Pen name Norm Rice, Tom Rice Nationality Australian | Period c.1930-1956 Name Norm Rice | |
Died 31 December 1965
Balgowlah, New South Wales, Australia Occupation Cartoonist, Comic book/strip artist | ||
Norman Rice (1913–1965), was an Australian cartoonist, comic book artist and illustrator.
Biography
Norman Howard Rice, was born in 1913, in Newtown, New South Wales. Upon leaving school he became an apprentice with a Sydney sign writing firm. Rice also studied art at Jack Watkin's Sydney Art School.
Rice worked freelance, selling cartoons to the The Bulletin, Smith's Weekly, Rydges Business Journal and other Sydney publications. Rice also drew comic strips, including Powerman, Steele Carewe, Dr Darbill and Nick Carver of the Circus for Frank Johnson Publications.
At the beginning of the Second World War Rice joined an army camouflage unit; he later transferred to a survey unit and served in New Guinea. During this time he produced a comic book of wartime cartoons called Rice and Shine.
Following the war, in 1946, Rice joined the staff of Smith's Weekly as a cartoonist. When the paper ceased publication in October 1950 Rice returned to freelancing and also prepared promotional material for Universal Films.
In 1956 following the death of Alex Gurney he took over the comic strip, Bluey and Curley, but drew the strip for less than a year, as he died in a car accident on New Year's Eve 1956.