15 Facts About Margaret Brundage

Margaret Brundage, born Margaret Hedda Johnson, was an American illustrator and painter who is remembered chiefly for having illustrated the pulp magazine Weird Tales.

Margaret Brundage's mother remained both a widow and a devout Christian Scientist for the rest of her life, and supplemented their income by instructing beginning Christian Science disciples.

Immediately after high school, Margaret Brundage worked providing illustrations for Chicago newspapers; she would draw fashion designs in both colour and in black-and-white, from ideas and descriptions provided by an agency.

Margaret Brundage's education continued at Art Institute of Chicago and the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts in the 1920s; she later stated that her failure to graduate was due to her inept lettering, though she continued her freelance work for the agency while she completed her coursework.

Margaret Brundage was a former hobo, and the founder of the College of Complexes.

In 1932 Margaret Brundage was looking for more work, and found herself at the office of Farnsworth Wright, then editor of the weird fiction magazine Weird Tales.

Margaret Brundage began working for Wright by doing a few covers for his side publication Oriental Stories, later known as The Magic Carpet.

Wright was so impressed with these that he hired Margaret Brundage to draw for Weird Tales.

Margaret Brundage was the most frequently-appearing cover artist on Weird Tales during her stint with the magazine.

Margaret Brundage's first cover appeared on the September 1932 issue; she created covers for 39 straight issues from June 1933 to August 1936.

From 1936 through 1938, Margaret Brundage often alternated with others as cover artist; Virgil Finlay was her chief competitor.

Pulp covers were notorious for their explicit content, and Margaret Brundage's were no exception.

In 1939, Margaret Brundage painted two covers for Golden Fleece, a Chicago-based pulp magazine that specialized in historical fiction.

Margaret Brundage continued to draw after her relationship with the magazine ended, and appeared at a number of science fiction conventions and art fairs, where some of her original period works were stolen.

Sprague de Camp is often quoted as claiming she used her daughters as models, but Margaret Brundage had no daughters.