Fred Fredericks
| Fred Fredericks | |
 from 1960 | |
| Biographical information | |
| Born: | August 9, 1929 |
|---|---|
| Died: | March 10, 2015 |
| Nationality: |  American
|
| Occupation: | Artist, Cover artist, 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[footnotes 1].
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 "The Globe" (Camp LeJeune), in which he drew the strip "Salty Ranks".
After ending his military career he attended the Cartoonists and Illustrators School[footnotes 2]. During his studies in the years 1953 to 1956 he had teachers like Burne Hogarth, Dan Barry, Jerry Robinson among others. In 1954 he was one of the 18 winners of the Annual June Exhibition of the Cartoonists and Illustrators School. He was[1] on of the 3 winners in the Comic Books and Comic Strips category, each awarded with a $3.600 prize. The two other iwinners were William Montes and Angelo Torres. At the same time Fred Fredericks began freelance cartooning, advertising and greeating card work.
In 1957 Fred Fredericks married 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, "New Jersey Patriots" in 1959, followed by "The Late, Late War" and "Under the Stars and Bars".
With about the same theme, he also did two covers for the "Leatherneck - Magazine of the Marine".
from 1960, November
from 1961, April
He then began to create 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 "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"[footnotes 3]... 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 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 strips from 1995 to 2000, after which Graham Nolan took over the Sundays. He also inked one week of the Phantom 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)
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Various views
at the 1975 NewCon II
all the best from the 1975 NewCon II
Comics Buyer's Guide issue 131 (1976)
"The lads together"
a matter of time...artists montage
from Mandrake (2006)
Two in one
Note
- ↑ He was art editor of the high school newspaper (Atlantic City High School, Herald ?)
- ↑ Renamed to School of Visual Arts at nights in 1956
- ↑ 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".
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, January-February 1969, 1-2
- Greim, Martin L (1972). Mandrake's Magic Maker, Comic Crusader, 14, 11-16
External links
See also
- ↑ C and I award scholarships", Art Direction, September 1954, p 26