Nat Falk

Nat Falk (June 28, 1898 – September 9, 1989) was an American illustrator and cartoonist. His 1941 book How to Make Animated Cartoons was one of the first instructional books on animation in the United States, covering the work of a wide variety of animation studios including Warner Bros. and Terrytoons.[1]

Early life and education

Nathan Isaac Falk was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1898 to Lithuanian Jewish parents.[2][3] He began drawing at a young age, becoming the art editor of The Club, the magazine of the Alliance Athletic and Literary Club of the Jewish Educational Alliance in Baltimore, in 1917.[4] He studied art at the Maryland Institute,[5] and then at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia.[6]

Career

In the 1920s Falk moved to New York, where he drew illustrations for various newspapers and magazines, on subjects ranging from health tips to anti-Nazi political satire.[7][8] He also illustrated book covers, including for the long-running Tom Swift[9][10] and Don Sturdy[11] series.

In 1933 Falk published Magic Mother Goose, an illustrated collection of Mother Goose rhymes accompanied by a "magic glass" for viewing a hidden image in each picture.[12] The following year he released Russian Folk Tales, a collection of six Russian folk stories for children, with Yock Schwab.[13]

He published his best-known work, How to Make Animated Cartoons: The History and Technique, in 1941.[1][14] It covered virtually all U.S. animation studios in existence at the time[15] and included a foreword by Paul Terry, the founder of Terrytoons and creator of such characters as Mighty Mouse.[16] The book was one of the first of its kind available in the early golden age of American animation, and it influenced future animators including Richard Williams, who led the animation of Who Framed Roger Rabbit.[17]

Because recordings of many early animated cartoons have not survived, How to Make Animated Cartoons also serves as a useful record of the period in animation history.[18]

Personal life

In 1925, Falk married Katherine Sagal.[19][20] The couple had two sons, the military historian Stanley L. Falk and the physicist David S. Falk.[21][19][22]

He died in New York in 1989, at age 91.[23]

Selected works
  • Magic Mother Goose (1933)
  • Russian Folk Tales (1934)
  • How to Make Animated Cartoons (1941)
  • It's Fun to Draw (contributed, 1944)[24]

References
  1. "Animation: Nat Falk's How To Make Animated Cartoons Part One". AnimationResources.org - Serving the Online Animation Community. 2020-01-16. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  2. "Nathan Isaac Falk". www.ancestry.com. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  3. "Children's Book Published by Former Baltimorean". The Jewish Times. 1933.
  4. "Officers of A. and L. Club". The American Jewish Chronicle. 3. 1917.
  5. Circulars, Volume 37. Johns Hopkins University. 1918.
  6. "Black and white photographic reproduction of class with Henry McCarter. · PAFA's Digital Archives". pafaarchives.org. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  7. Brown, Fisher; Falk, Nat (1938-02-04). "What Do You Know About Health?" (PDF). Andover News.
  8. "CATALOG 114: Can You Translate The Unthinkable? A Catalog of Holocaust Imprints Issued in Three Parts: Part I". Dan Wyman Books. Archived from the original on 2019-08-19.
  9. ""A very normal guy": An Interview with Robert Barnes on Marcel Duchamp and Étant Donnés". Toutfait Marcel Duchamp Online journal. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  10. "The Tom Swift Series by Victor Appleton". tomswift.net. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  11. "The Don Sturdy Series by Victor Appleton". seriesbooks.info. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  12. Falk, Nat; Vanguard Press; H. Wolff Estate (1933). Magic Mother Goose. New York: The Vanguard Press. OCLC 68439500.
  13. Schwab, Yock; Falk, Nat (1934). Russian folk tales. Racine, Wis.: Whitman Pub. Co. OCLC 905256438.
  14. Falk, Nat (1941). How to Make Animated Cartoons: The History and Technique. Foundation books.
  15. Klein, Norman M., 1945- (1993). Seven minutes : the life and death of the American animated cartoon. London: Verso. ISBN 0-86091-396-1. OCLC 28891649.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  16. Michigan State University. Libraries. Special Collections Division. (1993). The Comic Art Collection catalog : an author, artist, title, and subject catalog of the Comic Art Collection, Special Collections Division, Michigan State University Libraries. Scott, Randall W. (Randall William), 1947-. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. ISBN 0-313-28325-7. OCLC 27938147.
  17. Williams, Richard, 1933- (25 September 2012). The animator's survival kit (First American expanded paperback ed.). New York. ISBN 978-0-86547-897-8. OCLC 794367471.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  18. Barrier, J. Michael. (1999). Hollywood cartoons : American animation in its golden age. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-802079-0. OCLC 436041091.
  19. "Nat Falk from Assembly District 2 Queens in 1940 Census District 41-199". www.archives.com. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  20. "Katherine Falk". geni_family_tree. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  21. "Stanley Falk". www.javadc.org. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  22. Anne Suplee. "David Falk, 1932-2020 - UMD Physics". umdphysics.umd.edu. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  23. "FALK, Nat". The New York Times. 1989-09-11.
  24. Bogorad, Alan Dale (1944). It's fun to draw. New York, N.Y.: Knickerbocker Pub. Co. OCLC 2488321.
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