Saturday, December 13, 2014

Martha Sigall, RIP


We have lost a bright link to animation's past. Someone who was there near the beginning, when a small studio in Hollywood turned out whacky, black-and-white cartoons that are still watched ... and laughed at ... around the world.

Martha Sigall, who worked alongside Clampett, Jones and Freleng (among numerous others) went to her rest today. She was ninety-seven years old.

As I wrote three years ago when I interviewed her:

During the depths of the Depression, Martha Sigall was a neighborhood kid who ran errands for artists at a small animation shop who worked at light boards. Little did she know that it would lead to a half-century career creating cartoons. The studio was in some small buildings in Hollywood and owned by a man named Leon Schlesinger. Martha painted her first cels before she was in high school, and took a full-time job in the business when she turned nineteen.

By then, Schlesinger and his staff were headquartered in a larger building that came to be known as "Termite Terrace." ...

Martha went on from there, ending her journey today.

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