Leo Vroman is a Dutch illustrator, poet, writer, scientist and painter, who also created occasional comic strips. His first known comic is 'Stiemer en Stalma', a story written by Anton Koolhaas about a wonderfish and a diver, that appeared for the first time in the daily newspaper NRC in 1937.
Later on, the comic was also published in album format a couple of times, and in De Volkskrant (1961-62) and foreign papers. His other strip, 'Totie de Sphinx', was less successful and only appeared in the small colonial news magazine, Actueel Wereldnieuws, in 1941.
Coming from a Jewish background, Vroman fled to England and the Dutch Indies (Indonesia) during the early days of World War II. After the War he settled in New York, where he worked as a hermatologist. Although only known as a scientist in the USA (among others for the "Vroman effect"), he is best known in The Netherlands for his poetry. He passed away in Fort Worth on 22 February 2014 at the age of 98.
