Charles Apple

Here’s wishing the happiest of VizEds birthdays to my good friend Jeff Bash, art director of The Des Moines Register. Jeff turns 31 today.

Left to right: Yours truly; my assistant,
Jeff Bash; and our good friend,
illustrator/designer Mark Marturello.
October, 2003.
—

Jeff is an amazing guy. He was my summer intern in 1999, during my first summer at graphics director of The Des Moines Register. A very quiet guy, Jeff preferred to do his talking with his graphics work. He decided right away he wanted one of the open positions we had on our news graphics staff. When summer ended, he stayed with us, part-time, to help make ends meet. By November, we knew we wanted to lock him in to a full-time position once he graduated.

Not only he work his way into a job, but he also brought to our attention the incredibly talented Katie VanDalsem. We ended up hiring her, too. The two of them did a lot of great work for us over the years in Iowa.

A year or so later, I decided to begin grooming Jeff to become my eventual successor in the job. My editors thought I was nuts. Hell, Jeff thought I was nuts. The guy was way too young for something like that.

But he learned fast. And, sure enough, when I left for Virginia in 2003, The Register promoted him to art director. Jeff has done very well in the five years since, and my old department ha flourished under his watch.

I’m extremely proud of the guy.

A few samples of Jeff’s work:

Find more in his NewsPageDesigner portfolio.

Jeff shares a birthday with hockey greats Gordie Howe and Pavel Bure, and actors Ewan McGregor (’Obi-Wan’ from the Star Wars prequels), Gabe Kaplan (the star of Welcome Back, Kotter), Shirley Jones (Mom of The Partridge Family), and Christopher Walken (from a huge number of weird roles).

In addition, today is the birthday of Al Gore, the creator of the internet.

Plus, today is Bunsen Burner Day and National Clams On The Half Shell Day. Seriously.

Best wishes, Jeff, my friend, for a happy birthday!

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