I will miss Jay Kennedy. Like a lot of cartoonists, I have attempted to create a syndicated strip several times in past years. Without fail, Jay always included a personal, hand-written note with thoughtful feedback when my efforts were less than worthy of it. Most syndicates simply stuff a photocopied rejection in your SASE and forget about you, but Jay was much more personable and always remembered who I was whenever I would submit work. I had the opportunity to interview him for my BFA project before I graduated in 2000 and he was kind and helpful and had some great insights on the future of comics.
My condolences and prayers go out to his family and friends.

My sympathies to Jay’s family, and to his friends and mine at King Features.

This is quite a shock. Back when I was still working for Disney in WDW, I got a call out of the blue from Jay Kennedy. He was looking for someone to carry on the drawing end of the Mickey comic strip and said my name had been recommended to him. Though my day job would have kept me too busy to consider taking it on, we had a nice conversation on the syndication business where he was happy to answer questions I had about the process. Sometime later I called him to inquire about about possibly getting my caricatures syndicated. Though he said King Features didn’t really handle that sort of art, he gave me some other leads to follow. He seemed like a very nice guy who was very approachable. My condolences to his family.