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12 Facts About Bob Thaves

1.

Robert Thaves was the creator of the comic strip Frank and Ernest, which began in 1972.

2.

Robert Lee Bob Thaves was born on October 5,1924, in Burt, Iowa, where his father, John, published local newspapers.

3.

Bob Thaves had no formal training; instead, he practiced by studying and drawing the works of other cartoonists.

4.

Bob Thaves was so skilled he could identify the cartoonist of a comic strip without looking at the signature.

5.

Bob Thaves attended the University of Minnesota, where he received both a bachelor's and master's degree in psychology.

6.

Bob Thaves's cartoons were published in the university humor magazine Ski-U-Mah and newspaper The Minnesota Daily.

7.

Bob Thaves married his wife Katie in 1954, and moved with her to Manhattan Beach, California three years later.

8.

Bob Thaves continued to be interested in cartooning, and developed the Frank and Ernest strip while working as an industrial psychologist, occasionally selling comics to publications such as the Saturday Evening Post, True, and Cosmopolitan.

9.

Bob Thaves drew the short-lived King Baloo strip, which ran during the 1980s.

10.

The elder Bob Thaves had planned on transitioning his son to take over the strip before his death.

11.

Bob Thaves won several awards for Frank and Ernest including the National Cartoonist Society Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1983,1984 and 1986.

12.

Bob Thaves died of respiratory failure in Torrance, California at the age of 81.