Ed Stein, editorial cartoonist for the Rocky Mountain News, will be speaking at the College of William and Mary (Virginia) on October 12 as part of the American Political Cartoonists exhibit that is running at the college through January 2007. Some of Ed’s work is on display as is a selection of work from Thomas Nast, Bill Mauldin, Dr. Seuss, Herbert Block (Herblock), Pat Oliphant, Garry Trudeau, Signe Wilkinson, and Hugh Haynie. Admission to the lecture is free. Hugh Haynie’s stuff can be seen online.

The movie “Over the Hedge comes out on DVD on the 17th of this month. If you didn’t take my advice from my review and see it in theaters, make sure you pick up a copy of the DVD. The movie is of course based on the comic strip by T. Lewis and Michael Fry.

At age 82, Stan Lee is proving to be somewhat of a super-human. Among some of his activities, he attends comic conventions signing books, works on movie productions (Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer is slated to be released in 2007 and Stan is listed in the writing credits), he had a reality TV show called Who Wants to Be a Superhero?, he runs his own entertainment company called POW (Purveyors of Wonder) and he’s writing Stan Lee meets… to commemorate 65 years with Marvel Comics.

Sandra Bell-Lundy, creator of Between Friends had a very nice write up in the Toronto Star. I can tell I’m getting older – life stories of other people are becoming more interesting to me. Sandra’s Grandmother was sent away to live with another family in 1908 (being only 8 years old) because her family was […]

Fantagraphic Books has an exhibit in New York City featuring 30 years of cartoons by Fantagraphic cartoonists such as Bill Griffith, creator of Zippy the Pinhead.

One doctor is applying a defibrillator while another is removing developers and tossing them into a waste can.Larson and his wife, Toni Carmichael, who own a place on Orcas, are members of the campaign steering committee.”Having spent time on the island off and on since I was a kid, it’s amazed me that to this day it’s been able to retain as much of its unspoiled beauty as it has,” said Larson, who grew up in Tacoma.To donateFor more information and to donate:www.saveturtleback.comThe San Juan Preservation TrustBox 327Lopez Island, WA 98261360-468-3202″My sense of why this is so is because many, if not most, of the people who live here are like-minded in their appreciation for the island’s intrinsic beauty and disconnect from the kind of blight we all see around other parts of the state, where farmlands are converted into shopping malls, rolling hills have become housing developments and sprawl goes unchecked.”Turtleback is owned by the Medina Foundation, a Seattle-based philanthropic organization started by the late Weyerhaeuser tycoon Norton Clapp….  Private gifts total about $6 million so far, and the San Juan Preservation Trust has added $1 million.If the goal isn’t reached, the groups probably would borrow the remaining money and consider selling pieces of Turtleback for development, said Tim Seifert, executive director of the San Juan Preservation Trust.No new development is planned on the mountain’s slopes or summit, beyond carving out hiking trails and possibly a small cabin for the caretaker.More than 540 individuals have donated to the campaign, some inspired by the gift of Sue Cooley, of Seattle, and her son-in-law, Bob Cooley-Gilliom, who are matching individual donations up to $1 million.

Gary and Glenn McCoy have announced a caption contest in yesterday’s The Flying McCoys comic panel.  The panel depicts a space shuttle flying toward an alien mountain that has a gaping mouth (my interpretation).  The contest runs through Oct. 27 and can be entered by visiting their web site at www.theFlyingMcCoys.com.

Mike Luckovich was on CNN’s American Morning on Friday Oct 6th to promote his news book – Four More Wars….  And — but we did decide to make him not get off scot-free, he’s, in addition to talking about his book, “Four More Wars,” he’s drawing a cartoon for us. We’ll tell you about “Four More Wars” in a little bit.Let’s check in with him in his office there.

Pickle’s creator Brian Crane is helping Habitat for Humanity by auctioning off a closet door painted with a four-panel Pickle’s strip.  The action, according to E&P, will take place on Oct. 18.

Every once in a while an article comes along that makes me shake my head and wonder if there was nothing better for the newspaper to publish, and here is a case in point from the Chicago Tribune who, in an effort to write a health story, took Hagar the Horrible and Broom-Hilda – analyzed their health shortcomings and then found a real nutritionist, dermatologist and dietician to advise them on how to shape up.

Dallas Morning News columnist Mike Peters writes a column that reads like an obit for Aaron McGruder’s The Boondocks.Almost overnight, Mr. McGruder was a self-made social commentator, eager to shake our easy assumptions about race.”I don’t write The Boondocks for black people,” he told me in 2003….  I’m trying to make white people see and think about black people.”He did.

Glenn Foden, editorial cartoonist for Marylandâ??s Patuxent Publishing Co. and syndicated through Artizans has illustrated Politics & Pot Roast: An Unofficial, Unauthorized & Completely Unclassified Cookbook by Sarah Hood Salomon. The book came out in August.

I’m still trying to catch up from last weeks vacation and it’s not looking like I’m going to be able to give these stories the individual attention that they deserve, but I wanted to make sure they got some play on the blog.

Tribune Media Services has launched a new comic feature called Raising Hector. The strip has been around in self-syndication since 1996, according to this story in E&P, and is created by Peter Ramirez who is a former police officer – now stay at home dad (which is also the premise of the feature).

Next Saturday, the 14th, the Toy and Action Figure Museum (which also houses the Oklahoma Cartoonist’s collection) will be celebrating their first year in operation….  Three of the inductees are comic strippers – Chester Gould, who was born in Oklahoma and went on to create Dick Tracy; Bill Mauldin, whose first cartoons were published in the Daily Oklahoman; and Dick Locher who (and I think they’re stretching things here) is an Oklahoman by association because of his work on the Dick Tracy strip.Attending the celebration will be Alley Oop producers Jack and Carole Bender.For information on dates, locations, click the link above.