Clifford Berryman was born on April 2, 1869, near Versailles, Kentucky, United States, the sixth of seven sons of James Thomas Berryman, a commission merchant, and his second wife, Sallie Church; there were also two sons and two daughters by the first marriage. Both parents were descended from English and Scottish families that had settled in Virginia before 1726.
Even as a youth Berryman loved to draw, a skill he taught himself. In 1886 he graduated from Professor Henry's School for Boys in Versailles.
Berryman’s first job was as a draftsman in the United States Patent Office in Washington. While working in the Patent Office, Berryman in 1889 began contributing sketches to the Washington Post, which soon made him a regular illustrator. Visual content in newspapers was then increasing, spurred by intense journalistic competition and the availability of a rapid means of reproduction. Berryman at first drew news sketches and advertising art; he became the Post's editorial cartoonist in 1896.
In 1902 the young artist learned of President Theodore Roosevelt's bear-hunting expedition in Mississippi. The party had no luck, but one attendant dragged a bear cub into camp on the end of a rope. Roosevelt commented, "If I shot that little fellow, I couldn't look my boys in the face again. " Seizing on the incident, Berryman sketched a cartoon, "Drawing the Line in Mississippi, " showing T. R. refusing to shoot the cub. The woeful little bear was an immediate success and brought thousands of requests for reprints. A New York toy manufacturer put out a stuffed "Teddy bear, " and the idea caught on, creating what was to become a standard item for generations of children to come - though the artist was always quick to point out that he got none of the profits.
In 1907 Berryman left the Washington Post to become editorial cartoonist for the Washington Evening Star, and he remained with that newspaper until his death.
Berryman drew his figures in a more realistic style than most cartoonists of the day. He was not influenced by the grease-pencil school created by liberal and radical artists. Neither in concept nor in execution did Berryman's work have the bite of such great political cartoonists as Thomas Nast or Rollin Kirby. He was more in the folksy tradition of his contemporaries J. N. "Ding" Darling and John T. McCutcheon. One of his best-known cartoon series was "Squash Center, " in which a group of old-time countrymen gathered around a stove in a village grocery store. Six feet tall and broad-shouldered, white-haired and pink-cheeked in later years, courtly in manner, Berryman had a gentle, whimsical nature that found expression in his work. Only rarely were his opinions sharp, as in a 1938 cartoon which portrayed the American farmer goosestepping in front of Secretary of Agriculture Henry A. Wallace, depicted as the "Fuehrer. "
He was, however, often critical of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and later of Harry S. Truman, who nonetheless admired him. Cartoonists have not generally been well integrated into the journalistic community, but Berryman was elected to Washington's prestigious Gridiron Club and was its president in 1926. He was also a frequent and popular giver of "chalk talks" - lectures illustrated by blackboard sketches. Clifford Berryman died of a heart ailment in Washington at the age of eighty and was buried in Glenwood Cemetery, Washington.
Clifford Berryman was one of the nation's best-known political and editorial cartoonists. During his career he contributed to the Washington Post, the Washington Evening Star, Life, the Review of Reviews, and World's Work. A cartoon of 1943, "But Where Is the Boat Going?" won a Pulitzer Prize. Berryman was also honored as the city's "outstanding citizen" by the Cosmopolitan Club in 1949.
Berryman was an active member of the Washington Heights Presbyterian Church.
Clifford Berryman was a member of the Gridiron Club.
Berryman was married on July 5, 1893, in Washington, to Kate Geddes Durfee, the daughter of an engraver. They had three children: Mary Belle, who died in infancy; Florence Seville, later an art critic for the Washington Evening Star; and James Thomas, who succeeded his father as cartoonist on the Star.
