This is one of the very last assignments for Ruralite. There were only two more jobs after this, illustrating an article on how the electrical grid worked. The piece was dead serious and I was provided basically no information on what transformers or power plants looked like, so to no great surpise the final illustrartions were rejected by the new editor. I demanded and got a kill fee (standard when the magazine solicits work). My contact there, the assistent editor, retired shortly after that, so there were no more offers from Ruralite. I didn't know it, but my "career" as a professional illustrator was all but over.

Had it been 1940 or even 1950, I might have found other work, but the day when this sort of cartoony b/w style was fashionable was a thing of the past.

The story behind this final bow as the curtain dropped is that some gujy's gran'pop liked to blow things up, and had about as much sense going about it as a half-wit. He actually did carry extra sticks in his back pocket!