Benjamin Allen

Who is Benjamin Allen?

Benjamin David "Stookie" Allen was a cartoonist who created the nationally syndicated comic strip Mugsey. He worked on Flapper Fanny during the 1930s with his wife, Gladys Parker, while they lived in New York City. They moved to Los Angeles in 1937.

Allen grew up in Corsicana, Texas, and attended the University of Texas. A local sports legend, in 1924 he caught the winning touchdown pass against Texas A&M University when a bobbled ball was tipped into his hands, leading the Longhorns to 7-0 victory against the Aggies in the brand new Memorial Stadium. In college, Allen also played baseball and the St. Louis Cardinals offered him a pitching tryout. He left Texas to study at the Art Institute of Chicago.

Allen moved around the southern oil fields for a while and ended up working for Standard Oil looking for swamp gas. When that job ended he was set to work on a pipeline in Natchez, Mississippi, and was ready to take a job in Venezuela, when he was offered a position drawing sports cartoons for the Associated Press.

In 1940, Allen invested in a mica mine 90 miles north of Santa Fe, New Mexico, with the 1920s New York band leader, Smith Ballew.