Home > News Story and Obituary Archive

Bill Hume, 1916-2009
posted July 2, 2009
 



William Stanton Hume, a multi-talented artist who worked in a panoply of fields, died on Saturday in a health care facility near Columbia, Missouri. He was 93 years old.

In a professional life that included stints as a ventriloquist, an actor, a playwright, an art director, an animator, a newspaper man and a photographer, Hume's period as a cartoonist was specific and typically successful. Hume served in the Navy in World War II after failing to find work as a cartoonist or on a newspaper staff. He opened an art studio in Columbia after the war and like so many ex-servicemen was called to duty in the early 1950s. Part of his duties as the Naval Air Station in Yokosuka, Japan was the base's newspaper The Oppaman. The cartoons he did with writer John Annarino for the paper about life as lived by servicemen in relation to Japanese women and Japanese culture became enough of a hit to lead to a short series of books. Hume's spotlight character was named "Babysan."

A photos and covers to his books -- including a pair featuring Babysan -- are available at Christopher Wheeler's site.

Hume is survived by a son, a daughter and several grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his wife.