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Bill Ward (comics)
Encyclopedia
William Hess Ward known as Bill Ward, was an American cartoonist
notable as a good girl art
ist and creator of the risqué comics character
Torchy
.
, New York
, Ward grew up in Ridgewood
, New Jersey
, where his father was an executive with the United Fruit Company.
At age 17, Ward began his professional career by illustrating "beer jackets", a type of white denim jacket with text or design printed or drawn on the back; he charged one dollar a jacket and by his own count drew hundreds during that summer. Back in Brooklyn, he went to Pratt Institute
, where one classmate was future naturist painter Bob Kuhn
. Ward graduated in 1941, and through the university's placement bureau obtained a Manhattan
art-agency job at $18 a week, sweeping floors, running errands and serving as an art assistant. He was fired after accidentally cutting in half a finished Ford automobile
illustration with a matte knife.
Still rooming at his college fraternity
house, he received a call from Pratt regarding another job, assisting comic book
artist Jack Binder
. He joined Binder's small art studio, a "packager" that supplied outsourced comics pages to fledgling comic-book publishers, where Pete Riss was an assistant. The studio was relocating from The Bronx
to Ridgewood, New Jersey
at the time, to the upstairs loft of a barn; there, Binder drew layouts for Fawcett Comics
stories, for which Riss penciled and inked
figures and Ward drew the backgrounds. Features included "Mister Scarlet and Pinky", "Bulletman", "Ibis the Invincible
", "Captain Battle
", the "Black Owl", and the adapted pulp magazine
features "Doc Savage
" and "The Shadow
". The studio grew to approximately 30 artists, with Ken Bald
as art director
.
Ward's first credited works are writing and drawing an episode each of the two-page humor feature "Private Ward" in Fawcett's Spy Smasher
#2 (Winter 1941) and Bulletman #3 (January 14, 1942), published closely to each other. His first major job was an issue of Fawcett's Captain Marvel
, after having worked on that C.C. Beck feature in Whiz Comics
.
Shortly thereafter, Quality Comics
editor George Brenner
hired Ward to write and pencil the hit World War II
aviator
feature "Blackhawk
"; Ward confirmably did Military Comics #30-31 (July–August 1944), with the next several issues generally but unconfirmably credited to Al Bryant. He also drew some Blackhawk stories in Modern Comics and some issues of the Blackhawk title itself in 1946 and 1947, occasionally afterward, and then often in the early 1950s. His story "Karlovna Had a True Underworld" from Blackhawk #14 (Spring 1947) was reprinted in the book Comix: A History of Comic Books In America (Bonanza Books, 1971).
Drafted into the U.S. Army, Ward was stationed at a naval base in Rhode Island, but he continued to draw, creating artwork for his past pal Wendell Crowley, who was at Fawcett Publications
. The military wanted a comic strip to boost morale that would appear in the local Naval base newspaper, and Ward responded with Ack-Ack-Amy, an early version of his Torchy Todd
character. Ward's ingenue
character was created for the base newspaper
at Brooklyn
's Fort Hamilton
, where he was based. The comic strip
was soon syndicated to other Army newspapers worldwide.
' Doll Man
#8 (Spring 1946), and continued in all but three issues through #28 (May 1950), as well as in Modern Comics #53-89 (September 1946 - September 1949). A solo series, Torchy, ran six issues (November 1949 - September 1950).
Several Torchy stories, including some Fort Hamilton strips, were reprinted in Innovation Comics' 100-page, squarebound comic book Bill Ward's Torchy, The Blonde Bombshell #1 (January 1992). Others have been reprinted in fy Pages #1 (1987); AC Comics
anthology
Good Girl Art Quarterly #1 (Summer 1990), #10 (Fall 1992), #11 (Winter 1993), and #14 (Winter 1994), and in AC's America's Greatest Comics #5 (circa 2003). Comic Images released a set of Torchy trading cards in 1994.
Ward drew an original cover featuring Torchy for Robert M. Overstreet's annual book The Comic Book Price Guide (#8, 1978).
Ward's last confirmed comic-book work is at least one Blackhawk
story in Blackhawk #63 (April 1953); another story in that issue is unconfirmed but generally credited to Ward. His last unconfirmed but generally accepted comic-book works appeared the same month: a Blackhawk story in Blackhawk #65 and a Captain Marvel Jr.
tale in Fawcett Comics
' The Marvel Family #84 (both June 1953).
Ward turned to magazine cartooning afterward, doing humorous spot illustrations, some featuring Torchy, for such publications as editor Abe Goodman's Humorama
. Some of Ward's gag comics were collected in the Avon Books paperback Honeymoon Guide (#T-95, 1956; reprinted as #T282, 1958). Ward was also a regular artist for the satirical-humor magazine Cracked, sometimes signing his work "McCartney".
He did very occasional comic-book humor stories, such as the four-page "Play Pool" in Humor-Vision's satiric
Pow Magazine #1 (August 1966), and, that same decade, episodes of "The Adventures of Pussycat
", a risqué feature about a sexy secret agent
, which ran throughout various men's adventure
magazines published by Martin Goodman
's Magazine Management Company. Ward dabbled in underground comics, drawing a pornographic "Stella Starlet" story in publisher John A. Mozzer's Weird Smut Comics #1 (1985) and a "Sugar Caine" story in issue #2 (1987); both were written by Dave Goode. Ward also illustrated erotic stories, written by himself, in such men's magazines as Juggs
and Leg Show
— an article a month for the former in his later years. One feature in Juggs that ran for a year was "Quest for a Big Pair", featuring the sexual adventures of Harold Brown, who had sexual encounters with busty women. Ward also drew the comics feature "Debbie" in Club
magazine.
In a rare turn doing a mainstream comics character, Ward drew the four-page part one of a Judge Dredd
story, "The Mega-City 5000", in the weekly UK comic 2000 AD
#40 (November 26, 1977), reprinted in Eagle Comics' Judge Dredd: The Early Cases #3 (April 1986); it was written by John Wagner
under the pseudonym
T.B. Grover.
Ward remained a freelance artist throughout his career. He married twice and lived most of his life in Ridgewood, New Jersey.
Cartoonist
A cartoonist is a person who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is usually humorous, mainly created for entertainment, political commentary or advertising...
notable as a good girl art
Good girl art
Good girl art is found in drawings or paintings which feature a strong emphasis on attractive women no matter what the subject or situation. GGA was most commonly featured in comic books, pulp magazines and crime fiction...
ist and creator of the risqué comics character
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
Torchy
Torchy (comics)
Torchy is a comic strip and, primarily, a series of comic books featuring the ingenue Torchy Todd, created by the American "good girl art" cartoonist Bill Ward in 1944.-Publication history:...
.
Early life and career
Born in BrooklynBrooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
, New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, Ward grew up in Ridgewood
Ridgewood, New Jersey
Ridgewood is a village in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the village population was 24,958. Ridgewood is an affluent suburban bedroom community of New York City, located approximately northwest of Midtown Manhattan.The Village of Ridgewood was...
, New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
, where his father was an executive with the United Fruit Company.
At age 17, Ward began his professional career by illustrating "beer jackets", a type of white denim jacket with text or design printed or drawn on the back; he charged one dollar a jacket and by his own count drew hundreds during that summer. Back in Brooklyn, he went to Pratt Institute
Pratt Institute
Pratt Institute is a private art college in New York City located in Brooklyn, New York, with satellite campuses in Manhattan and Utica. Pratt is one of the leading undergraduate art schools in the United States and offers programs in Architecture, Graphic Design, History of Art and Design,...
, where one classmate was future naturist painter Bob Kuhn
Bob Kuhn
Bob Kuhn is a former mayor of Glendora, California.Kuhn was elected to the Glendora City Council in 1986 and was the city's mayor in 1990, 1993, and 1994. He also served as a Planning Commissioner from 1982–1986....
. Ward graduated in 1941, and through the university's placement bureau obtained a Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
art-agency job at $18 a week, sweeping floors, running errands and serving as an art assistant. He was fired after accidentally cutting in half a finished Ford automobile
Automobile
An automobile, autocar, motor car or car is a wheeled motor vehicle used for transporting passengers, which also carries its own engine or motor...
illustration with a matte knife.
Fraternity and sorority houses
North American fraternity and sorority housing refers largely to the houses or housing areas that fraternity and sorority members live and work together in...
house, he received a call from Pratt regarding another job, assisting comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
artist Jack Binder
Jack Binder (comics)
Jack Binder was a Golden Age comics creator and art packager. A fine artist by education, Binder had a prolific comics career that lasted from 1937–1946, then continued from "semi-retirement" until 1953. He was the creator of the original comic book Daredevil, for Lev Gleason Publications...
. He joined Binder's small art studio, a "packager" that supplied outsourced comics pages to fledgling comic-book publishers, where Pete Riss was an assistant. The studio was relocating from The Bronx
The Bronx
The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...
to Ridgewood, New Jersey
Ridgewood, New Jersey
Ridgewood is a village in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the village population was 24,958. Ridgewood is an affluent suburban bedroom community of New York City, located approximately northwest of Midtown Manhattan.The Village of Ridgewood was...
at the time, to the upstairs loft of a barn; there, Binder drew layouts for Fawcett Comics
Fawcett Comics
Fawcett Comics, a division of Fawcett Publications, was one of several successful comic book publishers during the Golden Age of Comic Books in the 1940s...
stories, for which Riss penciled and inked
Inker
The inker is one of the two line artists in a traditional comic book or graphic novel. After a pencilled drawing is given to the inker, the inker uses black ink to produce refined outlines over the pencil lines...
figures and Ward drew the backgrounds. Features included "Mister Scarlet and Pinky", "Bulletman", "Ibis the Invincible
Ibis the Invincible
Ibis the Invincible is a fictional character, a comic book superhero originally published by Fawcett Comics in the 1940s and then by DC Comics beginning in the 1970s. Like many magician superheroes introduced in the Golden Age of Comics, Ibis owes much to the popular comic strip character Mandrake...
", "Captain Battle
Captain Battle
Captain Battle was a Golden Age comic book hero and one of the features in Lev Gleason's Silver Streak Comics. His first appearance was Silver Streak Comics #10, and his final appearance was Silver Streak Comics #23, when that series was cancelled....
", the "Black Owl", and the adapted pulp magazine
Pulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
features "Doc Savage
Doc Savage
Doc Savage is a fictional character originally published in American pulp magazines during the 1930s and 1940s. He was created by publisher Henry W. Ralston and editor John L...
" and "The Shadow
The Shadow
The Shadow is a collection of serialized dramas, originally in pulp magazines, then on 1930s radio and then in a wide variety of media, that follow the exploits of the title character, a crime-fighting vigilante in the pulps, which carried over to the airwaves as a "wealthy, young man about town"...
". The studio grew to approximately 30 artists, with Ken Bald
Ken Bald
Kenneth Bruce Bald is an American illustrator and comic book artist best known for the Judd Saxon, Dr. Kildare and Dark Shadows newspaper comic strips. Due to contractual obligations, he is credited as "K...
as art director
Art director
The art director is a person who supervise the creative process of a design.The term 'art director' is a blanket title for a variety of similar job functions in advertising, publishing, film and television, the Internet, and video games....
.
Ward's first credited works are writing and drawing an episode each of the two-page humor feature "Private Ward" in Fawcett's Spy Smasher
Spy Smasher
Spy Smasher is the name of two fictional characters appearing in comics published by DC Comics. The first is a superhero that was formerly owned and published by Fawcett Comics...
#2 (Winter 1941) and Bulletman #3 (January 14, 1942), published closely to each other. His first major job was an issue of Fawcett's Captain Marvel
Captain Marvel (DC Comics)
Captain Marvel is a fictional comic book superhero, originally published by Fawcett Comics and later by DC Comics. Created in 1939 by artist C. C. Beck and writer Bill Parker, the character first appeared in Whiz Comics #2...
, after having worked on that C.C. Beck feature in Whiz Comics
Whiz Comics
Whiz Comics was a monthly ongoing comic book anthology series, which was published by Fawcett Comics from February 1940 with issue #2 and stopping at issue #155 in June 1953, best known for introducing Captain Marvel. The first issue published of Whiz Comics was issue #2...
.
Shortly thereafter, Quality Comics
Quality Comics
Quality Comics was an American comic book publishing company that operated from 1939 to 1956 and was an influential creative force in what historians and fans call the Golden Age of comic books....
editor George Brenner
George Brenner
George Brenner was an American cartoonist in the mid 1900s. He created comics such as The Clock, Bozo the Iron Man, and 711.He also had a small part as a guest in the 1946 movie The Razor's Edge....
hired Ward to write and pencil the hit World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
aviator
Aviator
An aviator is a person who flies an aircraft. The first recorded use of the term was in 1887, as a variation of 'aviation', from the Latin avis , coined in 1863 by G. de la Landelle in Aviation Ou Navigation Aérienne...
feature "Blackhawk
Blackhawk (comics)
Blackhawk, a long-running comic book series, was also a film serial, a radio series and a novel. The comic book was published first by Quality Comics and later by DC Comics. The series was created by Will Eisner, Chuck Cuidera, and Bob Powell, but the artist most associated with the feature is Reed...
"; Ward confirmably did Military Comics #30-31 (July–August 1944), with the next several issues generally but unconfirmably credited to Al Bryant. He also drew some Blackhawk stories in Modern Comics and some issues of the Blackhawk title itself in 1946 and 1947, occasionally afterward, and then often in the early 1950s. His story "Karlovna Had a True Underworld" from Blackhawk #14 (Spring 1947) was reprinted in the book Comix: A History of Comic Books In America (Bonanza Books, 1971).
Drafted into the U.S. Army, Ward was stationed at a naval base in Rhode Island, but he continued to draw, creating artwork for his past pal Wendell Crowley, who was at Fawcett Publications
Fawcett Publications
Fawcett Publications was an American publishing company founded in 1919 in Robbinsdale, Minnesota by Wilford Hamilton "Captain Billy" Fawcett . At the age of 16, Fawcett ran away from home to join the Army, and the Spanish-American War took him to the Philippines. Back in Minnesota, he became a...
. The military wanted a comic strip to boost morale that would appear in the local Naval base newspaper, and Ward responded with Ack-Ack-Amy, an early version of his Torchy Todd
Torchy (comics)
Torchy is a comic strip and, primarily, a series of comic books featuring the ingenue Torchy Todd, created by the American "good girl art" cartoonist Bill Ward in 1944.-Publication history:...
character. Ward's ingenue
Ingenue (stock character)
See also Disingenuous, which is not quite the antonym that it may seem!The ingénue is a stock character in literature, film, and a role type in the theatre; generally a girl or a young woman who is endearingly innocent and wholesome. Ingenue may also refer to a new young actress or one typecast in...
character was created for the base newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
at Brooklyn
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
's Fort Hamilton
Fort Hamilton
Historic Fort Hamilton is located in the southwestern corner of the New York City borough of Brooklyn surrounded by the communities of Bay Ridge, Dyker Heights, and Bensonhurst, and is one of several posts that are part of the region which is headquartered by the Military District of Washington...
, where he was based. The comic strip
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
was soon syndicated to other Army newspapers worldwide.
Torchy
Torchy made her comic-book debut as star of a backup feature in Quality ComicsQuality Comics
Quality Comics was an American comic book publishing company that operated from 1939 to 1956 and was an influential creative force in what historians and fans call the Golden Age of comic books....
' Doll Man
Doll Man
Note: This article is about the Quality Comics character. For the Full Moon Features film Dollman, see Dollman . For the article on the movie's titular character, please see Brick Bardo....
#8 (Spring 1946), and continued in all but three issues through #28 (May 1950), as well as in Modern Comics #53-89 (September 1946 - September 1949). A solo series, Torchy, ran six issues (November 1949 - September 1950).
Several Torchy stories, including some Fort Hamilton strips, were reprinted in Innovation Comics' 100-page, squarebound comic book Bill Ward's Torchy, The Blonde Bombshell #1 (January 1992). Others have been reprinted in fy Pages #1 (1987); AC Comics
AC Comics
AC Comics is a comic book publishing company started by Bill Black.AC Comics specializes in reprints of Golden Age comics from now-defunct companies whose properties lapsed into public domain and were not reprinted elsewhere...
anthology
Anthology
An anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler. It may be a collection of poems, short stories, plays, songs, or excerpts...
Good Girl Art Quarterly #1 (Summer 1990), #10 (Fall 1992), #11 (Winter 1993), and #14 (Winter 1994), and in AC's America's Greatest Comics #5 (circa 2003). Comic Images released a set of Torchy trading cards in 1994.
Ward drew an original cover featuring Torchy for Robert M. Overstreet's annual book The Comic Book Price Guide (#8, 1978).
Later career
Blackhawk (comics)
Blackhawk, a long-running comic book series, was also a film serial, a radio series and a novel. The comic book was published first by Quality Comics and later by DC Comics. The series was created by Will Eisner, Chuck Cuidera, and Bob Powell, but the artist most associated with the feature is Reed...
story in Blackhawk #63 (April 1953); another story in that issue is unconfirmed but generally credited to Ward. His last unconfirmed but generally accepted comic-book works appeared the same month: a Blackhawk story in Blackhawk #65 and a Captain Marvel Jr.
Captain Marvel Jr.
Captain Marvel Jr. is a fictional character, a superhero originally published by Fawcett Comics and currently in the . A member of the Marvel Family team of superheroes, he was created by Ed Herron and Mac Raboy, and first appeared in Whiz Comics #25 in December 1941.Captain Marvel Jr.'s...
tale in Fawcett Comics
Fawcett Comics
Fawcett Comics, a division of Fawcett Publications, was one of several successful comic book publishers during the Golden Age of Comic Books in the 1940s...
' The Marvel Family #84 (both June 1953).
Ward turned to magazine cartooning afterward, doing humorous spot illustrations, some featuring Torchy, for such publications as editor Abe Goodman's Humorama
Humorama
Humorama, a division of Martin Goodman's publishing firm, was a line of digest-sized magazines featuring girlie cartoons by Bill Ward, Bill Wenzel, Dan DeCarlo, Jack Cole and many others....
