Camera-ready comic art drawing for Kerry Drake

This pen-and-ink drawing produced for the Kerry Drake comic strip shows Drake looking for Cricket and Paul after they have been taken hostage by “killers.”

Alfred James Andriola (1912-1983) after studying to become a writer, worked with Milton Caniff on the Terry and the Pirates strip and then on his own adaptation of Earl Derr Biggers’s character, Charlie Chan. Andriola drew Charlie Chan until the early 1940s and then began working with Allen Saunders on Dan Dunn, and then on his own strip Kerry Drake, which he wrote and drew until his death in 1983. Toward the end of his life, Andriola was assisted by several artists who continued the strip after his death.

Kerry Drake (1943-1983), like similar dramatic strips, was written to appeal to interests in a less physical character portrayal, although the Kerry Drake character was involved in crime control after the murder of his fiancée. With his success at bringing the criminal to justice, the strip became more of a soap opera-style drama.

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