Syndicated cartoonist Stephan Pastis is drawn to Akron by family roots
***Pastis draws the daily comic strip “Pearls Before Swine”***
His family roots here go back more than a century.
The 56-year-old author and cartoonist plans to do a lot of sightseeing when he comes to town to discuss and sign his new book, “Looking Up,” at noon Oct. 15 at Barnes & Noble in Montrose.
“To me, it’s a homecoming of sorts,” he said.
Stephan Pastis, creator of the comic strip “Pearls Before Swine,” is a bestselling author and award-winning artist.
Pastis is the creator of the syndicated comic strip “Pearls Before Swine,” which appears in more than 800 newspapers, including the Akron Beacon Journal. He is also the creator of the “Timmy Failure” and “Trubble Town” book series and the co-writer of the 2020 Disney+ movie
(snip)
Pastis’ great-grandparents Gust and Calliope Pastis emigrated from the Greek island of Icaria and settled in Akron in the early 1920s with their children John, James, George, Nick, Peter, Steve and Bessie. The family operated the Savoy Restaurant on East Market Street near Goodyear.
Pastis’ grandfather Steve owned the Apolon Pool Hall on East Market Street during the Great Depression. He and his wife, Pana, lived on Middlebury Avenue with sons Gus, Tom and Arry in the 1930s and 1940s.
Many of Pastis’ relatives moved west to Arizona and California in the 1950s, but some stayed in Ohio, including cousins who owned Egg Castle, Grapevine Cafe, Burger King and Arthur Treacher’s restaurants here.
Pastis’ mother, the former Patti Tripodes, grew up in a Greek family in Cleveland and married Tom in 1957. Stephan, the youngest of three siblings, was born in 1968 in Los Angeles.
As a kid growing up in San Marino, he loved to read “Peanuts” and idolized Charles M. Schulz. He drew cartoons and dared to imagine what it might be like to have his own comic strip.
“It was a lifelong dream,” he said. “I never really thought it was very realistic.”
He doodled characters while earning a political science degree from the University of California at Berkeley. After earning a law degree from UCLA, he embarked on a career that he absolutely hated.
Continued …
https://www.beaconjournal.com/story/news/2023/10/07/pearls-before-swine-syndicated-cartoonist-stephan-pastis-drawn-to-akron-ohio/71043692007/
= new reply since forum marked as read
Awesome punster…👏
Who can blame him hating being an insurance lawyer? I’m so glad he found success as a cartoonist.
I never realized he has Ohio roots!
I don’t feel so bad now if Stephen Pastis was rejected by the cartoon syndicates 80 times. Makes my 10 rejections feel paltry in comparison!
