Richard Bassford
Encyclopedia
Richard Bassford is an American
illustrator
who has worked in both advertising
and comic books.
from age three, he lived successively in the neighborhoods of Maspeth
, Corona
and Whitestone
until his marriage in 1961, when he moved to Flushing
. In 1975, Bassford settled in Cold Spring, New York
.
As a teenager, he took particular note of comic books drawn by Wally Wood
, who became a major influence. In Manhattan, Bassford studied at the School of Industrial Art (which later became the High School of Art and Design
), and he entered the commercial art
field in the early 1950s with magazine
gag cartoons and packaging art for toy
boxes. His pen-and-ink illustrations were published in the magazine Amateur Art & Camera in 1954.
Bassford's first work in comics came in 1957 with "What Happened on the Mountain!" for Atlas Comics
' World of Mystery, reprinted in Atlas' World of Fantasy #13 (August 1958). At the Wally Wood Studio, Bassford was an artist on Tower Comics
' T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents
almost from the start. Beginning with the second issue, he assisted Wood on the penciling of "Dynamo Battles Dynavac" (reprinted in Tower's The Terrific Trio paperback). Bassford, Wood and Dan Adkins
teamed on The Munsters
, a comic book adaptation of the 1964-66 CBS
television series. Bassford also worked with Gil Kane
on Undersea Agent.
An interview with Bassford about Wally Wood noted the educational aspect of the Wood Studio: "His later black-and-white work using Craftint doubletone board was truly amazing. I learned to use the valuable tones available with Zip-A-Tone
Benday shading sheets simply by studying Woody's application."
After James Warren
recruited Bassford for Warren Publishing
in the early 1970s, beginning with an illustration in Vampirella
#11 (May, 1971), he contributed to both Creepy and Eerie
. For Creepy
#39 he drew "The Dragon Prow" from a Steve Skeates
script, and in issue #41, he executed "The Hangman of London" for "Creepy's Loathsome Lore." For Eerie
#39, he illustrated Doug Moench
's "The Mysterious Men in Black!" for "Eerie's Monster Gallery."
His work as an illustrator spans a wide range of subjects from science fiction
and fantasy
interiors to color cartoons and the poems of Nick Kenny
. His airbrush
ed informational-card illustrations for International Masters Publishers
have covered military aircraft; mermaids and creatures for IMP's Myths and Monsters series; and Sports Heroes, Feats & Facts.
Bassford's drawings have appeared in a variety of publications, including Screw and Bill Pearson's Sata. For the magazine Fantastic
he illustrated two stories: "The Forest of Unreason" by Robert F. Young (July 1961) and The Trekkers by Daniel F. Galouye
(September 1961).
The client list for Bassford's advertising art includes Disney
, General Electric
, IBM
, Nestle
, People's Bank and Waldenbooks
. Over decades, he continued to do cartoons and illustrations for corporate audio-visual advertising art presentations, such as a slide show of 79 cartoons for GE Lighting and 36 cartoons for a People's Bank promotion. He returned to comics in 1986 when he teamed with Pearson on the story "Daddy's Little Girl" for Lurid Tales, published by Eros Comix
, an imprint of Fantagraphics Books
.
’s attempt to sell West Point to the British during the American Revolution, the capture of British Major John André
and his execution in Tappan, New York
. In 2003, he was a contributor of both text and art to Bhob Stewart
's Against the Grain: Mad Artist Wallace Wood, and his T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents pages were reprinted in the hardback T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents Archive series (2003-05), published by DC Comics
. In 2006, he provided illustrations for Bill Pearson's novel, Drifter's Detour.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
illustrator
Illustrator
An Illustrator is a narrative artist who specializes in enhancing writing by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text...
who has worked in both advertising
Advertising
Advertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...
and comic books.
