British Cartoon Archive

“TROW” has been claimed as the pseudonym of Frank Eric Smith, who was born in Salisbury on 2 March 1908, lived...

Christian Adams was born in Warlingham, Surrey, on 10 June 1966. He later recalled that waiting for the weekly comic...

Rex Audley was born in Cobridge in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire in 1927. He was educated at Wolstanton County Grammar School...

David Austin was born on 29 March 1935 in Chelmsford, Essex, the son of a shoe manufacturer. He attended...

Brian Bagnall was born in Crumpsall, Manchester on 22 April 1921, the eldest son of Vincent Bagnall, a businessman working...

David Banks was born in London on 7 August 1963 and was educated at Stoke Brunswick School and, from 1977...

Jeremy Banks [Banx] was born in London in 1959. He became a freelance cartoonist in 1980, and since 1989...

Gary Barker was born in Fleetwood, Lancashire in 1963. He trained as a geologist and later as an environmental...

Harry Guy Bartholomew was born in London on 17 October 1884, and, after leaving school at the age of fourteen,...

Les Barton was born on 8 December 1923 in Wareham, Dorset. A self-taught artist, he started work at the...

A. E. Beard was born in Birmingham on 16 January 1902. He studied at the Birmingham School of Art, and...

Steve Bell was born on 26 February 1951 in Walthamstow, London, where his father was an engineer. Bell was...

Margaret Belsky was born Margaret Constance Owen in Dorset on 20 June 1919. Nicknamed ‘Cooee’ by her Australian-Irish father,...

Neil Bennett (‘NB’) was born in Warsop, Nottinghamshire, on 13 January 1941, the son of Stanley Bennett, a headmaster....

Nicolas – originally Nicholas – Bentley was born on 14 June 1907 in Hampstead, London. The son of the...

Andrew Birch was born in Burton-on-Trent, Staffordshire, in 1952. Despite a remarkable facility for drawing Pterodactyls, he was pushed...

Patrick Blower was born in Brussels on 10 January 1959, the son of Michael Blower, an English architect. Educated...

Mark Boxer was born in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire, on 19 May 1931, the son of Steven Boxer, an army officer....

Frank Boyle (also know as Francis Boyle) was born in Falkirk, Scotland in 1952. From 1964 to 1970 he attended...

Hector Breeze was born in London on 17 November 1928, and educated at Dartford Technical College. He was first...

Frank Brown was born on 8 May 1926 in Forest Gate, London. He was the son of Sidney Brown, a...

Dave Brown was born in Barnehurst, Kent, on 4 December 1957 the son of Arthur Leslie Brown, a teacher....

Eric Burgin was born in Maidenhead on 3 February 1926 and educated at Gordon Road School in the town. At...

Bill Caldwell was born in Glasgow on 30 September 1946, the son of William McComish, an opera singer and musical...

Melville “Mel” Calman was born in Stamford Hill in London on 19 May 1931. His father, Clement Calman, was a...

Kate Charlesworth was born in Barnsley, Yorkshire, in 1950. Educated at Wombwell High School, Barnsley, from 1961 to 1968,...

Emilio Coia was born in Glasgow on 13 April 1911, the son of Giovanni Coia, an Italian immigrant who owned...

Richard Cole was born on 19 August 1942 in Wimbledon, London, the son of Archibald George Cole, an ecclesiastical...

Born in Weston-Super-Mare, Somerset on 6 February 1942, Clive Collins studied graphic design at Kingston School of Art in...

Bernard Cookson was born in Manchester on 3 January 1937, the son of Richard Cookson, an engineer. From 1953...

Tom Cottrell was born in South Mimms, Hertfordshire in 1890, the son of Charles Henry Cottrell, who moved to...

Michael Cummings was born in Leeds on 1 June 1919. His mother was an artist, and his father was...

Michael Daley was born in Hull, Yorkshire, on 15 January 1944 and was educated at Hull High School for...

Andy Davey was born in London in 1956. He trained as a research chemist, but became a professional caricaturist and...

Michael ffolkes was born Brian Davis in London on 6 June 1925, the son of the commercial graphic artist Walter Lawrence...

Frank Dickens was born in Hornsey, North London, on 2 February 1932, the son of a painter and decorator....

Jack Dunkley was born in Holloway, London, in 1906, and educated at Sir Hugh Middleton Secondary School. At the age...

