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Cartoon Pencil Sketches Biography

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The 1911 Census shows Strube still living at the Coach and Horses, as an art student working in advertising. As Strube recalled, he sent material to several London papers, but "very little of it ever got past the office boys", until he left a cartoon at the Daily Express. This anti-socialist cartoon had been refused by The Throne and Country, but the Daily Express printed it the next day - 14 September 1912. Strube quickly signed an exclusive freelance contract with the paper, and his cartoons were so successful that in December 1913 the Daily Express issued the first album of his cartoons.

Strube's career at the paper was interrupted by the outbreak of First World War in 1914. He joined the army in 1915, becoming a corporal in the Artists' Rifles. For part of his service he was a physical training and bayonet instructor, on one occasion filling a bayonet practice dummy with red paint, causing a new recruit to faint. He served in France, sending back cartoons from the front - one entitled "Back to Rest" being especially treasured by the Daily Express editorial department, as it was "done with liquid mud from the trenches". On demobilisation in December 1918 Strube, still only twenty-six years old, returned to the Daily Express as staff political cartoonist, and the paper ran the headline "STRUBE COMES BACK."

Strube was described as "a short, sturdy, blue-eyed, clean-shaven young man with a pipe between his teeth and a trick of astringent repartee". His work was increasingly popular with Daily Express readers. The key, he told an interviewer in 1920, was sincerity: "Treat things lightly if you can, but if a crisis is really serious you must handle it with dignity. The public always know if a chap is sincere in his ideas and work." He worked in indian ink on board, but first produced roughs to show the editor. "For every cartoon that appears", it was noted in 1923, "there are generally five or six 'also rans' lying around faintly traced in pencil on drawing boards."

Particularly suited to the Daily Express was the "Little Man" character that Strube developed. With his umbrella, bow-tie and bowler hat, he became a national symbol of the long-suffering man-in-the-street, struggling, in Strube's words, "with his everyday grumbles and problems, trying to keep his ear to the ground, his nose to the grindstone, his eye to the future and his chin up - all at the same time." The "Little Man" was a cautious optimist, who, according to Strube, "always carried an umbrella on a fine day because he thought it would rain - but always believed it would clear up."

In 1927 Strube married the Daily Express fashion artist Marie Allwright. An immensely popular artist, Strube was now also one of the highest paid. By 1931 the Daily Express was paying him £10,000 a year, after it had been obliged to match an offer made by its circulation rival, the Daily Herald, in an attempt to lure him away (the Daily Herald settled for Dyson instead). Strube disliked publicity, and the Daily Express respected his desire for anonymity, which it noted was "born of shyness and a belief that the characters he drew were more important than he." However, a figure of Strube appeared in Madame Tussauds in 1934 (alongside David Low and Percy Fearon), and in 1937 the Daily Express published a photograph of him, to celebrate twenty-five years with the paper.

During the Second World War Strube produced a number of memorable poster designs including "Yield Not an Inch! Waste Not a Minute" and "The Three Salvageers". In addition he drew advertisements for Guinness and others. His work remained popular after the war, but in 1948 Strube was suddenly sacked after a disagreement with the editor of the Daily Express, Arthur Christiansen. He was succeeded as Political Cartoonist by Cummings, who alternated with Giles. Strube went on to freelance for the Sunday Times, Time & Tide, Everybody's and Tatler.

An admirer of Partridge, Frank Reynolds and Low, Strube worked on Whatman board with indian ink, after sketching preliminary outlines in pencil. In 1927 one journalist described Strube's working on the roughs, his face "set and solemn": "When he is sorting out his ideas he takes a piece of drawing board and his pencil begins to dance over it, making little rough scrawls which resolve themselves into Mr Baldwin's pipe, Mr Ramsay MacDonald's moustache, a tall stove-pipe hat to which becomes added the face of Sir William Joynson Hicks." He only smiled when the rough was complete, and he began transferring it to Bristol board.

