Veteran gag cartoonist Orlando Busino has left us at the age of 95. I don't write these about a lot of magazine cartoonists but Mr. Busino did exceptional work for magazines like McCalls, Reader's Digest, Good Housekeeping and Saturday Evening Post, and many other magazines. His series Gus — cartoons about a large shaggy dog — ran for years in Boys' Life.
I first became familiar with his work, as did my pal Scott Shaw!, during a brief period when Busino worked for the Archie people. His work appeared in Archie's Madhouse and a wonderful, not-sufficiently-recognized comic book called Tales Calculated to Drive You…BATS. It was kind of like "What if Charles Addams had produced MAD?" Scott and I both remember exactly which newsstand we were patronizing in December of 1961 when we glimpsed the cover of Bats #3 (above) and grabbed up our respective copies.
Alas, Busino's time in comic books did not last long and he soon joined the ranks of talented writers and artists who were driven from the industry by its parsimonious business practices. But he did not suffer because magazines eagerly welcomed his work. He just plain drew funny. As Scott noted on Facebook, "He was a member of the National Cartoonists Society and a 3-time recipient of the NCS' Reuben Division Gag Cartoonist of the Year Award and several other awards."
Scott and I just spent some time on the phone talking about how cleverly Mr. Busino designed that Bats cover. I don't want to oversell it because it's just another comic book cover…but it's a real good comic book cover. Artists who draw covers today could learn from Busino's placement of all the elements and the way he leads one's eye around the drawing. If you want to get a better look at it, click here. I was nine and Scott was ten and it did everything a good cover does. It got us to buy the comic and never forget it.
