View source for Fred Fredericks

{{Creator 
|name=Fred Fredericks
|image=[[Image:Fred_Fredericks-60s-01.jpg|200px]]<br>from 1960
|Born= August 9, 1929
|Died= March 10, 2015 
|Nationality= [[Image:Mini_usa.gif]] American
|Occupation= [[:Category:Artists|Artist]], [[:Category:Cover artists|Cover artist]], [[:Category:Writers|Writers]]
|Website=
|}}

== Biography ==
'''Harold "Fred" Fredericks Jr.''' was born to Harold I Fredericks and (Helen) Phyllis Fredericks (née Haman) on August 2, 1929 in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Growing up in the family with two sisters and one brother (Helen b. 1931, Ann b. 1933, John b. 1934) he attended the Atlantic City Friends School<ref group="footnotes">He was art editor of the high school newspaper (Atlantic City High School, Herald ?)</ref>. 

Fredericks sold his first cartoon to Atlantic City Daily World at the age of 18, and in the late 1940's he worked for The Press of Atlantic City. In 1950 he joined the Marine Corps and served with the Second Marine Division as cartoonist for the the weekly newspaper "[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Globe_(Camp_Lejeune) The Globe]" (Camp LeJeune), in which he drew the strip "Salty Ranks". 

After ending his military career he attended the Cartoonists and Illustrators School<ref group="footnotes">Renamed to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_of_Visual_Arts School of Visual Arts] at nights in 1956</ref>. During his studies in the years 1953 to 1956 he had teachers like Burne Hogarth, Dan Barry, Jerry Robinson among others. At the same time he began freelance cartooning, advertising and greeating card work. 

In 1957 Fred Fredericks married [[Frances Fredericks|Frances Brungard]]. In 1958 their daughter Constance ''"Connie"'' was born and the family moved from Pleasantville to Gilette in 1959. Fredericks also sold his first historical newspaper comic strip, [[Spotlight on Fred Fredericks - Other Comics - New Jersey Patriots|"New Jersey Patriots"]] in 1959, followed by [[Spotlight on Fred Fredericks - Other Comics - The Late, Late War|"The Late, Late War"]] and [[Spotlight on Fred Fredericks - Other Comics - Under the Stars and Bars|"Under the Stars and Bars"]] befor he began to create [[Spotlight on Fred Fredericks - Other Comics|comic books]] for "Gold Key" and "Dell", including ''Nancy'', ''The Twilight Zone'', ''Mighty Mouse'', ''Barney Google and Snuffy Smith'', ''Bullwinkle'', ''Mister Ed'' and ''The Munsters''.

In 1964, Fredericks created the comic strip [[Spotlight on Fred Fredericks - Other Comics - Rebel|"Rebel"]] which was published in ''Scholastic Scope'', a magazine distributed to schools in USA. On in April 1965 Fred Fredericks became the new artist on the "Mandrake the Magician" newspaper strip, after [[Phil Davis]]. 

Fredericks was also a film collector, and his interests included movie serials; "Red Barry", "Dick Tracy", "The Clutching Hand", "Daredevils of the Red Circle"<ref group="footnotes">On often find the no [[39013]] on a picture of a convict or a mug shot.. It is the "heavy" from "Daredevils of the Red Circle".</ref>... He also had a copy of the TV pilot of Mandrake from 1954.

Fred and Frances' son, Patrick, was born in 1967 and early 1970s the family moved to Cape Cod. 

===Mandrake the Magician===
[[Lee Falk]] modernized "Mandrake the Magician" when Fredericks took over the strip from March 21, 1965 for the Sunday pages and May 3, 1965 for the daily strips. Making it more reality-based by focusing less on science fiction and fantasy, and making Mandrake operate more like a secret agent, often helping out the police with cases they could not solve. After working on "Mandrake the Magician" for a long run of 48 years, Fred Fredericks announced his retirement after making 6 weeks of "[[Vanguard of Shadows]]" (story interrupted after the strip of July 6, 2013 / from July 8, 2013 the ongoing daily strip are only colored reprints of previous stories). He passed away on March 10, 2015 in Hyannis, Massachusetts.


