Alex Anderson, creator of the iconic cartoon characters Rocky and Bullwinkle and Dudley Do-Right, died yesterday at the age of 90.
The grandson of Paul Terry of Terrytoons fame, Anderson and friend Jay Ward created a television pilot entitled “The Comic Strips of Television” in 1948, which featured three ideas for original animated series using a process which would be later called “limited animation,” inspired by a sequence in Walt Disney’s The Reluctant Dragon in which a storyboard is shown rather than full animation. The following year, one of the three series, Crusader Rabbit, went into production, the very first animated television cartoon. Around the same time, Anderson also came up with another idea, The Frostbite Falls Revue, revolving around a group of animals putting on their own show. Among the animals was a flying squirrel named Rocky and a moose named Bullwinkle- the latter inspired by a dream he had in which he had brought a moose to a party.
Anderson chose not to move to Southern California with Ward when he opened up his own studio and thus was not involved hands-on (but acted as a consultant) on the TV show that would bring his characters fame: Rocky and His Friends (later renamed The Bullwinkle Show, currently marketed as Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends), which would not only give the moose and squirrel a starring role, but also feature another character created by Anderson for the “Comic Strips of Television” pilot, Dudley Do-Right.
Anderson did not receive on-screen credit for the creation of the characters, and in 1996 sued Ward Productions- the full details of the settlement remain confidential, but as a result the studio recognized Anderson as the creator of the characters. Despite this, he is not as well known as his former partner, who recieved on-screen credit (alongside the fictional Ponsonby Britt) as producer of the show and is even listed as the creator of the characters in the live-action Bullwinkle film. With Anderson’s passing, hopefully he will get some of the recognition he deserves. Either way, both Anderson and Ward (and Moose and Squirrel) deserve a cheer for helping to usher in a new era of goofy, entertaining animation on television, many of which of today owes a great debt to them- Homer J. Simpson and Bart J. Simpson have their middle initials in honor of Rocket J. Squirrel and Bullwinkle J. Moose (who in turn got theirs from J Troplong Ward), and the creators of Phineas and Ferb have also stated that Bullwinkle was a big influence. And all that entertainment- both then and now- is definitely something I hope you’ll really like.
TIME has a very nice obituary.