‘Best of 2023’ Sacramento Pulitzer Prize Winning Editorial Cartoonists Jack Ohman & Darrin Bell

Insight’s best conversations of the year. We revisit interviews with two Sacramento-based Pulitzer-Prize winning editorial cartoonists– Jack Ohman and Darrin Bell.

Jack Ohman 

At 19 years old Jack Ohman became a nationally syndicated editorial cartoonist and, decades later, earned a Pulitzer Prize for the Sacramento Bee. For almost a decade, Jack’s cartoons at the SacBee evoked a wide range of thoughts and emotions from readers about the politicians or events shaping our lives. But earlier this year, the Sacramento Bee’s parent company “McClatchy” let go of Jack, along with other Pulitzer-Prize-winning editorial cartoonists saying it would no longer publish editorial cartoons. Insight sat down with Jack Ohman in July as he closed a chapter with the SacBee and opened up about his remarkable career, and point of view, that spans more than 40 years, and is far from over.

Darrin Bell

Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Darrin Bell is turning to his youth for his new graphic memoir “The Talk.” Bell grew up in Los Angeles in the ‘80s and ‘90s to a white mother and Black father, and through vulnerable illustrations he shares personal experiences that shaped his understanding of race and racism throughout his life, culminating into fatherhood and whether he and his son are ready to have “the talk.” Bell joined Insight in September about his career as an editorial cartoonist with syndicated comic strips, and a passion for graphic novels.