Christian Richard "Dick" Schaare Jr. was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on July 5, 1893. His father was also named Christian Richard Schaare. His mother was Mary Schaare. Both of his parents had emigrated from Germany. He was the second born of four children in his family. When his father found employment as a waiter at a New Jersey hotel, the family moved to 415 Hill Street in West Hoboken.
At the age of twelve, as was the custom at the time, he was legally eligible to begin working to provide for the family, so he finished school and began to work at a local brass factory, where he was trained as an engraver's assistant. The engraving company also supplied graphic design services for newspaper advertising.
At the time of the U.S. draft registration in 1917 for the Great War, he was twenty-four years old and he lived at 715 Fifth Street in Lyndhurst, NJ, and he was employed as a sketch artist at the Bashbach Advertising Company in NYC. His registration records describe him as medium height, medium build, with blue eyes and brown hair. He served in the Army as an ammo carrier and was stationed in France.
In 1920 after the war he married Margaret Evelyn Licitra and they moved to a home in Lincoln Park, NJ. They eventually had seven children. Six boys and one girl. The Family regularly attended Methodist Church.
He wrote and illustrated several children's books on Wild West topics for the Cupples & Leon Publishing Co., such as Lewis & Clark, Pioneer Stories, Daniel Boone, and Buffalo Bill.
In 1925 he began to sell freelance pulp magazine covers to Ace-High, Air Stories, Airplane Stories, All-American Sports, Complete Sky Novel, Gun Molls, Lariat Story, Masked Rider, Navy Stories, Sky Riders, and War Stories. He continued to work for the pulps as a cover artist until 1940.
Between 1932 until 1941 he painted a remarkable series of eighty-two covers for the boxing periodical, The Ring. Afterwards his cover illustrations continued to sporatically appear on The Ring up until the 1950s. He grew to become a close personal friend of the publisher, Nat Fleischer, and he socialized with many several world-famous athletes, such as Joe Louis and Jack Dempsey.
In 1936 the family moved to a bigger home on Vreeland Avenue in Boonton, NJ.
During the late 1930s and early 1940s he also worked for the comic book industry as a penciller and an inker for Veri Best Sure Fire Comics and Fawcett Wow Comics.
During WWII he worked for national defense as a guard at the Picatinny U.S. Government Arsenal in Dover, NJ. In 1944 the family moved to Washington, NJ.
From 1945 until 1960 he worked as an arist in packaging design for The American Can Company in Passiac, NJ, where he produced several iconic advertising images, such as the logo for Sunoco, and Maxwell House Coffee "Good To The Last Drop." He also designed countless milk cartons and cigar box labels.
After retiring from commercial illustration in 1960 he continued to paint pastoral scenes and portraits of friends for his own pleasure.
C. R. Schaare died of a heart attack at the age of eighty-six at home in Washington, NJ, on February 20, 1980.
© David Saunders 2009 |
