Bigfork cartoonist dies at 87

The Daily Inter Lake

Elmer Sprunger, Bigfork artist and longtime cartoonist for the Bigfork Eagle, died Wednesday at Kalispell Regional Medical Center. He was 87.

Sprunger grew up in Swan Lake, where his father was a caretaker for the property of Jim Woodard, president of Montana's historic Metal Banks. He was an artist for most of his life; he sold his first cartoon when he was still in high school. After graduation, he was offered an art scholarship to New York University but declined it - he didn't have enough money to get to New York.

Instead, he moved to the coast, where he worked in the woods and in Seattle shipyards before serving in the Army in Hawaii during World War II.

Sprunger was able to apply his artistic ability in the military, lettering soldiers' helmets, creating posters and teaching leatherwork at the USO Club. He also drew cartoons for an Army newspaper.

After the war, Sprunger worked in road construction and logging in Seattle for 12 years, then returned to Bigfork with his children and his wife, Marie. He signed on with the aluminum company in Columbia Falls, where he painted signs, produced break-down illustrations of machinery and did safety cartoons that were posted on bulletin boards.

He also began drawing political cartoons and drew an occasional cartoon for The Missoulian newspaper.

During the 1970s, after 15 years at the aluminum plant, Sprunger decided to paint full time. During the remainder of his life, he completed more than 3,000 paintings, many of them with wildlife themes. He kept thousands of photographic slides in his basement to help him create his art.

He displayed his work at a Safari Club show in Las Vegas, at the Cowboy Hall of Fame show in Oklahoma and in several one-man shows around Montana.

Locally, he was best known for his cartoons, which have appeared in Bigfork Eagle for more than two decades.

Funeral services are pending.