Carl Barks was employed by the Walt Disney Corporation from 1935 to 1942. He started as an in-betweener in the animation department, but soon moved on to the story department, where he learned the ropes of putting comic book stories together, which in turn enabled him to later start on his own.
The years in the story department were a good time for Barks. He liked to work hard, and he was highly respected among his colleagues for his dedication and tenacity (he was eager as a beaver as the saying goes). Despite the fact that he was not very sociable - primarily due to his severe hearing impediment that caused him to never attended lunchtime sports or after hours bar visits with his colleagues for the same reason - Barks was very well liked. This was clearly expressed in the many salty caricatures that the colleagues made of him. There can be little doubt that Barks enjoyed that kind of caring attention, because he saved a number of the sketches in his personal files.

This page treats you to a few caricatures (you can see more HERE) concentrating on two of Barks' closest colleagues, namely Nick George and Dave Hand*. The sketches were made at the spur of the moment, quickly jotted down on the studio's finest animation paper, and, frankly, rather puzzling to us today as the instant in-jokes they were. It is not known who made the sketches, but they tell the story of good spirits combined with piercing humour - with a benevolent and proud Barks on the receiving end.

* Nicholas 'Nick' George (1910-1977). Started at Disney as an in-betweener in 1931. Animator from 1931 to 1938. Storyman on both Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse shorts from 1938 to 1942 and (after military service) from 1945 to 1953. Worked for Western Publishing from the 1950s to 1970.
David 'Dave' Dodd Hand (1900-1986). Joined the Disney studios as an animator in 1930. He worked on numerous shorts during the 1930s as well as being a supervision director on the feature cartoons Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) and Bambi (1942).

 

 

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http://www.cbarks.dk/THEJOSHING.htm

Date 2017-10-25