Wilson Starbuck

Wilson Starbuck (December 25, 1897 – December 27, 1983) was an American writer, sailor, and United States Navy officer known for his written works involving life at sea. He is best known for creating the World War II comic strip Navy Bob Steele which was published by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate from 1939 to 1945, and for his play Sea Dogs which was staged on Broadway in 1939.

Life and career Wilson Starbuck was born in Newark, New Jersey, on December 25, 1897. He served as a lieutenant in the United States Navy during World War I, and also worked as a sailor aboard a freighter. Similar non-fiction books for children in the Our Changing World book series followed including Down the Ship's Ways (1935, Thomas Nelson & Sons) and Flash-Flash-Flash: About Lightships and Lighthouses (1937, Thomas Nelson & Sons).

Starbuck's melodrama Sea Dogs premiered on Broadway at Maxine Elliott's Theatre's on November 6, 1939. Set aboard a freighter at sea, the play starred the actor Joseph Macauley as an abusive alcoholic captain involved in dope smuggling who is pitted against a young crewman who threatens to expose his illegal enterprise. The play was deemed exceptional by The New York Times in its authenticity of scene and characters, pulling from Starbuck's own experience working on the crew of a freighter, but was otherwise criticized by the paper as not going beyond authenticity to create a compelling drama. Theatre historian Gerald Bordman noted that the play was unusual in that it "contained some of the foulest language heard" on the Broadway stage up until that point in history. He created the comic strip with the intent of supporting President Franklin D. Roosevelt's policy and campaign for American military preparedness. With Erwin Greenwood as his comic strip artist, he successfully sold the comic strip to McClure Newspaper Syndicate who began publishing the strip in their newspapers nationally on November 9, 1939. The comic strip fared well. On the day of the Attack on Pearl Harbor the Navy Bob Steele strip on that day featured the character aboard an American destroyer attempting a heroic rescue at sea. After this event, the strip featured Bob Steele fighting in the Pacific War. He is buried in West Laurel Hill Cemetery.