Horace T. Elmo

Biography He was born Arazio Theodore Elmo in Manhattan (later moving to Brooklyn and then the Bronx), the sixth of seven children of Italian immigrants Joseph and Josephine Elmo. After starting out as a stock clerk in the export business, he worked as a cartoonist with the local tabloid the New York Evening Graphic.

His first professionally published work were six episodes of the recurring one-page feature Did You Know That for the film magazine Picture Play in 1932–1933. Dash Dixon, and followed by Biff Baxter's Adventures, Detective Riley, Little Buddy, Your Health Comes First!!!, and Socko the Sea Dog (a takeoff on Popeye).

In the period 1935–1939, Elmo worked on a number of strips of his own, including Facts You Never Knew, The Fizzle Family, Goofus Family, and Laughs from Today's News. While with the syndicate, Kirby also did the artwork for a 24-page pamphlet produced for the banking industry, called The Romance of Money. Kirby remained with the syndicate until late 1939, when he began working for the theatrical animation company Fleischer Studios.

After a two-year hiatus, from 1941 to 1946 Elmo worked on some new weekly strips, including It's Amazing, Sally Snickers,

Elmo's Lincoln service operated until c. 1945, when he restarted it as Elmo Features Syndicate, sometimes employing the talents of the Roche-Iger Studio;

After the demise of his syndication service, Elmo did some work in the comic book industry, for both National Comics Publications and Timely Comics.

Elmo's later strips included The Rhyming Romeos, which ran exclusively in the African-American newspaper the Arkansas State Press in the 1950s; and Puggy and Tell Me, which ran exclusively in the Hubbard, Ohio, News Reporter in the 1960s and in the Spirit Lake Beacon in the mid-1970s.

Personal life and death Elmo was married twice; first to Martha Oliver, and then to Vilma A. Molnar. by Jack Kirby Cyclone Burke (a.k.a. Larry Antonette) Detective Riley (1935–c. 1943) by "Richard Lee" (ghosted by Jack Kirby, H. T. Elmo, and others) Did You Know by Topps (1939–1944) Little Buddy by "Bruce Stuart" (1935–?) Nappy by Irv Tirman (1939–1944) Socko the Sea Dog (1935–1944) by H. T. Elmo (1935–1939) and then "Teddy" (1939–1944) — at some point ghosted by Jack Kirby Useless Eustace (1941–1946) Your Health Comes First!!! by Jack Kirby (under the pseudonym "Jack Curtis") (1935–1939)