We stayed overnight in Murphy, North Carolina and then drove over to the newly opened Trail of Tears component of the Cherokee County Historical Museum in Murphy. Though a bit wordy, the display is excellent. Learn more at their website. The drawings are of a tomahawk, a ceremonial baton and an 1840’s bed.

 

We made it to Murphy, North Carolina, where we had cartoonist encounter #2 for the day. This one was planned. I’d contacted Jack and Brenda Cassady before we left about stopping by and saying ‘Hello’!

Jack is a long time cartoonist drawing everything from magazine gag cartoons to advertising cartooning. Jack also was the birth-uh-father of the Suncoast Inkslingers group of cartoonists in the Tampa Bay area of Florida that I now head up.

That’s Jack in his nifty stand alone studio down a path from his home armed with a brush. Thank goodness it wasn’t loaded!

As we headed off the mountain of the lodge we stayed for two days, we made our way to Murphy, N.C. We made a few stops along the way for Sandra to take more notes.

One stop was in Highlands, North Carolina. As we strolled the streets we ran into former Mad magazine cartoonist Jack Davis and his wife Dena. Ya never know where you’ll find a cartoonist these days!

The cover shown is from my favorite of Jack Davis collections of art. It’s an entire spoof of movies. I first saw it when it came out  30 years ago and was a definite influence on me and my artwork.

It was literally an uphill battle to get up to where we stayed on the 3rd and 4th. Waaaaay up a mountain, Sandra’s Jeep had it’s first heavy duty test of travelling nearly straight up. The lodge is owned by a husband and wife who also own a country club waaaaay down the mountain and a few miles away. It was at the country club that we celebrated the 4th. I went so far as to breaking out the caricature equipment and drawing awhile.

On the 3rd we accomplshed a rigorous hike that knocked us out.  I had hoped to add some outdoor drawings during our trip, but the 3rd and 4th were the only days we really experienced the natural outdoors. The cingular drawing of a tree is all that I sketched and it was done as we were hurrying out the door of the place on the 5th.

We toured around downtown Franklin, North Carolina, and visited many of the shops. One of the stops was for a bit of food at the Motor Co. Grill where we had a fine hamburger and grilled cheese sandwhich. The drawing is of the real soda fountain spicket.

We took a ride on the ‘Great Smoky Mountains Railroad’ near Bryson City, North Carolina. It was a two hour ride that provided dinner and quite an experience! This was the first time I’d been on a train for many, many years. I’d forgotten how great it is to ride the tracks.

The train and rails were also part of the movie sets of the Harrison Ford film, ‘The Fugitive’ and the James Garner and Jack Lemmon film, ‘My Fellow Americans’ (One of my favorites!).

The first drawing is of the doorway from one car to the other. Sorry for its lack of clarity. The other drawing is of a train car door handle.

The blog continues (and catches up) after July 10th!

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After we left Coral Gables we drove toward Lake Okeechobee. We started at the south end of the lake and went around the west side of the lake heading north and noting locations for a project Sandra’s working on for the Florida Trail Association. 

We ended up in Sebring where we stayed at the Inn on the Lake and had breakfast at a restaurant in Downtown Sebring. Here’s a drawing of a woman eating at the counter.

We headed out to the grand and historic Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, just blocks from where my mother was born and raised. Sandra was there for a tourism board meeting. We had a number of meals in one of their restaurants, 1200 Courtyard Grill.

The fellow on the left is a chef there and the fellow on the right was one of the waiters.

Rob Labby drove up from Fort Lauderdale to have lunch with me. While there a pigeon had escaped quite a torrential downpour outside and wandered around the restaurant. I tried to help chase the bird out, but only succeeded in getting the bird to fly into the lobby of the resort. Sorry, Biltmore!

The annual National Cartoonists Society meeting started Friday and we were there for the opening reception. I drove from the Florida Historical Society meeting to meet Sandra to attend the reception which ocurred at the site for this years gathering, a Ritz-Carlton hotel in southeast Orange County, south of Orlando.

The drawing is from the business meeting Saturday morning and is of Mike Luckovich reading an exchange he had with someone else involving some confusion with his cartoons.

The lower drawing is of gag cartoonist Sam Gross who conducted a seminar later in the day.

Later that night was the grand Reuben dinner. The drawing is of one of the danc members. The REuben award was given to Bill Amend, who created and draws the comic strip, ‘Foxtrot’.

The first talk I attended today was a discussion of Southern fiction. My favorite line quoted I believe was attributed to Harry Crews, ‘Mosquitoes sing beautiful songs’. This is a drawing of the speaker, Ron Cooper.

The second talk given involved Key West. The speaker was another Jose Marti sympathizer and crying for a new Cuba. Marti was a piece of garbage who hated America and all it stood for. He was the Reagan of the hope-to-be-dictator set and swooned many as he travelled the U.S. riling up Spanish migrants to force one kingpin out for another and tripping the U.S. into the Spanish/ American war. The plus side to all of this is we later got Teddy Roosevelt as president. Folks can’t face that Cuba is a spit of dirt that has been a despot’s paradise and still is and apparently will always be. Bad news for those hoping for Castro’s death – Things ain’t changing.

The second talk about Key West was from a fellow from Illinois (Drawn at the left) who pointed out that Jimmy Buffett is the “Patron saint of Key West”.  He compared Key West to Galveston, Texas.