Crumb, R.

Crumb, R. (Robert)

(1943–  ) cartoonist; born in Philadelphia. While living in the Haight-Ashbury district in San Francisco during the hippie movement of the 1960s, he created the classic underground "comix" series, Zap (1967), and Snatch (1968), featuring the overtly sexual escapades of Mr. Natural, the grotesquely voluptuous Angelfood McSpade, the sexually repressed suburbanite Whiteman, and many others. He was the creator of the cartoon symbol of an era, the strutting hippie over the slogan, "Keep On Truckin'," which he failed to copyright. His comic series, Fritz the Cat, was adapted to an X-rated animated feature in 1972.

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.