Obituaries : Raeburn Van Buren; Illustrator Drew Popular ‘Abbie an’ Slats’
Raeburn L. Van Buren, who drew the comic strip “Abbie an’ Slats” about life in rural America, died Tuesday at the age of 96 following a fall at his home here.
Born in Pueblo, Colo., Van Buren began his career in 1909 as a sketch artist for the Kansas City Star. He came to New York in 1913, sharing a studio apartment with three fellow Missourians: actor William Powell, artist Thomas Hart Benton and caricaturist Ralph Barton.
He sold sketches and illustrated hundreds of articles for such magazines as Life and later drew for hundreds of stories in the Saturday Evening Post, Collier’s, Redbook and other publications.
In 1937 he began “Abbie an’ Slats,” a comic strip about life in small-town America featuring a lovable curmudgeon named Bathless Groggins. In its heyday in the 1940s and ‘50s, “Abbie an’ Slats” was carried by nearly 400 newspapers. It ran until 1971.
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