First Comics News: Sandy, I’d like to start, if it’s alright, with some biographical questions. Can you tell our readers where and when you were born, and where you went to school as a young lad?
Sandy Carruthers: I was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1962. I lived there for five years before moving to Cherry Hill, Prince Edward Island (Canada’s smallest province), where I spent my school years attending Mount Stewart Elementary School, then Morell Regional High School, until moving to Charlottetown P.E.I in 1980.
1st: That’s a coincidence, Terry! I, too, was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in a hospital there; I grew up in Herring Cove, the fishing village, where we lived, till I was ten years old, right next to the Atlantic Ocean, perhaps seven miles from Halifax! 
How old were you when you first discovered the entertainment world of comic books, and how and when did that take place, if you remember?
Sandy: Our house always had comic books. From the Classics Illustrated to Dells and Charltons and Archies, as well as DCs and Marvels. When I was about ten or so, my Dad got me a MAD magazine, and I started getting into drawing in Grade 7-8.
1st: What were your favourite comics characters and comics series growing up?
Sandy: With comics, I read Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Howard the Duck, Nova, and Tarzan (the DC stuff), Magnus Robot Fighter, Fantastic Four, Silver Surfer, Green Lantern/Green Arrow, and Justice League of America. House of Mystery (and the others), Swamp (and Man) Thing. Then, I discovered EERIE and CREEPY (from Warren Publishing), and a slew of black and white comics from MARVEL and Charlton. When I was 16, my Dad got me my first Heavy Metal magazine. My father was very supportive of me, and I’ll be forever thankful to him for that.
1st: I got most all of those, and I loved the DC 1970’s Tarzan title! I particularly liked Bill Dubay’s The Rook sort-of cowboy time-traveler, with his grandfather, and with his manservant, the robot named ‘Manners.’ How old were you when you started to draw?
Sandy: I started drawing when I was around four, and I remember watching the Adam West Batman on TV when I was five, which sparked my imagination. I always drew, but it wasn’t until around grade eight that I determined I wanted to draw comics for a living.
1st: Did you also watch, at around the same time, The Green Hornet TV series, with Bruce Lee and Van Williams? I was very young, and my mother wouldn’t let me watch it, because it was on too late at night. But later, knowing the final episode was coming up, she let me stay up and watch the final episode, and I was hooked. But sadly, I didn’t get a chance to see it again until several decades later! I am aware that you attended Prince Edward Island’s Holland College. When were you there, and how long was that course?
Sandy: I attended Holland College in Charlottetown in 1980, taking the Commercial Design Program (later to be renamed Graphic Design), and graduated two years later, as a Graphic Artist.
1st: Did the college have a course in cartooning, comics making, and/or animation? And did you attend at the same time as James Somers, who was a fellow comics fan and collector, and like me, was an artist, also?
Sandy: None of that. The program I took would cover a broad scope of stuff, but mostly focused on design and printing. I was lucky that my instructor (the late Russell Stewart) was a big appreciator of comic books. He introduced me to underground comics, which I thought were amazing. The program also had an amazing screen printing shop and a letterpress.
1st: And what other courses, if any, did you take there?
Sandy: None. However, there were tons of opportunities to cross over with other disciplines, like photography, on projects. It also taught me invaluable business practices.
1st: Holland College, I am aware, offers a huge variety of courses available to students, including courses in policing; RCMP, am I correct?
Sandy: Yep! The College did have other creative art programs such as Photography, Pottery, Sculpture, and Weaving, but most of those programs got cancelled, over time. Both the design and photography programs survived, and later Video Game Animation and Fundamental Arts was included.
1st: Can you tell our readers, kindly, how you broke into working in the comic book industry?
Sandy: After working in the design industry for a spell, I went back to school to Sheridan College in Ontario, and took the Illustration Program.
1st: Sheridan (art) College in Oakville, Ontario, which opened in 1967 — I do know that, in the 1970s, they put out an annual comic book, magazine-sized, called GAMUT. I have all four issues, but two of those four issues are rare. Will Eisner and Mike Ploog did original comics work in them, to name just some. These are very interesting, and they are very collectible; # 1 and # 2, with Ploog and Eisner covers, are common; the final two issues are rare. You can see these Sheridan College Gamut issues right here, on the Grand Comics Database. The GCD lists a fifth issue, but no one I know has ever seen the so-called fifth issue, and it is rumoured not to even exist. Were you familiar with the existence of these Canadian comics? I have attached them to the interview.
Sandy: Never heard of them until now. Returning to P.E.I. in 1987, I freelanced and began submitting art to publishers. Remember, this was the booming black and white comic book boom in the late 1980’s, and there were plenty of publishers to submit to. I answered a call in CBG (started as The Buyer’s Guide For Comics Fandom, under Alan Light, and many years later morphed in to the title The Comics Buyer’s Guide) – looking for stories, and I began drawing comics for Eternity, Aircel and Adventure Comics (All Malibu Comics imprints), for a few years.
1st: Can you kindly tell our readers and myself what titles did you do for Eternity, Aircel and Adventure Comics, under the Malibu Comics imprint? Our readers as well as myself would love to know!
Sandy: A few issues of Shattered Earth, New Mutants, Headless Horseman, Alien Nation, Invaders from Mars, and The Men in Black. There are other one-offs, but I can’t recall. In the early 90’s I was hired to teach Graphic Design at Holland College (the very program I graduated from ten years earlier!), and I taught there until I retired in 2017. I still did plenty of comics stuff for publishers at that point, but only on a part-time basis. I drew Captain Canuck (the very, very rare Captain Canuck: Utopia Moments, two issues, both limited to print runs of fifteen to thirty copies each, never reprinted), Lerner Publishing and Charlton Neo, plus the editorial cartoons for ten years at our local paper.
1st: Can you kindly tell our readers which titles you illustrated for Lerner Publishing, as well as for Charlton Neo?
Sandy: For Lerner: Yu the Great, Sunjata, School of Evil, Ghost House, and Peril in Summerland Park. For Charlton Neo: Spookman, Ms. Molecule, and Spirit Talker, plus a bunch of one-offs.
1st: Sandy, are you possibly able to provide a complete list of the comics you have illustrated, over the decades?
Sandy: That was pretty much it that I remember, apart from Captain Canuck and my titles like Canadiana and the Sandstone Comics stuff. It’s only been the past six years I’ve been at it full time, publishing my stuff.
1st: Sandy, thank you very, very much for taking the time to chat with me about working in comics.
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