Shepard, Otis, 1894-1969

Designer Otis Shepard, or Shep as he was called, was born in 1894 in Smallville, Kansas. He left home at the young age of 12, when he traveled to El Paso, Texas, finding work as an errand boy at an engraver’s shop. The young nomad continued on to California to live with an uncle who owned a vineyard in Napa Valley – but the life of a vintner wasn’t for him. He relocated to San Francisco less than a year later where he found work drawing cartoons for the San Francisco Tribune under the guidance of Bud Fisher of Mutt & Jeff cartoon fame. At some point shortly thereafter, he apprenticed with an area lithographer, and by 1912 was able to hang out a shingle of his own. He signed on with the outdoor advertising firm Foster & Kleiser in 1917, where he spent a year before heading off to war. By the end of the war in 1919, he returned to his position at Foster & Kleiser, rapidly moving up the ranks to take over as general art director for the firm. During the mid 1930s, when Shep was leading the design efforts of both Wrigley Gum and Catalina Island, PK leaned on him once again – this time to create designs for Wrigley’s beloved ball team, the Chicago Cubs. Around 1936, Shep began to redesign the team uniform. With the uniforms complete, PK sent him off to redesign the all aspects of the stadium – like the work on Catalina, the objective was to create a whole graphic identity for the ballpark. This is perhaps one of the first forays into creating what we call today, “the customer experience.” In fact, his work was so popular, that the National League commissioned him in 1951 to create the 75th anniversary uniform shoulder patch worn by all teams. Shep continued his relationship with the team until the early 1960s.--https://www.maximalist.org/designs/otis-dorothy-shepard/