Nate Butler's Bio
& Testimony
Christian cartoonist and comics publisher/trainer
Nate Butler was born February 1st, 1954 in Meriden, Connecticut USA to Sewall and Jacqueline Williams Butler. On
his mother's side he is a descendent of the early New England Puritans,
a number of whom were preachers of the Gospel. His maternal great grandparents,
John Henry and Susan Adeline House, were missionaries
in the Balkans and founded the American Farm School
in Thessaloniki, Greece. "Grandma Susan" even produced a tract
for allied soldiers in WWII. So perhaps it's not entirely surprising to
see the place to which the Lord has led Nate today.
Nate began drawing at age four after seeing Dick
Tracy in the paper, Tom Terrific
on Capt. Kangaroo and Disney's Sleeping Beauty
at the movies. But it was primarily Dick Tracy which made Nate decide
he wanted to be a cartoonist when he grew up. His first comic was about
an Anglican minister named "Father Fox,"
an actual fox in a clerical collar. In kindergarten he created a comic strip
about a little Chinese man with springs for legs who was bounced and harassed
by a villain so bad he had poison ivy in his hat band instead of a flower.
Nate drew on small sheets of manila paper, one panel per sheet of paper.
When his kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Griswold,
understood that it was sequential art and put it up on the bulletin board
for Open House in the right order, he was greatly encouraged that she understood
what he was doing. And when all the parents at Open House wanted to know
who drew the comic strip, he gained a reputation as "the little artist"
in his small town.
Nate received a great deal of encouragement about his artwork
from his mother and also his grandmother, Gladys House
Williams.
Nate was also blessed with a brother close to his age, David, who also loved drawing. Once, while at their
grandparents' house in Vermont in 1962, they complained of boredom and "nothing
to do." Their grandfather Edward H. Williams
III, a surveyor, brought out blueprint paper and a copy of the January
'62 National Geographic magazine, with pictures of the Swedish
warship "Vasa," and encouraged them to draw. The brothers
started rendering ships (eventually turning them into stories about sea
whaler detectives), and thus began what would become an almost 10 year competition
to see who could produce the most stories about their hero characters Capt. Clark (Nate) and Capt.
Lincoln (David). (The contest was sparked by their youthful reasoning
that whoever had done the most stories when they died, historians would
say that brother had obviously started first, since he had the most finished.)
So they started eagerly cranking out vast quantities of them. While they
probably did learn some craft and a even little about storytelling in this
process, this exercise mainly kept Nate's focus on cartooning throughout
his childhood... that and the tons of Batman/Detective,
Legion of Super-Heroes/Adventure, and
Superman/Action comics he bought and
studied. Eventually the influence and inspiration of Dick Tracy became
eclipsed by his discovery of Spider-Man
around the time he reached high school.
Sadly Nate's spiritual life had also gone into eclipse. Though
he had grown up in an Episcopal churchgoing family, he decided, at age 13,
that there was no God. His teen years became a regressively dark and dreary
time. One bright spot was a chance to spend a Greek
Summer in 1971 at the American Farm School
in Greece, where (among other eye-opening experiences) Nate had the opportunity
to meet Edwin Howell, a Born Again ex-RAF pilot,
whose enthusiasm for the Lord impressed even a sullen atheist such as himself.
Another occurred shortly after during a visit to his Uncle
Ned Williams (his mother's oldest brother), an Episcopal clergyman
who was living in Boston at the time. Despite the collar, this uncle had
always been one of Nate's most favorite relatives, so Nate eagerly responded
to the invitation to visit (which may have been inspired by his parents'
concerns over his shoulder length hair and drug-related behavior). When
the uncle told Nate that they would go to see a Boston musical, Nate was
convinced this "cool" uncle would take him to see Hair,
which was big at that time. Instead, to his horror, it turned out that his
uncle had purchased tickets to Godspell,
the musical based on the Gospel of Matthew.
Despite his best efforts to hate the experience, Nate found he liked the
music and bought the record album in the lobby
on the way out. His uncle, encouraged by this no doubt, tried talking to
him about the Lord as they walked home, but Nate refused to discuss it rationally
or politely. He returned home to his same downward spiral, with all his
plans, dreams, and even interest in being a cartoonist sliding
After graduation from high school, a dead end (but good paying)
factory job gave him enough money to make a months-long cross country
trip in 1973 with a goal of meeting several personal heroes, including
Larry Fine of the 3 Stooges and comic book
legend Jack Kirby. This trip revitalized and
redirected Nate in several ways. First, the mere accomplishment of it convinced
him that his old dreams could become realities. Second, he made new friends
on the road and became acquainted with the city of Albuquerque,
NM. Third, his visit with Jack Kirby inspired him to resume his quest
to become a cartoonist. Returning East, he showed his meager portfolio to
DC Comics, a major New York comics publisher--
and received a scathing rejection. So he decided to relocate to a place
where he could spend a couple years honing his craft before returning to
New York to live and work. He chose Albuquerque.
