Born Zenas Winsor McKay in Canada in 1867, Winsor McCay
developed an interest in drawing from a young age. He attended business college
at the request of his father, a real estate agent who wanted him to become a
businessman. Simultaneously, however, McCay worked as a portrait artist in a
dime museum in Detroit, unbeknown to his parents.
At the age of 21, McCay left business college and began work
at the National Printing Company of Chicago, creating posters and other forms
of illustrated publicity for the purposes of promotion. Two years later, he
relocated to Cincinnati, where he continued to produce promotional material and
gained acknowledgement as a talented artist. In addition, he worked as a
billboard painter, attracting the attention of the public wherever he painted.
In 1891, he married Maude Leonore Dufour, with whom he had
two children, Robert and Marion. Additional pressure of supporting a family
encouraged him to pursue further work as a reporter and illustrator for the
Cincinnati Commercial Tribune. He also submitted drawings to the magazine
‘Life’, from 1899. The end of 1903 saw McCay and his family move to New York
following an invitation from the New York Herald.
McCay’s first notable successes were the comic strips
‘Little Sammy Sneeze’ and ‘Dream of a Rarebit Fiend’, produced in 1904. ‘Little
Sammy Sneeze’ continued to be published every Sunday from July 1904 to December
1906, while ‘Dream of a Rarebit Fiend’, a more adult strip based on adult fears
and nightmares, continued until 1911. Since the latter was produced for the New
York Telegram rather than the Herald, McCay’s contract stipulated that he was
unable to use his real name, and so, for that particular publication, he went
by the pseudonym ‘Silas’. 1905 saw the creation of ‘Little Nemo in
Slumberland’, which was later developed into a Broadway musical.
McCay then went on to perform ‘speed-drawing’ as a
Vaudeville act whilst simultaneously producing strips. After eight years, he
left the Tribune to work for William Randolph Hearst of the New York American.
It was then he began to experiment using animated pictures as his act.
Initially, he used characters from ‘Little Nemo’, followed by ‘How a Mosquito
Operates’, another success. His crowning achievement, however, was 1914’s
humorous animation ‘Gertie the Dinosaur’, in which he interacted with the first
ever character created solely for animated film.
Hearst forbade McCay from pursuing acts outside of the New
York area, believing that it detracted from his work at the paper, and allowed
him only to illustrate editorial cartoons. McCay’s next film, ‘The Sinking of
the Lusitania’, was released in 1918. Despite Hearst opening his own studio,
McCay continued to work on his own films.
McCay died following a stroke in 1934, leaving behind a
legacy for the world of animation.
Sources:
JVJ Publishing http://www.bpib.com/illustrat/mccay.htm
Van Eaton Galleries http://vegalleries.com/winsorbio.html
Beck, J. (ed) (2004) Animation
Art. Fulham: Flame Tree Publishing.
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