News Release

Conservative Comic Strip Reflects the Election

Kansas City, MO  (11/09/2006)  Scott Stantis, creator of the conservative comic strip “Prickly City,” from Universal Press Syndicate, is handing over the lives of Carmen and Winslow to a staunch liberal editorial cartoonist. Call it a post-election turn around.

Matt Davies, a Pulitzer Prize-winner and editorial cartoonist for the Journal News of Westchester County, N.Y., will take over the strip “in the spirit of bipartisanship” while Stantis recovers from rotator cuff surgery. After that, it’s a free-for-all with other Universal Press Syndicate cartoonists coming to Stantis’ rescue.

The switch to Davies will occur the week of December 11-16. “The story line will be something like ‘in the last election, the Democrats won control of the House, the Senate, a majority of governorships, and Prickly City,’” Stantis says. This marks the first time another artist, and viewpoint, has taken over “Prickly City” since its inception in 2004. Prickly City appears in about 75 newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune and the Boston Globe.

Matt Davies is syndicated by Tribune Media Services. Besides winning the Pulitzer, he has also been the recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award in 2001 and the inaugural Herblock Prize in 2004.

The following week, December 18-23 will see six different artists fill-in for Stantis. Universal Press Syndicate creators Don Asmussen (“Bad Reporter”), Mark Tatulli (“Lio”), Phil Dunlap (“Ink Pen”), Paul Gilligan (“Pooch Café”), and Rob Harrell (“Big Top”) are all contributing one daily strip, as well as Greg Cravens, who took over Stantis’ previous strip, “The Buckets.”

This is the second time this year that Universal Press Syndicate creators have stepped up to help a recovering friend. When Rob Harrell who draws Big Top took a few weeks off to manage his cancer treatment, talents such as Jim Davis (“Garfield”) and Tom Wilson (“Ziggy”) contributed Big Top strips .

“Prickly City” features the adventures of Winslow, a naïve coyote pup, and his pal Carmen, a straight and narrow type of kid, who live in the desert areas of the United States. It was started because of Stantis’ love of the region and political issues. Stantis also serves as an editorial cartoonist for The Birmingham News and syndicates his work to more than 400 newspapers.

Creator(s): Scott Stantis

Contact(s): Kathie Kerr

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