Hagar the Horrible cartoonist dies at age 70 on strip’s 50th anniversary

Chris Browne was instantly recognizable at charity and community events during his many years living in Sarasota. He was often wearing a Viking helmet, a reminder of his role drawing the popular “Hagar the Horrible” comic strip started by his father.

The cartoonist who joined the family business started by his father, Dik Browne, died Feb. 4 at age 70, just as Hagar marked its 50th anniversary. Chris Browne had lived in Sioux Falls, South Dakota since 2007, his younger sister, Tsuiwen “Sally” Browne-Boreas said.

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Hagar, which Dik Browne created in 1973, was among the most popular comic strips in the world, appearing in more than 2,000 papers at its peak, Boreas said. It was printed in 45 countries and translated into more than a dozen languages.

“Hagar” follows the comical exploits of the eponymous pillaging and plundering Viking; his bossy wife, Helga; their studious son, Hamlet; their sweet daughter, Honi; her boyfriend, Lute; and other characters. Chris Browne began drawing the strip in 1988, about a year before his father’s death. Dik Browne also drew the popular Hi and Lois (a spinoff of Beetle Bailey), which his other son, Robert (or Chance) continues to draw. Brown-Boreas handled the administrative end of the business, including fan mail.

“Chris was very talented, very generous with art,” she said. ”He would draw for people in Sarasota. He would go to schools and draw for the children. He loved Sarasota and was very much a part of the community, judging art contests, taking part in local parades.” He frequently donated original artwork to charity auctions.

He moved to Sioux Falls because he didn’t like how much Sarasota had grown, she said.

“He wanted to go back to a small town. Sioux Falls reminded him of Connecticut where he grew up. He had a big fan base out there and there were a lot of Scandinavians who liked Hagar,” she said.

For about five years, Chris Browne also produced his own strip “Raising Duncan,” about a sweet-tempered black Scotty dog and the couple who loves him. It appeared in dozens of newspapers before it ended in 2005.

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“Frankly, they could have canceled it two years ago, but they were willing to give it more time,” he told the Herald-Tribune in 2005. “It never quite managed to break through.” He said he was “sad for a few days. But these things happen for a reason and now I’m looking ahead.”

He said Raising Duncan’s main themes were “love, acceptance and family,” and he was bucking a trend at a time when many strips were edgier or more sarcastic.

“The comics pages used to be a refuge from the problems of the world that you see in the rest of the paper," he told the Herald-Tribune. “It’s not that way any more. Now the controversial social issues are addressed in the strip. But I think that’s fine. There should be diversity in the strips.”

Though “Hagar” was about a Viking, Brown-Boreas said it had universal appeal because “he was still a family man. He had the same problems that families have. He has to go make a living. There are demands from his wife. A lot of the fans saw themselves in Hagar or Helga.”

Chris Browne retired from drawing “Hagar” in 2017. It is now drawn by Gary Hallgren and continues to run in the Herald-Tribune and dozens of other newspapers.

In addition to his strips, Chris Browne created the children’s books “The Monster Who Ate the State” and “Santa Confidential,” featuring letters to Santa. He also created illustrations for The New Yorker, National Lampoon and Playboy, among other magazines.

He was born May 16, 1952, in South Orange N.J. to Dik and Joan Kelly Browne. Five years later, the family moved to Wilton, Connecticut, where he graduated from Wilton High School. He briefly attended the Philadelphia College of Art, but Boreas said he mostly studied with his father and on the job.

The parents vacationed in Sarasota for many years, before the parents began spending winters in the community and eventually lived full-time starting in the 1980s. Chris Browne lived in Sarasota from 1975 to 2007.

“He was a gentle genius, just the most charming person you could ever meet,” Chance Brown said in a statement. “By the time he was 10, he could draw as well as any of our family’s many professional artist friends. He really was a prodigy and a born cartoonist. He could make me laugh harder than anyone else ever could.”

Boreas said her brother was “sort of like the character of Hamlet, very pensive, shy and sweet. Bob was like Lute, the musician.”

In addition to his siblings, he is survived by his sister-in-law Debra Brown, brother-in-law Rico Boreas, his stepdaughter, Ashley Smith and numerous nieces and nephews. He was predeceased by his wife, Carroll.

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This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Longtime Sarasota cartoonist of Hagar the Horrible dies at age 70