Philip Emms was born in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, on 2 July 1941. After studying aeronautical engineering at Hatfield...

Barry Fantoni was born in London on 28 February 1940, the son of Peter Fantoni, an Italian-born painter. Educated at...

Simon Farr was born in Harrow, Middlesex, on 9 November 1950. He was educated at Harrow School of Fine...

Walter Ernest (“Wally”) Fawkes was born in Vancouver, Canada, on 21 June 1924, and came to England with his family...

Percy Fearon was born in Shanghai, China, on 6 September 1874, of English parents. His father then moved to business...

Arthur John Ferrier was born in Glasgow on 15 November 1890, the son of John Ferrier, an organist. He...

Jacky Fleming was born in London in 1955, and attended the North London Collegiate School for Girls. A Foundation...

Noel Ford was born on 22 December 1942 in Nuneaton, Warwickshire, the son of Thomas Joseph Ford and Martha...

Frank Wallis Ford (1906-1970) was born on 28th June 1906 at Forest Hill, South London, the son of Harry Ford,...

Stanley Franklin was born on 30 October 1930 in Bow, London, the son of a coppersmith. While still at school...

George Chrystal was born in Aberdeen. After war service in the RAF as a pilot-instructor, he attended Gray’s School...

Jimmy Friell was born in Glasgow on 13 March 1912, the fifth of the seven children of James Friell, the...

Derek Fullarton grew up in Salisbury, and at the age of twelve won a scholarship to Salisbury Art School. During...

George Paterson Gale was born on 11 June 1929 in Leven, Fife. He went to a local school, and then...

Nicholas Withycombe Garland was born on 1 September 1935 in Hampstead, London, the son of Thomas Garland, a doctor, and...

David Thomas Gaskill was born in Liverpool on 27 May 1939, the son of Ernest Gaskill, a sergeant in the...

Carl Giles was born in Islington, north London, on 29 September 1916. His father, Albert Giles, was a tobacconist,...

Harold Gittins was born in Manchester in 1895, the son of a Post Office worker. He became apprenticed to a...

John McGlashan [Glashan] was born in Glasgow on 24 December 1927, the son of portrait painter and Royal Scottish Academician,...

Jack Greenall was born in Whitefield, Lancashire, in 1905. He sold his first cartoon at the age of fifteen, and...

Charles Griffin was born in Ruislip, Middlesex, on 20 May 1946, the son of Alec Griffin, a furniture manufacturer’s agent....

Barry Gurbutt was born in Louth in Lincolnshire on 13 January 1933. Educated in Lincoln, he did National Service before going to...

Bert Hackett was born in Birmingham on 28 June 1933, and attended the Birmingham College of Art from 1949 to...

David Haldane was born on 10 November 1954 in Blyth, Northumberland, and studied graphic design at Newcastle-upon-Tyne Polytechnic. After...

Harry Hargreaves was born in Manchester on February 9 1922, the son of a civil servant. He was educated...

Cliff Harper was born on 13 July 1949 in Chiswick, North London. His father was a postman, and his mother...

W.K Haselden was born in Spain on 3 December 1872, the son of Adolphe Henry Haselden, the English director...

Michael Heath was born on 13 October 1935 in Bloomsbury, London, the only child of George Heath, whom he...

Graham High was born in Dundee, Scotland, on 27 March 1957. He studied drawing and painting at Edinburgh College...

Frank Hoar was born in India in 1909. He attended Plymouth College, Devon, and, at the age of fifteen, won...

Haro Hodson was born in Glasgow on 9 February 1923, the second son of Canon R.V. Hodson, a hunting parson...

Bernard Hollowood was born in Burslem, Staffordshire, on 3 June 1910. The son of Albert Hollowood, clerk and amateur...

Basil Hone was born on 4 October 1926. The son of a school attendance officer, he was educated at the...

Martin Honeysett was born in Hereford on May 20 1943 and brought up in Croydon. He went to Selhurst...

E. H. Shepard was born on 10 December 1879 in St John’s Wood, London, the son of Henry Dunkin Shepard,...

Clive Hudson was born in Liverpool on 31 January 1926. He worked for the Inland Revenue, but drew cartoons...

Leslie Illingworth was born in Barry, Glamorgan, on 2 September 1902. His father was Richard Illingworth, a Yorkshire quantity surveyor...

Raymond Jackson was born in the Middlesex Hospital, London, on 11 March 1927, the son of Maurice Jackson, a tailor...

