Jules Feiffer is a Pulitzer prize winning American cartoonist, author, and playwright, born in the Bronx in 1929 to immigrant parents. His decades long career began in 1946 when he became an assistant to Will Eisner, and the first work of his own was the comic strip "Clifford" which ran from 1949-1951, ending when he was drafted into the U.S. Army during the Korean war. He is responsible for many different works over the years, but for me, it is one in particular which has always been a huge part of my life. When I was in about 5th or 6th grade, I was lucky enough to be introduced to the wonderful 1961 novel, The Phantom Tollbooth. Written by Norton Juster and illustrated beautifully by Jules Feiffer, I was immediately in love with this book! To this day, I still absolutely love this story, and have been planning to get a few of the illustrations from the novel tattooed on myself.
Imagine my excitement when I saw that in celebration of his 90th birthday, a venue in East Hampton was doing a special concert reading of his 2003 play, A Bad Friend! I decided to go to the event by myself, and the night before the show, I ordered my ticket which just so happened to be the last available seat in the front row of this quaint theater. The night of the show, I arrive at the theater and sit in my seat, unsure what to expect with the performance, but hopeful maybe I'll have a chance to meet him after the reading. Moments later, Mr. Feiffer walked out from backstage to take his seat in the audience, and...SITS RIGHT FRICKEN NEXT TO ME!!!!!!! HOLY CRAP!!! What are the unbelievablly amazing chances that I bought the ticket that allowed me to share an arm rest with a childhood idol?! (Don't be ridiculous...I didn't try to take any of the arm rest from him. He's a 90 year old, 1986 Pulitzer prize winner for editorial cartooning that brought to life the characters and scenes from one of my favorite books EVER. He gets the entire arm rest!!) During intermission, I introduced myself to both him and his lovely wife, Joan, and got to shake his hand! After the reading of the play, which I thoroughly enjoyed and was performed by a great cast including a couple of Academy Award winners, the theater offered everyone cake out in the garden to celebrate Mr. Feiffer's milestone birthday. While I didn't eat a piece of cake on account of the whole being vegan thing, I did ask him to sign my copy of The Phantom Tollbooth, which I had brought along for the night in the hopes of such an opportunity. Before I left, his wife was even nice enough to take a couple of picutes on my cellphone of me standing beside him! Talk about a total fangirl dream-come-true night for me...
As I got back to my truck after what turned out to be one of the best nights of my life (yea, I'm a bit of a nerd, and I'm fine with that!), I decided the icing on the birthday cake would be to place a new cache in honor of Mr. Feiffer! And so I chose a hiding location nearby, and did just that. You're welcome! You're looking for a tiny nano, with only a log, so be sure to bring your own pen. I'm sure at certain times, this location can be rather muggle heavy, so please be sure to use stealth.
Happy caching! And Happy 90th Birthday to Jules Feiffer!! It was an absolute honor to meet you...
Please feel free to share in your log if you've ever been lucky enough to meet someone that made a big impact on your childhood, or any other time in your life.