Meet the Man behind Super Pig



Don and his beautiful granddaughter Ellie



Meet Don Canonge Artist Extraordinaire! 

I've known Don for about 20 years now. He worked in the Huntington Beach office and then moved with the office to Florida. Don and his lovely wife Myrle are Wycliffe Members and served in Australia for 16 years before returning to the states and going to work at the Wycliffe headquarters.

Don is the son of missionary parents who served in Oklahoma working among the Comanche Indians.

Don's father also taught linguistics at the University of Oklahoma in Norman. Wycliffe Translators take linguistic courses to get the tools they need to do a translation. Don has been a missionary his whole life.



Don getting a ride.



Don works in our Prayer Letter Dept. here at the Orlando headquarters where he turns prayer letters into works of art. All my missionary friends rave about the job he does on their letters. They look like they come from a very high end printing company. The colors, the backgrounds and the arrangement of photos make each letter extremely appealing, something you really want to read.

 Don has also been a artist most of his life and he did all the artwork for my books and the formatting so they are ready to print when they get to the publishers. There would be no Super Pig books without Don, believe me. I don't know the first thing about formatting, I can't even get the pictures to go where I want them to in this stupid blog!

 I had asked another artist if she would be interested in doing my artwork, but when things didn't work out, I was at a loss as to what to do. My friend Penny Livingston said, "Why don't you ask Don?" Now why hadn't I thought of that?




Artwork for my first book The Adventures of Super Pig.
You can see why I was so excited to have him do my artwork.

  I asked him and he said yes. I gave him some input as to what I wanted and a few stories to read so he could get an idea of the characters. With in a few days he had a sketch for me, then a sample of the first story with the artwork. I was beside myself with joy. My book was taking shape and now I knew what Super Pig looked like.

I pretty much gave Don free reign as to what he wanted to do with the artwork. I wasn't paying him nearly enough to be micro managing him. And besides I trusted him to do a great job, and he did. With in a year my book was ready for the publishers.

When my first proof copy came I was so excited! My book in print! It was so cool. I couldn't wait to show it to Don.

I took it to him after showing it to everyone who breathed at work the next day. I left it with him to look through and soon got an e-mail - Roxanna there are some problems with the book. WHAT?!! What do you mean there are problems. It looks great to me. I went down to see him (I'm on the 3rd floor, he's on the 1st). He explained the problems and show me what was wrong. I'd seen none of it, I just saw my book in print. He saw everything, he was a pro. So once he explained, I saw it too and went back upstairs to call my publisher. We finally got it worked out and I got a second proof with all the problems fixed. Next the real thing, my books, in hardback, 25 of them, plus 10 free paperback copies, arrived about 3 weeks later.

Our first book

So happy, so excited, doing the dance of joy I once again showed them to everyone who breathed. I was selling them left and right and mailing them out to my family. I took Don his half and about 20mins later, I get a phone call. It's Don. "I bet you hate hearing from me," he said. "I hate to tell you this but there's a problem with the book." My little heart sank. They had duplicated a page and left one out. Oh man!! I looked through one of my copies and it was fine, no duplicated page. It turned out only half the books had this problem. It had to do with the way they were printed. So, I had to get a hold of everyone who had bought one so they could check their copies for errors and I had to open all my mailing packets to check those copies. I was bummed. But thank heavens I had someone sharp enough around to catch the things I was to giddy to notice. I once again called my publisher and they quickly sent out corrected copies.

Soon after my books arrived, I had a book signing at Wycliffe. My sister, Connie, surprised me with a cake that had my book cover on it. Wish I had a picture of it. A friend, Debbie Darlington, made me a Super Pig costume to wear to the book signing. Back in Huntington Beach we used to have theme parties. We picked a movie and dress like the characters. One of Don's favorites was the Blues Brothers, we dressed like the Blues Brothers and ate food like the Blues Brothers. Don had to have a valve replace in his heart so we had an "Open Heart Surgery" party. We all wore red, the food was red and much of it heart shaped, then we watched a video of his surgery. (I watched most of it with my eyes closed.) So it is no surprise that I would wear a Super Pig costume to my book signing.

Don and I at our first book signing




About 2 years later Don and I worked on Book II "Super Pig to the Rescue". More great artwork and formatting. No problems with the second book.



Artwork for Book II  "Super Pig to the Rescue"





Book II



A few months ago Don became a grandpa for the first time. His son and daughter-in-law had a beautiful baby girl,  Ellie Marie. She was really a miracle baby due to health concern for her mom, so she is a double blessing. That's the great news, the sad news, Don and Myrle put their house up for sale. They are moving to Washington state to be near that new grand baby. I don't blame them for wanting to be close to her. There is nothing like a grand child. They are so much more fun then having your own kids. You get all the fun and half the worry.




The reason for the move to Washington.
Little Ellie Marie.

 

I'm very happy they are now grandparents and will get to spend lots of time with their grand baby, but will miss seeing them in the office. We don't do as much together as we used to, but when we do get together, it is always so much fun. They have a great sense of humor, and Don always has great stories to tell. Don has agreed to continue to do my artwork, he sent me an e-mail that said, "If you want to do anything Super Pigish, I'm willing." which makes me very happy. I have Book III all written, so maybe in between working on prayer letters and playing with that grand baby he'll have a little time to work on artwork. I'm in no big hurry.