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by: RickLondon
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When in the mood, I can talk about my favorite Far Sides all night, Only several humorists influenced me greatly before Londons Times Cartoons became my pet prroject. Others who influenced me a great deal were the original cast members of Saturday Night Live, a former roommie in New York, Patrick Weathers (who also was a featured performer on SNL in the early 1980's) Steven Wright, Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore, Jack Benny, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Lucy, Rowan & Martin, Peter Sellers, and and I'm sure I could name a hundred more if I had time. One other cartoonist was the late great Charles Schulz, and they all influenced me in a different way.

The reason Gary Larson had such an impact is that, like a lot of confused young people in our society at that time, his even greater confusion made sense of it all, and did so with very few words, sometimes no words, but only an illustration. He was a step above so many other cartoonists in that he most often "stuck to what he knew". He had a major in biology and aside from the frequent use of cows and insects, biology and mad funny looking scientists were often his theme-de-jour. Before Larson launched The Far Side, he was working on a cartoon called "Nature's Way". The Seattle Times was the first paper to publish it in 1979. A year later, Chronicle Features picked The Far Side up for syndication and it ran fifteen years. Larson put down his pin on New Years Day, 1995. For awhile we heard nothing. Then he wrote a very biologically-accurate children's story about worms titled "There's A Hair In My Dirt" which quickly became a New York Times Best Seller. When asked why he was retiring, he said, he simply didn't want to become mediocre. He stopped while he was ahead. He could be labeled more than a cartoonist, perhaps a "cartoon surrealist" of sorts. A lot of his cartoons featured bovine behavior and conversations that cows had when no people were around. The behavior was often erudite to make the reader understand he or she perhaps might not be so much smarter than these cows (and other animals, from squid to deer to bears. A great many dogs and cats appeared in The Far Side as well, usually as "mortal enemies". One of the most popular is a dog who has led a trail with chalk that said "Cat Fud" that led to an open dryer in a laundry mat and the dog thinking while holding the door open ready to close it, "Oh Pleeeeeze", but the cat is just standing in the middle of the laundromat not taking the bait.

One of his most famous panels shows a chimpanzee couple grooming each other. One discovers a blonde human hair on the other and queries "Conducting a little more 'research' with that Jane Goodall tramp?" Jane Goodall's institute board immediately took action as they thought it was in awful taste, Their attorneys shot out a letter to Larson and his Chronicle Syndicate, in which they described the cartoon as an "atrocity". They were stopped, ironically by Goodall herself, who enjoyed the cartoon. Since then, all of the profits from the sale of a Far Side shirt featuring this cartoon benefit the Goodall Institute. Most recently, Larson has published a 2007 calendar and 100% of the royalties benefit Conservation International. So Gary Larson not only turned out to be a very talented man, but a man who cares about the world in which he lives, and does something about it in a very unique way. Gary Larson is not just the greatest cartoon who ever graced the planet (and I don't gush often), he's obviously a very kind soul as well.

About the Author

Cartoonist Rick London, founder of Londons Times Cartoons says many famous funny people have influenced him but none had an impact like The Far Side's Gary Larson on his now very popular offbeat Internet Cartoon, Londons Times The Gary Larson Far Side Influence Continues

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