Etta Hulme, 90, passed away on Wednesday, June 25, 2014, at her home in Arlington. Visitation and funeral: Visitation will be 1 to 3 p.m. Monday at Wade Family Funeral Home, 4140 W. Pioneer Parkway, Arlington, with funeral following at 3 p.m. Interment: 2 p.m. Tuesday in Oaklawn Cemetery in Somerville. Etta Grace Parks was born Dec. 22, 1923, to Charles and Grace Parks in Somerville, where she grew up helping in her family's grocery store. After graduating from high school, she went to the University of Texas at Austin and earned a degree in art education. After graduating she packed her Model A and drove to California to work for Disney Studios for the next two years. She later went to Chicago, where she drew Red Rabbit comic books, and then returned to Texas to work as a commercial artist and art instructor. In 1952 she married Vernon Hulme in Kitzengen, Germany. After their return to Texas, she drew freelance cartoons for the Texas Observer. In 1972 she joined the Fort Worth Star-Telegram as a political cartoonist, and continued drawing cartoons for the newspaper until 2009. One of the first female political cartoonists in the nation, her work was nationally syndicated. She was the first woman to win the National Cartoonist Society Editorial Cartoon Award in 1991, which she won again in 1998. She was president of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists in 1987. Etta traveled widely but especially loved spending time at her family home in Somerville. Everyone who met Etta loved her sense of humor. She will be missed. She was preceded in death by her husband, Vernon C. Hulme, in 1983; and her sister, Mary Love Olsen, in 2012. Survivors: Sons, Charles Hulme and wife, Celesa, and John Hulme; daughters, Kay Hulme Hale and Helen Hulme and husband, Paul Nichols; grandchildren, Samantha, Sara, Ryan, Aaron and Emily; and great-grandchild, Vernon.
Published in Star-Telegram on June 29, 2014