HERBLOCK Biography - Other artists & entretainers

 
 

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HERBLOCK

Name: Herbert Lawrence Block                                                         
Born: 13 October 1909                                                               
Died: 7 October 2001                                                                 
                                                                                     
Herbert Lawrence Block, commonly known as Herblock (October 13, 1909 - October 7,   
2001), was an American editorial cartoonist and author.                             
                                                                                     
During the course of his long career, he won three Pulitzer Prizes (1942, 1954,     
1979), the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1994), the National Cartoonist Society     
Editorial Cartoon Award in 1957 and 1960, the Reuben Award in 1956, and the Gold     
Key Award (the National Cartoonists Society Hall of Fame) in 1979.                   
                                                                                     
His first cartoon appeared in the Chicago Daily News on April 24, 1929. It           
advocated for the conservation of America's forests. After working (1933-43) for     
the Newspaper Enterprise Association, in 1946 he joined the Washington Post,         
from which he never retired. His personal assistant for 44 years was Jean           
Rickard, now Executive Director of the Herb Block Foundation. Herblock's last       
cartoon was published on August 26, 2001. He died of pneumonia just six weeks       
later, at the age of 91.                                                             
                                                                                     
During the 1930s, his own political views had become more liberal and he favored     
Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal. He pointed out the dangers of Soviet         
aggression, the growing Nazi menace, and opposed American isolationists. In 1942,   
he won the Pulitzer Prize for the first time. He joined the Washington Post         
after serving in the military during World War II.                                   
                                                                                     
In the early 1950s, Senator Joseph McCarthy was one of his recurring targets,       
for whom Herblock coined the term "McCarthyism" in a particular cartoon in 1950.     
He won a second Pulitzer Prize in 1954.                                             
                                                                                     
Herblock vigorously attacked the political abuses and scandals of the Nixon         
Administration and won his third Pulitzer Prize in 1979. Nixon canceled his         
subscription to the Post after Herblock drew him crawling out of a sewer.           
                                                                                     
In 1986, Block received the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award as well as an honorary       
Doctor of Laws degree from Colby College.