Frank Kramer

Who was Frank Kramer?

Frank Kramer was an American artist known chiefly for his illustrations for Jack Snow's two Oz books, The Magical Mimics in Oz and The Shaggy Man of Oz, founded on and continuing the famous Oz stories by L. Frank Baum. He also illustrated Robert A. Heinlein's Solution Unsatisfactory, Maureen Daly's Twelve Around the World, and many of Caary Paul Jackson's sports novels for children, including the Bud Baker series.

Other than a short biography in Jack Snow's reference work Who's Who in Oz, almost nothing was written about Kramer. Recently, however, the Spring 2011 issue of The Baum Bugle featured articles discussing his life, career, and work.

Snow notes that Kramer was born in New York City and lived in Brooklyn, and was a fan of the Brooklyn Dodgers, living as modestly as a "typical" business man. He had indeed been a business man, but gave it up to become a freelance artist. His work appeared in Street & Smith magazines prior to Snow's discovery of his "flair for the imaginative" in his sports drawings that drew Snow to his art, which Snow states is known nationally.