====Working on Mandrake====
1972
*''If in a story Lee wants someone to look a certain way he'll tell me the way to depict him; otherwise I can do it my own way.''
*''I do my own lettering and decide where the word baloons are going to be. Then I try to vary my shots, almost like a movie. You have a long shot, then a close up, then a medium shot. Yoy try to keep the camera moving, just like in a film.''
*''Five weeks (advance) for the daily strip and ten for the Sunday page.''
*''I use an Esterbrook #22 pen point, with which I get a good thick and thin line. After I ink the figures with a pen, I put in the blacks with a #3 Windsor-Newton brush and always keep the white paint handy in case of mistakes!''

===Other Figures===
Fredericks returned to comic books in the late 1980's, first as inker on the ''[[Marvel stories|Defenders of the Earth]]'' comic book where he and penciller [[Alex Saviuk]] got the chance to draw Mandrake, the Phantom and Flash Gordon. After that, Fredericks remained as a productive inker until the mid-1990's on several comic books for [[Marvel Comics]] and [[DC Comics]], for example ''The Punisher War Journal'', ''Nth Man: the Ultimate Ninja'', ''The Avengers'', ''Daredevil'', ''G.I. Joe'' and ''Ren & Stimpy''.

He is also well known for inking "[[The Phantom]]" [[Sunday stories|Sunday strips]] from 1995 to 2000, after which [[Graham Nolan]] took over the Sundays. He also inked one week of the Phantom [[daily stories|daily strips]] in 1996 that was published in American newspapers the same week that the Phantom movie premiered.

===Writer and Artist of Mandrake the Magician===
After creator Lee Falk died in 1999, Fredericks has also been responsible for writing the scripts for the Mandrake strip by himself. He retired from the Sunday strip in 2002, but continues to produce new daily strip stories as of 2008, often with guest appearances or cameos by [[The Phantom]] or other characters from the Phantom strip.

Fred Fredericks announced his retirement after making 6 weeks of "[[Vanguard of Shadows]]". From July the 8th of 2013 the ongoing daily strip are reprints.

===To be compared : The real man and his self-caricatured picture by Fred Fredericks...===
*see below on the right : 1989 original ink (drawing of himself being drawing Mandrake the Magician)

[[Image:Fred_Fredericks-70s.jpg|200px]]
[[Image:Fred_Fredericks-80s.png|200px]]|

===Various views===
<gallery>
Image:Fred Fredericks-70s-01.jpg|''at the 1975 NewCon II''
Image:Fred Fredericks-70s-02.jpg|''all the best from the 1975 NewCon II''
Image:Fred Fredericks-70s-03.jpg|''Comics Buyer's Guide issue 131 (1976)''
Image:Fred Fredericks-04.jpg|''"The lads together"''
Image:Fred Fredericks-05.jpg|''a matter of time...artists montage''
Image:Fred Fredericks-06.jpg|''from Mandrake (2006)''
Image:Fred Fredericks-07.jpg|''Two in one''
</gallery>

==Note==
<references group="footnotes" />

==Sources==
* King Features Syndicate (??), Fred Fredericks,
* Cartoonist Returns, ''The Courier-News'' (Bridgewater, New Jersey) 09 Jun 1965, p 33
* Dustow Charles, There's No Trick Involved - Mandrake 'Lives' in Gilette, ''The Courier-News'' (Bridgewater, New Jersey) 23 April 1966, p 9
* Higgins Flo, Draws "Mandrake" - Children Love His Magic, ''Echoes-Sentinel'' (Warren Township, New Jersey) 18 Nov 1965, p 1 and 5 and ''Bernardsville News'' (Bernardsville, New Jersey) 02 Dec 1965, p 13
* Old Methods Recalled - NJPA Conference Closes, ''Asbury Park Press'' (Asbury Park, New Jersey) 20 Apr 1968, p 4
* Riggs, Ed (ed.) (1969). Film Fan Fredericks Is a Man of Pictures, ''[[Film Collectors Registry - Vol. 1 No. 2|Film Collectors Registry, January-February 1969]]'', 1-2
* Greim, Martin L (1972). Mandrake's Magic Maker, ''[[Comic Crusader 14|Comic Crusader, 14]]'', 11-16

==External links==
* [http://www.tcj.com/remembering-fred-fredericks/ The Comics Journal - Frank Thorne: Remembering Fred Fredericks]

==See also==
*[[Spotlight on Fred Fredericks - Other Comics]]
*[[Spotlight on Public Service Announcement]]

[[Category:Artists|Fredericks, Fred]]
[[Category:Cover artists|Fredericks, Fred]]
[[Category:Writers|Fredericks, Fred]]