JOHN HENRY "JACK" BENDER
March 28, 1931 – January 5, 2023
After a long life filled with creativity, artist John Henry "Jack" Bender died in Tulsa on 5 January 2022 at the age of 91 from complications of dementia. He was born March 28, 1931, in
Waterloo, Iowa, to John Henry "Hank" and Wilma Lowe Bender. Bender received a BA in journalism from the University of Iowa in 1953 and a master's degree in journalism from the University of Missouri where his thesis was entitled, "Editorial Cartoonists: Development Philosophy Today". He also studied at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1956.
In the course of his professional life, Jack completed and retired from three careers, each running for around thirty years. Career number one in journalism kicked off in St. Louis, where Bender worked as art director at the Commerce Publishing Company from 1953 to 1954 and again from 1956 until 1958. He was an editor and cartoonist for the Florissant Reporter (Missouri) from 1958 until 1961. Bender returned to
Waterloo, Iowa and became the editorial cartoonist, staff writer and associate editor at the Waterloo Courier in 1962 where he stayed until retiring in 1984.
Career number two began when, as a student at University of Iowa, Jack joined the Air Force ROTC program and followed up with a 30-year career in the Air Force, retiring as a full Colonel. His active duty was served during the Korean War at Perrin Air Force Base, Texas, where he became an expert as a radar controller, controlling some 10,000 intercepts. For the rest of his reserve duty, his service included several years at the Pentagon and ended as the Air Force advisor to the Minnesota Civil Air Patrol, handling traffic landings at the annual air show at Oshkosh. He served his Air Force time concurrent with his 31-year career in journalism and editorial cartooning, from 1953 to 1983.
Bender was always passionate about sports. He excelled in baseball in high school and college, was a lifelong swimmer and was an avid collector of stats. While in Iowa, he served as a highly respected diving judge for area Iowa schools. He collaborated with several of the best-known diving coaches in the nation and came up with a booklet, "Pocket Guide to Judging Springboard Diving." It included drawings by Jack of the perfect form for each dive. The booklet became widely used, especially by the AAU and eventually was purchased for use in the Rules and Casebook of the National Federation of State High School Associations. Throughout Jack's career he was well known for his sports cartoons (the first of which was published when he was 15) and portraits of college athletes from around the state and beyond. He wrote and illustrated sports books and from the mid 1970s until the early 1990s he contributed cartoons to University of Iowa Athletics, Baseball Digest, Baseball Weekly, Hockey Digest and Football News.
In 1984, Bender relocated to
Tulsa, Oklahoma, and taught art for a time at Platt College, serving as Director of the Production Art department. While there, he launched career number three when he moved into the world of comic strips by assisting Don Martin with the strip "Nutheads" from 1989 until 1992. In 1991, Jack fulfilled his lifetime dream of doing a comic strip on his own, when he began assisting Dave Graue with the drawing of caveman strip "Alley Oop." By the end of the year, he became the strip's full-time artist, making him only the third artist to sign that classic strip. At exactly the time he signed the contract to do the strip, Jack met Carole Humphrey, who had experience as a calligrapher. After offering her a tryout, he hired her to do the lettering on the strip. The two married in 1995 and eventually became full partners in producing the strip. Bender's wife Carole took over writing "Alley Oop" in 2001 when Graue retired from writing the strip. The Benders retired in 2018 after a 28-year career producing the strip, distributed in an estimated 600 newspapers and online.
Bender received the Missouri Press Association Best Editorial award in 1960 and a Grenville Clark Editorial Page Award in 1967. In 1971 he received a Freedom Foundation Medal of Honor and in 1981 he was presented with an Air Force Commendation medal. An Orlando Con Ignatz Award was given to Bender in 1992. Bender was a member of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists and a lifetime member of the National Cartoonists Society. He was inducted into the Waterloo East High Hall of Fame and Oklahoma Cartoonists Hall of Fame as well as being included in "Who's Who in America," "Who's Who in the Southwest" and "Who's Who in the World."
Jack never forgot his Iowa roots and remained a huge fan of Iowa sports, but he also proudly embraced his adopted state of Oklahoma, rooting for Oklahoma State Cowboys. He and Carole loved traveling the country and world and going to art museums, plays and movies. He was also a lifelong collector of original comic art, amassing hundreds of works of art spanning a 100 plus year history of the comics. Thanks to a dear friend, this collection will live on carrying his name.
Jack was preceded in death by his parents and stepson, Christopher Darmus Humphrey, NYC. He is survived by his wife, Carole, of the home; daughter, Thereza "Tracy" Oleinick (widow of Jon),
Auburn, AL, son, John (Gina) of
St. Petersburg, FL; son, Tony (Tien) of
Indian Harbour Beach, FL; and stepdaughter, Milana Zettel (Kerry) of
Seattle, WA. He is also survived by eight grandchildren and seven great grandchildren.
At his request, Jack will be cremated, and there will be no service. We ask that those who knew and loved him raise a glass in his memory and share your stories.
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