'Garth' (The Daily Mirror, 22 October 1970).
John Allard was a British comic artist, illustrator and editor, who was the longtime assistant of Stephen Dowling. Between 1968 and 1971, he was the second artist of Dowling's signature newspaper comic 'Garth'. As comic editor of the Daily Mirror, he was responsible for the creation of the 'Scorer' soccer comic and the relaunch of the sexy 'Jane' strip.
Garth
Born in 1928, John Allard was only fifteen years old when he became the assistant of Stephen Dowling, a productive cartoonist at the Daily Mirror newspaper. Allard joined only a couple of months after Dowling had launched his comic strip about the muscular time-traveler 'Garth' (1943-1997). As Dowling's assistant, Allard inked and provided background art on the series, being specifically instructed to imitate Milton Caniff. He combined his art duties with studying at the St. Martin's School of Art. Since during World War II Dowling served at the Home Guard, Allard had to do quite a lot of work on the comic strip. Sometimes Dowling had drawn his comics during train trips between London and Bristol. After fulfilling his national service in the R.A.F. between 1946 and 1948, Allard returned as assistant on 'Garth'.
'Garth' (25 October 1969).
When in 1968, Steve Dowling retired from drawing 'Garth', John Allard succeeded him as artist, working with writer Jim Edgar. In 1971, Allard in turn was replaced by Frank Bellamy, although he continued to do background art during Bellamy's first couple of months. Between 1977 and 1983, Allard co-scripted 'Garth' with Jim Edgar. During its final years, the 'Garth' series was written by Angus Allan and Phil Harbottle and drawn by Martin Asbury.
'Garth' (23 March 1970).
Illustrator and editor
After leaving 'Garth', John Allard remained with the Daily Mirror, doing illustration work for several features, for instance the 'Fishing With The Experts' column (1973-1977), the 'Mind Bogglers' puzzle feature (1982-1984) and the 'Saturday Brain Teaser' (1991-1992). With artist/writer Maurice Dodd, he also worked as scriptwriter for the daily kids' gang comic 'The Perishers'.
Between 1986 and his retirement in 1992, John Allard was the cartoon strips and crosswords editor for the Daily Mirror, in which capacity he also oversaw production of the 'Garth' comic and was involved in the relaunch of the Mirror's classic 'Jane' comic (1985-1990) by John Burns and Ian Gammidge. As editor, he was also responsible for the creation of the soccer comic 'Scorer' (1989-2015), written by Barrie Tomlinson and drawn over the years by Barrie Mitchell, John Gillatt and David Sque. The feature was meant as the Daily Mirror's answer to the popular soccer comic 'Striker' from The Sun and IPC/Fleetway's weekly 'Roy of the Rovers' comic.
Death
Living in Feering, near Kelvedon, Essex, John Allard passed away in 2018.
'Fishing With The Experts' column (The Daily Mirror, 6 December 1973).