Editorial cartoonist Mike Smith poses for a photo in the archives of the Las Vegas Sun Tuesday Feb. 9, 2021.
Monday, Feb. 15, 2021 | 2 a.m.
Mike Smith answered his newsroom phone expecting to talk with a reader. That’s commonplace when his editorial cartoons are published in the Las Vegas Sun, as callers either reach out with a compliment or criticism. But this caller in the mid-1990s was different.
Smith’s cartoon for the Sun on the O.J. Simpson double-murder trial was syndicated in the Los Angeles Times, and caught the eye of one of the people in the drawing — Judge Lance Ito. His office reached out saying Ito wanted a copy.
Smith mentioned the phone call to executive editor Mike O’Callaghan, who jokingly replied, “I’ll be impressed when the pope calls asking for one of your cartoons,” Smith recalled.
A few days later, as fate would have it, the Vatican called.
Smith had featured Pope John Paul II in one of his cartoons, and officials wanted it for their collection. “O’Callaghan didn’t believe me for three days. He thought I was joking,” Smith said.
Smith’s work has appeared for more than 35 years in the Sun, dating to when he was a student at Loyola Marymount University in Southern California, and including depictions of seven U.S. presidents and plenty of Las Vegas notables. It’s one big history lesson, and it is now living permanently in the UNLV Libraries Special Collections & Archives.
Smith and Sun publisher Brian Greenspun donated the entirety of Smith’s work — more than 13,000 drawings — last week to the university, where it will be archived and preserved by the collection’s curators and eventually available for public consumption.
“Sitting in the basement (at the Sun), they served no purpose,” Smith said. “When you do a drawing every day, there’s a personal connection. It’s your artistic endeavor, so you are close to it. UNLV is the perfect place for it to live.”
The UNLV collection is massive at 15,000 linear feet and serves as the area’s de facto historical society, with documents dating back more than 50 years. Included is a little bit of everything, from showroom pamphlets to letters sent by UNLV faculty when the university was getting established in the 1950s.
Everything is neatly boxed, labeled and organized. Adding Smith’s work to the collection is a win-win situation, UNLV officials said.
“This is one of the coolest collections we’ll be able to get,” said Aaron Mayes, the special collections and archives curator for visual materials at UNLV Libraries. “This is an entire collection of someone’s life’s work in a field that’s dying.”
When Smith debuted at the Sun in the 1980s, there were about 250 editorial cartoonists nationally, he said. But as newsrooms have shrunk, there’s only a few dozen remaining. And Smith, who has won many statewide and regional awards, is one of the best.
“Mike has been an integral part of the Las Vegas Sun for decades,” Greenspun said. “While, inexplicably, he has not won a Pulitzer Prize yet, his incisive wit and artistic talents have given Sun readers a very personal view of history as it has unfolded.”
Smith, a car hobbyist, grew up drawing sketches of vehicles for recreation at the family dinner table. Toward the end of his college education, he decided to make a career out of it. He mailed his editorial cartoons to many newsrooms across the nation.
O’Callaghan loved the work and published a few each week in the Sun. For each drawing, Smith was paid $8.
After graduating from college, Smith worked filling gas in car rentals at Los Angeles International Airport at night and continued with his editorial cartoons during the day. But when he was offered the opportunity to work in management at the rental company on the day shift, he called O’Callaghan to say he would be stepping away from cartooning.
But O’Callaghan quickly offered him a full-time job, and “I packed up my car and moved to Las Vegas,” Smith said.
Smith’s work in the Sun reaches more than 250 newspapers through syndication with King Features Syndicate. For more than 20 years, he also did a weekly cartoon for USA Today, which is also part of the UNLV donation.
“His body of work is a treasure, windows into the political and social life of the United States, Nevada, and Las Vegas over four decades,” said Rebecca Cruz-Clifford, the Sun’s librarian. “With Smith’s professional career playing out here locally, UNLV was an obvious choice for preserving his work.”
Those 13,000 sketches transferred to UNLV are a history lesson, documenting the growth of Las Vegas and its leaders, and tackling important national issues. He’s drawn presidents from Ronald Reagan to Joe Biden — President Bill Clinton has many of Smith’s works hanging on his office walls. Former presidential candidates John McCain and John Kerry have, as well.
Smith stood in amazement last week when watching UNLV curators pack his drawings into boxes. There’s a certain sense of pride knowing his life’s work has found a secure, friendly archival home.
“Now, his complete collection will be available through the university for academics, students, researchers and others interested in our civic life to learn from one of the very best in his profession,” Greenspun said. “We are happy to support Mike in his desire to create this gift to UNLV.”
Smith’s work appears about five times weekly on the editorial pages of the Sun. Those drawings will continue to be sent to UNLV. And, surely, his phone will continue to ring with feedback from readers looking for copies of his work. It’s communication he cherishes — just like his role at the Sun.
“I’ve been lucky in my career to have the support of the paper,” Smith said. “Every artist needs a gallery to have their work displayed, and the Sun’s been my gallery.”
