Note: This is an encore post from 2013.
When Americans think of classic illustrators from the early 20th century, names such as Charles Dana Gibson, Harrison Fisher, Haskell Coffin, James Montgomery Flagg, and John Held Jr. spring to mind. Forgotten by almost everyone, but in every way these men’s equal, is the great female artist Nell Brinkley. Her image of American womanhood supplanted that of Gibson, conveying the vivacity, intelligence, and spunk of young women eager to take on the world.
Born on Sept. 5, 1886, Brinkley scribbled drawings growing up as a child in Edgewater, Colo. Headstrong and determined, she announced at age 17 that she would leave high school to earn a living as an artist. Soon thereafter, the Denver Post hired the young woman as an editorial cartoonist at $7 a week. Unfortunately, she earned the nickname “Smearo” and was fired after six months. After two years of art school, Brinkley was hired by the Denver Times to draw what became her stock-in-trade, beautiful girls.
This week’s mystery movie was the 1956 Universal picture A Day of Fury, with Dale Robertson, Jock Mahoney, Mara Corday, Carl Benton Reid, Jan Merlin, John Dehner, Dee Carroll, Sheila Bromley, James Bell, Dani Crayne, Howard Wendell, Charles Cane, Phil Chambers, Sydney Mason and Helen Kleeb. 
ladailymirror.com 