13 Facts About Doug Marlette

Doug Marlette began his cartooning career while a student at Seminole Community College where he worked on the student newspaper.

Doug Marlette then went on to Florida State University where he drew political cartoons for The Florida Flambeau, from 1969 to 1971.

Doug Marlette was the cartoonist for The Charlotte Observer, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution for which he won a Pulitzer Prize in 1988, New York Newsday, The Tallahassee Democrat and The Tulsa World.

Doug Marlette wrote and drew the internationally syndicated comic strip Kudzu, which launched June 15,1981.

Doug Marlette collaborated with Bland Simpson and Jack Herrick of the Red Clay Ramblers on a musical comedy adaptation of the strip, Kudzu, A Southern Musical.

Doug Marlette's work appeared in Time and Newsweek, along with newspapers such as The New York Times and The Washington Post.

In 1981, Doug Marlette became the first cartoonist ever awarded a Nieman Fellowship.

Doug Marlette won every major award for editorial cartooning, including the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning, the National Headliner Award for Consistently Outstanding Editorial Cartoons and first prize in the John Fischetti Memorial Cartoon Competition.

Doug Marlette was a close friend of author Pat Conroy, speaking to him daily.

Doug Marlette died in Marshall County, Mississippi, a passenger in a Toyota pickup truck that hydroplaned and struck a tree in heavy rain; Doug Marlette died instantly.

Doug Marlette was traveling from Memphis International Airport to Oxford, Mississippi to help students at Oxford High School prepare for their performance of Kudzu, A Southern Musical at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Doug Marlette died less than a week after he delivered the eulogy for his father, Elmer Monroe Doug Marlette, in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Doug Marlette was buried at Walnut Grove United Methodist Church near Hillsborough on July 14,2007.