Jay Irving
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jay Irving (October 3, 1900 – June 3, 1970)[1] was an American cartoonist notable for his syndicated strip Pottsy about an overweight, goodnatured, dutiful New York police officer, Pottsy, who often came into conflict with his stricter and less imaginative sergeant, known only as "Sarge."
Born in New York, Irving became familiar with police procedures and activities at an early age when his father, Abraham Rafsky, was a lieutenant in the New York Police Department. After attending Columbia University, Irving was employed as an insurance salesman for New York Life and a police reporter for the New York Globe.[2]
A self-taught artist, Irving became a cartoonist in the late 1920s. He drew the strip Bozo Blimp for King Features Syndicate and spent two years doing advertising art. Dorothy Prago and Jay Irving married in 1922, and their only child, Clifford Irving, was born November 5, 1930. Clifford Irving said about his father, "He didn’t want the family to know he was a cartoonist - they thought he was a 'respectable' insurance salesman - and he also felt that it would be a handicap to use his real name because of widespread antisemitism in the cartoon business. For a decade he kept his work a secret from the family and his real name a secret from the professional cartoon world. He drew under the name Jay Irving, which was derived from his real name, Irving Joel Rafsky. Then, in 1937, when he felt he was sufficiently successful, he confessed, and changed his name legally."[3]
In 1932, Irving began a 13-year association with Collier's, drawing the weekly cartoon panel Collier's Cops. He also did covers for Collier's, including the famous Halloween cover for the October 26, 1940 issue.
In 1946, he created the short-lived comic strip Willie Doodle, also about a fat and cheerful police officer, for the Herald-Tribune Syndicate.[2]
Pottsy
His Pottsy strip was syndicated by the Tribune-News Syndicate from 1955 until 1970.[2] Irving's son, Clifford, was an art student in the mid-1940s at the High School of Music & Art, and he assisted his father by doing lettering on both Willie Doodle and Pottsy.[4] Clifford Irving later wrote about the art world in his notable biography Fake! The Story of Elmyr de Hory, the Greatest Art Forger of Our Time (1969).
The word "Pottsy" entered the language during the run of the strip. A police officer who prevented the loss of his badge by wearing a fake badge referred to the fake as a Pottsy. Later, these fake badges became known as "dupes".[5]