Biography
Raised in the New York City borough of QueensQueens
Queens is the easternmost of the five boroughs of New York City. The largest borough in area and the second-largest in population, it is coextensive with Queens County, an administrative division of New York state, in the United States....
from age three, he lived successively in the neighborhoods of Maspeth
Maspeth, Queens
Maspeth is a small community in the borough of Queens in New York City. Neighborhoods sharing borders with Maspeth are Woodside and Sunnyside to the north, Long Island City to the northwest, Greenpoint to the west, East Williamsburg to the southwest, Fresh Pond and Ridgewood to the south, and...
, Corona
Corona, Queens
Corona is a densely-populated neighborhood in the former Township of Newtown in the borough of Queens in New York City, New York, United States...
and Whitestone
Whitestone, Queens
Whitestone is a residential neighborhood in the northernmost part of the City of New York borough of Queens. Located between the East River to the north and 25th Avenue to the south. Whitestone is surrounded by College Point, Flushing, Bayside, Auburndale, Linden Hill, and Murray Hill...
until his marriage in 1961, when he moved to Flushing
Flushing, Queens
Flushing, founded in 1645, is a neighborhood in the north central part of the City of New York borough of Queens, east of Manhattan.Flushing was one of the first Dutch settlements on Long Island. Today, it is one of the largest and most diverse neighborhoods in New York City...
. In 1975, Bassford settled in Cold Spring, New York
Cold Spring, New York
Cold Spring is a village located in the Town of Philipstown in Putnam County, New York. The population was 1,983 at the 2000 census. It borders the smaller village of Nelsonville...
.
As a teenager, he took particular note of comic books drawn by Wally Wood
Wally Wood
Wallace Allan Wood was an American comic book writer, artist and independent publisher, best known for his work in EC Comics and Mad. He was one of Mads founding cartoonists in 1952. Although much of his early professional artwork is signed Wallace Wood, he became known as Wally Wood, a name he...
, who became a major influence. In Manhattan, Bassford studied at the School of Industrial Art (which later became the High School of Art and Design
High School of Art and Design
The High School of Art and Design is a Career and Technical Education high school located at 1075 Second Avenue, between 56th and 57th Streets in Manhattan, New York City, New York.It is operated by the New York City Department of Education...
), and he entered the commercial art
Commercial art
Commercial art is historically a subsector of creative services, referring to art created for commercial purposes, primarily advertising. The term has become increasingly anachronistic in favor of more contemporary terms such as graphic design and advertising art.Commercial art traditionally...
field in the early 1950s with magazine
Magazine
Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...
gag cartoons and packaging art for toy
Toy
A toy is any object that can be used for play. Toys are associated commonly with children and pets. Playing with toys is often thought to be an enjoyable means of training the young for life in human society. Different materials are used to make toys enjoyable and cuddly to both young and old...
boxes. His pen-and-ink illustrations were published in the magazine Amateur Art & Camera in 1954.
Bassford's first work in comics came in 1957 with "What Happened on the Mountain!" for Atlas Comics
Atlas Comics (1950s)
Atlas Comics is the term used to describe the 1950s comic book publishing company that would evolve into Marvel Comics. Magazine and paperback novel publisher Martin Goodman, whose business strategy involved having a multitude of corporate entities, used Atlas as the umbrella name for his comic...
' World of Mystery, reprinted in Atlas' World of Fantasy #13 (August 1958). At the Wally Wood Studio, Bassford was an artist on Tower Comics
Tower Comics
Tower Comics was an American comic book publishing company best known for Wally Wood's T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, a strange combination of secret agents and superheroes; and Samm Schwartz's Tippy Teen, an Archie Andrews clone...
' T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents
T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents
T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents is a fictional team of superheroes that appeared in comic books originally published by Tower Comics in the 1960s. They were an arm of the United Nations and were notable for their depiction of the heroes as everyday people whose heroic careers were merely their day jobs...
almost from the start. Beginning with the second issue, he assisted Wood on the penciling of "Dynamo Battles Dynavac" (reprinted in Tower's The Terrific Trio paperback). Bassford, Wood and Dan Adkins
Dan Adkins
Dan Adkins is an American illustrator who worked mainly for comic books and science-fiction magazines.-Early life and career:...
teamed on The Munsters
The Munsters
The Munsters is a 1960s American family television sitcom depicting the home life of a family of monsters. It starred Fred Gwynne as Herman Munster and Yvonne De Carlo as his wife, Lily Munster. The series was a satire of both traditional monster movies and popular family entertainment of the era,...
