Barney Google and Snuffy Smith at One Hundred – Cartoonist John Rose Interviewed
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John Rose discusses 100 years of Barney Google and Snuffy Smith.
I had been Fred Lasswell’s inking assistant for three and a half years. When Fred passed away in 2001, I was offered an audition by Jay Kennedy, the late, great longtime editor at King Features. He auditioned four or five other people and apparently liked my work the best. Jay offered me the job to be the cartoonist for Barney Google and Snuffy Smith and with that, he made all my professional dreams come true.
John tells of some centennial celebrations:
As part of the comic strip’s centennial anniversary, IDW is publishing a book entitled Barney Google For President. It will be one of the books in their beautiful Library Of American Comics series. It will come out in December of 2019 and will feature several Barney Google comic strip stories by Billy DeBeck which ran during the height of Barney’s early fame. I was very honored to have a small part in this exciting project. I was asked to write the foreword and also contribute an illustration.
I have created a special storyline that will begin on Monday, June 3rd and run through Tuesday, June 19th. Everyone at King Features has been really helpful and enthusiastic about this storyline. I hope our readers will really like it! It was so much fun to create. I actually came up with the story idea a little over two years ago and have been revisiting, refining and working with it ever since. If Barney Google and Snuffy Smith is not in your local newspaper, you can follow the whole series at my website which is: comicskingdom.com/barney-google-and-snuffy-smith.
John also discusses the only other cartoonists responsible for the 100-year-old comic strip.
The Root Beer Party conducts the interview.
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