Lynn Johnston

About Lynn Johnston

Lynn Johnston CM OM (born May 28, 1947) is a Canadian cartoonist, well known for her comic strip For Better or For Worse, and was the first female cartoonist to win the Reuben Award.

Born Lynn Ridgway in Collingwood, Ontario, she was raised in North Vancouver, British Columbia. She attended the Vancouver School of Art with hopes of making a living as an artist. After working briefly in animation, she married in 1969, and moved back to Ontario, where she worked as a medical artist at McMaster University for five years. Johnston's illustrations are currently in storage in McMaster University's medical archive. They include depictions of routine hospital happenings, such as a father smoking in the waiting room.

While expecting her first child, she drew single-panel cartoons for the ceiling of her obstetrician's office. Those drawings were published in her first book entitled David We're Pregnant, which was published in 1973. After her divorce, she did free-lance commercial and medical art in a greenhouse which was converted into a studio. Hi Mom! Hi Dad!, a sequel to David, was published in 1975. Shortly thereafter she met and married dental student Rod Johnston - and acquired the name Lynn Johnston.