Cyril Jacob was born in Dulwich, London, on 25 February 1926, the second of four sons of William Charles...

Ben Jennings was born in Hemel Hempstead, and began cartooning at school, recalling that in his maths class he’d...

Gren Jones was born on 13 June 1934 in Hengoed, in the Rhymney Valley in Wales, the son of Harry...

William John Philpin Jones – known as John Jones – was born in Llandrindod Wells, Wales, on 17 August 1913,...

Ian Knox was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, on 4 May 1943. After attending the Royal Belfast Academical Institution from...

Kathryn Lamb is one of the UK’s leading female cartoonists. Lamb’s parents worked for the Foreign Office, and her...

David Langdon was born in London on 24 February 1914, the son of Bennett Langdon and his wife Bess. Keen...

Geoffrey Frederick Laws was born in 1947 in Blyth, a busy shipbuilding and coal exporting port in Northumberland. He...

Joe Lee was born in Burley-in-Wharfedale, near Leeds, on 16 May 1901. He won a scholarship to Leeds Grammar School,...

John Longstaff was born in Darlington, Co. Durham, on 25 June 1949. He studied graphics at Teesside College of...

Humphrey Richard Adeane Lyttelton was born in Eton College, Windsor, on 23 May 1921. The second son of the...

Kenneth Mahood was born in Belfast on 4 February 1930, claiming to have been brought up “in a religious community...

Bryan McAllister was born in Peterborough in 1945, but moved to Bath in his early teens and attended Keynsham Grammar...

Bill McArthur was born in 1939. He studied drawing and painting at Edinburgh College of Art, then took a degree...

Malky McCormick was born in Glasgow in 1943, beside the football stadium in Hampden Park. His first cartoon was...

Born in Humberstone, Leicestershire, on 22 April 1940, Ed McLachlan attended Wyggeston Grammar School and, from 1956 to 1959, Leicester College...

Stan McMurtry was born in Edinburgh on 4 May 1936, but moved to Birmingham at the age of eight. His...

Gerard Jerome Melling – known as “Ged” (pronounced Jed) – was born on 6 January 1934 in Stirling, the...

John Miles was the son of a policeman, and was born on 21 August 1934 in the police station at...

Born in Guildford, Surrey, on 13 August 1949, John Minnion is largely self-taught as an artist. In the early...

Bob Moran went to Wellington School in Somerset, and graduated from the illustration degree at University College Falmouth in...

John Musgrave-Wood was born in Leeds on 22 February 1915, the son of Gerald Musgrave-Wood, a painter of landscapes and...

David Myers was born in London on 8 December 1925, the son of Sidney Myers, a civil engineer, and his...

Ronald Niebour was born in Streatham, London, on 4 April 1903, and educated at Barry County School with Leslie Illingworth....

Don Osmond was born in 1929. In 1946, at the age of seventeen, he joined the Southern Daily Echo in...

Bernard Partridge was born in London on 11 October 1861, the youngest son of Professor Richard Partridge FRS, President of...

David Philip Millar was born on 28 August 1909, and started his professional cartooning career in the 1930s as...

Ingram Pinn was born in Bristol in 1950, and studied Fine Art at Camberwell School of Art before working as...

Ian Pollock was born in Cheadle, Cheshire in 1950, the son of Gordon Pollock, a traditional claypipe manufacturer. He was...

Chris Priestley was born in Hull on 25 August 1958. He was an avid reader of American comics as a...

Matthew Pritchett was born on 14 July 1964, the son of Daily Telegraph columnist Oliver Pritchett and grandson of...

Jonathan Pugh was born in Worcester on 17 February 1962, the son of John Mervyn Cullwick Pugh, a Bromsgrove solicitor....

Ken Pyne was born in London on 30 April 1951, the son of John Ernest Pyne, a boot-repairer. Self-taught,...

Bryan Reading was born in London on 24 February 1935. After serving an apprenticeship in printing, he worked in advertising...

Glyn Rees was born in Cardiff in 1946. Whilst at art college, Rees contributed some early cartoons to OUTRAGE...

Chris Riddell was born on 13 April 1962 in Cape Town, South Africa, where his father was an Anglican priest...

Don Roberts was born in Devon on 17 April 1936, the son of a hotelier. After spending more than seven...

David Rowe was born in Preston in 1924. In 1962 he began drawing the long-running “Playboy” series for the Daily...

