PHOENIX (AP) - Bil Keane "Family Circus" comics readers entertained with a simple but sublime blend of humor and traditional family values more than half a century. Supported the appeal, the author believes, because the American public needs consistency.
Keane, who began drawing a caricature of a panel with Billy, Jeffy, Dolly, PJ and their parents in February 1960, died Tuesday at age 89 at his home life in Paradise Valley near Phoenix. His comic strip appears in nearly 1,500 newspapers around the country.
Jeff Keane, Keane son, who lives in Laguna Hills, California, said his father died of congestive heart failure with one of her other children at his side after his condition worsened during the last month. Keane All five children, nine grandchildren and great-granddaughter were able to visit last week, said Jeff Keane.
"He said,'I love you' and that's what I said, it's a great way to go, "said Jeff Keane of the last conversation he had with his father." The good thing is that my father loved the family so much, so the fact that we all saw him, I gave it a great comfort and made his way easy. Luckily did not suffer through a lot of things. "
Jeff Keane has been drawing "Family Circus" in recent years, as his father loved retirement.
Keane said in a 1995 interview with The Associated Press that the cartoon had staying power because of its consistency and simplicity.
"It is reassuring, I think, to the American public to see the same family," he said.
Although the band Keane kept current with references to pop culture movies and songs, the context of his comic was timeless. The ghost-like "Ida Know" and "Not Me" who blame deferred accidents in the home were the staples of the strip. The family pets were dogs Barfy and Sam, and the cat, Kittycat.
"We are in the comics, the last frontier of good humor, and wholesome family entertainment," said Keane. "In radio and television magazines and movies, you can not find what you're going to get. When you look at the comic page, you can usually rely on something acceptable for the entire family."
Jeff Keane shared the sentiment, saying: "Family Circus" had flourished through the decades as readers are related to its values of family moments.
"It was a different kind of comic, and I think that was the genius of my father - creating something that people really can relate and not necessarily the intention of making people laugh," he said. "It was more of a feeling of warmth or a lump in my throat."
Charles M. Keane Friend Schulz, the creator of the late "Peanuts", once said the most important thing about "Family Circus" is that it's fun.
"I think we share a concern for the same type of humor," Schulz told the AP in 1995. "We are both family men with children and look with love on our families."
Keane said the band hit its pace with a drawing he did in the mid 1960's.
"Jeffy was shown leaving the living room late at night in pajamas and watching TV mom and dad and Jeffy says:" I do not feel great, I think I need a hug. "And suddenly, I received an email a lot of people loved about this guy need a hug, and I realized there was more to get a laugh every day."
Even with its traditional motif, Keane recognizes the efforts of young artists. He made a list of Gary Larson, "The Far Side" among his favorites, and I loved it when Bill Griffith had his unconventional "Zippy the Pinhead" character awakens from a blow to the head thinking it was Jeffy Keane.
Zippy Keane responded by giving an appearance on "Family Circus".
Born in 1922, Keane was taught to draw in high school in his native Philadelphia. Around this time, young Bill dropped the second "L''de his name" just to be different. "
He worked as a courier for the Philadelphia Bulletin before serving three years in the Army, where he called a "Yank" and "Pacific Stars and Stripes." He met his wife, Thelma ("Thel"), while serving on a work table in Australia.
He began a one panel comic in 1953 called "Laughs Channel" which satirized the middle and coming up on TV. (In one, a mother in front of a TV, a crying baby in her lap, she tells her husband: "I slept through two shootings and a bar fight - then woke her business.")
He moved to Arizona in 1958 and two years later began a comic about a family very similar to yours. Keane and his wife had a daughter, Gayle, and Glen's sons, Jeff, Chris Neal, and - a son in his family cartoon.
"I never thought in a philosophy of the strip - is gradually developed," Keane told the East Valley Tribune in 1998. "I was representing the family through my eyes. All that has happened in the strip that has happened to me.
"That's why I have all this white hair at 39 years of age."
Thelma Keane died of Alzheimer's disease in 2008 and was the inspiration for the character in the comic mom.
When his wife died, Keane called "the inspiration for all of my success. ... When the cartoon first appeared, she looked so much like Mommy that if she was in the supermarket pushing her cart around, people are coming to her and say, 'Are not you the mother of "Family Circus?'"
He also served as business manager and financial resources.
Arizona and Keane had a mutual influence between them. Keane work you can find everything - from the centers of the children ice cream.
Also, Arizona is also found in the work of Keane.
A comic book of 2004 the family at a lookout over the Grand Canyon with the kids asking, "Why are rocks painted in different colors" and "What time do you close?"
Jeff Keane said that the memories remain.
"He was our father. The great thing about it is that working at home, we have to see it all the time, and everyone sat down to dinner together. What you see in the" family circus "is what we were and what they still are, just different generations. "
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