Ruth Atkinson

{{Short description|Canadian American comic book writer and artist}}

{{For| the New Zealand suffrage and temperance activist|Ruth Atkinson (activist)}}

{{Infobox comics creator

| image =

| caption =

| birth_name =

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1918|6|2}}

| birth_place = Toronto, Ontario, Canada

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1997|6|1|1918|6|2}}

| death_place = Pacifica, California, U.S.

| nationality = American

| area =

| write = y

| pencil = y

| alias =

| notable works = Millie the Model
Patsy Walker

| awards =

}}

Ruth Atkinson Ford, née Ruth Atkinson and a.k.a. R. Atkinson (June 2, 1918 – June 1, 1997),{{efn|There is some dispute as to Atkinson's date of death, with the Ink Blots column of the Comic Artists Professional Society monthly newsletter{{cite web|url=http://cagle.msnbc.com/prolinks/library/mcGeean/newsviews2.asp| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080509123725/http://cagle.msnbc.com/prolinks/library/mcGeean/newsviews2.asp |archive-date= May 9, 2008|first=Ed| last= McGeehan | title=Ink Blots (column)| publisher=Comic Artists Professional Society monthly newsletter|via="Cartoon News and Views" (column; ed. Daryl Cagle), MSNBC.com| date=October 3, 1997}} and Comics Buyer's Guide{{cite web|url=http://www.cbgxtra.com/default.aspx?tabid=42&view=topic&forumid=34&postid=6525 |work=CBGXtra| title= 1997: The Year in Comics: Sidebar: 'Passages: 1997' |first= John Jackson |last=Miller|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927192946/http://www.cbgxtra.com/default.aspx?tabid=42&view=topic&forumid=34&postid=6525 | archive-date=September 27, 2007}} giving the date as June 1, 1997. Lambiek Comiclopedia{{cite web |title= Ruth Atkinson Ford: (2 June 1918 – 1 June 1997, USA)|website=Lambiek Comiclopedia|url=https://www.lambiek.net/artists/a/atkinson_ruth.htm|access-date=Feb 12, 2024}} and The Comics Journal,{{cite journal|journal=The Comics Journal|department= Newswatch |title= Atkinson Ford Dead at 79|issue =198|date=August 1997|page= 31}} however, both give the date of death as May 31, 1997. Finally, Atkinson's Social Security Death Index entry gives a date of June 15, 1997, and states verification came per a family member or someone acting on behalf of a family member, rather than an observed death certificate. Family members sometimes inadvertently submit filing dates or burial dates.{{cite web|url=https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:JKLG-S59 |title=Ruth Ford, Social Security Number 073-14-6513|publisher=United States Social Security Death Index|via=FamilySearch|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150721205041/https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:JKLG-S59|archive-date=July 21, 2015}}}} was an American cartoonist and pioneering female comic book writer-artist who created the long-running Marvel Comics character Millie the Model and co-created Patsy Walker.{{cite magazine|last=Vassallo|first=Dr. Michael J.|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080828180033/http://www.ess.comics.org/ess/docvstan.html |title=A Look at the Atlas Pre-Code Crime and Horror Work of Stan Lee|work=Comics Buyer's Guide|number=1258 |date=December 26, 1997|via=Live ForEverett|url=http://www.ess.comics.org/ess/docvstan.html|archive-date=Aug 28, 2008|quote =MILLIE THE MODEL and PATSY WALKER were inaugurated with artwork by Ruth Atkinson, an artist whose style would be the template for all Millie and Patsy Walker artists to follow.}}

Biography

File:WingsComics45 WingTips.jpg in 1976, but Ruth Atkinson was drawing Hellcats long before then. From Wings Comics #45 (Nov. 1944).]]

Born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Ruth Atkinson as an infant moved with her family to upstate New York.

