Here’s a new salute to people in the armed forces and their faithful families.
Self-professed “military brat” Paul Jon recently launched “Fort Knox,” a strip about a constantly moving military clan.
It follows the Knox family after they get transferred to the fictional Fort Lincoln. Joe Knox and wife Jane have to deal with military brass, frequent moves and raising two crazy kids. Wes, a bullied boy with asthma, and his brother, Donald, a tie-wearing kid bent on world domination, regularly get into trouble.
Because of his comic’s military theme, Jon has done work with the USO, MilitaryBrats.net and the Army Wife Network. He said he has been getting great feedback from folks in the military since the comic’s launch in October. It appears in more than 25 papers, including the Seattle Times, the (Minneapolis) Star-Tribune and, yes, the Fort Knox Turret.
Jon, who maintains his full-time job for a software company, called in from California to talk about his characters, the comic and his creative process.
Q. Were you in the military or in a military family?
A. My dad is a retired colonel and (the comic is) pretty much drawing from my experience. Actually, we lived in Fort Knox. Even though it’s based on the Knox family and it’s in a fictitious fort — Fort Lincoln — it’s based on our experiences living in Fort Knox.
It’s definitely a different life. I work in software now, and there’s a lot of change that goes on in the office, but you get used to it. We were so used to change growing up, every two or three years moving.
It’s a cool lifestyle because you get to meet all these different personalities, but it definitely keeps you on your toes.
Q. And you live in California now?
A. Yes. I went to college in South Carolina. My dad was sent out there in 1990. I decided to go to the University of South Carolina and worked at the State newspaper there. It was fun. I lived there for about 10 years.
Q. What’s something that happened in real life that made it into the strip?
A. I was an asthmatic growing up and was living on an inhaler. That’s in there.
The bully experiences. Oh, my gosh, I had plenty of bullies. Being a military brat, every two years I got a new bully. That’s in there.
Q. Are you one of the characters?
A. Yeah, Wes. Wes is me. My brother Dan, he’s Donald. He actually used to wear a tie and carry a briefcase to school when he was in kindergarten. The kid was weird. He was always kind of full of himself, and I was the sweet-hearted kid. We were definitely like oil and water. Now we’re the best of friends.
He was a true character and always planning on taking over the world. He had plans in that briefcase. And he’s red-haired just like Donald is.
Q. And your parents?
A. My parents are named Joe and Jane, which is weird. You think of G.I. Joe and G.I. Jane, but that’s my parents’ real names.
Q. How did you get started in cartooning?
A. I’ve wanted to become a cartoonist since I was 5. It was weird. I never wanted to be anything else.
I won awards in high school and my first real cartooning job was in high school working for a weekly paper. I was getting paid $15 a comic.
Through college I was a political cartoonist for the University of South Carolina paper, the Gamecock. I ended up on the editorial page of the State newspaper. Then I was doing a comic strip for the newspaper and always trying to get syndicated. They only syndicate a handful of people a year.
I always did these weird strips on aliens or technology. They say “write what you know” and I finally did and that’s what worked.
Q. Do you work ahead?
A. Right now, I’m about five months ahead in the dailies and the Sundays and even more ahead with strips that I’ve got sketched out.
The good news is that I can swap out weeks. Next month, we’re sending the father to desert training. I was able to take two weeks that I had planned and put the desert training weeks in there. We’re doing a special D-Day week and a special Memorial Day on Sunday. It allows me to do special events and stuff like that.
Q. Wow, you’re way ahead. Do you worry about writer’s block?
A. That’s my biggest fear. I keep to a really tight routine. Every Saturday and Sunday, I’ll write and I usually get about two weeks’ worth. I’m probably a year ahead in writing.
I’m pretty happy with the way that’s going. If you have it in the can already, you can always just add.
Q. You have a full-time job, so how do you juggle a job and doing a comic strip seven days a week?
A. That is one good question. It’s obscene. What I do is keep to that routine. On the train going to work, I sketch out the dailies and during lunch I’ll tighten up the sketches. When I get home around 6:30, I ink.
My wife misses me. (Laughs)
But it works. ... There’s no room for writer’s block. I don’t even want to think about it.
Q. How do you draw the strip?
A. I do what Scott Adams (of “Dilbert”) does. I draw directly on the computer. I scan in my rough sketches and use what’s called a Cintiq (a computer drawing tablet with a video screen that allows the user to digitally draw directly on the screen).
I can’t tell you how many thousands of hours it’s saved me. ...
The great thing is the do-overs. You can click “undo” (on your computer), and you can’t do that with pen and ink.
Seriously, it saves my marriage. (Laughs) I have chores to do, and I gotta have time.
Q. How did you learn to draw?
A. I’m self-taught. I always drew. I took college courses in drawing — a few — but my major was journalism. They always say, “Good drawing can’t save bad writing in a comic strip, but good writing can save bad drawing.” I always go by that.
I did take a few life-drawing classes, but they always had the nude models facing me, and it was uncomfortable. (Laughs) It wasn’t good. I definitely had the teachers that kind of looked down on cartooning. But cartooning is one of the few truly American art forms.
Q. Do you have any favorite comic strips?
A. I would say “Peanuts,” particularly the 1960s to 1980, is just awesome. The characters and the interactions are fantastic.
“The Far Side,” I love. Who doesn’t love “The Far Side”?
There’s a strip called “Piranha Club” by a guy named Bud Grace. He used to be a nuclear physicist and became a cartoonist. One of the craziest guys you’ll ever meet. He’s brilliant.
Of course, the McCoy boys (Glenn and Gary of “The Flying McCoys”).
Contact the writer: 444-1557, kevin.coffey@owh.com
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