C: Cartoons

One of my favorite cartoons (left) from the TeamSTEPPS Program, Shared Mental Model

If you visit my website, http://www.davedrawsitall.com/, you will see a very eclectic collection of drawings, designs, and artwork. One of my favorite genres is cartooning. As a child of the 60s, I grew up with Saturday morning cartoons and the worlds of people like Chuck Jones, creator of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, and (my personal favorite) Pepe Le Pue. Who couldn't love that bounding little furry French ambassador of zee love. Except, of course, the cat with the stripe painted down her back.

Another icon of the time, which captured my pencil and imagination, was MAD Magazine. I copied the styles of Jack Davis and studied with great passion the creations of Al Jaffee and others in the cast of usual idiots. Alfred E. Neuman was a chameleon, matching the hottest movie and political icons of the day. This magazine was about as naughty as a 12-15 year old could get his hands on. Fortunately my older brother shared this interest, so the supply was available.

I remember getting in trouble for injecting a little "MAD" quality into a illustration of one of my brother's English reports. The teacher was a savvy publisher in her day and detected the minute activity happening in the back of a Spanish galleon with eagle eyes. She must have used a microscope. The paper was returned with the minuscule naughty activity circled in bright red.

Through college, I continued to create cartoons and caricatures. When I was in Officer Training School, I occupied the down-time while awaiting for the end of Saturday inspection with a cartoon of the week. Everyone enjoyed the posting until one cartoon bounded over the line. I was called on the carpet by a captain who, restraining an obvious appreciation for the subject, told me that I should probably move on to another subject. When an officer would come into the classroom, rather than upsetting the chairs and creating kaos, the class would come to attention in their seats to the command " in seats--attention." The cartoon was set in the stalls of the latrine, where boots and dropped drawers were visible below the stall doors. The motion of clicking boots accompanied the same command. Come on, that's funny.

These days, the cartoon that I most closely follow is Dilbert. I insist that someone in my world is feeding the artist, Scott Adams, daily reports. It draws its humor from touching on the exposed nerves of today's cubical dwellers. Once a week, http://www.msnbc.com/ posts the week's political cartoons and I feast my eyes on the last bastion of true free speech. The modern-day bearers of the banner of Thomas Nast still peel away the smoke and mirrors of the political beasts to expose their naked, poached, and bloated underbellies. The source of inspiration seems endless.