Description

Extended Data

DAAO URL

https://www.daao.org.au/bio/montague-thomas-archibald-wedd

Birth Place

Glebe, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Biography

cartoonist and comic book artist, was born in Glebe, Sydney (acc. Shiell ed). He always wanted to draw cartoons and attended Saturday morning art lessons as a boy at Oswald Brock 's studio in Sydney’s Victoria Arcade. He left high school during the Depression and found work as a junior poster artist with Hackett Offset Printing, meanwhile studying commercial art at night at East Sydney Technical College. He stayed at Hackett’s for six months, then became a designer and illustrator for a furniture manufacturer, Corkhill & Lang (later Frazer’s Furniture). He moved to Grace Brothers as furniture artist and salesman, but this was short-lived; he spent 1941-45 in the AIF and RAAF. After the war Wedd decided to complete his Commercial Art course under the Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme. He created his first strip, Sword and Sabre , during the 1946 Christmas break. It was sold to Syd Nicholls’s publishing company and appeared as three monthly episodes in Middy Malone magazine. Wedd produced eight more strips for the magazine, all like Sword and Sabre about the French Foreign Legion. Nicholls, who was both nationalist and anti-war, encouraged him to try an Australian story, resulting in Captain Justice , the bushranger who righted wrongs, and a lifelong passion for Australian history. The strip first appeared in a Middy Malone book, was upgraded to a Fatty Finn comic, and when Nicholls was forced to abandon publishing after the 1950 Coal Strike, Wedd managed to get a contract with New Century Press for a series of 'Captain Justice’ books with the hero now from the American Wild West. 23 comic books were isssued in this series. Meanwhile, Wedd produced one-off comic books, Kirk Raven and Tod Traill – the latter an American Western – for Elmsdale Publications. He created strips for Stamp News (on the history of the stamp) and for Dr T.S. Hepworth’s Australian Children’s Newspaper (which lasted for 16 years) and designed and illustrated all eight ABC Argonauts annuals. In 1954 he created The Scorpion for Elmsdale. It became a bestseller with sales of up to 100,000 per issue, he claimed, despite being banned in Queensland. Calvert Publishing decided to re-issue the Captain Justice books, but they had to be largely re-drawn to satisfy 1950s censorship rules and regulations, e.g. the hero’s face could not be entirely hidden, no flashes could issue from guns, no character could carry an offensive weapon in the hand, and no-one was allowed to be killed (the code did not apply to rival American strips, of course). He also wrote and illustrated eight books for Calvert about a war-time American, Kent Blake of the Secret Service . Aching to do 'something really Australian’ (Wedd in Rae, 91), Wedd sold to the Women’s Mirror a serial strip called Children of Fortune set in the Macquarie period. Its success led to other commissions from the magazine, part of the Bulletin stable. At the same time he was producing a local version of Chuckler’s Weekly for Telegraph Newspapers. When local comics 'again took a nose dive’ in the early 1960s, Wedd found a new part-time career discussing his growing collection of Australiana and other historic topics as a TV guest on various Channel 9 programs. In 1965 he drew about 60 'Dollar Bill’ strips for the Decimal Currency Board. In 1966 he joined Artansa Park Studios and helped design a Lone Ranger animation feature for TV. This was followed by Rocket Robin Hood (also 1966). In 1968 he worked with Eric Porter Studios designing a TV series about his old Chuckler’s Weekly characters, leading to further work in the 1970s. Wedd was in great demand for the Cook Bicentenary, creating historic strips, illustrations and cards for everything from TV series to Minties and washing powder in 1969-70 (Wedd in Rae, 92-93). He finally cracked the Sunday comics in 1974 when the Sunday Mirror accepted his Ned Kelly strip. It ran for 146 issues, until July 1977, and was published in Sydney, Brisbane and Perth. Bold Ben Hall followed. A longtime member and vice-president of the Australian Black and White Artists’ Club, Wedd lives at Williamstown, NSW (Lindesay 1994). He is married and has a family. In 1993 he was awarded an Order of Australia for his services as author, illustrator and historian. He won Stanley Awards in 1987 and 1989. Writers: Kerr, Joan stokel Date written: 1996 Last updated: 2007

Born

b. 5 January 1921

Summary

Wedd was a Sydney cartoonist, designer and comic book artist who worked on the nation's earliest animated film "Marco Polo vs the Red Dragon". He also executed covers for pulp fiction, drew trading cards and other emphemera. His obituary cites the establishment of his "Monarch Historical Museum", Dee Why (1960). Early in his career, he also designed selected items of furniture for Corkhill & Lang and Grace Bros., Sydney.

Gender

Male

Died

1-Jan-12

Age at death

91