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WD_328/ 2007
(  Satoshi Kinoshita )
| Series: | Works on paper: Drawings 4 | | Medium: | oilstick on paper | | Size (inches): | 25.6 x 17.7 | | Size (mm): | 650 x 450 | | Catalog #: | WD_0328 | | Description: | Signed, date and copyright in pencil on the reverse.
Robert LeRoy Ripley -
Born: Dec. 26, 1893, Santa Rosa, Calif., U.S.
Died: May 27, 1949, New York, N.Y.
-www.britannica.com/eb/article-9063760/
Robert-LeRoy-Ripley
About Robert Ripley -
Robert Leroy Ripley, artist, author, and radio broadcaster, was born on Christmas Day, 1893, in Santa Rosa, California. A talented, self-taught artist, Ripley sold his first drawing to Life magazine when he was only 14! Ripley was also a natural athlete who longed for a career in baseball, but his dreams of pitching in the Big Leagues were shattered when he broke his arm while playing his first professional game. After the accident, Ripley returned to his earlier goal of becoming a professional artist. He landed a job as a cartoonist covering sports for the San Francisco Chronicle, but, soon after, he left California and headed for New York City.
In 1918, while working as a sports cartoonist for the New York Globe, Ripley created his first collection of odd facts and feats. The cartoons, based on unusual athletic achievements, were submitted under the title "Champs and Chumps." His editor, however, wanted a title that would describe the incredible nature of the sporting feats. After much deliberation, it was changed to Believe It or Not!® -- the cartoon was an instant success.
Travel was Robert Ripley's lifelong obsession. During his career, he visited 198 countries, traveling a distance equal to 18 complete trips around the world! In 1920, he made his first trek across Europe. Two years later, he visited Central and South America and wrote about what he saw in a syndicated feature column called "Rambles Around South America."
He was drawn to Asia in 1925, crossing through Japan, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Ripley felt most at home in China. He found Chinese culture to be fascinating, and adopted certain Chinese customs. When he entertained, he often greeted his guests in traditional Asian costume. He presided over elaborate feasts in which he described the dishes of each course in precise detail, and at one point he even signed his cartoons "Rip Li!"
Ripley lived up to his reputation as a man who thrived on all things strange, and his personality was in many ways as unusual as the stories and objects he collected! His houses and apartment were filled with artifacts he brought back from his travels. There were Chinese wallhangings, totem poles from Alaska, a collection of beer steins from Germany, and giant bronze guardian statues from the Orient. A colleague once said that "the most curious object in the collection is probably Mr. Ripley himself." He drew his cartoon every day between 7 am and 11 am -- always drawing it upside-down! He was a man who dressed in bright colors and patterns, wore bat-wing ties and two-toned spat shoes. He collected cars, but never learned to drive. Even though he often used complicated recording equipment for his broadcasts, associates remarked that he was afraid to use a telephone for fear he would be electrocuted! A non-swimmer, he owned an odd assortment of boats including dug-out canoes and even an authentic Chinese sailing junk moored at B.I.O.N. Island, his estate in Mamaroneck, New York.
The 1930s and 40s were the Golden Age of Ripley. The phrase "Believe It or Not!" was a part of everyday speech. In small towns across the United States, people filled halls and vaudeville theaters to hear his lectures and see his films. Later, he would introduce his wonders to the world via television. The shy young man from a small town in California was now a celebrated public figure. Self-educated, he received honorary titles and degrees, and was the first cartoonist to become a millionaire!
-www.ripleysf.com/ripley/about/about.html
Ripley's Believe It or Not! -
Ripley's Believe It or Not! is a franchise which deals in bizarre events and items so strange and unusual that readers might question the claims.
The Believe It or Not franchise started in 1918 as a newspaper cartoon panel featuring unusual and startling facts from around the world.
Conceived and drawn by Robert Ripley, the panel proved popular and was later adapted into a wide variety of formats, including radio, television, a chain of museums, a book series and a pinball game (produced by Stern Pinball, Inc.).
