Dan DeCarlo - An Inspiration to Many of Today’s Artists

Dan DeCarlo was a man that inspired many of today’s artists, like Jamie Hernandez. He was born in December 12, 1919, in New Rochelle, New York. Dan DeCarlo was your typical American cartoonist. He created the artwork for many of our classic comics, such as “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” and “Jodie and the Pussycats”. Before all of this, however, he had to start somewhere.

He attended Manhattan’s Art students League from 1938 to 1941. He could not start his art career immediately after college, however. In 1941, he was drafted into the military. There he worked as a drafter. He spent his time painting company mascots on the nose of planes. In his spare time, he created a weekly military comic strip called the “418th Scandal Street”.

When he served his time in the military in 1947, he began working for Timely Comics. His first assignment there was a comic known as “Jeanie”. Like other artists and comic writers, he was never credited for the work that he did, which would pose problems later.

In 1949, he stopped working on “Jeanie” and began working on “Millie the Model”. He worked on this comic ten years.

Since working just for Timely Comics was not enough, he did freelance work for magazines like the Saturday Evening Post. In the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, he began doing freelance work for Archie Comics. He modernized the characters of Archie Comics.

Many people have heard of “Josie and the Pussycats”. If they have not read the comic, they have probably seen the movie. “Josie” was first introduced in the #23 issue of “Archie’s Pals and Gals”. Later, in 1963, the first issue of “She’s Josie” was released. The name was changed to “Josie” in December of 1965. Again, the name was changed to “Josie and the Pussycats” in December of 1969. The “Josie and the Pussycats” comic ended in December 1982 at issue #106.

Before Dan DeCarlo died of a heart attack, he was in the middle of a lawsuit with Archie Comics. This revolved around the fact that Archie wanted to retain copyright ownership of the franchise. Archie Comics terminated the 43-year contract with Dan DeCarlo after everything settled. Universal Pictures created a “Josie and the Pussycats” live action movie, naming Dan DeCarlo as the creator.

Dan DeCarlo died of a heart attack on December 19, 2001. According to his wife, he died in New Rochelle.

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