cartoonist, began his career in Melbourne, went to Sydney, then moved back to Melbourne to work on the Argus. He then spent fifteen years with the Brisbane Courier-Mail, some (all?) however as art editor of the Sydney Production Unit in York Street, Sydney, where Mollie Horseman also worked in the late 1940s. He was one of the cartoonists who decorated Mollie’s ABWAC smock in 1956. McCrae was married to Cecily.
According to David McNicoll in 'Australia's magnificent cartoonists’ (Bulletin 12 November 1985, 95) – which includes a self portrait:
“[his] career began with a mild dirty joke in Man. It spanned Smith’s Weekly, The Bulletin, The Argus, The Courier Mail and retirement in Sydney. A really dirty joke sold to Playboy inspired him to be a cartoonist again. He won the Walkley Award in 1978.”
Blaikie (p.109) called him an outstanding joke deviser. He was smocked by the ABWAC in July 1996, the presentation being made by his longtime colleague, the SMH's Alan Moir.
McCrae, who normally signed his cartoons 'Pep’, filled in for Mitchell as editorial cartoonist on the Australian newspaper on a couple of occasions. He freelanced for the Bulletin both before and after the 1960 ACP takeover. An original drawing of 1959 is in ML Bulletin collection; so is one of 1961 [woman to group of women]: “A typical Australian party! I wish I could think of a way of luring them away from the keg and taking an interest in their womenfolk” (behind the couch a man and woman are smooching, ill. Lindesay 1979, 300). In the 1961 Christmas issue of the Bulletin, edited by Donald Horne, 'Pep’ drew a not very exciting page of vignettes (but terrific gag) of some of the people who write letters to the editor, ending with a bearded man, wearing a singlet, a hammer and sickle tattooed on one arm and a cross around his neck, seated in a tent writing by lamplight:
“As an ex-student of the University of Tasmania, once a supporter but now an opponent of Professor Orr (Observer 58-59, Bulletin 60-61), recently converted to the Catholic faith and now residing in the Northern Territory, I look forward each week to my copy of the New Bulletin (quoted Rolfe 304, not ill; ill. Coleman Voices).”
- Writers:
- Kerr, Joan
- Date written:
- 1996
- Last updated:
- 2007
