Bessie the Animator

Buried in the “Coming and Going” column of Film Daily of July 13, 1936 is this item:

BESSIE MAES, animator connected with the Max Fleischer studios, went to Minneapolis last week to lecture on animated cartoons at the University of Minnesota summer session.

Research is bringing to light the women who animated cartoons in the Golden Age, including at Walt Disney. This post isn’t very scholarly but we’ll pass along a couple of stories from the Minneapolis newspapers of the day about her. Both were published July 8, 1936.

First, a bit of a set-up. It would appear she was seconded away from her drawing board, judging by a column in the Minneapolis Journal of April 1, 1936. It read, in part:

Take the case of Bessie Maes, who for years was on the art staff of Fleischer (Betty Boop) Studios, holding a position never before or since held by a woman . . . animated cartoonist.
The public’s demand for knowledge as to how animated cartoons are made was so great that Paramount decided to feature Bessie Maes in a program and put it on in their theatres. She was billed as a lecturer and staff representative. Some clubs, colleges and other organizations began to ask for the programs. Six months of each year was spent in “animated lecturing” at these places. Out of these busy days, some way or other time was squeezed out to draw the cartoons.

The Journal’s story on July 8:

Betty Boop Having Figure Worries, Says Cartoonist
Mrs. W. A. Hirschy Is Spending Summer at Home in City
Betty Boop's figure is causing her to worry and the poor girl is contemplating a salad-eating and rope-skipping campaign to reduce, according to Mrs. W. A. Hirschy, one of Betty's "bosses," who, with her husband, is spending the summer at the Minneapolis home of the Hirschys at 3510 Twenty-seventh avenue S.
Known professionally as Bessie Maes, Mrs. Hirschy is the only woman animated cartoonist in the world. She works for the Max Fleischer studios in New York City drawing Betty Boop and other cartoon characters for the screen.
Has Reason for Worries
"Betty's reason for worrying about her figure," explained Miss Maes, "is because fourth dimension pictures are fast being developed. Betty Boop has made one of these already. So, with the fourth dimension to think about, Betty has to keep an anxious eye on her calories."
Miss Maes is one of a staff of 230 artists, tracers, cameramen and other employees who work on cartoon comedies. It takes 15,000 separate pictures to make a one-reel cartoon and requires 10 full weeks of the staff's time. Artists draw as high as 350 separate pictures a day.
Pioneering at Cartooning
A diminutive, attractive blond with a small wee voice, Miss Maes is not unlike the Betty Boop she creates. She is a pioneer in animated cartoon work and proud of the fact she is the only woman in the world in this work.
She spoke before an audience of nearly 500 students in the music auditorium of the University of Minnesota yesterday, describing the work of making the cartoon comedies for the screen.

This is the version from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.

Animated Cartoons Visit City With Woman Creator
Only Feminine Artist in Films, Bessie Maes, Tells How They're Made.
Betty Boop gave her dress an extra saucy fillip in Minneapolis Tuesday under the approving eye of Popeye the Sailorman. Oswald the Rabbit looked on wonderingly, but Mickey Mouse was too busy making eyes at Minnie to pay much attention.
The person who brought about all these strange things was Bessie Maes, who believes she is the only woman animated cartoonist in the world. She gave an illustrated lecture Tuesday afternoon in the music auditorium at the University of Minnesota, but first she told something about how she comes to be in a class by herself.
The mental strain of preparing the hundreds on hundreds of pictures that go to make an animated cartoon has proved too much for most women, she said, adding that it bothers her less perhaps since she was in the animated cartoon business from the start.
She was ready to become a cartoonist just about the time the bright lads got the idea that there was a gold field to be captured by turning the comic strips into celluloid strips. And she's been in the business down through the days that saw Betty Boop develop into one of the major film stars. Popeye become the rage of the day, and Walt Disney take the show houses by storm with his Mickey Mouse creations. She has worked with most of the leading animated cartoonists, including Disney and Walt Lantz, the creator of Oswald the Rabbit.
She doesn't dare to have any favorites, she said, but admitted she has an especially soft spot in her heart for the husky Popeye.
In an average cartoon some 125 persons in a studio begin racing against time as soon as scenarists dump the light story on the producer's desk. Each of the cartoonists is allotted a number of the scenes, drawing the hundreds of pictures that take Mickey Mouse, for instance, through the act of sliding down a rain pipe. Then they are assembled, the necessary re-takes made. Women in the studio generally are used for tracing, washing celluloid and similar jobs.
Miss Maes’ husband, W. A. Hirschy, resides at 5510 Twenty-seventh avenue south.

What’s odd about this is Fleischer employed Lillian Friedman as an animator. How could Maes not know her?

Maes was born Elizabeth Mae Kelley on November 10, 1891. 1936 saw the death of her father, Josiah B. Kelley, in Maine. She evidently gave up employment in the Fleischer studio as she is in the Minneapolis directory in 1937. She had no job recorded in the 1940 or 1950 Census for the city.

Maes’ husband, William Amerland Hirschy, passed away in 1980. Maes died in Lake City, Minnesota on Oct. 21, 1981.