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Lynn Johnston, Creator of For Better or For Worse, Part One

© Susanna McLeod

While expecting Aaron, Lynn's obstetrician challenged her to do cartoons for the ceilings of his patient examining rooms. She complied, creating over 80 comics. The collection formed her first book, "David, We're Pregnant." Shortly after, Lynn and her husband divorced. She was left a single parent, struggling to run her own business from a greenhouse turned into a studio.

Rod Johnston was a second year dental student when he entered Lynn's life. They married in 1975, around the same time her second book of cartoons came out, " Hi Mom, Hi Dad." The Johnston family grew to include baby Katie. The family prepared to move to a small town in Northern Manitoba in 1978 (to fulfill Rod's dream of becoming a flying dentist) when Lynn received a letter from Universal Press.

Lynn did not seek syndication. Universal Press Syndicate sought her talents to do a daily comic strip. They liked her books and thought she would be a good bet for cartoonist. They requested samples of her cartooning, so she sent almost two dozen strips of a comic she called "The Johnstons." Lynn based the characters on her own family. "We were the only people I knew I could draw over and over again with some consistency." *(2)

Universal offered Lynn a 20-year contract on the basis of her ingenious work. The syndicate editor changed the name from "The Johnstons" to "For Better or For Worse." Lynn changed the characters' names to the second names of everyone in her family, except for the star character. Elly is named after a high school friend of Lynn's who died of brain cancer. In negotiations with the syndicate, Lynn held out for a few things, such as insisting the strip remain Canadian-based.

The characters of the comic strip are broadly constructed from the family and friends of the Johnston's. Michael and Elizabeth follow some elements of Lynn's own children Aaron and Katie, but are three years behind. John is very similar to her husband Rod, both being dentists and model railroaders. April is Lynn's own imaginative creation, sprung from her desire to have another child. April's spirit follows the cartoonist's own childhood attitudes. Lynn lovingly added traits of her own father into Elly's father. She added elements of her in-laws into several other characters and created new in-depth personalities as friends and neighbours.

Even the animals in For Better or For Worse take on endearing personalities. The readers are pulled into the joys of the rabbit, Mr. B., chasing Edgar, the pup, through the house, then looking like guilty children when ordered to stop. Fans world-wide were wrenched with sadness on the death of the Patterson's beloved first pooch Farley, after he saved April from drowning the Sharon River near their house.