Al Capp

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Al Capp in 1966

Alfred Gerald "Al" Caplin (born September 28, 1909 in New Haven , Connecticut , † November 5, 1979 in Cambridge , Massachusetts ; according to other information: South Hampton , New Hampshire ) was an American comic artist and author. The older brother of the comic book author Elliot Caplin and creator of the strip Li'l Abner became world famous as "Al Capp" .

Life

Capp lost his left leg in an accident when he was ten. He attended several art schools and was initially an assistant to Ham Fisher , whom he supported as a ghost draftsman on his series Joe Palooka . There he developed a hillbilly figure, an idea that would form the basis for Li'l Abner . Li'l Abner's first day trip appeared on August 20, 1934, the Sunday page, which also contained the Washable Jones strip drawn by Capp for the first 16 weeks , followed on February 24, 1935. The main character was Abner Yokum, a handsome man but a simple-minded young man who always tried to defend himself against marriage and work. The strip continued from Capp into 1977: the last daily strip appeared on November 5, 1977, the last Sunday page on November 13, 1977.

Other strips from Capp were Col. Gilfeather and Fearless Fosdick . Col. Gilfeather was sold by Capp to the Associated Press in 1927 and was taken over by Milton Caniff some time later . The Dick Tracy parody Fearless Fosdick was created in 1942 as a separate series, but also appeared at irregular intervals in Li'l Abner as the title character's favorite reading. Capp supplied the texts for the Abbie comics to 'Slats (drawings: Raeburn Van Buren ) and Long Sam (drawings: Bob Lubbers ). Both writing activities were later taken over by his brother Elliot.

In 1947, after Milton Caniff, Al Capp became the second artist to receive the Reuben Award , the award given by the National Cartoonists Society since 1946. John Steinbeck , who called him the best writer in the world , suggested Capp for the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953 . In German some adventure published by Li'l Abner in Carlsen Verlag .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Andreas C. Knigge : Comic-Lexikon , Ullstein, Frankfurt am Main, Berlin and Vienna 1988, ISBN 3-548-36554-X , p. 129.
  2. ↑ a b Al Capp on lfb.it (Italian) , accessed on September 7, 2012
  3. ↑ Lynne Hendricks: Al Capp was here ( Memento from February 19, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
  4. ↑ a b Douglas Martin: Elliot A. Caplin, 86, Writer Who Devised Comic Strip Plots at nytimes.com (English) , accessed September 7, 2012
  5. ↑ Al Capp on comicguide.de , accessed on August 24, 2020
personal data
SURNAME Capp, Al
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Caplin, Alfred Gerald
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American cartoonist and comic artist
DATE OF BIRTH September 28, 1909
PLACE OF BIRTH New Haven , Connecticut
DATE OF DEATH 5th November 1979
Place of death unsure: Cambridge , Massachusetts