Editorial Cartoonist Steve Sack announced he is retiring from The Star Tribune today.
It’s with extremely mixed feelings that after 42 years, and some 10,000 cartoons, I have decided to retire from the Star Tribune.
I wish I was able to offer a farewell cartoon. I’ve been away from my drawing table in recent weeks, recovering from hand surgery for carpal tunnel and other nerve issues. I’ll eventually regain use of my hand, but after difficult reflection I’ve decided that I’d like to change my focus. At 68, I have other interests and projects, artistic and otherwise, that I’d like to devote more time to.
Making one less staff editorial cartoonist.
An early Steve Sack cartoon from The Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette of 1979
(as rerun in The Minneapolis Star of 1979):
On April 8, 1981 The Minneapolis Tribune welcomed Steve to the fold:
The last editorial cartoon by Steve was in the February 27, 2022 Star Tribune:
The Steve Sack Star Tribune Archives. The Steve Sack Cagle Cartoons Archives.
We wish Steve the best in, and eagerly await, his future endeavors.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune pays homage to their departing cartoonist:
Steve Sack is best known from Minnesota to France (and no doubt beyond) as a Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist — a master of his craft for more than four decades. But for those of us at Star Tribune Opinion, he’s been so much more.
It’s virtual work now, for the most part, and making the human connection is even more difficult. Yet there were some teary eyes when Steve told our team, over video, that he had decided to retire after 42 years with the Star Tribune.
When the call ended, the memories came flooding back.
… Before the end of the workday, he would turn those sketches into mini-masterpieces displaying what the Pulitzer judges called his “original style and clever ideas to drive home his unmistakable point of view.” Those viewpoints sometimes attracted critics, and more than once I overheard him on the phone patiently explaining to callers that they were entitled to their opinions, and so was he.
Steve Sack’s 2013 Pulitzer Prize-winning portfolio.
Steve was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2004, 2016 and 2017.
In the farewell to Steve The Star Tribune says:
Another staff cartoonist may succeed Steve at the Star Tribune, although a decision on whether to fill the position has not yet been made, and for now we’ll use cartoons from around the country.
Steve Sack: an extraordinary cartoonist, illustrator, sculptor, humorist, creative thinker — most of all, a longtime, dear friend.
No mention of Steve Sack working on the Professor Doodles/Doodles comic strip first with Craig Mac and later the late Chris Foote?
Have a happy retirement, my friend. I’m looking forward to your next endeavor.