Leigh Rubin, Creator of Rubes

Nobody finds the fun in cows, dogs, religion and weird, quirky people better than Leigh Rubin. His witty streak of humour shines through in his comic panel, Rubes, where the animals take on human-like attitudes and the people behave, well, um... oddly. Sometimes leaning toward the gross, occasionally repulsive, but always a hoot, Rubes has grown to be standard fare in newspapers around the globe, 365 days of the year.

Got Milk? Photo by Jeff Harman, courtesy Leigh Rubin

Difficult to break into the mainstream syndicates no matter how funny his panels were, Leigh was undaunted. Rather, he began self-syndication to promote his work. Small newspapers and college campus newspapers were more open to his work - in the beginning, he earned $10 each for cartoons printed in the Antelope Valley Press. *(1) To keep his bills paid, the struggling cartoonist worked at his father's printing company in Los Angeles.

After standing in the card section of a pharmacy in 1978, Leigh was struck with a business idea. "I just stopped in my tracks, looked at the cards and thought: 'Wait a minute. I can do that.'" He took the bold step of dropping out of studies at Pierce College in Los Angeles in 1979 to found his own publishing business, Rubes Publishing. Creating and distributing greeting cards and books, Leigh at first sold his wares at street fairs in Southern California. He published his first book, "Notable Quotes" in 1981. In the book's unique theme, music notes took on fascinating, inspired lives of their own.

In 1988, Creators Syndicate took on Leigh and his panel creations, which had been in self-syndication since 1984.

The Northridge earthquake in California struck in 1994, and its widespread effects changed Leigh's life. Freeways were damaged; he could not get to work at the printing company. Instead, he used the opportunity to stay home and put his efforts into developing the strangely captivating style and character of Rubes into his profession. "Maybe you could call me a sit-down comedian. Whatever you call it, I'm just gratified I have the opportunity to make other people laugh," Leigh mentioned on amazon.com.

Building slowly, the panel now appears in more than 400 newspapers under the Creators Syndicate umbrella. Through Rubes Publications and the Syndicate, Leigh has sold over 10 million greeting cards plus calendars, t-shirts and other stuff. There are 13 Rubin comics collections print, with three recently come: "The Wild Life of Dogs: A Rubes Cartoon Book", "The Wild Life of Farm Animals" and "The Wild Life of Pets: A Rubes Cartoon Book". All three collections are published by Bowtie Press.

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