More Berny Wolf

Berny Wolf's daughter, Lauren Wolf-Purcell, was kind enough to send these photos of her father and some panel cartoons that he created. Click on any image to see an enlargement.

Berny Wolf is on the left at the drawing board and Bud Swift is wearing the Jiminy Cricket hat. Based on the calendar in the background, this picture was taken in May of 1939.

Lauren writes, "The photo in the oval type frame is from the time period he did the work for the MGM Grand Hotel in Vegas and it was used as the photo for the Lowery Gallery brochure that went along with the book, with other animators included, i.e. Ward Kimball, Ken O'Connor, Joe Grant, Frank Thomas, Thor Putnam, Don Lusk, and Ollie Johnston."

Berny Wolf on his 94th birthday.

Lauren writes, "The cartoon panels are ones that he worked on and we could not get syndicated. That is so upsetting to me as he deserved a chance and I promised him, I would try and get him published. So someday, I will find a way, even if it is using his panels in another format."

Berny Wolf

Animator Berny Wolf passed away recently at the age of 95. Information and tributes to him are now popping up in various places. Unfortunately, I have nothing to add but I do want to point out where you can read the information.

Over at Cartoon Brew, Mark Kausler has contributed a biography of Wolf. Mark Evanier has contributed some personal memories of Wolf from the TV animation era. Mark's entry includes a link to the Fleischer Betty Boop cartoon The Old Man of the Mountain. On the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive, Stephen Worth has written about Wolf, posted some model sheets that Wolf worked on at the Iwerks studio and put up a quicktime of the Betty Boop cartoon Minnie the Moocher, where Wolf was responsible for rotoscoping Cab Calloway and turning him into a walrus.

Alberto Becattini's listing for Wolf claims that Wolf was a puppeteer on the Howdy Doody television series. Nobody else is mentioning this, but Wolf's career was so varied that it's very possible.

Ray Pointer's DVD compilation of Fleischer Out of the Inkwell cartoons includes some interview footage with Wolf.

There's some more personal reminiscences of Wolf on this thread at Animation Nation.

UPDATE: John Cawley has written some memories of Berny Wolf during Wolf's time at Film Roman. See John's entry for September 15.