Veteran cartoonist Tom Moore, who brought to life the town of Riverdale and his red-haired, freckled inhabitant Archie along with his pals, passed away in his hometown El Paso. He was 86.
Moore, who began drawing cartoons while in the US Navy during the Korean War, died on Monday morning while in hospice care in his hometown, his son lito Bujanda-Moore said on Tuesday. lito said his father was diagnosed with throat cancer last week and chose not to undergo treatment.
Moore drew Archie Andrews and his friends on and off from 1953 until he retired in the late 1980s. Annual sales of the comic regularly surpassed half a million copies during the 1960s, according to his hometown newspaper El Paso Times.
“Tom was very funny and had a knack for putting together really great, hilarious gags and special pages when he worked at Archie,” said Archie Editor-in-Chief Victor Gorelick. “He was probably best known here for inking our Jughead relaunch decades ago. We’re all sad to hear this news and wish his family the very best during this time. He was a cartoonist’s cartoonist.”
After retiring, Moore kept tabs on Archie, and disagreed when the comic book company decided to kill off the character. The El Paso Museum of Art displayed some of Moore’s work and his vast comic collection about 20 years ago.