Howie Post: 1926 – 2010
Howard “Howie” Post, one of America’s premiere cartoonists, passed away last Friday.
At Harvey Comics, Howie worked on Hot Stuff, Casper the Friendly Ghost, Wendy the Good Little Witch, Richie Rich and his own creation, Spooky The Tuff Li’l Ghost. He produced literally hundreds of stories for the company during his tenure. He is best known among comics fans for his creation Anthro at DC Comics, where he also produced The Adventures of Bob Hope, Jerry Lewis (both with and without Dean Martin) Doodles Duck, J. Rufus Lion and numerous romance stories. He did The Monkey and the Bear, Stawberry Shortcake, Heathcliff, and other features for Marvel Comics as well as their Star Comics imprint.
In the mid-60s Howie succeeded Sy Kneitel as head of Paramount’s animation studio. He was fired for producing a cartoon called Two By Two, which lampooned a story
from the bible. This was very much in keeping with Post’s unconventional lifestyle – called “bohemian” in the days before the beatniks and the hippies. He played a variety of musical instruments and spoke numerous languages. Howie also did television animation for Hanna-Barbara, including their Richie Rich series.
Howie’s greatest exposure under his own name came from his syndicated strip The Dropouts, shortly after Anthro was canceled. It ran from 1968 to 1982 in hundreds of newspapers and enjoyed a short tenure as a Saturday morning animated feature.
In recent years Howie supplemented his retirement income by giving training sessions to budding young cartoonists in the general New York / Connecticut / New Jersey area.
Personally speaking, Howie Post was one of the most outrageous and interesting people I had ever met; I was always in awe of his sharp wit and his unique worldview.
(Thanks to Craig Yoe and Linda Gold for the lead.)
Howie Post, Leonard Starr and Frank Bolle attended the High School of Music & Art with me and we were all friends. Even though Howie was in the class behind us, we stayed in touch and I shall miss his friendship. The last time I spoke to him he seemed to be recovering from his broken hip and was looking forward to getting home to his beloved Pam. He rarely complained and if he did.. it was done lightly by way of a joke. I was glad to see those nice words you wrote, he deserves it all.
Howie Post, Leonard Starr and Frank Bolle attended the High School of Music & Art with me and we were all friends. Even though Howie was in the class behind us, we stayed in touch and I shall miss his friendship. The last time I spoke to him he seemed to be recovering from his broken hip and was looking forward to getting home to his beloved Pam. He rarely complained and if he did.. it was done lightly by way of a joke. I was glad to see those nice words you wrote, he deserves it all.