Virgil Franklin Partch (October 17, 1916 – August 10, 1984) was one of the most prominent and prolific American magazine gag cartoonists of the 1940s and 1950s. His unusual style, surreal humor and familiar abbreviated signature (VIP) made his cartoons distinctive and eye-catching.Partch's cartoons expressed a dry, sardonic wit, and his characters were instantly recognizable by their lipless mouths, large triangular noses, thin ankles and thin wrists, and sometimes well-combed bangs. He was a gagwriter for The New Yorker magazine, but his own cartoons were rarely published there because, according to VIP biographer Bhob Stewart, "New Yorker editor Harold Ross couldn't stomach VIP's drawing style."
His first job was at Walt Disney Studios, working his way up to assistant animator before being discharged in the early 1940's when he took part in a strike.
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Was a passenger in the car driven by his 64-year-old wife when it collided with a trailer being pulled by a slower-moving pickup truck, killing them both. The pickup driver told the highway patrol he was traveling about 50 miles an hour when the crash occurred.
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Best known for the daily Big George cartoon character distributed nationally by News America Syndicate.
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The cartoons he drew were marked by a kind of maniacal humor that presented people in absurd situations. One well-known panel drawn by him showed a man walking down a sunny street under an umbrella and soaked to the skin by rain falling only under his umbrella. Another had a man on a rowing machine who suddenly sees shark's fins cutting through the floor around him.
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Signed his work ''VIP''.
Writer
Title
Year
Status
Character
The Flintstone Comedy Show
1980
TV Series story - 1 episode
Popeye the Sailor
1960-1961
TV Series 3 episodes
Duck Pimples
1945
Short story
Visual Effects
Title
Year
Status
Character
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying
1967
visual gags
Thanks
Title
Year
Status
Character
Frank and Ollie
1995
Documentary acknowledgment: caricatures - as VIP Partch
Self
Title
Year
Status
Character
Cartoon
1969
TV Series
Himself
The Jack Paar Tonight Show
1959
TV Series
Himself
The Ed Sullivan Show
1956
TV Series
Himself
You Bet Your Life
1954
TV Series
Himself - Cartoonist
Known for movies
Duck Pimples (1945) as Writer
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (1967) as Visual Effects
$950,000