Martin Rowson was born in London on 15 February 1959, and is the adopted son of Dr K.E. Rowson, a...

John Gerald Christopher Ryan was born in Edinburgh on 4 March 1921, the youngest son of the diplomat Sir...

Gerald Scarfe was born on 1 June 1936 in St John’s Wood, London, the son of Reginald Scarfe, a City...

David Shenton was born in Ashton-under-Lyne, Lancashire, on 20 May 1949. He was educated at Ashton-under-Lyne Grammar School from 1960,...

Robert Stewart “Bob” Sherriffs was born in Arbroath, Scotland, on 13 February 1906, the son of a flax merchant....

James Austin Sillavan (JAS) was born in Cheshire in 1950, and studied Advertising at Manchester Art School. He spent...

David Simonds was born in Pinner, Middlesex, on 18 May 1961 and after taking a one-year Foundation Course at St...

Gary Smith was born in Portsmouth on 5 December 1963 and is self-taught as a cartoonist. As he later recalled,...

Born in Barking, Essex, on 8 December 1915, George Smith left school at sixteen to work as a clerk in the...

David Smith was born in Leeds on 7 March 1955, and educated at Gotts Park Secondary School. With the help of a...

David Smith was born in Kings Lynn, Norfolk in 1943, and studied at both St Martin’s School of Art and...

Reg Smythe was born Reginald Smyth in Hartlepool, in the north of England, on 10 July 1917. He was the...

Will Spencer was born in the East End of London on 23 April 1921. He trained at his local...

Sidney Strube (pronounced “Stroobee”) was born in Bishopsgate, London, on 30 December 1892, the son of Conrad Frederick Strube, a...

Bert Thomas was born in Newport, Monmouthshire, on 13 October 1883, the son of Job Thomas, a sixty-five year old...

Harold Underwood Thompson was born in West Kirby, Cheshire, on 9 April 1911. His father, Arthur Henry Thompson, was an...

William Edward “Bill” Tidy was born in Tranmere, Cheshire, on 9 October 1933, the son of William Edward Tidy and...

Jim Turnbull was born in 1930 in Maryhill, Glasgow, near Partick Thistle’s Firhill football ground. The son of a railway...

Martyn Turner was born on 24 June 1948 in Wanstead, Essex, the son of Ernest Turner, a general dealer. He...

Roy Ullyett was born in Leytonstone, Essex, on 16 March 1914, the son of Henry John Emerson Ullyett, Secretary-Manager of...

Brian Walker was born in Brislington, Bristol, on 22 March 1926. When he was fourteen he enrolled on a...

Alex Noel Watson was born in Airdrie, Lanarkshire, on 2 December 1929, the son of Alex Grant Watson, a journalist,...

Tony Weare was born in Wincanton, Somerset, on 1 January 1912. Tony Weare later recalled that he was always...

Gilbert Tom Webster was born in Bilston, Staffordshire, on 17 July 1886, the son of an ironmonger. He was...

Born in Hindhead, Surrey, on 23 February 1938, Colin Wheeler studied at Farnham School of Art from 1954 to 1958, and...

Hugh Brian White was born in Luton on 4 April 1902. Brian White became an artist and film animator,...

Frank Whitford was born in Bishopstoke, Hampshire, on 11 August 1941 and is a self-taught artist. From 1965 to...

Colin Whittock was born in Birmingham on 25 February 1940. Having failed “O” level art at the Central Grammar School,...

Gilbert Wilkinson was born in Liverpool in October 1891. He studied at Liverpool Art School for a year, then...

Glan Williams was born in Pentrechwyth, Swansea, Wales, on 1 September 1911. At the age of fourteen he won a...

Mike Williams was born in Liverpool on 24 February 1940, he attended Quarry Bank Grammar School. A self-taught artist,...

Christopher Williams was born in the Wirral, Cheshire, on 30 December 1951, the son of Aubrey Williams, a local...

Richard Willson was born in London on 15 May 1939, the son of an importer of bone and horn....

Arthur Wragg was born near Manchester in 1903, and studied at Sheffield School of Art from about 1916. In 1923...

David Wright was born in London on 12 December 1912, to parents who were both artists. When he was...

Richard Yeend was born in London on 5 April 1945, and was educated at Canterbury Cathedral Choir School, Kings College,...

Philip Zec was born in London on 25 December 1909, the fourth of the eleven children of Simon Zecanovsky, a...