Published on Show Me Mizzou April 24, 2026
Story by Rob McCarthy, BJ ’87
Brian Walker wants to introduce comic-strip fans to a side of Beetle Bailey that people often miss. The newspaper staple about a nap-happy Army private at the fictional Camp Swampy featured the best artwork of its kind, produced by his father. Mort Walker, BA ’48, was a gifted illustrator admired by his peers, including Doonesbury creator Gary Trudeau, Brian writes in his new book released for the strip’s 75-year anniversary.
The 276-page coffee table book, Mort Walker’s Beetle Bailey: 75 Years of Smiles (Fantagraphics Books), is a retrospective anthology with the best examples of his dad’s drawings alongside a history of the Army-themed comic strip, according to the younger Walker.
“There have been many Beetle Bailey books, but the quality of this one is unprecedented,” says Brian, who followed dad into the family business as a cartoonist. He’s also a historian and a former director of the Museum of Cartoon Art.
As a comic artist, Mort Walker was a double threat: both a strong joke writer and an unmatched illustrator in the funnies until his death in 2018. He created or co-created nine strips between 1950 and 1998. The strip Hi and Lois debuted in 1954 as a spinoff of Beetle Bailey. Both are still running today. Ditto for Pvt. Beetle Bailey & Co. In addition to Brian, Mort Walker’s sons Greg and Neal continue to work on Beetle Bailey and Hi and Lois, carrying on the family’s long-running cartooning legacy.
The challenge for a cartoonist is making a joke work using few words or none at all. Brian leaned on his dad’s advice in assembling the picture-heavy history of Beetle Bailey that spans seven decades.
“I’ve always tried to get as many funny pictures into my work as possible,” Mort Walker was fond of saying. Among the illustrations Brian chose is a giant color panel featuring an exasperated Sgt. Snorkel chasing Beetle, Cookie taking out the garbage, and Miss Buxley strolling past an admiring Gen. Halftrack. In other words, a typical day at the always dysfunctional outpost.
In other Mort Walker news, The Lexicon of Comicana, his playfully instructive 1980 guide to the visual language of cartoons, continues to draw fans. Brian edited the recently republished edition, and famed comic artist Chris Ware penned the forward.
For more information on Mort Walker’s Beetle Bailey: 75 Years of Smiles, visit Fantagraphics.com.
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