HARGREAVES, ROGER

born 1935, Cleckheaton, Yorkshire, Eng. died Sept. 12, 1988, Kent county British cartoonist who created whimsical characters best known in the popular Mr. Men series of books for children. Hargreaves was a creative director in an London advertising firm when he began to market his potato-shaped doodles in the early 1970s. The simple figures were given such names as Mr. Tickle, Mr. Happy, Mr. Nosey, Mr. Greedy, and Mr. Grumpy. These characters appeared in books, as BBC cartoons, and in a comic strip in the Daily Mirror. The Mr. Men characters spawned more than 700 products, from T-shirts to food cartons, and paved the way for a Little Miss series, including Little Miss Helpful and Little Miss Bossy. Together the two series reached worldwide sales of 85 million volumes and were published in 20 languages.