In Memory: Doug Marlette

Doug Marlette, award-winning cartoonist and death penalty opponent, died this week in a car accident. We will miss Doug's work. Here's an Associated Press story about Doug and his career:

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - Doug Marlette, the Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist who recently turned his incisive wit toward a budding career as a novelist, has died in an auto accident in Mississippi. He was 57.

Marshall County Coroner John Garrison said the accident occurred in heavy rain about three miles east of Holly Springs. He said he believed the truck hydroplaned, then struck the tree.
Marlette started his cartooning career in 1972 at The Charlotte Observer and most recently was on staff at the Tulsa World. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1988 for his work at The Observer and the Atlanta Constitution, the same year The Observer won the Pulitzer's public service award for its work detailing the misuse of funds by Jim Bakker's PTL television ministry.

Marlette published two novels, "The Bridge," in 2001, and "Magic Time," in 2006.

He received death threats for a cartoon he drew in 2002 that depicted a Muslim driving a rental truck with a nuclear weapon on board. Above were the words, "What Would Muhammad Drive?"

Marlette graduated from Florida State in 1971 and joined The Observer the next year. After more than a decade in Charlotte, he moved to the Atlanta Constitution before stops at New York Newsday and the Tallahassee Democrat.