cartoonist, was born in Sydney in 1891, the first child of Arthur and Carrie Fry. She studied art (c.1910-12) and worked for a time as a commercial artist, drawing newspaper advertisements as well as cartoons and illustrations for the Bulletin, Sydney Mail and Lone Hand e.g. Young Australia 1 December 1914, 30 (little kids playing). Her Bulletin cartoons during WWI include: One point in their favour (little girl’s legs) 12 December 1914, 21; Women’s Clothes Again 12 March 1914, 10; Circumstantial Evidence 15 June 1916, 11. A reasonably good Bulletin original (ML Px*D463/53), The Economist [re teacher and four pupils, three girls and a boy, captioned – after elaborations of the joke had been editorially removed]: 'Willie (detected in the act of extracting piece of chewing gum), “Please miss, need I throw it away. It’s only a new piece”’. It was published on 2 January 1919, when Fry was living in Lindfield.
After further study, Fry worked as a typist/stenographer. In 1919 she took up a position in Batavia (Jakarta, Indonesia) in the office of a British firm. She returned to Australia in 1923 and worked for various organisations in the private and public sectors before retiring in 1953. She died at Sydney in 1965. The Fry family papers in ML (1898-1953, mss) were presented by Mrs Wilga Morgan in 1978 and Mrs Jean Fry in 1989. They include family letters and papers, a 2-part newspaper article 'The Australian Girl in Java’ September 1921 and (1937 and undated) printed material containing illustrations by Dorothy Fry including 'Sulks Grizzlegrumps by Aldea Wane, Sydney, W.C. Penfold n.d. ML MSS 1159, ADD ON 2076/ Box 5; 'Dorothy’s Art Work and Printed Specimens c.1910-22: sketches, mainly of people, commercial illustrations, magazine covers and illustrations, cartoons and postcards (ML MSS 1159, ADD ON 2076/ Box 6).
- Writers:
- Kerr, Joan
- Date written:
- 1996
- Last updated:
- 2007