The Ripley collection includes 20,000 photographs, 20,000 artifacts and more than 130,000 cartoon panels. With 50-plus attractions, the Orlando-based Ripley Entertainment, Inc., a division of the Jim Pattison Group, is a global company with an annual attendance of more than 12 million guests. Ripley Entertainment's publishing and broadcast divisions oversee numerous projects, including the syndicated TV series, the newspaper cartoon panel, books, posters, games and mobile phone content.
Syndicated feature panel:
"Ripley’s Believe It or Not!" is a registered trademark of Ripley Entertainment, Inc. Originally involving sports feats, Ripley first called his cartoon feature Champs and Chumps, but he changed the title to Believe It or Not, and it premiered on December 19, 1918, in the New York Globe. When the Globe folded in 1923, Ripley moved to the New York Evening News. That same year, Ripley hired Norbert Pearlroth as his researcher, and Pearlroth spent the next 52 years of his life in the New York Public Library, working ten hours a day and six days a week in order to find unusual facts for Ripley. Other writers and researchers included Lester Byck and Don Wimmer.
And on the syndicated newspaper panel after Ripley included Joe Campbell (1946–1956), Art Sloggatt (1917-1975), Clem Gretter (1941–1949), Carl Dorese, Bob Clarke (1943–1944), Stan Randall, Paul Frehm (1938–1978) - Frehm became full time artist in 1949) and his brother Walter Frehm (1948–1989) - Walter worked part time with his brother Paul and became full time Ripley artist from 1978–1989). Paul Frehm won the National Cartoonist Society Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1976 for his work on the series. Clarke later created parodies of Believe It or Not! for Mad, as did Wally Wood and Ernie Kovacs, who also did a recurring satire called "Strangely Believe It!" on his TV programs.
At the peak of its popularity, the syndicated feature was read daily by about 80 million readers, and during the first three weeks of May 1932 alone, Ripley received over two million pieces of fan mail. Dozens of paperback editions reprinting the newspaper panels have been published over the decades. Other strips and books borrowed the Ripley design and format, such as Strange As It Seems by John Hix and It Happened in Canada by Gordon Johnston. Recent Ripley's Believe It or Not! books containing new material have supplemented illustrations with photographs.
Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz's first publication of artwork was published by Ripley. It was a cartoon claiming his dog was "a hunting dog who eats pins, tacks and razor blades." Schulz's dog Sparky later became the model for Peanuts' Snoopy.
Radio:
In April 1930, Ripley brought "Believe It or Not" to radio, the first of several series heard on NBC, CBS and the Mutual Broadcasting System. As noted by Ripley On Radio, Ripley's broadcasts varied in length from 15 minutes to 30 minutes and aired in numerous different formats. When Ripley's 1930 debut on The Collier Hour brought a strong listener reaction, he was given a Monday night NBC series beginning April 14, 1930, followed by a 1931–32 series airing twice a week. After his strange stories were dramatized on NBC's Saturday Party, Ripley was the host of The Baker's Broadcast from 1935 to 1937. He was scheduled in several different 1937–38 NBC timeslots and then took to the road with popular remote broadcasts. See America First with Bob Ripley (1939–40) on CBS expanded geographically into See All the Americas, a 1942 program with Latin music. In 1944, he was heard five nights a week on Mutual in shows with an emphasis on WWII. Romance, Rhythm and Ripley aired on CBS in 1945, followed by Pages from Robert L. Ripley's Radio Scrapbook (1947–48).
Ripley is known for several radio firsts. He was the first to broadcast nationwide on a radio network from mid-ocean, and he also participated in the first broadcast from Buenos Aires to New York. Assisted by a corps of translators, he was the first to broadcast to every nation in the world simultaneously.[citation needed]
As the years went on, the show became less about oddities and featured guest-driven entertainment such as comedy routines. Sponsors over the course of the program included Pall Mall cigarettes and General Foods. The program ended its successful run in 1948 as Ripley prepared to convert the show format to television syndication.