Strube was fond of allegorical characters, and in 1942 a writer described calling at his office in the Daily Express building to find him standing in front of the large mirror: "He balanced a drawing-board on his left arm, a pencil was in his right hand, his trousers were rolled up over his knees. 'I'm Mars,' he explained, 'working against time. Got to be wired to Glasgow and Manchester in half an hour.' " A fastidious worker, his motto was "Never let it go until you are satisfied - and never be satisfied!"
nue his art training in Berlin and Paris, where he had a flat and studied at the Academie Julian. Illingworth freelanced for Nash's, Passing Show, Strand Magazine, Good Housekeeping, London Opinion, Red Magazine, Wills' Magazine, Answers, Tit-Bits and, later, for Life. In addition he produced advertising illustrations for the 'Beer is Best' campaign, and for Winsor & Newton, Grey's Cigarettes, Symington's Soups, Eiffel Tower Lemonade and Wolsey underwear. In 1930 Illingworth again visited Canada and the United States. In 1937 he produced his first "big cut" for Punch, and continued to supply them with regular political cartoons.

In 1938 Percy Fearon ("Poy") retired from the Daily Mail, and Illingworth decided to apply for his job. He sent in some sample cartoons, but signed them "MacGregor" in case there was prejudice against employing "Illingworth of Punch." There was some justification for this, for Percy Bradshaw, who ran the Press Art School, was asked to recommend possible cartoonists for the Daily Mail, and decided that "Illingworth was not among those who, in my view, would be able to hold the job down." It seemed likely that Illingworth's detailed style might not be adaptable to daily cartooning, but the work he submitted was liked, and he joined the Daily Mail staff in November 1939. Illingworth produced a cartoon a day, but claimed that in wartime it was not difficult to find subjects: "it was absolutely easy - there's no doubt about it."

It was noted in 1942 that Illingworth's busiest time began on Thursday mornings, after the Punch cartoon had been commissioned the previous day. This was "Illingworth's toughest period of the week...when he has a Punch cartoon and two Mail cartoons to produce before Saturday", and he would often work through the night and into the next day to produce the detailed drawings. His wartime cartoons were very successful, and after the war a cutting of one of his Daily Mail cartoons - from 14 January 1944 - was found in the ruins of Hitler's Chancellery.

Illingworth also produced work for the Ministry of Defence, and on Bernard Partridge's death in 1945 he replaced him as Second Cartoonist on Punch, working alongside Ernest Shepard. In 1949 Illingworth became Cartoonist on Punch, alternating with Norman Mansbridge. In 1948 Illingworth became a member of the Punch Table, but considered himself uneducated, and was very shy at the weekly lunches, where the subject of the cartoon was decided. When Malcom Muggeridge was editor of Punch from 1953 to 1957, Illingworth would sit at the Punch table between him and John Betjeman. "They were very kind to me", he recalled: "I was conscious that I was a monumental bore, so I used to concentrate on the claret and keep as quiet as a cabbage."

Muggeridge recalled that, as Illingworth "did not have a strongly political mind, a whole series of suggestions might be put to him...without his reacting strongly." Eventually, however, one would fire his imagination, and "from then on the only anxiety was actually to lay hands on the cartoon": "If left to himself he would go on working away at it indefinitely; sometimes it had to be snatched from him by cunning or brute force." The result was a highly-detailed Punch cartoon, which took Illingworth a day to produce and was designed to make a political point that would remain topical for a week. Muggeridge and Illingworth's most controversial collaboration was a portrait of the ailing Churchill, which appeared in Punch on 3 February 1954 with the caption "Man Goeth Forth unto his Work and to his Labour until the Evening."

Bernard Hollowood, who edited Punch from 1957 to 1969, agreed that Illingworth lacked passionate involvement and "produced very few of his own ideas." As he recalled, at Punch "the chief political cartoons were produced communally, and the method suited Leslie." The idea for Illingworth's cartoon would be conceived during the Wednesday lunch, and, as one Punch writer explained in 1966: "Every aspect of the drawing is discussed, Illingworth makes a number of roughs in which the position of figures and objects is finalised, and then returns to his Barbican flat to start work on the actual finish." Illingworth finally left Punch in 1968, being succeeded by Wally Fawkes.

In 1965 Illingworth was getting £1,000 a year for his Punch work, on top of £7,000 a year from the Daily Mail. As he told an interviewer that year, he made regular trips to the Houses of Parliament to study his subjects in action, for "I have a season ticket to the gallery - there’s usually a lovely show going on there." He was fascinated by politicians’ concern for their appearance - "they know all the angles...and they’re always combing themselves" - and by their love of the cartoonist’s attention - "to be left out...that’s death and destruction."