Background
He was born on July 19, 1883 in Krakow.
He was born on July 19, 1883 in Krakow.
Born in Austria, he was taken to the United States at the age of five and educated at various schools in New York.
Working as a cartoonist for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle and as art editor of Popular Science Monthly, he became interested in animated cartoons.
Among his most famous characters were Ko-Ko the Clown, from Out of the Inkwell, Betty Boop. and Popeye, whom he brought to the screen from paper comics. Betty Boop had a short career as her behavior was criticized for being “immoral,” but Popeye and his girlfriend, Olive Oyl, became national institutions.
As an innovator in the field of animated cartoons, Fleicher took out over two dozen patents for various technical production inventions. Most famous was the rotoscopc, a tool that brought verisimilitude to animation and became indispensable to cartoonists.
Although he also produced educational films for the armed forces, as well as several scientific features, he is best known for revolutionalizing the world of cartoons and making animated pictures a substantial part of the movie industry.