Camera-ready comic art drawing for Mark Trail

This pen-and-ink drawing produced for the Mark Trail comic strip shows the title character indoors, trying to prepare his camera, while Andy, his St. Bernard dog, escapes under the fence.

Edward Benton Dodd (1902-1991) was a comic artist with an active enthusiasm for nature and the outdoors. Dodd learned how to write and draw in his home state, Georgia, while working as a camp counselor for Dan Beard, founder of the Boy Scouts. In the 1920s, after his student years, Dodd created the comic Back Home Again, about a hillbilly family from Georgia. The comic ran until 1945. Dodd then launched Mark Trail in 1946 and drew it until 1978.

Mark Trail (1946- ) was an outdoor-themed comic strip starring a wildlife photographer. The title character's job and home life, in Lost Forest National Park, allowed his creator an opportunity to incorporate his own heartfelt appreciation of wildlife and strong environmental messages into the strip. In the 1940s and 1950s Mark Trail was adapted as a radio show and a comic book series.

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