Tuesday, January 15, 2008

The Professional School of Cartooning 1947 UPDATED

From the pages of the Eli Stein Cartoons blog, comes scans of gag cartoonists and their cartoons. It's all from a brochure for The Professional School of Cartooning circa 1947, run by cartoonist/editor Lawrence Lariar.

"LARIAR SOLD THIS COMIC TO SATEVEPOST

"Lariar's smart, stylized cartoons are a model for many beginners, and his drawings of cute girls are familiar to all. He will criticize your drawings personally!"

Part of the fun is attaching faces to names like Henry Boltinoff, Ed Nofziger, George Wolfe, and Adolph Schus. (No good link found for Mr. Schus, unfortunately.)

Eli, thanks so much for bowing to pressure to scan more of this great old ephemera!

To the right, an ad (Is that a Lariar-drawn cute girl?) from an advertisement in Popular Mechanics Magazine (September 1948) from this page at the Modern Mechanix site.

Related: Eli Stein on the four cartoonist Roth brothers.

UPDATE: The one and only Orlando Busino passed along the below email with additional information on Adolph Schus. Thank you very much, Mr. Busino! Here's Orlando:

Here's a bio. from Lariar's book, BEST CARTOONS OF THE YEAR 1943 :
ADOLPH SCHUS
Born on New York's upper east side. . . lived in Wembly, a suburb of London, where he spent a good deal of his childhood. The zeppelin raids on London during the first world war, sent the family back to America. Except for a year on the continent, during which time he art-edited a publication published in Paris for Americans abroad. He has
been residing in New York. Married a Rochestarian in 1938 and their son was born in 1943. Just before the blessed event they bought a home in Harmon-on-the-Hudson, where Schus will continue to do cartoons for the country's leading magazines.


6 comments:

Mark Anderson said...

"He will criticize your drawings personally!"

He will berate you. He will insult you. He will make you wish you were dead.

Lariar knows no mercy. Join his school and know pain.

(OK, gotta go get that coffee now...)

Mike Lynch said...

Even if someone asks nicely, "Would you critique my cartoons?" I always tell them to put them in an envelope and mail them to a market. If they're good, they will sell. Who am I to judge?

Unknown said...

Adolph Schus did not have a son, but a daughter, Stephanie. Adolph Schulz was my Uncle and Steffi is my cousin. Adolph died in about early 1957, the victim of a brain tumor.

Adolph's widow Sonya is still alive in New York (age around 92), and his daughter Steffi lives in Los Angeles. Mike Kaufman

Unknown said...

Mike, I just accidentally scored the full PSC 1947 course complete. It was advertised as just an old correspondence course with no details. When I got it I was excited to see Lariar as head director of the school. Did some searching and found scans of the advertising ad and postcard, no other information. Its a great course, fills four binders full. Mainly the art style is mostly gag cartoon technique but there is some strip art in it as well and a few Willard Mullin reprints. I don't see any way to post images here. Let me know if you have any questions about it.

Mike Lynch said...

Let me know if you're going to post some scans of those great PSC books you scored, Dave! My contact info is all over this blog and my sites.

Unknown said...

I sent you an email and didn't get a reply, I can email some scans to you to post if you want. Need your current email info. Check your spam folder if you didn't get my email. There literally are over 2,000 illustrations in the 44 lessons. I can scan a few drawing lessons or example pages of gag cartoon principles from each of the instructors. Let me know....