dream of the rarebit fiend

O Pioneer!: A (Probable) Birthday Tribute to Winsor McCay
O Pioneer!: A (Probable) Birthday Tribute to Winsor McCay
O Pioneer!: A (Probable) Birthday Tribute to Winsor McCay
Zenas Winsor McCay, who perhaps shrewdly went by his middle name (and sometimes professionally by the pen name “Silas”), was born on September 26 in 1869. Or... maybe not. He might have been born as early as 1867 or as late as 1871. Through a combination of birth records possibly lost in a fire, and a likely desire by McCay himself to disguise how large the age gap was between him and his wife, we simply don't know for sure when he was born; we've chosen to take his word for it that his birthday was September 26. One thing not in doubt, however, is that the astonishing Mr. McCay was a pioneer in not one, but two fields.