Billy Cam

Billy Cam was an artist for d'Orient, a family magazine from the Dutch colony of the Dutch Indies (now Indonesia) in the 1930s. He was the author of the popular gag series 'CAMouFLAGES', which gave a good view on life in the Dutch colony in the 1930s.

Little is known about the artist, whose real name was William Campbell and who lived a retiring life. But thanks to the investigatinos of Dutch researcher George Mulder, much have come to light. He was originally from the USA, where was born in either 1892 or 1893 in St. Louis, Missouri to parents of Irish descent. According to the 1910 census, he saw himself as a landscape painter. Campbell was drafted for World War I, but it is unsure if he ever faught in the trenches. He got married by 1920 and moved to Los Angeles shortly afterwards.

He had taken correspondense courses in art, but had a hard time finding assignments. He was therefore eager to accept editor Albert Zimmerman's offer to work for d'Oriënt in the Dutch Indies. He settled in Batavia, where he commenced working on 'CAMouFLAGES', of which the main character was modelled after his own image. The strip was a great success, and because of Cam's resemblances to the main character, he was recognized wherever he came.

Cam couldn't withdraw from the prevailing colonial morals of the time. Where the Indonesian woman was described as a graceful "queen of Sheba" in the first strip of 24 December 1935, she was devaluated to colonial level several episodes later, in which Cam calls his female servant not too smart, slow and lazy.

Billy Cam lived and worked in Batavia for four or five years, after which he went to Singapore (shortly before Pearl Harbor). According to a letter sent by Cam to the editors of d'Oriënt, he then relocated to Hongkong. Two clairvoyants had predicted that he would never see the United States again. Cam thought that if he did the journey home in short stages, he could make it. According to a newspaper article, Cam returned to the States on the Norwegian motorliner Roseville of the Klaveness Line. Cam apparently had a studio in South Broadway upon his return in the States in 1942. He most likely passed away in St. Louis on 24 April 1962.