I'm a day or two late in noting the passing of Julian "Bud" Blake, who wrote and drew the newspaper strip Tiger for close to 40 years. Tiger was one of those "stealth" strips that was widely respected but often overlooked. Blake won the Reuben award three times, which is a lot, but I can't recall ever hearing anyone say Tiger was their favorite strip or even mentioning it when they rattled off a list of the greats. On the other hand, I also can't recall ever hearing anyone say they didn't like it. On the rare occasions it was brought up in a group of cartoonists, the unanimous opinion would be, "Oh, yeah. He's great. Is he still doing that?" I have to admit that I never followed it on any regular basis even though when I did see it, it always impressed me as well done.
Here's a link to one of the many obits currently on the web. There seems to be some confusion as to whether Blake was still producing Tiger at the time of his death or if it had been handed over to assistants or what. My understanding — correct me if I'm wrong, somebody — is that Blake retired two years ago at the age of 85 and that while it was reported then that other hands would begin writing and drawing the feature, that never happened. Instead, it quietly went reprint…and since the strip was timeless and Blake's style had changed so little over the years, few noticed. Most of its 100 or so remaining client papers are overseas and King Features will continue to offer it to them in reprints.