THE BORN LOSER by Chip Sansom

Chip Sansom started preparing to be The Born Loser at the age of 14 when his father, the late Art Sansom, first created The Born Loser comic strip. That was 1965. After years of observing and assisting his father, Chip is now in the role he was destined for -- cartoonist for The Born Loser.

As the comic strip evolved, so did Chip's involvement with it. After graduating from Case-Western Reserve University with a double major in English and Management Science, and a short stint in the business world, Chip began apprenticing for his father in 1977. He became a full-time assistant in 1979 and gradually took on an ever-increasing role in the drawing and gag-writing duties. When Art passed away on July 4, 1991, 40 years to the day after Chip's birth, Chip was fully prepared to continue the strip in The Born Loser tradition.

"Because I lived with the strip since its inception, it all came together for me," Chip says. "Although I had no formal art training, I had the best teacher in the world--my dad! Other than Dad, no one knew or loved The Born Loser more than I did." Chip picked up the style of the strip exactly as his father had created it. Like his father, Chip believes the universal appeal of The Born Loser comes from people's pleasure in laughing at someone else's mistakes. "People relating to a familiar losing situation is the basis of the humor. The title says it all."

The Born Loser continues to be a family affair. Chip's wife, Brooke, now assists him in much the same way as when he started working for his father. Daughters Jacqueline, 14, and Isabel, 2, are a constant source of material for the strip. Appropriately, Chip now works in his father's old studio at the Sansom family home in Lakewood, Ohio.