Films, television, internet, and computer game:
The newspaper feature has been adapted into more than a few films and TV shows.
* Ripley hosted a series of two dozen Believe It or Not! theatrical short films in 1930 and 1931 for Warner Brothers Vitaphone. He also appeared in a Vitaphone musical short, Seasons Greetings (1931), with Ruth Etting, Joe Penner, Ted Husing, Thelma White, Ray Collins, and others.
* Ripley's short films were parodied in a 1939 Warner Brothers Merrie Melodies cartoon titled Believe it or Else!. Released on 25 June, directed by Tex Avery and written by Dave Monahan, it featured a running gag in which Egghead (a prototype Elmer Fudd) appeared to declare, "I don't believe it!" On 5 November of the same year, another Avery documentary parody, Fresh Fish, was released. Written by Jack Miller, this cartoon's running gag was a two-headed fish that kept swimming onto the screen to ask, "Pardon me, but can you tell me where I can find Mister Ripley?"
* The first Believe It or Not TV series, a live show hosted by Ripley, premiered March 1, 1949. Shortly after the 13th episode, Ripley died May 27, 1949 of a heart attack and several of Ripley's friends appeared as the host including future Ripley's Believe It or Not! president Doug Storer. Robert St. John served as host from the second season until the series ended on October 5, 1950.
* Ripley's Believe It or Not! aired from 1982 to 1986 on the American ABC Network. Character actor Jack Palance hosted the popular series throughout its run, while three different co-hosts appeared from season to season, including Palance's daughter, Holly Palance, actress Catherine Shirriff, and singer Marie Osmond. The 1980s series reran on the Sci-fi Channel (UK) and Sci-fi Channel (US) during the 1990s.
* An animated series, Ripley's Believe It or Not!, was produced in 1999 and followed the adventures of "Michael Ripley", Robert Ripley's nephew. The show was aimed at a younger audience, and would often feature Michael going around the world.
* The most recent series based upon the comic strip, once again titled Ripley's Believe It or Not! also debuted in 2000 on TBS. Hosted by actor Dean Cain, the series took a slightly more sensationalistic approach to its subject matter. The series was cancelled in October of 2003 after four seasons. Like the previous syndicated live-action series, this latest edition moved to the Sci Fi Channel for reruns, and continues to air today.
* Ripleys.com held a Dear Mr. Ripley contest where 10 contestants were chosen to be voted upon as to which of their stories is the most unbelievable. The contestants included a two-faced kitten, a car hurdler, and a tongue swallower. The winners were announced on December 15, 2006.
* The puzzle-solving game Ripley's Believe It or Not!: The Riddle of Master Lu was published and developed by Sanctuary Woods, Inc., and released in 1995.
Museums:
When Ripley first displayed his collection to the public at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933, it was labeled Ripley’s Odditorium and attracted over two million visitors during the run of the fair. That successful exhibition led to trailer shows across the country during the 1930s, and Ripley's collections were exhibited at many major fairs and expositions, including San Francisco, San Diego, Dallas and Cleveland. In New York, the famed Times Square exhibit opened in 1939 on Broadway. In 1950, a year after Ripley's death, the first permanent Odditorium opened in St. Augustine, Florida.
As of August 2006, there are 29 Ripley's Believe It or Not! Odditoriums around the world. Odditoriums, in the spirit of Believe It or Not!, are often more than simple museums cluttered with curiosities. Some include theaters and arcades, such as the one in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Others are constructed oddly, such as the Orlando, Florida Odditorium which is built off-level as if the building is sinking. The first one was opened in Chicago in 1933, where, in an apparent promotional gimmick, beds were provided in the Odditorium for people who "fainted" daily.
-en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ripley's_Believe_It_or_Not!
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