1967-2000

 

In 1994 Barks was asked if he ever read European comics such as Lucky Luke and Asterix. He replied that he knew both of the series and was quite impressed by the great variations in their stories.

In 1976 Barks produced his only painting of a Western character that is not a duck - Porky of the Mountains.
Zane Grey was one of Barks' favourite authors. Curiously, Gray lived part of his life in a fishing cabin at the Rogue River in Oregon, not far from Barks' home in Grants Pass.

(Newspaper clipping)

AUCTION
The Estate of Carl Barks "Famous Walt Disney Animator" Saturday June 30th, 2001. Preview is at 10am; Auction is at 11am 1415 Heritage Drive in Grants Pass, Oregon. Some of the items you will see there:
Large Curio Cabinet, China Cabinet, Canon NP 6016 Copier, HP Computer, DeskJet printer, ScanJet scanner & LaserJet printer, Sony 31" TV, Oak Bedroom Wall Unit, Lift Chair, 3 Oriental Carpets, Entry Hall Tree, Massage Recliner, Glass Front Credenza, Maple Desk, Oak Dinning Table & 4 Chairs, Sofa Table, Tilt Top Table, Blue Print Cabinet, 9-Drawer Dresser, Sofa, Coffee Tables, Lamps, Oak Queen Bed, Electric Bed, Treadmill, Frames, Bookcases, Dickson Elk Bronze, Horn w/silver trim, Vaseline glass, Figurines, Cranberry Candlestick, Hurricane Lamps, China Set "Rural England", Copeland Spode Tower, Costume Jewelry, Whirlpool Refrigerator & W/D, Gary Safe, Garage Items, Much Much More!


Among the auction numbers were a 1998 Buick Century Custom 4 door, 4760 miles, Red w/tan cloth interior, Concert Sound all Electric (the photo is of a similar vehicle).

Barks influenced such modern visual titans as George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. The famous scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark, where Harrison Ford escapes from a boulder rolling down a tunnel toward him, is taken directly from the comic book story 'The Seven Cities of Cibola'.

Carl and Garé owned a teddy bear purchased from a visiting professor from Montana University. It was named Monty and during the years it was given an increasingly robust past from the couple's vivid imagination.
Most people who lived in his neighbourhood did not know who Carl Barks was.
The University of Oregon is the only university allowed to use Donald Duck as its mascot.
Barks' hearing ability was very bad all of his life. It only got better in the last years due to some special hearing aids from Denmark.
Carl Barks' last published work was written in 1999:

Ode to the Disney Ducks
By Carl Barks

They ride tall ships to the far away,
and see the long ago.
They walk where fabled people trod,
and Yetis trod the snow.

They meet the folks who live on stars,
and find them much like us,
With food and love and happiness
the things they most discuss.

The world is full of clans and cults
abuzz as angry bees,
And Junior Woodchucks snapping jeers
at Littlest Chickadees.

The ducks show us that part of life
is to forgive a slight.
That black eyes given in revenge
keep hatred burning bright.

So when our walks in sun or shade
pass graveyards filled by wars,
It's nice to stop and read of ducks
whose battles leave no scars.

To read of ducks who parody
our vain attempts at glory,
They don't exist, but somehow leave
us glad we bought their story.

When visiting Europe for 6 weeks in 1994, Barks had a schedule so tightly packed that it could easily have broken a weaker man. He underwent a great many official gatherings, numerous interviews, and countless autograph sessions. But he enjoyed every moment and was genuinely surprised by all the attention.

The two Disney comic book giants Carl Barks (Donald Duck) and Floyd Gottfredson (Mickey Mouse) met for the first time - late in their lives - in 1982.
In the 1990s Barks dabbled with three-dimensional art for the first time. He supplied a series of meticulously drawn sketches that were later converted into figurines of bronze or porceline.
Carl and Garé owned a piece of land at Gig Harbor, which is situated 50 kilometers south of Seattle in Washington State. It was meant to be their refuge in the golden years.
Barks was always very surprised by all the analysis and 'hidden' statements people found when dissecting his stories.

