Lou Darvas
Lou Darvas is an artist who has worked as a sports cartoonist. He received the National Cartoonist Society Sports Cartoon Award for 1963 and 1967 for his work.
Apart from the fact that Lou Darvas worked as a sports cartoonist, and received the National Cartoonist Society Sports Cartoon Award for 1963 and 1967 for his work, not much is mentioned online about this remarkable artist.
Several sites also mention the fact that he authored a book called "You Can Draw Cartoons", published in 1960 by Doubleday, but it seems that the people selling his book are not even aware that Lou passed away many years ago.
Louis F Darvas was born in Cleveland, W 56th Street and Denison Avenue, and he started his artistic journey as a cartoonist at Thomas Jefferson Junior High School, and then at the West Technical High School through the 11th Grade.
Later on he got a job scrapping old signs for an advertising firm, whilst he followed his cartoonist training in night art clases at the old John Huntington Institute.
Lou got his first his first newspaper job with the Toledo News Bee as an artist, but wen to Clevaland and worked with the Cleveland Press from 1938 onwards.
During World War 2, he served in the US Army Air Forces as a head of drafting and art room of the senior staff school, supervising charts and graphs for secret air force statistical records. During his stint in the Army, he won the first place for cartoons in the art show of the Army Air Forces Tactical Center at Orlando, Florida in 1944.
He was the author of a daily comic strip called "Half Nelson" for the Chicago Sun Times Sydicate for a year before returning to Cleveland Press.
His work appared regularly from 1946 onwards on the cover a the national weekly publication: Sporting News.
He was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Sports Media Association of Cleveland, and received the National Cartoonist Society Award for the best work in the field of sports in 1964 and 1968.
Lou Darvas died aged 73, and was survived by his wife Margaret, his daughters Janet and Laura, his son Robert, his stepdaughter Terry Rohde, 2 granchildren and a sister.
His professional cartoonist career also left a legacy behind for those aspiring to become carton artists: His book "You Can Draw Cartoons", which has been republished in different editions under different names, including Cartoon Drawing Greatest Secrets.