:. back to News Releases Menu For immediate release October 27, 2005 For more information, contact: Jan M. Guszynski Marketing Director Tribune Media Services (312) 222-4717 jguszynski@tribune.com Michael Kilian, Writer for Dick Tracy Comic Strip and Veteran Journalist, Dies at 66 CHICAGO, October 26, 2005 — Tribune Media Services (TMS) today announced the death of Michael Kilian, a creative force behind the Dick Tracy comic strip since joining the Tracy team in February of 1993. He was 66. Kilian was instrumental in maintaining the spirit and high quality of the seminal Chester Gould comic strip and in making it relevant to contemporary readers. In fact, the current story line concerns digital piracy and features villains - Pixels and Cellphones - who would fit perfectly into the famous Gould "Rogues Gallery." A Washington-based reporter for the Chicago Tribune and the author of mystery novels and nonfiction books, Kilian conceived and wrote the story lines for Dick Tracy. His colleague and long-time friend Dick Locher, a Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist, draws the strip. "Michael was not just an outstanding writer for TMS," said David D. Williams, TMS President and CEO. "He was also a friend of long standing. The TMS family has lost one of its mainstays, a writer who has most definitely earned his place in the history of the American comic strip with his creative work on Dick Tracy." Williams said TMS immediately would begin a search for Kilian's successor. Locher and Kilian have completed work, he said, on strips that will run through January of 2006. Dick Tracy is one of the longest continuously running comic strips. It was launched on October 4, 1931 by the Chicago Tribune-New York News Syndicate. The strip's creator, Chester Gould, is recognized as one of the key innovators of the genre. Gould retired from the strip in 1977 and died in 1985.

© 2005 Tribune Media Services, Inc. All rights reserved.