Tom Tully (writer)


Tom Tully was a noted British comic writer mostly of sports and action stories. He is probably most famous as the longest-running writer of the popular football-themed strip Roy of the Rovers, which he wrote for much of Roy Race's playing career until the weekly comic closed in 1993.

Biography

From 1963 to 1970, Tully was the principal writer on Steel Claw for Valiant with artist Jesús Blasco, taking over for the fourth serial from Ken Bulmer, and later returning from 1971 to 1973 for the sequel strip, Return of the Claw. He also worked on Kelly's Eye and Janus Stark, and wrote Heros the Spartan with art by Frank Bellamy for Eagle. According to the first printing Paul Scoones's The Comic Strip Companion, Tully was also regular writer on the Doctor Who strip in TV Comic prior to 1966; however subsequent research suggests that the author had confused Tully with another comics writer of this period, Thomas Woodman.
In the 1970s and '80s, he worked on Johnny Red for Battle Picture Weekly. He worked on many 2000 AD projects including Dan Dare, and the sports-related Harlem Heroes and Mean Arena. He also created The Mind of Wolfie Smith for Tornado, which later transferred to 2000 AD.

Death

Tully retired to Wiltshire in the West Country. He died in Autumn 2013.