Bill Mauldin
by Robert Watters

Cartoonist and GI hero Bill Mauldin died January 22, 2003 from complications of Alzheimer's disease at a nursing home in Newport Beach, California. Mr. Mauldin was 81 years old.

Mauldin portrayed the realities of war, which brought humor to the battlefield, through his cartoons. His best known cartoon characters were "Willie and Joe", two scruffy infantry GI's, who were based loosely on Mauldin and his father. The ex-GI enlisted in the Army in 1940 and was assigned as a rifleman in the 180th infantry when he began drawing cartoons on military life for the 45 Division's newspaper.

His depiction of life in the trenches and on the battlefield both entertained the frontline soldiers and irritated the battlefield generals, including General George Patton, who once called him into his office.

Despite his confrontations with authority over his cartoons, Mauldin continued to draw what he wanted, eventually earning a Pulitzer Prize in 1945.