DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker in Williamson County tells it — and friend, this one's worth every mile. Now, you want to talk about a man who changed the way the world laughs? Pull over, because we're in Taylor, Texas, and Taylor is where it started.
February 26, 1908. Frederick Bean Avery comes into the world right here in this town. Frederick Bean.
Nobody was calling him that for long. The world would come to know him as Tex. He grew up in Taylor — homes on Eighth and Hackberry streets — just a kid in a small Texas town with something brewing behind his eyes that nobody could quite measure yet.
He went to high school in Dallas. North Dallas High School. And somewhere in those hallways, among the students, there was a phrase floating around.
Casual. Throwaway. The kind of thing kids say without thinking twice. "What's up, Doc?" Just a little piece of slang.
Nobody knew what it was about to become. After graduation, Avery packed up and headed to California. And in 1935, he took a job at Warner Bros.
Now, here's where things get interesting. Warner Bros. had this ramshackle little workspace the crew called Termite Terrace — and Avery presided over it. Presided.
That's the right word. Because out of that place came Daffy Duck. Out of that place came Bugs Bunny.
And that phrase from the halls of North Dallas High? Avery reached back for it when he was searching — his word, searching — for the perfect expression to capture Bugs Bunny's carefree attitude in a 1940 cartoon called A Wild Hare. "What's up, Doc?" Dropped right into animation history. Seven years Avery spent at Warner Brothers.
Then in 1942, he moved to MGM, where he kept right on going — perfecting what the marker calls a rapid-fire, logic-defying style of gags. He developed Droopy there. Chilly Willy.
Characters that have outlasted nearly everything else from that era. His peers called him a creative genius. Not a studio executive calling him that from a corner office.
His peers. The people in the room who knew exactly how hard it was to do what he was doing. Directing cartoons from 1935 to 1955, Tex Avery pioneered a fast-paced slapstick style that introduced comedic elements still found in cartoons today.
Still. That word does a lot of work. Because Avery died in Los Angeles in 1980, and yet here we are, and the cartoons are still running.
The marker says his influence on his craft is difficult to overstate. That's a careful, measured sentence — and it still barely contains the truth. A boy from Taylor, Texas, who grew up on Eighth and Hackberry, who remembered a hallway phrase from high school — he left his stamp not just on animation, but on the wider universe of American popular culture.
What's up, Doc? Turns out, it was Tex Avery. All along, it was Tex Avery.
What the marker says
Born in Taylor on February 26, 1908, Frederick Bean “Tex” Avery is one of the most important figures in the history of animation. Directing cartoons at Warner Brothers and MGM from 1935 to 1955, he developed such legendary characters as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Droopy and Chilly Willy. He also pioneered a style of fast-paced slapstick comedy that introduced many of the basic comedic elements still found in cartoons today. His peers considered him a creative genius and his films continue to enjoy critical and popular acclaim. Avery spent his childhood in Taylor, growing up in homes on Eighth and Hackberry streets. He attended high school in Dallas before moving to California after graduation. In 1935, Avery took a job at Warner Bros. Where he presided over the innovative crew of "Termite Terrace" and introduced the world to Daffy Duck and Bugs Bunny. Searching for the perfect expression to capture Bugs Bunny’s carefree attitude in A Wild Hare (1940), Avery recalled a phrase popular among students at North Dallas High School: “What’s up, Doc?” He spent seven years at Warner Brothers and then moved to MGM in 1942, where he perfected his unique style of rapid-fire, logic-defying gags. After a lifetime spent reinventing the American cartoon, Avery died in Los Angeles in 1980. Tex Avery’s influence on his craft is difficult to overstate. He created some of the most enduring characters and compositions in history and directed cartoons that were funnier, faster and wilder than anyone had ever seen. An enormously talented writer, artist and director, Tex Avery left his stamp not just on the world of animation, but on the wider universe of American popular culture. 175 Years of Texas Independence * 1836 - 2011