Doodle Dandy Pencils in a U.S. Championship

A doodler, according to Webster’s dictionary, “scribbles aimlessly.”

But don’t tell Ojai fourth-grader Ted McCormick that his aimless scribbling will get him nowhere, because he just won the 1997 National Doodle Contest. Not to mention $100 in cool cash.

“It’s the first contest I ever entered,” Ted said Thursday as he stood on the Topa Topa Elementary School playground.

Ted’s contest entry--complete with colored-pencil enhancement--depicts the contest’s theme, “A Day in the Life of a Cedar Pencil.” Drawn with a No. 2 cedar pencil, it aced out 1,000 other submissions. His doodle features a sinking Titanic, while several unsinkable yellow, eraser-topped pencils jauntily ride the waves around the doomed ship.

“Look on the bright side,” quips one pencil to another. “At least we float.”

So far, Ted hasn’t had any requests to help out with publicity on the upcoming movie “Titanic,” but if the producers need assistance, they can reach him in Lisa Niva’s fourth-grade classroom at Topa Topa. Niva will take a message.

“Ted will doodle and draw any time possible,” Niva said.

Ted’s mother, Janice McCormick, is also familiar with her son’s penchant for imaginative use of a pencil.

“She was surfing the Internet one day and found the contest. She told me about it,” said the budding artiste.

Given his druthers, Ted would draw jets all day long.

“I want to be a pilot in the Navy,” he said. “I like the modern fighter jets, like Tomcats, Eagles and Hornets.”

But his future could just as well be in finance. He knows exactly what he’s going to do with the $100 check he was awarded by the contest sponsor, the Incense Cedar Institute.

“I’m going to invest it in stock,” he announced. “The bank is a little slow.”