Andy Donato 1937-2026

With notes from The Toronto Sun.

Andy Donato inside his studio in 2015

It is with great sadness that I learned that long time Toronto Sun cartoonist Andy Donato has died at 89 while sustaining a head injury during a fall while playing a round at his beloved Hunt Club golf course.

Andy was born in Scarborough in 1937 and graduated from Danforth Technical School in 1955.

After working at Eaton’s as a layout artist, he joined The Toronto Telegram in 1961 as a graphic artist working in the promotion department. 

“The first cartoon I drew was in 1964 on the Canadian flag debate in Ottawa. The editor saw it and said, ‘Oh, good, I can run that.'”

Not only did it run in the Telegram but it was also published in the Encyclopedia Americana.

Donato began on a three-month trial basis, filling in whenever Telegram staff cartoonist Al Beaton was off, before eventually moving on to Sun, just after Thanksgiving weekend in 1971.

He went from two cartoons a week, alternating with cartoonist Yardley Jones, and by 1973, when the Sunday edition began, Donato moved from three a week to five once Jones left.

“It was hard enough coming up with one idea, let alone three, four, five,” he laughed.

But clearly, the news gave Donato all the material he needed – though he admitted “the summer months, when Parliament adjourns and whatnot, were tough.”

The world of politics comes with plenty of characters to choose from –some cartoons themselves – but Donato has two favourites that made for great editorial content: Former prime ministers Pierre Trudeau and Brian Mulroney.

Trudeau (“the father, not the son,” Donato made sure to clarify) was a favourite target of the Sun back in the day.

“We fought him tooth and nail – we thought he was far too much of a socialist,” he recalled.

But then Mulroney came along, when his Progressive Conservatives swept the Liberals, led briefly by John Turner, in a historic landslide victory following Trudeau’s retirement.

“When I go back and look at the Mulroney stuff, I think I was tougher on Mulroney than I was on Trudeau,” Donato mused.

Donato and Mulroney got along great, he said, noting the then-prime minister “loved my work,” even ordering originals to be framed and hung in his offices, paid for out of the Conservative treasure chest, not by the government, he explained.

Donato would eventually draw so many political cartoons, he had more than enough to fill 10 books.

His most memorable cartoon is a no-brainer. 

Titled “The American Dream,” he took the iconic photo, Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, but spun it so the U.S. Marines appeared to be “shoving the flag up the Ayatollah (Ruhollah) Khomeini’s rear end.”

“That was back in 1979 or 1980 for the Sun, and it won best editorial cartoon in the world in a competition,” he said proudly of the black-and-white drawing.

It got such a reaction that he re-did it in colour, and it ran on the front page.

Donato recently did a Canadian Dream version – except it featured Canadian soldiers shoving the Canadian flag up U.S. President Donald Trump’s behind.

He took early retirement in 1997 and continued drawing for the Sun on a freelance basis until earlier this month when he, as well as cartoonist Sue Dewar, were laid off by the Sun Media chain.

The Toronto Sun, Sunday, September 6, 2026

In 1985–86 he became the second Canadian to serve as president of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists.