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Mal Eaton’s Scratchy Big Feet
Mal (short for Malcolm) Eaton (1902-1974) was a New York-based cartoonist who was the artistic second cousin (three times removed) from the great T.S. Sullivant. While Eaton did not have the anthropomorphic chops of Sullivant, he did share a sense of wonderful stop animation-like figure movement, as well as that lively, scratchy pen line that both artists employed. Eaton was not a cartoonist of great renown. His most well-known newspaper feature was Peter Piltdown, which took place during the civilization of the Ice Age people, more commonly referred to as cavemen. The strip featured the main character Peter, Inna-Minnie, and my personal favorite Pookie, who dressed in a plaid one-piece…