Willard Mullin -- Self-Portrait with Characters!

This piece, most likely done for the New York Telegram, is sort of the be all and end all for a Willard Mullin fan such as myself. The cartoon is titled "It's Hot Enough for Poor Ol' Will" and is circa 1950. The piece features Willard Mullin himself seated at the bottom of his gigantic drawing board, sweating over a blank piece of paper. His drawing board is surrounded by his most well known characters, including the Brooklyn Bum, St. Louis Swifty (the Cardinals character), the New York Giants player, a jockey on horseback, Po White Trash (not PC, I know, but he was Willard's St. Louis Brown's character) a football player and one of his boxers. Mullin pleads with the characters, stating "...why don't a couple of you guys climb on th' drawing paper and make like a cartoon for me?", to which the Bum responds, "I'd be glad ter...but ya just drawred me so soon."

The drawing features Mullin's wonderfully lush brush work, combined with his subtle litho crayon shading. I'm pretty darned thrilled to add this to the collection.