Virginia Krausmann was one of the few female comic artists of the first half of the twentieth century. She was known for the versatility of her style, and her work on the comic features 'Annibelle' (1936-1939) and 'Marianne' (1938-1939) for the Newspaper Enterprise Association.
Early life
Virginia A. Krausmann was born in 1912 in Cleveland, Ohio. As a youngster she was an active member of Cleveland's social life, taking part in an annual county oratorial contest in March 1928 and being elected vice-president of the Inter-club Council at the Girl Reserve conference in September 1929. She got her artistic education at the Cleveland School of Art, and later resided in Rocky River, Ohio.
Newspaper Enterprise Association
During the second half of the 1930s Krausmann was a staff cartoonist with the Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA). She illustrated story serializations in the syndicate's Everyweek newspaper section, which were included with many papers, including the Times Picayune, Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune, Lima Sunday News and The Sunday Oregonian.
Illustration for a serial (The Longview News Journal, 21 October 1937).
Annibelle and Marianne
In March 1936 she succeeded Dorothy Urfer on the weekly comics feature 'Annibelle', which ran in Everyweek's color section. Krausmann continued the gossip and chitchat between the young, blonde Annibelle and her aristocrat flapper girl friends for another three-and-a-half years, until the strip came to an end on 15 October 1939. From July 1938 until somewhere in 1939 Krausmann also revived the all-female jokebook-style gag strip 'Marianne', which was originally created by Ethel Hays between 1936 and 26 December 1937.
Later life
Virginia Krausmann married Kenneth Gordon on 1 February 1941, after which the couple settled in Lakewood, Ohio. Like her comics colleague Dorothy Urfter, who quit the business shortly after marrying cartoonist Joe King, Krausmann's marriage spelled the end of her career in newspaper comics. Virginia Krausmann passed away on 15 May 1986, in Bay Village, Ohio.
Legacy
Together with Dot Cochran, Ethel Hays, Virginia Huget, Fay King, Gladys Parker and Dorothy Urfer, Virginia Krausmann is an early pioneer of female cartooning, gracing newspaper pages of the 1920s and 1930s with the comic exploits of 'Annibelle' and 'Marianne', two sophisticated and witty society girls.
