Stuart Carlson, a former Milwaukee Journal Sentinel political cartoonist, died Friday, June 10, at age 66, the newspaper reports.
Carlson, a West Bend native who earned an arts degree from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, served as a cartoonist for The Milwaukee Sentinel and The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel from 1983 to 2008. He was first hired by the Milwaukee Sentinel as a lifestyle reporter in the features department.
Prior to joining the Milwaukee paper, he wrote obituaries and made cartoons for the West Allis Post/Star and worked as a reporter covering the courts, crime and local news for the West Bend News.
In an obituary story for the paper, former Journal Sentinel publisher Keith Spore called Carlson “the best to ever create a political cartoon in Wisconsin.”
“He was not only exceptionally talented as a cartoonist, but one of the kindest men I ever met,” said former Journal Sentinel editorial writer Jerry Ressler. “You couldn’t not like him; he was such a good guy.”
After accepting a buy-out from The Journal Sentinel in 2008, Carlson continued working as a cartoonist — syndicated in more than 30 papers across the country.
His last cartoon — drawn during a brief time home between hospitalizations last month — was a commentary on semi-automatic rifles after the Uvalde, Texas school shooting.
