Creator: Carl Barks


Carl Barks (1901-2000) was a Disney writer and artist who made comics set in the Disney Ducks Comic Universe from 1942 to 1966. He was known as the Good Duck Artist by the readers for much of this time due to a Disney company rule which forbade the comic authors' names from being featured in their magazines.

Barks is renowned for creating characters such as Scrooge McDuck, Gladstone Gander, Gyro Gearloose, the Beagle Boys, Flinthart Glomgold, Magica De Spell, and many others, as well as setting in stone the base geography of the city of Duckburg. His stories brought in the treasure hunt plot to Duck comics and inspired a generation of people (such as George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Osamu Tezuka, Don Rosa and the writers of DuckTales) to replicate the thrill of adventure. He's also responsible for expanding Donald Duck's personality beyond his usual one-note characterization in the Classic Disney Shorts; reaching levels that were never rivaled in the animated appearances of the character.

After retiring, Barks took up painting (as seen in the page image). First his paintings were unrelated to his comic career, but later he began recreating scenes from Duck stories in paint. One completely original scene led to him writing one more story in retirement, which was drawn by William Van Horn, a younger Duck artist.

If you've been interested in reading his stories, there's good news for you:Fantagraphics books has been in the process of republishing all of his old Donald Duck stories over a 30 volume series of books in the upcoming years, with two volumes a year!

Not to be confused with a dog themed Punny Name version of Karl Marx.