survey indicated ''Rural Route'' had become the most read feature in the publication. It was syndicated by Miller Services to other local Canadian newspapers, and it also appeared in several newspapers in the Midwestern United States. Featuring the woodsy adventures of a small town youth named Willie and his farm-dwelling Uncle Elmer and Aunt Myrtle, Ball drew largely on his own childhood farm experiences in creating and developing ''Rural Route''. Ball, Frise and cartoonist

Doug Wright Douglas Wright (born December 20, 1962) is an American playwright, librettist, and screenwriter. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2004 for his play ''I Am My Own Wife''. Early years Wright was born in Dallas, Texas. He attended and ...

are considered to be co-creators of a distinct Canadian comic strip style of that time, with ornately detailed drawings and a simple, folksy humour style. When ''Rural Route'' and the ''Star Weekly'' folded in 1968, Ball continued in the Star's art department, being promoted to art director in 1970, and retired in 1976. He resided with his wife in the Toronto suburb of Richmond Hill until his death.

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