The Illustrated Krazy

CODA - A Zephyr from the West

Herriman’s will specified instructions to his attorney for the disposal of his remains, which were cremated and shipped to Arizona to be spread over the land he loved. News of his death reached composer John Carpenter, who spoke with sadness of it to Adolph Bolm, who had danced the role of Krazy Kat in Carpenter’s ballet. Writer Jane Wilson thanked Herriman friend and Katzenjammer Kids cartoonist Rudolph Dirks, along with his wife, Helen, for speaking with her for Herriman’s obituary in Time magazine. A letter from critic Gilbert Seldes pledged his help to E.E. Cummings for a planned anthology of Krazy Kat comics; this book would ensure that Herriman’s influence would live on past his death, including in the work of Charles M. Schulz. Herriman storylines such as pulling away a football and a falling autumn leaf would be echoed in Schulz’s Peanuts, and Schulz himself paid homage to Herriman in this drawing of Ignatz and Charlie Brown. Walt Kelly also paid homage to Herriman in these 1963 Pogo strips. Patrick McDonnell’s comic Mutts frequently contains homages to Herriman.