Addison Morton Walker was born September 3, 1923 in El Dorado, Kansas, to Robin Adair and Caroline Richards Walker.  The Walkers had a total of four children, two boys and two girls.  At the time Mort was born, the family lived at 915 West Third Avenue.  Previously, they had lived on a farm located at 800 North Topeka.

Mort has drawn pictures his entire life, beginning almost before he could talk.  In fact, he can’t remember ever not drawing.  He also loved books as a child, learning to read before he started school.  By age 7, he was devouring three or four books every week – mostly adventures and humorous tales.  Once he read an entire set of World Book encyclopedias.

Best known today for his comic strip, "Beetle Bailey," Walker’s ingenuity in portraying the army in a humorous manner has contributed to the morale of a multitude of soldiers, past and present, throughout the world.  Wanting to be a cartoonist for as long as he can remember, he once remarked, “I ‘commute’ to a room in my home, sit down and draw funny pictures, and they send me money and give me awards!”

Mort grew up in Kansas City, Missouri.  After graduating from Northeast High School, he attended Kansas City Community College and Washburn University, each for one year.

Schooling was interrupted when he was drafted into the army in 1943.  Walker served in Italy as an intelligence and investigating officer, and was in charge of a German Prisoner-of-War camp.  He was discharged as a first lieutenant four years later.

Returning to college at the University of Missouri, Walker earned his baccalaureate in Arts and Sciences in 1948.  During this time, he also wrote gags for Bob Hope and Milton Berle, among others.  Editing a campus humor magazine, he was regularly in trouble with the campus administration for his humor.

In March of 1949, Walker married Jean Suffill, an artist from Kansas City.  The couple raised seven children together, but the marriage later ended in divorce.

Walker later married Catherine Carty Prentice, who had three children of her own from a previous marriage.  With ten children in their blended family, the funny business has become a real family affair.  Six of their children, along with the son of Mort’s former collaborator Dik Browne, contribute to the business along with several other artists and writers.

Mort Walker holds membership in the National Cartoonists society, the Newspaper Features Council, and the Newspaper Comic Council.  He has served as president of the Artists & Writers Association golfing group.

Nearly every week, he does free cartoons for schools, charities and other good causes that write him for help.  He makes about twenty speeches and public appearances each year around the country and initiated the Cartoonists for Literacy program.

Walker enjoys playing golf and bridge, as well as inventing things.  For many years, he has run the Connecticut Cartoonists Invitational golf tournament, the yearly winner of which gets hit in the face with a pie.

Mort’s biography in Who’s Who in America is extensive, unique in that it also contains his personal creed:  “If I enjoy my own life, that’s one life enjoyed.  But if I can help others enjoy their own lives more, many lives are made more enjoyable.”

In 2003, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld sent Walker a birthday card, praising him for his ongoing support for the U.S. military, as well as his efforts on behalf of the World War II memorial.

With no plans for retirement in the near future, Walker quips, “Old cartoonists never retire – they just erase away.”


CONNECTION TO BUTLER COUNTY

Having been just a baby when he lived here, Mort does not have any memories of living in El Dorado other than the tales his older brother has told him.


Their father worked as an architect, owning a business with his brother in El Dorado early 1920s.  Their office was located in the Hoyt building at 208 W. Central; they designed several area rural schools in the area, including the original Haverhill school.  Mr. Walker was also an accomplished musician, the designated Poet Laureate of Kansas and an impressionist painter; many of his poems were published in newspapers, often illustrated by his wife.  Mrs. Walker was a landscape artist and also worked as a newspaper illustrator.
 

COMING TO / LEAVING THE AREA

The Walker family came to El Dorado in the early 1920s, following the oil boom.  Robin Walker figured that where oil booms were, families were.  Where families were, schools needed to be built.  As an architect, he hoped to get some of those jobs.

The senior Walker moved his family from El Dorado when Mort was three years old, in pursuit of other building opportunities in Texas and Oklahoma.  The family finally settled in Kansas City, Missouri in late 1927.

In 1994, Mort Walker arranged a Walker family reunion to be held in El Dorado, giving him opportunity to get to know the city of his birth.