Ray Billingsley

Ray Billingsley (born July 25, 1957, in Wake Forest, North Carolina) is an American cartoonist and the creator of Curtis — the long-running King Features Syndicate daily comic strip that debuted in 1988 and has run continuously for over 35 years. Curtis follows a Black middle-school boy named Curtis Wilkins navigating family life, school, friendship, and the city in a strip that is both warmly comedic and quietly political. Billingsley grew up in Harlem, New York, and began his professional cartooning career as a child, selling strips to Harvey Comics at age 13 and later drawing for Children's Television Workshop. He studied at the School of Visual Arts. Curtis was groundbreaking as one of the first nationally syndicated daily comic strips centered on a Black family and is regarded as a landmark in the history of Black representation in mainstream newspaper comics. Billingsley has received the NAACP Image Award and the Inkpot Award for his contributions to the medium.