59 Facts About Carl Barks

Carl Barks was an American cartoonist, author, and painter.

Carl Barks is best known for his work in Disney comic books, as the writer and artist of the first Donald Duck stories and as the creator of Scrooge McDuck.

Carl Barks worked anonymously until late in his career; fans dubbed him The Duck Man and The Good Duck Artist.

In 1987, Barks was one of the three inaugural inductees of the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame.

Carl Barks has been named by animation historian Leonard Maltin as "the most popular and widely read artist-writer in the world".

Carl Barks was born in Merrill, Oregon, to William Carl Barks and his wife, Arminta Johnson.

Carl Barks's parents owned one square mile of land that served as their farm.

The closest school was about two miles away and Carl Barks had to walk that distance every day.

The rural area had few children, though, and Carl Barks later remembered that his school had only about eight or ten students including him.

Carl Barks had high praise for the quality of the education he received in that small school.

In 1908, William Carl Barks moved with his family to Midland, Oregon, some miles north of Merrill, to be closer to the new railway lines.

Carl Barks established a new stock-breeding farm and sold his produce to the local slaughterhouses.

The year was 1913, and Carl Barks was already 12-years-old; but, due to the constant moving, he had not yet managed to complete grade school.

Carl Barks resumed his education at this point and finally managed to graduate in 1916.

Carl Barks's hearing would continue to get worse later, but at that point he had not yet acquired a hearing aid.

Carl Barks had to decide to stop his school education, much to his disappointment.

Carl Barks started taking various jobs but had little success in such occupations as a farmer, woodcutter, turner, mule driver, cowboy and printer.

Carl Barks later declared that he was sure that if not for a little humor in their troubled lives, they would certainly go insane.

Carl Barks reported that this was another thing he was familiar with.

Scrooge's main difference to Donald, according to Carl Barks, was that he too had faced the same difficulties in his past but through intelligence, determination and hard work, he was able to overcome them.

Carl Barks had attempted to improve his style by copying the drawings of his favorite comic strip artists from the newspapers where he could find them.

Carl Barks only followed the first four lessons and then had to stop because his working left him with little free time.

Carl Barks worked for a while in a small publishing house while attempting to sell his drawings to newspapers and other printed material with little success.

Carl Barks continued searching for a job while attempting to sell his drawings.

Carl Barks soon managed to sell some of them to Judge magazine and then started having success submitting to the Minneapolis-based Calgary Eye-Opener, a racy men's cartoon magazine of the era.

Carl Barks was eventually hired as editor and scripted and drew most of the contents while continuing to sell occasional work to other magazines.

In November 1935, when he learned that Walt Disney was seeking more artists for his studio, Carl Barks decided to apply.

Carl Barks was approved for a try-out which entailed a move to Los Angeles, California.

Carl Barks was one of two in his class of trainees who was hired.

Carl Barks started at Disney Studios in 1935, more than a year after the debut of Donald Duck on June 9,1934, in the short animated film The Wise Little Hen.

Carl Barks collaborated on such cartoons as Donald's Nephews, Donald's Cousin Gus, Mr Duck Steps Out, Timber, The Vanishing Private and The Plastics Inventor.

Unhappy at the emerging wartime working conditions at Disney, and bothered by ongoing sinus problems caused by the studio's air conditioning, Carl Barks quit in 1942.

Carl Barks was immediately assigned to illustrate the script for a ten-page Donald Duck story for the monthly Walt Disney's Comics and Stories.

At the publisher's invitation he revised the storyline and the improvements impressed the editor sufficiently to invite Carl Barks to try his hand at contributing both the script and the artwork of his follow-up story.

The Victory Garden, that initial ten-page story published in April, 1943 was the first of about 500 stories featuring the Disney ducks Carl Barks would produce for Western Publishing over the next three decades, well into his purported retirement.

Carl Barks's stories often exhibited a wry, dark irony born of hard experience.

Carl Barks was an accomplished landscape artist, some of whose paintings are in the collection of the Leanin' Tree Museum of Western Art.

Carl Barks retired in 1966, but was persuaded by editor Chase Craig to continue to script stories for Western.

The last new comic book story drawn by Carl Barks was a Daisy Duck tale published in Walt Disney Comics Digest issue 5.

Carl Barks wrote one Uncle Scrooge story, and three Donald Duck stories.

From 1970 to 1974, Carl Barks was the main writer for the Junior Woodchucks comic book.

Carl Barks sold a few sketches to Western that were redrawn as covers.

In July 1971 Carl Barks was granted a royalty-free license by Disney.

When word spread that Carl Barks was taking commissions from those interested in purchasing an oil of the ducks, much to his astonishment the response quickly outstripped what he reasonably could produce in the next few years.

At Boston's NewCon convention, in October 1975, the first Carl Barks oil painting auctioned at a comic book convention sold for $2,500.

In 1977 and 1982, Carl Barks attended the San Diego Comic-Con.

In 1983, Carl Barks relocated one last time to Grants Pass, Oregon, near where he grew up, partly at the urging of friend and Broom Hilda artist Russell Myers, who lived in the area.

The move was motivated, Carl Barks stated in another famous quip, by Temecula being too close to Disneyland and thus facilitating a growing torrent of drop-in visits by vacationing fans.

Seven years after Gladstone's founding, the Carl Barks Library was revived as the Carl Barks Library in Color, as full-color, high-quality squarebound comic albums.

Carl Barks appeared at the first of many Disneyana conventions in 1993.

Carl Barks was represented by Ed Bergen, as he completed a final project.

Carl Barks spent his final years in a new home in Grants Pass, Oregon, which he and Gare, who died in 1993, had built next door to their original home.

However, as the disease progressed, causing him great discomfort, the ailing Carl Barks decided to stop receiving treatment in June 2000.

In spite of his terminal condition, Carl Barks remained, according to caregiver Serene Hunicke, "funny up to the end".

The year before, Carl Barks had told the university professor Donald Ault:.

Carl Barks was interred in Hillcrest Memorial Cemetery in Grants Pass, beside Gare's grave.

Carl Barks has an asteroid named after him, 2730 Barks.

The life story of Carl Barks, largely drawing upon his relationship with Disney and the phonetic similarity of his name to Karl Marx, serves as a loose inspiration to one of the subplots in The Last Song of Manuel Sendero by Ariel Dorfman.

Films where Carl Barks served as storyman or story director include:.