One of the first female artists in American comic books, she entered the field doing work for the publisher Fiction House beginning either 1942 or 1943, and either on staff{{cite web|url=http://www.sequentialtart.com/archive/dec01/anderson.shtml|interviewer= Laurie J. Anderson|work=Sequential Tart|date=Dec 2001|title=The Gentleman of Comics: Murphy Anderson|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070209035526/http://www.sequentialtart.com/archive/dec01/anderson.shtml |archive-date=Feb 9, 2007|quote=Ruth Atkinson was an artist who worked there. Her brother happened to be a very prominent jockey; he was one of the top jockeys in the country at the time.}} or, as noted by the Connecticut Historical Society, through the Iger Studio, a comic book packager that produced comics for publishers on an outsource basis.{{cite web|last=Goldstein|first=Andrew|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080908090243/http://www.chs.org/comics/fictionhouse.htm |website=The Connecticut Historical Society|title=Fiction House: History and Influences|url=http://www.chs.org/comics/fictionhouse.htm|archive-date=Sep 8, 2008}} Fellow female artists Fran Hopper, Lily Renée, and Marcia Snyder also worked for Iger, where one of the business partners was a woman, Ruth Roche.{{cite web|url=http://www.bailsprojects.com/bio.aspx?Name=IGER+STUDIO|title=Iger Studio|website=Who's Who of American Comic Books, 1928–1999|access-date=23 March 2023}} Atkinson's first confirmed, signed work is the single-page "Wing Tips" featurette in Wings Comics #42 (Feb. 1944).

Atkinson continued to pencil and ink that airplane-profile featurette, as well such Fiction House features as "Clipper Kirk" and "Suicide Smith" in Wings Comics, "Tabu" in Jungle Comics, and "Sea Devil" in Rangers Comics. At some point, she became the Fiction House art director, but left the position to freelance after finding that the managerial position left little time for her art.

With writer Otto Binder, she went on to draw and co-create the feature "Patsy Walker", for Marvel Comics predecessor Timely Comics in Miss America Magazine #2 (Nov. 1944).[http://www.comics.org/issue/3970/ Miss America Magazine #2] at the Grand Comics Database. She would draw that humor/romance feature for two years, as well write and draw the premiere issue of the long-running series Millie the Model.{{cite book| title=Marvel Chronicle | editor-first=Elizabeth | editor-last=Dowsett| publisher=Dorling Kindersley | date=2008| isbn= 978-0756641238|chapter =Millie the Model debuts| page=31|quote= Millie the Model was created by cartoonist Ruth Atkinson, who drew the stories in the first issue. Mike Sekowsky ... took over as principal Millie the Model artist after the first issue)}}

Atkinson later drew true-life adventures for Eastern Color Printing's Heroic Comics, as well for some of the first romance comics, including Lev Gleason Publications' Boy Meets Girl and Boy Loves Girl, through the early 1950s.

Atkinson retired from comics sometime after her marriage. She was living in Pacifica, California, at the time of her death from cancer.

Personal

Her brother, horse-racing Hall of Fame jockey Ted Atkinson, died in 2005.{{cite web|url=http://www.canadianhorseracinghalloffame.com/jockeys/2002/Ted_Atkinson.html|website= Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame|title=Ted Atkinson|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090619165914/http://www.canadianhorseracinghalloffame.com/jockeys/2002/Ted_Atkinson.html |archive-date=June 19, 2009}}

Bibliography

Miss America (Vol. 1, #2, #4; 1944–45)
Patsy Walker (#1, 2, 4; 1945–46)
Miss America (Vol. 3, #1, 4; 1945)
Andy Comics (#20, 1948)
Juke Box Comics (#3–4; 1948)
Lovers' Lane (#1, 3, 4, 6–7, 9–11, 14, 16, 24, 26, 27; 1949–52)
Boy Meets Girl (#1, 6–7, 12, 16, 18–22; 1950–52)
Boy Loves Girl (#25–26, 28; 1952)
A Century of Women Cartoonists (1993) - Chapters 4 and 5

Notes

Footnotes

References

[http://www.comics.org Grand Comics Database]
[http://comicbookdb.com/creator.php?ID=25306 Comic Book Database]
[http://www.atlastales.com/ Atlas Tales]