MacNelly, Jeff (1947 - 2000)

Jeff MacNelly original cartoon artwork.

"Jeff was simply the most brilliant political cartoonist of the time,'' Chicago Tribune editor Howard A. Tyner said. "No one had an eye and a sense of humor like his. And he was as funny personally as he was in print.'' MacNelly started his first job as a political cartoonist in 1969 when he dropped out of the University of North Carolina to take a $120-per-week position with a weekly paper in Chapel Hill, N.C. MacNelly won his first Pulitzer when he was only 24 years old after working at the Richmond News Leader in Virginia for only 16 months. After 12 years at the Richmond News Leader, he joined the Chicago Tribune in 1982 where he won his 3rd Pulitzer. But political cartoons weren't his only outlet. In 1977, MacNelly began the daily comic strip ``Shoe,'' about a cranky newspaper's editor and its two-bit hacks, all of whom just happen to be birds. The cigar-chomping boss of the Treetops Tattler was P. Martin Shoemaker, inspired by MacNelly's former boss Jim Shumaker, now a University of North Carolina professor. He also illustrated humorist Dave Barry's syndicated column.