A Q&A with cartoonist, animator and Sheridan College alum Jeff Wilson: His time at Sheridan and with Gamut, his animation and comic strip work, and how the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan squashed the hopes of a sixth issue of Gamut
July, 2024
Jeff Wilson, an alumnus of the Cartooning Program at Sheridan College, is very much an inspiration and reason for the existence of this website. I reached out to Jeff out of the blue, hoping for answers to a couple of questions I had about Gamut, as I had been toying with the idea of writing an article about the magazine.
Jeff responded, and his responses and enthusiasm about the project were so gracious and energetic that I was inspired to turn my Gamut article idea into a full-fledged site.
He immediately agreed to answer my many questions about Gamut, Sheridan College and his own work in the industry:
How did you get into comics/cartoons, and what ultimately brought you to Sheridan College?
Jeff Wilson: I grew up on a small mixed farm in rural Ontario, Canada in the late 1950s and our media choices were TV, radio and newspapers/magazines, so gravitated to printed comics and animated cartoons broadcast on our one TV channel. I drew pictures a lot in my youth and even won an art proficiency award my final year of high school.
Which years were you enrolled at Sheridan, and what was your involvement with Gamut?
JW: Sheridan didn't come onto my radar until very late, so while I didn't know at the time, this was to be the only opportunity to be part of Gamut. By 1976, I had pared my post-secondary choices down to a 3-year Radio-TV course and the 2-year Cartooning at Sheridan course. I chose Cartooning largely due to Gamut. I only worked on Gamut number 4. I attended the course from Sept 1977 to May 1979.
Jeff's art from "Gamut" #4 - a full-page pinup
Who was the audience for Gamut (where was it distributed, was there a cost to buy it or was it a free publication)?
JW: Gamut was not created as a commercial publication, but as a launchpad for talented students to give them exposure, funded I believe by the college. It was NOT sold in stores and was only distributed to students to use as portfolio pieces, plus copies were mailed free to top comic companies, magazines and publishers.
Do you recall what the press run would have been for any of the issues of Gamut? Also, there is an “error” version of the first issue, where the cover was accidentally printed without the red ink, and some made it out into the wild. Do you know any information about that?
JW: There were copies of every issue at the college (likely Walter's English station) and I recall having leafed through each copy at least once.
Regarding the print run number, there was a time when I DID know, but after 40 years, that info is gone. I do know, each contributor was to have received a handful of copies for their portfolios, and a number of copies were mailed free to comic publishers, newspaper syndicates, etc. They may not have been big runs, which may positively affect the value of any copies you presently own.
That issue you speak of with the Ploog cover, of which several copies got past quality control without the red plate printed, is known to me, but as far as digging deeper about how and why, I never did so. Being in the printing business later, I learned how such mishaps can happen, and I have a vague idea how much money stood to be eaten by whoever would be re-running those covers. Possibly someone just wanted to get the run completed on budget and hoped the cover mishap would somehow contribute to overall value. Just a guess on my part.
It’s known that many famous working artists at the time, including Will Eisner, Neal Adams, Bernie Wrightson and Mike Ploog, were lecturers at the college. Are there other notable professionals who lectured there at the time that Gamut was in production? Did you learn from/interact with any of them?
JW: I was present during the Will Eisner sessions, which I recall as being mid-year in the 77-78 classes. I didn't know anything about Eisner, until afterward. At first, I didn't know what to make of him, as he came across as this loud New Yorker, but soon his generous spirit and love for cartooning shone through. Eisner is an icon, having held every possible job in the comic business, from owner, to publisher, to writer, to editor to artist, to floor sweeper. Our whole class watched how he flawlessly engineered a wraparound cover (Gamut Issue #3? [Ed note: Eisner’s cover was on issue #2]) and colored it with Dr. Martins dyes, all the while delivering a top-notch lecture.
I guess Wrightson, Adams and Ploog had kind of moved along by my time, because I never encountered any of them.
Jim Craig of Marvel was a regular instructor [Editor’s note: Craig was also a contributor on the first issue of Gamut]. Another of our regular instructors, Roy Condy, had quite a comfortable gig illustrating children's books. Our life drawing instructor was a fine artist of some repute, Tibor Kovalik, survivor of the 1968 USSR invasion of Czechoslovakia.
Regarding personal experiences: These were usually in the form of critique sessions, where we would queue up with far too much time to horse around, until getting to the instructor, who would look at what we had done and deliver remarks. Jim Craig was fairly approachable, and I always found his critiques helpful. Roy Condy was inspiring and critique sessions could quickly become brainstorming sessions. Very approachable and encouraging. Tibor K. was quite frank with his criticism, but in my case, I felt he noted my strong work ethic, so would take extra time sharing his expertise.
Can you recall one or two fond memories or anecdotes from your time in the cartooning program at Sheridan?
JW: It will be hard paring these down to just 2 anecdotes.
In the winter of first year, either late 1977, or early 1978, we students were asked to instruct a public school class for half a day. All I can remember was it was somewhere in the Greater Toronto Area. A half-day away from college appealed to me, so I signed up. Had a wonderful time. My classmates, Gary Pearson and Paul McCormack, had to physically haul me away from a mob of kids getting me to draw sketches of the Incredible Hulk.
