newsminer.com

A weird thing happened last month to the wolves, caribou and snowmen who populate “Tundra,” Chad Carpenter’s popular comic strip. They all took an extended trip to the warm, sandy beaches of Jamaica.

It’s an odd development for Carpenter’s strange cast of Alaskan people and animals, but a welcome one. On Dec. 22, Carpenter signed an international deal with King Features, making him the first Alaskan cartoonist to become syndicated.

Within two weeks, the Wasilla-based cartoonist discovered “Tundra” was going to start appearing in a Jamaican newspaper.

There’s still a hint of disbelief in his voice as he describes the amazing rise of his comic, which has gone from seven newspapers to more than 150 in the last few years.

“It snowballed,” Carpenter said. “It started as a few papers and then it just happened.”

The deal with King Features may help “Tundra” blossom into a strip known around the world.

The company represents 65 syndicated comic strips, comics editor Brendan Burford said, including venerable titles like “Blondie” and “Beetle Bailey.”

But despite the broader coverage, Carpenter said his approach to “Tundra” hasn’t changed. He figures the same oddities that Alaskans find funny — bar-hopping moose, sleazy dogsled salesmen and confused snowmen, among others — will appeal to pretty much anyone. Burford said King Features agrees.

“I invite anybody to see it and not just find universal humor in it,” he said. “I think that’s why he’s in the L.A. Times and other markets.”

Carpenter had pondered becoming a cartoonist through his teenage years, but the idea didn’t solidify until the late 1980s, when he moved to Sarasota, Fla., where an uncle lived.

The city, a “cartoonist mecca,” allowed him to meet such famed artists as Dik Browne, who creates “Hagar the Horrible,” and Mike Peters, the creator of “Mother Goose and Grimm.”

“That inspired me to do this — I decided I could sit around and draw pictures,” he said.

He returned to Alaska and launched “Tundra” 16 years ago. Carpenter was able to work full-time as a cartoonist only a year after starting the strip, thanks to success at the summer markets in Anchorage, where he’d peddle books of “Tundra” strips to the endless streams of tourists.

Carpenter cultivated a strong following in his home state, and was appearing in a handful of Alaska newspapers a few years ago, including the News-Miner. But with the help of a friend, Bill Kellogg, he went on an extensive tour of the Lower 48 two years ago, pitching his comic along the way.

The leg work paid off, landing 130 newspapers in a year, and Carpenter started realizing that his strip had broad appeal.

“Tundra’s never been specifically Alaskan,” Carpenter said. “If it’s funny it’s funny, and that’s the important thing.”

With domestic distribution flourishing, Carpenter wasn’t interested in syndicating his strip in the U.S. and Canada. But when King Features proposed a deal that could send it to Europe and other global markets, it was too good to pass up, Carpenter said.

Putting his work in front of so many new eyes has given Carpenter a much-needed boost.

“I enjoy doing what I do again,” he said. “I always liked it, but it was getting kind of stagnant and stale. To me it’s like a whole new job all of a sudden.”

Finding that creative spark through the years hasn’t always been easy.

At various times Carpenter ran dry on ideas, and enlisted his brother Darin Carpenter, a North Pole resident, to supply the humor for the strip.

“There have been a few low points in my life where I couldn’t come up with anything,” he said. “He kept the strip going for a month or so.”

Carpenter also uses a technique that’s unusual for a cartoonist — he encourages readers to send in ideas, and gives them credit if they appear in “Tundra.” Since the distribution of his comic blossomed a few years ago, the approach has been a mixed blessing.

“I get 150 times more bad ideas,” he said with a laugh. “Checking my e-mail sometimes is a little overwhelming.”

But while the financial success of “Tundra” has been welcome in the last few years, Carpenter said he’s not planning to take it easy. His new Jamaican readers, among others, deserve his best work.

“So much pressure is gone because of (the syndication money), but there’s more pressure because it’s so much work,” he said.