America’s favorite cartoon cat with a refined taste for Italian cuisine will soon be returning to theaters in 2024’s “The Garfield Movie” with a new animated style. In honor of this addition to Garfield’s many looks, here’s an overview of the history of his rise to fame.
Jan 8, 1976, the Pendleton Times, a local newspaper in Pendleton, Indiana, published the first edition of a weekly comic strip created by Jim Davis titled Jon. The comic followed cartoonist Jon Arbuckle and his orange cat, Garfield, who carries the name of Davis’s grandfather.
Over time, Garfield’s role expanded and in September of 1977, the strip was renamed to be called Garfield by suggestion of Tom K. Ryan, author of ‘Tumbleweeds’, which Davis was on the team for prior to ‘Jon’, reported by indianapublicmedia.org. United Feature Syndicate picked up the comic to go national in late January 1978 and it officially premiered in June, debuting in 41 US newspapers around the nation.
Davis started out his career at an advertising agency before joining the team for the strip “Tumbleweeds” and then creating his first original, “Gnorm Gnat” in 1973.
Garfield’s first book “Garfield at Large” released Feb. 21, 1980 and contained all strips dating from the national premiere to January of 1979.
From there, Jim founded the Paws Incorporated production company to support all Garfield related licensing and their products.
Garfield appeared on television soon after in the 1982 special “Here Comes Garfield” directed by Phil Roman and starring Lorenzo Music as the role of Garfield. Music reprised this role until 2001, followed by Bill Murray from 2004 to 2006, Jon Barnard to 2016 and Frank Welker from 2007 to 2023.
Garfield has taken on his fair share of odd jobs, being featured in the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade since 1984 and having his own Wikipedia page, proudly owned by members of the vast fanbase and its greatly dedicated community.
The physical appearance of the cat has changed over the years, keeping his traditional orange fur and chubby body, Garfield has become more and more cartoonish, with bigger eyes and the tendency to walk around on two feet.
Jim Davis has collected four Emmy awards over the years for his work on Garfield in the category of Outstanding Animated Program, the first being in 1985 for “Garfield on the Town”.
Recognized by Guinness World Records as the most widely syndicated comic strip in the entire world, Garfield was published in over 2,100 journals in 80 countries as recorded in 2015 by Guinness and read by an estimated 200 million people.
Now approaching his 46th anniversary, through Paws Inc., Garfield has produced 13 television specials, three television series, six feature films, 76 books, 148 songs and 28 games.
For the first time since 2006, Garfield is returning to the big screen with the voice of Chris Pratt. The movie focuses on the reunion of Garfield and his father, Vic (Samuel L. Jackson) as they chase the tails of a wild heist, said to be Garfield’s biggest adventure yet. Fans are ecstatic about the revival of this beloved character and the new attention it’s bringing to the franchise.