The daily experience in "the pit" was something never experienced by me before, or since. It was the lower level of an open atrium-like area of the college, surrounded by enclosed classrooms. Dividing the space overhead was what was called the "crows nest" where the Sheridan English department was situated, of which course coordinator W. A. Hanson was a part. That was where I had my critique sessions with Hanson over my Gamut piece. We'd all be at work drawing something quite different from each other, but at varying times, one or all of the class would break out in songs recomposed with dirty lyrics, name-calling of whomever caught the group's attention, or reciting lines from a Marx Bros. movie. [Fellow classmates] Jim Stephenson, Jim Whitney, Mark McLelland, Lloyd Walmsley, Mark Corrigan, Mike McDonnell were a few characters who stood out. I remember Walter H. Commenting, "Previous classes were so studious and quiet, no one knew the course existed. Now this?"
After leaving Sheridan, I understand you did the storyboards for the movie Prom Night and were a key animator on The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin. Can you share a bit about those experiences?
JW: Firstly, by May 1979, I felt totally unprepared for working in the cartooning field. Most of my fellow students had gone back to previous summer jobs, but some began freelancing alongside day jobs. I had been asked to stay in Oakville to collect artwork for what we hoped would sort of be the sixth Gamut. Walter H. wanted no further involvement but gave the group his blessing.
It was decided by the group it would be satirical cartooning work, a high quality glossy commemorative magazine we hoped we could sell and make money on as a co-operative effort. The humour style to be in the style of MAD, for the 1980 Moscow Olympics. As we know, all that crashed when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan and almost every country in the western world boycotted.
I jumped at the Prom Night story boards offer, because I was deeply in hock. Eventually the screen print shop my friend worked at, hired me. A few dry years later, I got hired on at Teddy Ruxpin. I was fortunate to learn on the job. It was the time when I learned the most about character movement, time management and quality control in my art. It was also the best income earned during my art career. Because they had a sponsor, the job paid better than animation traditionally did. I have been doing my best, but largely flopping around since then.
[Editor's note: In a 1999 interview with the now-defunct website "Teddy Ruxpin Online," Wilson described a typical work week on The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin, giving a behind-the-scenes look into the fast pace of an animated series. Here's what he said: "A regular work week was heavy on the whole staff. Often I would work 50 to 60 hours in the posing department, and then 10 more in the model design dept. After a sluggish start, we worked at an unbelievable rate of 2 and a half episodes a week. Some weeks we completed three! For our first few shows, there were two rooms of key animators, but production was falling behind schedule. The idea came along to divide the group into two "teams". I was in the group headed by Marc Sevier, and the other group was headed by Drew Edwards, both very experienced animators. We became friendly competitors, and production sped up dramatically."]
A still image and credits from "The Adventures of Teddy Ruxpin" (photos from IMDB.com and YouTube). Wilson was a key animator on the 65-episode run
Can you share a bit about your comic strip work, including Sincerely… Chores, Flatt’s Farm, and The Avridge Farm? Are the challenges between animation and comic work different, and are there any lessons you learned from the work? How did your time at Sheridan help shape your cartooning work?
JW: My newspaper comics were created in my spare time from farming, screen printing, all other work I did to keep myself and family alive. Cartooning isn't at all like animation, in so far as networking and having a communication grapevine. I did keep in close touch with one or two cartooning chums, particularly Paul Curtis. He and I would trade stories of good, bad and indifferent experiences, as we kept trying to sell our features. We'd aim high by mailing out to newspaper syndicates first, but ended up trying local newspapers, also.
I got quite discouraged in the late 1980s, but felt my work was improving. I drew Flatts Farm for about 10 years, when it struck me, maybe the general public didn't want a strip about farming.
I created a family strip called The Avridge Family but kept getting told the market was already flooded by family gag strips.
About this time, I worked writing on a 3rd strip about a blue-collar worker. It caught the attention of a Canadian syndicate, who introduced us to Lynn Johnston [Editor's note: Johnston is the Pulitzer-Prize-nominated creator of the long-running syndicated comic strip "For Better or For Worse"] . She suggested I stop all the extra strips and focus on one. Her thought was for me to make the family strip unique by moving them to a farm and it became the strip in which I did my best ever work, writing or drawing, although it never caught the mainstream attention I had dreamt of.
Jeff Wilson's "The Avridge Farm" ran in the Dundalk Herald, Flesherton Advance, Owen Sound Sun Times, Durham/Owen Sound/Dundalk-Flesherton Citizen, Haldimand Press, Aylmer Express, Delhi News Record, Ryerson Eyeopener, Gay Lea News, Wainwright Star Chronicle, Mildmay Town Crier, Barrie Advance, Grey-Bruce TV Facts and other Ontario farm and community publications (image courtesy Jeff Wilson's website)
By the way, the blue-collar strip did about as well without me as with me, so I didn't feel bad about having to leave it. My Sheridan background was integral, because it provided my graphics training and other skills I could get by with, as I pursued my lofty cartooning goals.
Learn more about Jeff Wilson and his work at https://jeffwilsonartist.yolasite.com/
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Jeff Wilson's books, THE COMPLETE FLATT'S FARM, THE AVRIDGE FARM COMPANION and THE AVRIDGE FARM COMPANION - BOOK II are available for purchase on Amazon. Click on the covers below to learn more and purchase the books:
