It is with great sorrow that we hear that legendary British comics creator Leo Baxendale has died at the age of 86 following a long battle with cancer. For DC Thomson’s Beano and other publications, he created a wealth of characters whose names still resonate within the minds of generations, the most famous of which are “The Bash Street Kids”, “Minnie the Minx”, “The Three Bears” and “Little Plum”.
       In 1964, seeking to break away from the management style of D C Thomson, he created, virtually single-handedly, the weekly comic Wham!, which, apart from a token reprint adventure strip, was initially all Baxendale’s own work, though other creators soon joined him.
       Always a staunch advocate for creators’ rights, he fought a seven-year legal battle with D C Thomson for the rights to his creations, a battle which ended only when DC Thomson settled out of court before a trial was imminent. His anarchic, cluttered and frenetic style, which later Beano artists were urged to imitate, belied a consummate sense of control and balance which influenced succeeding generations of cartoonists, not only in the humour field but also in the broader canvas of satire and political commentary.