'Little Miss Muffet'.
Fanny Y. Cory was one of the earliest female cartoonists in the USA. Around the turn of the 20th century, she worked in New York City as an illustrator for magazines and books. Later in life, she settled on a ranch in rural Montana, where she combined her family life with working on several syndicated newspaper features, mostly with the humorous antics of mischievous youngsters. After some short-lived attempts, she eventually created the long-running 'Sonnysayings' cartoon panel (1926-1956) and the orphan adventure strip 'Little Miss Muffet' (1935-1956). During her career, she has signed her work with F. Y. Cory, F. Cory Cooney and Fanny Cory Cooney, but she eventually settled on Fanny Y. Cory, sometimes shortened to "FYC".
Early life
She was born in 1877 as Fanny Young Cory in Waukegan, Illinois, one of six children in the family of Benjamin Sayre Cory, Jr. and Jessie S. MacDougal Cory. Her older brother, John Campbell Cory (1867-1925), and their Canadian-American cousin, Benjamin Sayre Cory Kilvert (1879-1946), later became notable cartoonists in their own right. Another famous relative was Kate Cory (1861-1958), who worked as a fine artist and photographer. After the death of her mother from tuberculosis, when Fanny was ten years old, the remaining family members moved to Helena, Montana. There, she got her first drawing lessons from the celebrated European-trained artist Mary C. Wheeler. However, her father was an ill-tempered traveling salesman with a disdain for his daughter's passion for art. In 1894, she and her ailing sister Agnes went to live with their brother John and his wife in New York, where Fanny continued her artistic education at the Metropolitan School of Fine Arts and the Art Students League. Since the Cory family had little resources to finance her education, Fanny eventually dropped out of school.
'The Fanny Cory Mother Goose' (1913).
Early career
Around the time Cory dropped out of school, the health of her sister Agnes deteriorated, leaving Fanny determined to financially support her care. She began selling her artwork to magazines, starting in 1897 with contributions to St. Nicholas Magazine. In the years that followed, she provided both cover and interior illustrations to The Century Magazine, Harper's Bazaar, Life, Scribner's, The Saturday Evening Post and other magazines. She also illustrated books, including 1902 editions of Lewis Carroll's 'Alice's Adventures in Wonderland' and 'Through the Looking Glass', as well as books by L. Frank Baum ('The Master Key', 'The Enchanted Island of Yew'), William L. Hill, Marion Hill and Abbie Farwell Brown ('A Pocketful of Posies'). In 1913, Bobs-Merrill Company Publishers released a 'Mother Goose' storybook with lavish Fanny Y. Cory illustrations. Her illustrations stood out for her depictions of playful fairies and mischievous children, and critics praised her original style and her wry humor. In 1902, Agnes died from tuberculosis, after which Fanny returned to rural Montana, where her brothers John and Bob joined the gold mining business.
Piece from Fanny Cory's 'Fairy Series' (1930).
Ranch life
In 1904, Cory married Frederick "Fred" Cooney, a ranch owner on the Missouri River, near the community of Canyon Ferry. Their union was covered in a lengthy article by the Minneapolis Tribune, with the headline "Romantic Marriage of the Girl Who Draws Cute Babies: Won like the Heroine in a Melodrama." By now going under the name Fanny Cory Cooney, she continued to use Fanny Young Cory or Fanny Y. Cory as her professional name. In 1913, as she had to take care of her three children on the family ranch, Cory temporarily put her career in art on hold. In her spare time, she painted watercolors of fairies, flowers, birds and other small animals, resulting in her 'Fairy Alphabet', although it took until the 1980s before it was released in book format.
'Ben Bolt - The Kid You Were Yourself' (Buffalo Courier Express, 3 October 1916).
Big Ben Bolt - The Kid You Were Yourself
In 1916, Cory briefly returned to cartooning when the Publisher Feature Bureau syndicated her daily panel 'Ben Bolt - The Kid You Were Yourself'. The gags centered on children doing things readers might find reminiscent of their own childhood. The short-lived feature was inspired by the 1843 sentimental poem 'Ben Bolt' by Thomas Dunn English, but had no further relation to the post-war adventure comic strip 'Big Ben Bolt' (1950-1978) by John Cullen Murphy and Elliot Caplin. As her cartoon feature failed to capture an audience, Fanny Cory quickly returned to her family life, raising her children and working on the farm.
'Sonnysayings' panels from 24 December 1928 and 13 December 1950.
Sonnysayings
To finance her children's college and art school educations, Cory eventually attempted new daily cartoon panels. 'O, Don't You Remember' (1924) and 'Other People's Children' (1925), followed in 1926 by the more successful 'Sonnysayings' (1926-1956). Distributed internationally by the Ledger Syndicate, this latter feature became her signature strip, starring a rambunctious and precocious toddler and his unique view of the world.
Little Miss Muffet
Between 2 September 1935 and 30 June 1956, Cory produced a second feature, the daily strip 'Little Miss Muffet', for King Features Syndicate. Running for 21 years as a direct competitor to Tribune Media's 'Little Orphan Annie' by Harold Gray, this strip featured the dramatic adventures of an orphan girl, named after a nursery rhyme character and modeled after Hollywood child star Shirley Temple. Between 1940 and 1946, the feature was written by Tecla Scheuring, although other King Features staff writers have presumably also contributed to the comic over the years. In 1948 and 1949, three issues of a 'Little Miss Muffet' comic book were published by Best Books, collecting stories from the newspaper strip.
'Little Miss Muffet'.
Later life and death
In 1946, Fanny Cory's husband Fred died. Seven years later, the backwaters of Canyon Ferry Dam flooded most of the family ranch. In 1951, she was named "Montana Mother of the Year". Fanny Young Cory continued to work on her two comic features until failing eyesight led to her retirement in 1956. When the 'Sonnysaying' cartoon came to an end, Cory remarked "thirty years was long enough to keep Sonny five years old." Continuing to paint for her own amusement, Fanny Cory moved to the Puget Sound area to live near her daughter Sayre. She died in 1972 in Stanwood, Washington, at the age of 94.
In 2017, Toni McCarty released a biography about the life and work of Fanny Young Cory, 'Queen of Montana Beach: The Story of Artist Fanny Y. Cory' (Sunnyshore Studio, 2017).
Fanny Young Cory and her characters.