from my sketchbook: dorothy dell

Dorothy Dell aspired to fame from the time she was a child. She won a “Beautiful Baby” contest in her native Hattiesburg, Mississippi at one year old and continued to enter and win others throughout her childhood. In high school in Louisiana, she made friends with Mary Leta Dorothy Slaton, another aspiring actress. The pair became known …

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from my sketchbook: lorene yarnell

After meeting while filming the Sid and Marty Krofft special Fol-de-Rol  in 1972, tap dancer Lorene Yarnell married mime Robert Shields in a flamboyant, but silent ceremony in San Francisco’s Union Square. Soon, the duo were cast as regular performers on The Mac Davis Show  and later, The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour.  They performed …

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Monday Artday: villain, part 1

This week’s Monday Artday challenge word is “villain”.  Here is the first of two illustrations for this suggestion. (Here is the second.) She spent her entire screen time in “The Wizard of Oz” tormenting Dorothy Gale. Whether it was in her role as Miss Almira Gulch, the wealthy but crotchety landowner who takes Dorothy’s beloved …

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from my sketchbook: geli raubal

After her husband passed away at the age of 31, desperate and destitute Angela Raubal took her three children and sought refuge with her half-brother. Angela became his housekeeper and he allowed her family to move into his home in the Bavarian Alps in Obersalzberg, Germany. Angela’s half-brother took an unnatural affection to Angela’s youngest …

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from my sketchbook: thuy trang

Thuy Trang was born in Vietnam around the time Communist forces overtook Saigon. Fearing for his life, Thuy’s father, a soldier in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam fighting against the North Vietnam army, fled to Hong Kong with his family after the Communist victory. The family was interred in a detention camp in …

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IF: stir

This week’s Illustration Friday challenge word is “stir”. Poor Thurman Munson. Despite an array of meritorious accomplishments — seven-time All-Star, two-time World Series champion, three-time Gold Glove Winner, 1970 Rookie of the Year and 1976 American League Most Valuable Player — the popular catcher and captain of the New York Yankees took a lot of …

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from my sketchbook: stanley fafara and sue randall

Poor Beaver Cleaver. He was a pretty nice kid, if only he didn’t give in to the misguided persuasion of idiotic Larry Mondello and two-faced liar Gilbert Bates. The antics got Beaver into a certain amount of trouble, though he usually walked away with nothing worse than a torn pair of pants or some lost lunch money. …

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Monday Artday: strange food

The new illustration challenge on the Monday Artday website is “strange food”. To break up the monotony between shots of sun-tanned tourists on cruise ships and Anthony Bourdain’s smoke-filled excursions to out-of-the-way gourmet eateries, the Travel Channel debuted Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern  in 2007. Andrew is a chef, a food critic and, most important, a daring gourmand. He’s a …

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