Ted Key

Ted Key (born Theodore Keyser; August 25, 1912 – May 3, 2008) was an American cartoonist and writer. He is best known as the creator of the cartoon panel Hazel, which was later the basis for a television series of the same name, and also the creator of the Peabody's Improbable History animated segments. College to cartoons Born in Fresno, California, Key was the son of Latvian immigrant Simon Keyser, who had changed his name from Katseff to Keyser, and then to "Key" during World War I. Although his family thereafter went by Key, Theodore Keyser did not legally adopt the name until the 1950s. Attending the University of California, Berkeley, Key became the art editor of the student newspaper, The Daily Californian, and was associate editor of the campus humor magazine, the California Pelican and was a member of the Pi Lambda Phi fraternity. After graduating from college in 1933, Key relocated to New York City, where he published cartoons and illustrations in a number of periodicals, including Better Homes and Gardens, Collier's, The New Yorker, Ladies' Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, McCall's, Cosmopolitan, TV Guide, Mademoiselle, Look, and Judge. Key also worked as associate editor of Judge in 1937. Hazel Key's most famous creation, the single-panel Hazel, about a wry and bossy household maid, came to Key in 1943 in a dream that he drew the next morning and sent to The Saturday Evening Post, where it was accepted and began running regularly. He soon afterward gave the character a name and employment at the Baxter household. In 2008, the cartoonist's son, Peter Key, said, "He picked the name Hazel out of the air, but there was an editor at The Post who had a sister named Hazel. She thought her brother came up with the name, and she didn’t speak to him for two years."