, a comic book adaptation of the 1964-66 CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
television series. Bassford also worked with Gil Kane
Gil Kane
Eli Katz who worked under the name Gil Kane and in one instance Scott Edward, was a comic book artist whose career spanned the 1940s to 1990s and every major comics company and character.Kane co-created the modern-day versions of the superheroes Green Lantern and the Atom for DC Comics, and...
on Undersea Agent.
An interview with Bassford about Wally Wood noted the educational aspect of the Wood Studio: "His later black-and-white work using Craftint doubletone board was truly amazing. I learned to use the valuable tones available with Zip-A-Tone
Screentone
Screentone is a technique for applying textures and shades to drawings, used as an alternative to hatching. In the conventional process, patterns are transferred to paper from preprinted sheets, but the technique is also simulated in computer graphics...
Benday shading sheets simply by studying Woody's application."
After James Warren
James Warren (publisher)
James Warren is a magazine publisher and founder of Warren Publishing.Magazines published by Warren include Creepy, Vampirella and Famous Monsters of Filmland...
recruited Bassford for Warren Publishing
Warren Publishing
Warren Publishing was an American magazine company founded by James Warren, who published his first magazines in 1957 and continued in the business for decades...
in the early 1970s, beginning with an illustration in Vampirella
Vampirella
Vampirella is a fictional character, a comic book vampire heroine created by Forrest J Ackerman and costume designer Trina Robbins in Warren Publishing's black-and-white horror comics magazine Vampirella #1 . Writer-editor Archie Goodwin later developed the character from horror-story hostess, in...
#11 (May, 1971), he contributed to both Creepy and Eerie
Eerie
Eerie was an American magazine of horror comics introduced in 1966 by Warren Publishing. Like Mad, it was a black-and-white newsstand publication in a magazine format and thus did not require the approval or seal of the Comics Code Authority. Each issue's stories were introduced by the host...
. For Creepy
Creepy
Creepy was an American horror-comics magazine launched by Warren Publishing in 1964. Like Mad, it was a black-and-white newsstand publication in a magazine format and thus did not require the approval or seal of the Comics Code Authority. The anthology magazine was initially published quarterly but...
#39 he drew "The Dragon Prow" from a Steve Skeates
Steve Skeates
Steve Skeates is an American comic book creator known for his work on books such as Spectre, Hawk and Dove, T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, Aquaman, and Namor the Sub-Mariner.-Career:...
script, and in issue #41, he executed "The Hangman of London" for "Creepy's Loathsome Lore." For Eerie
Eerie
Eerie was an American magazine of horror comics introduced in 1966 by Warren Publishing. Like Mad, it was a black-and-white newsstand publication in a magazine format and thus did not require the approval or seal of the Comics Code Authority. Each issue's stories were introduced by the host...
#39, he illustrated Doug Moench
Doug Moench
Douglas Moench , better known as Doug Moench, is an American comic book writer notable for his Batman work and as the creator of Black Mask, Moon Knight and Deathlok.-Biography:...
's "The Mysterious Men in Black!" for "Eerie's Monster Gallery."
His work as an illustrator spans a wide range of subjects from science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
and fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
interiors to color cartoons and the poems of Nick Kenny
Nick Kenny (poet)
Nicholas Aloysius Kenny was a syndicated newspaper columnist, a song lyricist and a poet who wrote light verse in the Edgar Guest tradition.-Biography:...
. His airbrush
Airbrush
An airbrush is a small, air-operated tool that sprays various media including ink and dye, but most often paint by a process of nebulization. Spray guns developed from the airbrush and are still considered a type of airbrush.-History:...
ed informational-card illustrations for International Masters Publishers
International Masters Publishers
International Masters Publishers is a publisher with activities in 35 countries. IMP creates and markets products within the areas of recipes and cookery, home and hobbies, entertainment and education....
have covered military aircraft; mermaids and creatures for IMP's Myths and Monsters series; and Sports Heroes, Feats & Facts.
