Dick Calkins

Who was Dick Calkins?

Dick Calkins, who often signed his work Lt. Dick Calkins, is a comic strip artist who is best known for being the first artist to draw the Buck Rogers comic strip.

Calkins served as the artist for this series from January 1929 to November 1947. Buck Rogers is sometimes credited as being the first science fiction comic strip.

Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Calkins graduated from the Chicago Art Institute. His first job was cartoonist for the Detroit Free Press. During World War I, Calkins served in the Army Air Service as a pilot and flight instructor. He worked as an editorial cartoonist for The Chicago American until 1929, the year he began drawing Buck Rogers.

Calkins died at the age of 67 in Tucson, Arizona on May 13, 1962.