Every week the Isanti-Chisago County Star publishes a cartoon on page four with the signature, Joe Heller. Every week, Joe Heller makes us laugh, critically think, and sometimes makes us angry – all with a stroke of a pen.
But just who is this cartoonist?
Sierra Kingen, of the Northstar Media, profiles Joe Heller and his 40+ year cartooning career.
Here is the article from their Isanti-Chisago County Star paper.
Many, many years ago, cartoonists were syndicated; that syndicate represented the artists to the paper. I used to be like that, but I dissolved it and started my own,” Heller described.
Heller created his own syndicate and is able to represent himself to papers and social media, being able to take the full amount of profit earned instead of the distribution between syndicate and artist. This creation of the syndicate fully took shape when he was laid off ten years ago from the Green Bay Press[-Gazette].
Currently, Heller has a circulation of around 400 papers, with the specific number fluctuating due to newspapers’ budgets and other outside circumstances.
To see more of Heller’s work, visit his website at https://www.hellertoon.com/, follow him on social media, or subscribe to any of the Northstar Media, Inc. newspapers near you.
loved Joe’s cartoons and cancelled my p g subscription soon after they fired him
Having lived in three cities within a fifty mile radius of Green Bay all my life, the newspaper is the Green Bay Press-Gazette.