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Cheers for Vic Cantone, Paper cartoonist

By Ed Weintrob, Paper founder
The Brooklyn Paper

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Vic Cantone hasn’t drawn for The Brooklyn Papers in quite a while, but he remains one of our most loyal readers, and I one of his ardent fans.

When Vic’s cartoons graced our front pages in the 1990s, he’d hop on the Long Island Railroad from his home in Bethpage, sketchboard and inks in hand, and find an open desk in our Court Street office — ready to express his view, or ours. One week, amidst an exploding controversy in Bay Ridge over plans by developer Charles Katz to build what The Papers labeled a “mega-mall,” Vic captured the spirit of all the protagonists, including Katz (depicted as a well-fed feline) and then-City Council candidate Marty Golden.

It was a great cartoon, one of my favorites, and it would have stood the test on its own. Then, one of our staffers suggested the addition of fleas to the space around Katz’s face, and fleas became a trademark in Vic’s ongoing mega-mall rendition.

After the U.S. Supreme Court library porn ruling on Monday, Vic called to remind me of his February 1999 cartoon that featured a mop-topped youngster sitting atop volumes of the once-censored “Ulysses” and “Tropic of Cancer” while viewing adult porn on a library computer. Early on, The Brooklyn Papers covered each side of the library computer porn issue, and Vic’s cartoons exposed sensitivities on all sides.

Over the years, Vic contributed to the Daily News, was syndicated by King Features and was active in local press organizations. He’d send me the latest editions of “Best Editorial Cartoons of the Year,” an annual volume in which one or more of his Brooklyn Papers cartoons would invariably be represented; my son, a budding cartoonist, loves to page through them.

We dropped our editorial page a few years back to devote more space to news coverage, expecting to resume it “any day now.” We also stopped running cartoons on our front page. Vic stood by, reading each week’s editions, calling periodically to let us know he had lots of ideas. We weren’t ready to resume the editorial page, we’d demur.

• • •

Several months ago, Vic was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease. Drawing with either hand is beyond him now, and the disease progresses.

Recently, he made it to his son’s graduation, with honors, from Northeastern University, an accomplishment and a joy for both parent and child. And his wife encouraged him to attend a Deadline Club awards dinner — it was a difficult trip from Bethpage to Manhattan — at the Marriott Marquis, where he was presented with an award for distinguished service.

“At least Lou Gehrig was a champion,” Vic said the other day. As is Vic Cantone.


A Maimonides win

It’s said you can tell the quality of an individual by his or her friends; on that basis, evidenced by those in attendance at Monday’s Borough Hall reception for Pamela Brier, the new president and CEO of Maimonides Medical Center, the hospital is clearly privileged in its leadership.

Among the recognizable faces was Brier’s husband, Peter Aschkenasy, whose smile lit the room while his wife spoke. Peter, former owner of Gage & Tollner, is active in Brooklyn’s arts community.

Hospitals are odd institutions. On the one hand, they are big businesses, very big, that tend to be imposing entities — and not always appreciated — in their communities.

But when you need medical help, it’s important that there’s one nearby, and you’re grateful if it’s one that meets the standards of Maimonides.

©2003 Community Newspaper Group

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