It took Barks 3 months of concentrated work to finish his 1995-painting Surprise Party at Memory Pond. The painting is unusual, because it is the only one in which Barks depicted Disney characters from long ago: The early Donald Duck, The Wise Little Hen, Peter Pig, Horace Horsecollar, and Clarabelle Cow.
It took a total of 5 months for Barks to produce his largest painting Rich Finds at Inventory Time. It immediately sold for 200,000 dollars.
Barks was a long-term subscriber to the National Geographic Magazine. In the later years the publishers used to write 'valued subscriber since 1935' on the invoices.
After all of the millions of dollars Barks generated for Disney's, there were no Disney representatives at the funeral. They just send a bouquet...
Barks reached 100!
Barks was expecting to reach 100 years of age and he even had received a special count-down calendar from a friend. In one sense he made it, as he experienced 100 summers...
Barks was quite impressed with the Duck Tales cartoon series on TV when it first aired. But he gradually lost interest because of the many characters and the many different plots woven into another.

Don Rosa and Barks viewing each other's comics in Barks' home, August 1998
Barks’ fans include such media giants as the creator of Star Wars, George Lucas. Lucas calls Barks' stories 'cinematic' and 'a priceless part of our literary heritage'.
Barks had an ambivalent relationship with Keno Don Rosa who is regarded by many experts as his foremost successor. On one hand he praised Rosa's eye for details, but on the other hand he regretted the detailed display of Scrooge's family life.
Barks is best known for his comic book work which he produced for 25 years, but he actually produced paintings for a longer time: 27 years.

One of Barks' favourite charities was 'Wildlife Images', an animal rehabilitation center where injured and orphaned animals were cared for until they could be returned to the wild. This is the manager of the center, David Siddon Jr.
The Golden Fleece (officially #17) was painted in 1972 and later reproduced. The 96-color serigraph was made in three editions - General, Remarqued and Deluxe. Only 65 of the Deluxe edition were produced but half of them were destroyed in a flood. In February 1998, the remaining copies had an estimated value of 6,000 dollars each.
Although Barks did not have a say when it came to the colouring of his comics, he was always very fond of bright and strong colours. He actually felt that the special colouring in the Disney cartoons greatly contributed to their success, and he tried very hard to incorporate the same type of colouring in his paintings. But, according to himself, he was never entirely satisfied with his results.

A collage of prints on display in the foyer of the funeral home at Barks' funeral
Barks kept most of his mementoes from fans in glass showcases in his living room.
The farm in which Barks was born in 1901 is still standing. It is situated about 5 kilometers northwest of Merrill.
Barks never owned a television set until the mid 1970s.

In 1988 Duckburg could be found in Florida, USA. An attraction by that name was built in Walt Disney World. Barks had a street bearing his name, and there were statues of Uncle Scrooge, the most prominent Duckburgian, and Cornelius Coot, the original founder of Duckburg. All that remains now is the statue of Cornelius Coot.
At his death Barks left a number of unfinished paintings. They are now - along with his other effects - stored away in vaults at Bank of America.
Several famous people died on August 25th:

Dutch painter Jan Vermeer 1691
British astronomer William Herschel 1822
British scientist Michael Faraday 1867
German philosopher Fr. Nietzsche 1900
British polar explorer Robert Scott 1912
Soviet cosmonaut Juri Gagarin 1968
American author Truman Capote 1984
American storyteller Carl Barks 2000
American actor Milton Berle 2002
American actor Dudley Moore 2002
American film instructor Billy Wilder 2002

Fearing burglary Barks had a rubber stamp made which he used to stamp a dire warning across all the front covers of all his comic books. The message was in large letters and read: THIS COMIC BOOK IS THE PERSONAL FILE COPY OF CARL BARKS. ANYONE ELSE POSSESSING THE BOOK HAS STOLEN IT
Many of us tend to recall what we were doing when a famous person or a distant family member died. Carl Barks died on Friday the 25th of August, 2000, at 12.15 a.m. PDT (West coast time). What were YOU doing at the time?

Barks left a number of unfinished paintings behind. One of them, #8-96 Queen of Sheba, was published in the book Animal Quackers in 1996. Barks tried to delete the painting from the book but did not succeed. He did this mainly because the queen's headgear, the gemstones, and the negroes were not finished.
The 1968 painting The Cool of Morning was painted on the backside of Masonite in order to give it a special, hazy look.
Barks' wife Garé told a story of when he first wanted to start painting the ducks: He got out a Ping-Pong ball, attached a string to it, and studied it under different lighting conditions to figure out how shadows looked on a sphere. It was from studying that Ping-Pong ball that he finally learned how to shade the heads of the ducks. That's the way he approached everything.

 

 

http://www.cbarks.dk/thetitbits1967-2000.htm   Date 2004-08-20