Famous comic book creator Trina Robbins passes away at 85

Trina Robbins, the famous American cartoonist, passed away at the age of 85 on April 10, 2024. She was best known for her books titled Funny Ladies, No Straight Lines: The Rise of Queer Comics, and more.

According to her longtime partner and superhero comics inker Steve Leialoha, Robbins died in San Francisco, following a stroke that left her hospitalized earlier this year. Steve and Trina were reportedly together since 1977.

Robbins was a pioneering woman in a male-dominated field, and famous as an artist, writer, historian, and editor of comics. Robbins was a feminist writer who morphed her work and ideals into politics and pop culture and stood out among peers like Robert Crumb and S. Clay Wilson.

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Trina Robbins, historian of comic books, dies at 85

During a 2021 interview for the Bay Area Women in Politics Oral History Project, Trina Robbins shared details about her entire journey. She was born on August 17, 1938, in Brooklyn, New York to Max Bear Perlson and Elizabeth (Rosenman) Perlson. Her father was a tailor but had to retire due to Parkinson's disease and her mother was a second-grade teacher.

In the 1960s, Trina Robbins first worked as an accomplished clothes designer and seamstress. However, she turned to comic books in 1970. That year, the artist became one of the creators of It Ain’t Me Babe Comix, the first comic book made exclusively by women.

From an early age, Robbins drew inspiration from comic strips and books, mainly gravitating towards female characters such as Brenda Starr, Patsy Walker, and Millie the Model.

One of her favorite characters was the fashion plate, Katy Keene, which moved Trina Robbins to make dresses for her paper dolls. In her 2017 memoir, Last Girl Standing, she wrote about beginning to draw her comics at the time:

"My wonderful mother brought home from school an endless supply of 8½” by 11” Board of Education paper and No. 2 pencils, from which I would chew off the erasers."

Robbins further stated in her interview with the Oral History Center that her mother wanted her to finish high school first. Hence, the artist shifted her focus to science fiction.

During her conversation with the Oral History Project, she said:

"I was a science fiction fan, and I was going to a convention, and they had a costume party. So I just took this length of velvet and sewed it just at the sides and at the top, and belted it with a gold metal belt, and came as a, whatever, some kind of pixie."

In her senior year, Robbins was the writer and costume designer for a sci-fi play called Twenty Years Later. She did pursue further education and got admitted to Queens College, but she left in the first year to move to Los Angeles.

The historian married Paul Jay Robbins, a magazine editor in 1962 in LA and then got divorced in 1966. In 1985-86, Trina Robbins also wrote and drew a character named Meet Misty, portrayed in a mini-series for Marvel Comics. Misty was made for young girls and the comic was about a teenage soap opera actress who was the niece of Millie the Model (one of Trina's earlier inspirations).

In 1985, the historian became the first woman to draw Wonder Woman in her books. She was approached by DC Comics after four decades of only male artists adapting the character. She founded Friends of Lulu in 1994, an advocacy group for female comic book creators and readers.

Robbins was the author of more than 60 comic books. Her notable works include The Great Women Superheroes, A Rose for Barbie, Catswalk: The Growing of Girl, Wonder Woman: The Once and Future Story, and more.

She was also known for writing around a dozen or more prose books, including Pretty in Ink: North American Women Cartoonists 1896-2013 and Flapper Queens: Women Cartoonists of the Jazz Age.

The artist's work is currently exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and Museum of Cartoon Art.

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Trina Robbins is survived by her partner Steve Leialoha, her older sister named Harriet Nadel, her daughter with fellow cartoonist Kim Deitch, Casey Robbins, and a granddaughter.