Walt Kelly began his animation career in 1936 at Walt Disney Studios, contributing to Pinocchio, Fantasia, and Dumbo.
29 Facts About Walt Kelly
2.
In 1941, at the age of 28, Kelly transferred to work at Dell Comics, where he created Pogo, which eventually became his platform for political and philosophical commentary.
3.
Walt Kelly was extremely proud of his journalism pedigree and considered himself a newspaper man as well as a cartoonist.
4.
Walt Kelly became close friends with fellow cartoonists Milton Caniff and Al Capp, and the three occasionally referred to each other in their strips.
5.
In 1930, Walt Kelly graduated from high school and met Helen DeLacy at choir practice.
6.
In 1951, Walt Kelly divorced DeLacy and married Stephanie Waggony; the two remained married until Waggony died of cancer in 1970.
7.
Walt Kelly met Selby Daley in the late 1960s while working on The Pogo Special Birthday Special, a television special based on the Pogo comic strip.
8.
Walt Kelly worked for Disney from January 6,1936, to September 12,1941, contributing to Pinocchio, Fantasia, The Reluctant Dragon, and Dumbo.
9.
Walt Kelly once stated that his salary at Disney averaged about $100 a week.
10.
Walt Kelly's drawings are especially recognizable in The Reluctant Dragon of the little boy, and in the Mickey Mouse short The Little Whirlwind, when Mickey is running from the larger tornado.
11.
Kimball stated in an interview years later that Walt Kelly felt creatively constricted in animation, a collective art form, and possibly over-challenged by the technical demands of the form, and had been looking for a way out when the strike occurred.
12.
On May 25,1960, Kelly wrote a letter to Walt Disney regarding his time at the studio:.
13.
Walt Kelly began a series of comic books based on fairy tales and nursery rhymes along with annuals celebrating Christmas and Easter for Dell Comics.
14.
Walt Kelly seems to have written or co-written much of the material he drew for the comics; his unique touches are easily discernible.
15.
Walt Kelly then wrote, drew, and performed on children's records, children's books, and cereal boxes.
16.
Walt Kelly returned to journalism as a political cartoonist after the war.
17.
In 1948, while serving as art director of the short-lived New York Star, Walt Kelly began to produce a pen-and-ink daily comic strip featuring anthropomorphic animal characters that inhabited the Okefenokee Swamp in Georgia.
18.
Walt Kelly eventually arranged to acquire the copyright and ownership of the strip, which was then uncommon.
19.
Walt Kelly received the Reuben Award for the series in 1951.
20.
The Okefenokee Swamp Park near Waycross, Georgia, now has a building housing Walt Kelly's relocated studio and various Pogo memorabilia.
21.
Additionally, Walt Kelly illustrated The Glob, a children's book about the evolution of man written by John O'Reilly and published in 1952.
22.
Walt Kelly died on October 18,1973 in Woodland Hills, California, from diabetes complications, following a long and debilitating illness that had cost him a leg.
23.
Walt Kelly is sometimes listed as having been interred in the Cemetery of the Evergreens in Brooklyn, New York, but there is no grave for him there.
24.
Walt Kelly, a great admirer of Lewis Carroll, was a prolific poet, especially in the "Anguish Languish" form.
25.
Walt Kelly's singing voice, a boozy Irish baritone, can be heard on the Songs of the Pogo album, for which he supplied the lyrics.
26.
The album features Walt Kelly singing his own comic lyrics and nonsense verse to melodies written mostly by Norman Monath.
27.
Carolyn Walt Kelly, having worked extensively on The Complete Pogo, died on April 9,2017.
28.
Walt Kelly has been compared to everyone from James Joyce and Lewis Carroll, to Aesop and Uncle Remus.
29.
Walt Kelly was elected president of the National Cartoonists Society in 1954, serving until 1956, and was the first strip cartoonist to be invited to contribute originals to the Library of Congress.