In Albuquerque Nate was able to secure his first art-related
job at Albuquerque News/Modern Press, a weekly
newspaper and printing outfit, starting at the lowest rung on the ladder
as a paste-up artist. It was a nonunion shop
where he could wander freely and learn much about print production, which
he did. Within 3 years he had moved up to the position of advertising
art director. Soon he somewhat arrogantly assumed he had learned
all there was to know and quit to begin free-lancing.
During all this time Nate's personal life had continued to deteriorate
as he tried to fill that well-known "God shaped
vacuum inside'' with all the wrong things. His first year of free-lancing
ended in disaster and discouragement. Once again the dream of an art career
looked as if it would die unfulfilled. And he began to worry that he was
losing his mind, as strange and unwelcome thoughts about the possible reality of God started to enter his mind. (The witness
of a relatively new friend, Jose Ponce, had
in part caused some of this new questioning. Jose was the first Christian
peer Nate had met who refused to stop talking about the Lord yet continued
to want to be his friend, even though Nate was hostile and cruel when the
subject came up.) Finally in November of 1979,
he wrote to his Uncle Ned to ask for his help
and opinion. While awaiting a response, Nate had the bizarre (to him) notion
that he needed to hear Christmas music. He
had one of those little plastic Eva-Tone Sound Sheets
which used to come in the mail, with a number of popular Christmas carols.
He listened to it, feeling strangely comforted. Then he remembered he had
the Godspell album. As he played it
and sang along, he vividly recalled the visuals of the stage play he had
seen 7 years before. As the death and resurrection
were once again recreated in his mind and on his lips, he finally understood,
for the first time, something of the enormity of what Jesus
Christ had done for him. He felt the Holy Spirit
come down on him, and he fell to his knees, crying and stumbling through
his first prayer in over 13 years. His whole life had just turned downside
up. He had been Born Again. He knew Jesus Christ--
the Lord, his Savior-- was alive!
A letter from his uncle arrived within days of his conversion,
confirming what he now knew had been happening, that God had been calling
him back to Himself. The letter recommended C.S.Lewis'
Mere Christianity, which helped Nate in his early growth.
(Further reading of Lewis' fiction works also inspired Nate's creative side.)
After that it seemed God worked quickly to put his life back together: He
was freed from his addictions. Free-lance work increased dramatically. A
return to church (one suggested by his uncle from a previous visit) led
to his meeting and eventually marrying Susan Edwards,
the woman God had chosen for him, and becoming stepdad to two daughters,
Carin and Christy,
in the process. Then the Lord spoke to him one night about getting back
in touch with two of the people he had met on his cross-country travels
in '73. When he did, he discovered that one had become an editor of Muppet Magazine in New York. God had led him
back to his dream of working for the big New York publishers. Eventually,
in addition to drawing characters such as The Muppets,
Archie & Jughead,
Heathcliff, Snuffy Smith,
Bugs Bunny, Popeye, Rocky & Bullwinkle,
Animated Batman, Mighty Mouse, Barbie, The Jetsons,
and Berenstain Bears, he received instruction
in the art of script writing by two fine editors, Victor
Gorelick at Archie Comics and Sid Jacobson at Marvel Comics.
In that process he learned a great deal about editing as well.
It didn't take long before Nate decided that God had put him
through this amazing training and networking process
so that he could package Christian comics.
Publications such as Aida-Zee, Paro-Dee, Behold
3-D, Christian Comics Catalog,
and Christian Comics & Games Magazine
were produced over the next several years. But once again, God's plan turned
out to be so much bigger than Nate could have imagined, as these comics
proved to be the first stepping-stones to the realization of an even more
amazing vision: To hold international training seminars
on the production and use of comics for evangelism. The Lord has led Nate
to cofound COMIX35, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) ministry involved in this mission. He has now taught in the Philippines, Thailand,
Australia, Japan, Romania,
Ukraine, Mexico, England,
Bulgaria, India, and Croatia, to people from over 40 different countries. In early 1999, he closed his 20-year-old studio to work full time in this ministry.
And God only knows where it goes from here! All Glory
to HIM!
If you are interested in supporting Nate
and the COMIX35 ministry, please write to:
COMIX35 / ROX35 Media, Inc.
P.O. Box 27470
Albuquerque, NM 87125-7470 USA
Email: Nate(at)comix35(dot)org
[As a means of preventing spam,
in the preceding email address,
please replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .]
This web site and its contents are Copyright © Nate Butler, except where other copyrights are noted. All rights reserved.