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When Calvin and Hobbes' 10-year run came to a close in December 1995, Bill Watterson pulled a J.D. Salinger, effectively withdrawing from public life. Not that he'd been much for publicity in the first place. While creating Calvin and Hobbes, Watterson rarely gave interviews or made public appearances. When he retired, he moved with his wife and cats to his childhood home of Chagrin Falls, Ohio. Residents of the small town are protective of their local celebrity. For a few years after ending the comic, Watterson signed Calvin and Hobbes books for the town's book shop, but even that proved to be too much attention for the shy cartoonist. Watterson now spends much of his time painting, supposedly burning each work once he finishes. His last public appearance was giving the 1990 commencement speech at his alma mater, Kenyon College, in Gambier, Ohio. Watterson has written introductions for a few Calvin and Hobbes books. In 1999, he wrote a eulogy of sorts in The Los Angeles Times for the finale of the Peanuts comic strip.
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