. Some of Ward's gag comics were collected in the Avon Books paperback Honeymoon Guide (#T-95, 1956; reprinted as #T282, 1958). Ward was also a regular artist for the satirical-humor magazine Cracked, sometimes signing his work "McCartney".
He did very occasional comic-book humor stories, such as the four-page "Play Pool" in Humor-Vision's satiric
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
Pow Magazine #1 (August 1966), and, that same decade, episodes of "The Adventures of Pussycat
The Adventures of Pussycat
The Adventures of Pussycat was a risqué, black-and-white comics feature that ran throughout various men's adventure magazines published by Martin Goodman's Magazine Management Company in the 1960s...
", a risqué feature about a sexy secret agent
Secret Agent
Secret Agent is a British film directed by Alfred Hitchcock, loosely based on two stories in Ashenden: Or the British Agent by W. Somerset Maugham. The film starred John Gielgud, Peter Lorre, Madeleine Carroll, and Robert Young...
, which ran throughout various men's adventure
Men's adventure
Men's adventure is a genre of magazines that had its heyday in the 1950s and 1960s. Catering to a male audience, these magazines featured glamour photography and lurid tales of adventure that typically featured wartime feats of daring, exotic travel or conflict with wild animals.These magazines are...
magazines published by Martin Goodman
Martin Goodman (publisher)
Martin Goodman born on was an American publisher of pulp magazines, paperback books, men's adventure magazines, and comic books, launching the company that would become Marvel Comics....
's Magazine Management Company. Ward dabbled in underground comics, drawing a pornographic "Stella Starlet" story in publisher John A. Mozzer's Weird Smut Comics #1 (1985) and a "Sugar Caine" story in issue #2 (1987); both were written by Dave Goode. Ward also illustrated erotic stories, written by himself, in such men's magazines as Juggs
Juggs
Juggs is a softcore pornography adult magazine published in the United States which specializes in photographs of women with extremely large breasts. It has been called "the magazine of choice for breast men."...
and Leg Show
Leg Show
Leg Show is an adult fetish magazine published in the United States which specialises in photographs of women in nylons, corsets, pantyhose, stockings and high heels. The magazine features pinup style photographs and articles geared towards dominant women...
— an article a month for the former in his later years. One feature in Juggs that ran for a year was "Quest for a Big Pair", featuring the sexual adventures of Harold Brown, who had sexual encounters with busty women. Ward also drew the comics feature "Debbie" in Club
Club (magazine)
Club is a monthly American pornographic magazine which is a spin-off publication of the United Kingdom's Club International. Club features sexually oriented articles, video reviews, and pictorials that include hardcore pornography, masturbation, dildo usage, and lesbianism.During the early and mid...
magazine.
In a rare turn doing a mainstream comics character, Ward drew the four-page part one of a Judge Dredd
Judge Dredd
Judge Joseph Dredd is a comics character whose strip in the British science fiction anthology 2000 AD is the magazine's longest running . Dredd is an American law enforcement officer in a violent city of the future where uniformed Judges combine the powers of police, judge, jury and executioner...
story, "The Mega-City 5000", in the weekly UK comic 2000 AD
2000 AD (comic)
2000 AD is a weekly British science fiction-oriented comic. As a comics anthology it serialises a number of separate stories each issue and was first published by IPC Magazines in 1977, the first issue dated 26 February. IPC then shifted the title to its Fleetway comics subsidiary which was sold...
#40 (November 26, 1977), reprinted in Eagle Comics' Judge Dredd: The Early Cases #3 (April 1986); it was written by John Wagner
John Wagner
John Wagner is a comics writer who was born in Pennsylvania in 1949 and moved to Scotland as a boy. Alongside Pat Mills, Wagner was responsible for revitalising British boys' comics in the 1970s, and has continued to be a leading light in British comics ever since.He is best known for his work on...
under the pseudonym
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
T.B. Grover.
Ward remained a freelance artist throughout his career. He married twice and lived most of his life in Ridgewood, New Jersey.
External links
- Agena, Eric, ed. "Other Adult Publication GGA - Bill Ward", ComicStripFan.Com, n.d. WebCitation archive.
- Courtney, Bill. "The Sexy and Patriotic Cartoon World of Bill Ward", The Uranium Cafe (fan site), June 18, 2007. WebCitation archive.
- "Did You Know? Torchy Todd", Scoop (column), Diamond Galleries, December 25, 2003. WebCitation archive.