Marge, 1904-1993

A cartoonist best known as the creator of Little Lulu, "Marge" was born Marjorie Lyman Henderson, the first of three daughters of Bertha Brown and attorney Horace Lyman Henderson. She grew up on a farm in Malvern, Penn., attended the Friends' School in West Chester, and graduated from Villa Maria Academy in 1921. She and her sisters drew throughout childhood and while still in high school she sold cartoons to the Philadelphia Ledger. An early mentor was Ruth Plumly Thompson, author of many Oz books following the death of L. Frank Baum in 1919, and Marge illustrated many of Thompson's writings. By 1929 Marge had produced two regular features: "The Boy Friend" and "Dashing Dot," while also writing humorous articles, some of which she illustrated.

In 1935 she was asked by the Saturday Evening Post to invent a successor to a single panel cartoon called "Henry." Marge devised a mischievous little girl, initially christened "Little Lulu Moppet" by the editors, who first appeared in February 1935 and ran weekly for the next ten years. Merchandizing and advertising campaigns soon followed, especially in 1944 when Marge signed a contract with Kleenex. In 1943 the first of the twenty-eight animated cartoons appeared, followed by the first comic book, initially drawn and written by Western Publishing staff cartoonist John Stanley. By the late 1940s Marge continued to manage a merchandizing empire, approving all Lulu appearances although she only drew Lulu for the Kleenex campaign. In 1971 she sold her rights to Western and moved to Ohio, where she died in 1993. Marge was married to Clarence Addison Buell, a Bell Telephone executive; they had two sons.

...