Bassford's drawings have appeared in a variety of publications, including Screw and Bill Pearson's Sata. For the magazine Fantastic
Fantastic (magazine)
Fantastic was an American digest-size fantasy and science fiction magazine, published from 1952 to 1980. It was founded by Ziff-Davis as a fantasy companion to Amazing Stories. Early sales were good, and Ziff-Davis quickly decided to switch Amazing from pulp format to digest, and to cease...
he illustrated two stories: "The Forest of Unreason" by Robert F. Young (July 1961) and The Trekkers by Daniel F. Galouye
Daniel F. Galouye
Daniel Francis Galouye was an American science fiction writer. During the 1950s and 1960s, he contributed novelettes and short stories to various digest size science fiction magazines, sometimes writing under the pseudonym Louis G...
(September 1961).
The client list for Bassford's advertising art includes Disney
The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...
, General Electric
General Electric
General Electric Company , or GE, is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in Schenectady, New York and headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut, United States...
, IBM
IBM
International Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
, Nestle
Nestlé
Nestlé S.A. is the world's largest food and nutrition company. Founded and headquartered in Vevey, Switzerland, Nestlé originated in a 1905 merger of the Anglo-Swiss Milk Company, established in 1867 by brothers George Page and Charles Page, and Farine Lactée Henri Nestlé, founded in 1866 by Henri...
, People's Bank and Waldenbooks
Waldenbooks
Waldenbooks , operated by the Walden Book Company, Inc., was an American shopping mall-based bookstore chain and a subsidiary of Borders Group. The chain also ran a video game and software chain under the name Waldensoftware as well as a children's edutainment chain under Walden Kids...
. Over decades, he continued to do cartoons and illustrations for corporate audio-visual advertising art presentations, such as a slide show of 79 cartoons for GE Lighting and 36 cartoons for a People's Bank promotion. He returned to comics in 1986 when he teamed with Pearson on the story "Daddy's Little Girl" for Lurid Tales, published by Eros Comix
Eros Comix
Eros Comix is an adult-oriented imprint of Fantagraphics Books, established in 1990 to publish pornographic comic books. Eros Comix sells anime videos, DVDs, adult comic books, and books of erotic art and photography...
, an imprint of Fantagraphics Books
Fantagraphics Books
Fantagraphics Books is an American publisher of alternative comics, classic comic strip anthologies, magazines, graphic novels, and the adult-oriented Eros Comix imprint...
.
Books
For Hope Farm Press, Bassford illustrated Crisis in the Lower Hudson (1995), about Benedict ArnoldBenedict Arnold
Benedict Arnold V was a general during the American Revolutionary War. He began the war in the Continental Army but later defected to the British Army. While a general on the American side, he obtained command of the fort at West Point, New York, and plotted to surrender it to the British forces...
’s attempt to sell West Point to the British during the American Revolution, the capture of British Major John André
John André
John André was a British army officer hanged as a spy during the American War of Independence. This was due to an incident in which he attempted to assist Benedict Arnold's attempted surrender of the fort at West Point, New York to the British.-Early life:André was born on May 2, 1750 in London to...
and his execution in Tappan, New York
Tappan, New York
Tappan is a hamlet in the Town of Orangetown, Rockland County, New York, United States located north of Old Tappan, New Jersey; east of Nauraushaun and Pearl River; south of Blauvelt and west of Palisades and Sparkill...
. In 2003, he was a contributor of both text and art to Bhob Stewart
Bhob Stewart
Bhob Stewart is an American writer, editor, artist and film maker who has written for a variety of publications over a span of five decades. His articles and reviews have appeared in TV Guide, Publishers Weekly and other publications, along with online contributions to Allmovie, the Collecting...
's Against the Grain: Mad Artist Wallace Wood, and his T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents pages were reprinted in the hardback T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents Archive series (2003-05), published by DC Comics
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
. In 2006, he provided illustrations for Bill Pearson's novel, Drifter's Detour.