Jim Pabian

James Anthony Pabian (April 14, 1909 – July 23, 1996) was an American animator, screenwriter and director.

Pabian was born in 1909 in Rochester, New York. When he was 15 years old in 1924, his mother died of a ruptured appendix. He studied at the Mechanics Arts Institute in Rochester before moving to Hollywood in 1931. In the 1930s, he worked as an animator for Ub Iwerks, Leon Schlesinger Productions and Harman & Ising. Pabian then worked for the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio in the 1940s and later branched out as a comic artist for Dell Comics in the 1940s and 1950s. He created the syndicated daily comic strips Hollywood Johnnie, Screen Girl, and Go Go Gruver. He also worked on various Disney comics.

In 1955, Pabian was hired by Le Cineastis Associates and moved to Paris with his family. He won an award at the Cannes Film Festival for his work in animation before working with Hanna-Barbera in London. His family moved to Ojai, California, in 1966. In 1968, he established a comic studio called Editor's Workshop Syndicate in Ojai. Pabian was a member of the California Watercolor Society and had his art on display in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

In his old age he became legally blind and suffered from Parkinson's disease, causing him to pick up writing rather than animation. He died on July 23, 1996, at 87 years old.

Further reading

• Pabian, James A. (1992). Immigrants' Son (1st ed.). University Editions, Inc. ISBN 1-56002-182-9. LCCN 91-67914.
• Jim Pabian at IMDb