Tex Blaisdell

Vocation

American comic strip artist and comic book editor. He worked on 22 syndicated features, including Little Orphan Annie, which he drew for five years. Tex Blaisell studied at New York's Art Students League. After four years in the Air Force, he worked for 13 years on strips by Al Capp, Stan Drake, Will Eisner, Irwin Hasen, John Cullen Murphy, Bud Sagendorf, Dick Wingert and others. In the early 1960s, he helped Hal Foster on Prince Valiant, originally doing backgrounds but eventually his contribution escalated to finishing everything but the faces while his assistant Lee Marrs inked the backgrounds. After Harold Gray's death in 1968, Blaisdell stepped in as the artist on Little Orphan Annie, which he continued until 1973, with assists from Paul Kirchner. For Leonard Starr, he handled the backgrounds for Mary Perkins, On Stage. Blaisdell also inked numerous DC Comics, including Green Lantern, Adam Strange, Superman, The Flash and Batman. He taught for years at the Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art. He won the National Cartoonists Society Comic Book Award in 1976. Blaisdell married Elaine French, and the couple lived in Flushing, New York, where he died on March 14, 1999. Link to Wikipedia biography