JIM LOGAN,
who received the Golden Award in 1992, died on January 13, 2002 at the age
of eighty. From 1941 until his retirement in 1987 he worked for Terrytoons,
Fletcher Smith, Bill Sturm, Tempo, Academy, Focus, Pelican, Zander
Animation, Bakshi-Krantz, Lester Osterman, Paramount, Filmfair, Richard
Williams, Ziggy, Hanna-Barbera and Filmation. The family requests that donations
in his name be made to Parkinson's disease research.Jim was a great animator, whose cleanup had a beautiful line quality that was a badge of distinction before Wacoms and footage counts. In World War Two, Jim was with the US Army forces stationed to help Nationalist Chinese Forces battle the Japanese invasion. He said he received his Screen Cartoonists Guild union card while sitting in a slit trench being bombed by Zero Fighters. He would wow Chinese artists he worked with by showing them his campaign medals and a citation given him by Chiang Kai-Shek.
After the war he walked picket lines at Terrytoons with Pepe Ruiz and Jim Tyer. Jim was a past Vice President of the National Cartoonist Society and proudly counted among his friends Burne Hogarth, Dik Browne and Milt Caniff.
To me, Jim was one of those wonderful Old Soldiers of the animation production line. A quiet, uncomplaining, dependable pro who got your films done. A gruff but kindly old dog who took young puppies like Eric Goldberg, Lou Scarborough, Rick Maki and me under his wing and showed us the ropes. In 1978 he recommended a young girl fresh from CalArts named Nancy Beiman to animate for Jack Zander.
In my mind's eye, I can go back to when I was a young skinny student standing in awe over the shoulder of this man who was the first real professional animation artist I had ever been permitted to watch at work! The smell of the Hammerill Bond paper and .05 mm cells, the whirr of the pencil sharpener. I wanted so much to be like him. He had the Irish twinkle in his eye and loved to laugh. All through the production of Raggedy Ann and Andy, Jim had us inbetweeners in stitches with his delightful little cartoons making fun of some new incident in the office. Lester Pegues would run into our room and only have to say "A new Logan!" and we'd drop our pencils and rush to the Xerox machine to laugh and get a copy.
He spent his last years retired in Florida with his beloved wife Elly by his side. Adieu Jim, say hi for us to Tytla and Marty Taras, and I hope they let you do gag drawings in Heaven. Down here we'll remember to keep a rubber band twisted over the pegs to hold the paper down while you roll the drawings, because you taught us well.