John Ryan (cartoonist)
| John Ryan | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
4 March 1921 Edinburgh, Scotland |
| Died | 22 July 2009 (aged 88) Rye, East Sussex, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Area(s) | Cartoonist Animator |
|
Notable works
|
Captain Pugwash |
John Gerald Christopher Ryan (4 March 1921 – 22 July 2009) was a British animator and cartoonist, best known for his character Captain Pugwash. His brother was Roman Catholic theologian and philosopher Columba Ryan.
Ryan was born in Edinburgh. He expressed his love of writing and drawing early in life, creating his first book, Adventures of Tommy Brown, at the age of 7. Ryan attended Ampleforth College, a Catholic boarding school. After serving as an officer with the Lincolnshire Regiment in Burma during the Second World War, Ryan studied at the Regent Street Polytechnic.
Whilst teaching art at Harrow, Ryan first created Captain Pugwash as a comic strip for The Eagle in 1950, although the strip was dropped after three months as it was felt to be too young for the target audience. Unperturbed, Ryan created Harris Tweed, Special Agent. However, when The Radio Times commissioned him to provide a strip he resurrected the Captain Pugwash strip, and in 1957 he was commissioned by the BBC to produce a series of animation shorts featuring the character, originally running from 1957 to 1958. The animation of these films was done in real time (rather than by the stop-frame animation method) using an ingenious system of cut-out characters and boats, moved by hidden cardboard levers. Further episodes were commissioned almost twenty years later in 1974, and in all 126 episodes were made with the last airing in 1975. Ryan also wrote and illustrated a number of children's books featuring the character; in the 1980s three new comic albums appeared.
...
Wikipedia