Overview of the Collection |
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| Creator: | Overgard, William. |
| Title: | William Overgard Cartoons |
| Inclusive Dates: | 1954-1968 |
| Quantity: | 3,159 items |
| Abstract: | Original drawings by the American cartoonist, for daily and Sunday installments of Steve Roper. |
| Language: | English |
| Repository: | Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Library 222 Waverly Avenue Syracuse, NY 13244-2010 http://scrc.syr.edu |
William Overgard (1926-1990) was born in Southern California and as a young boy was a fan of the Terry and the Pirates comic. A fan letter he wrote to Milton Caniff led to a correspondence lasting several years and "the only formal training in the cartoon field I was to have." (Encyclopedia of American Comics, p. 282)
In 1948 Overgard launched his career, drawing Crimebuster, the boy hero of Boy Comics, the Little Wise Guys in Daredevil, and a Western strip about a masked cowboy entitled Black Diamond. For Dell, his next employer, Overgard worked as an assistant to Caniff on Steve Canyon and drew at least one original issue of the strip. In 1954 he was assigned to draw Steve Roper, which had for several years been ghosted by various artists though still appearing under the name of the original artist, Elmer Woggon. Overgard was allowed to sign his own name to the strip, and he remained with it for nearly thirty years. For a few years in the early 1970s he also was responsible for the Kerry Drake strip. He left Steve Roper in 1982 in favor of Rudy, an original strip of his own creation about a chimpanzee.
In addition to his artistic endeavors, Overgard wrote thriller novels, screenplays, and scripts for animated series such as Thundercats. He also plays the banjo.
The William Overgard Cartoons consists of a single series containing daily and Sunday panels for the Steve Roper newspaper comic strip.
Cartoons are divided into daily and Sunday strips and then arranged chronologically.
There are no access restrictions on this material
Written permission must be obtained from SCRC and all relevant rights holders before publishing quotations, excerpts or images from any materials in this collection.
Special Collections Research Center has collections of over eighty cartoonists. Please refer to the SCRC Subject Index for a complete listing.
Preferred citation for this material is as follows:
William Overgard Cartoons
Special Collections Research Center,
Syracuse University Library
Created by: TRO
Date: Jul 1969
Revision history: 23 Mar 2007 - converted to EAD (MRC)
| Cartoons | |||||||||||
| Steve Roper | |||||||||||
| Daily strips | |||||||||||
| Package 1 | 1954, Jul-Dec (31 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 1 | 1955 (210 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 2 | 1956 (139 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 3 | 1957 (213 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 3 | 1958 (175 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 4 | 1960 (189 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 5 | 1961 (263 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 6 | 1962 (230 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 7 | 1963 (231 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 8 | 1964 (249 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 9 | 1965 (243 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 10 | 1966 - includes 1 proof (251 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 11 | 1967 (216 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 11 | 1968, Jan-Jun (110 items) | ||||||||||
| Sunday strips | |||||||||||
| Package 12 | 1954-1961 - includes 25 watercolors (110 items) | ||||||||||
| Package 13 | 1962-1968 - includes 2 watercolors (199 items) | ||||||||||
