Linda Sutter

Linda Sutter (1941–1995) was an American comics writer and journalist. She wrote the storyline for the comic strip Brenda Starr, Reporter from 1982 to 1985. A graduate of Vassar College, she was involved in television and radio journalism in the 1960s and 1970s. She produced a series for NBC Radio Network's Monitor program and worked for the WINS radio station and Channel 5 in New York City.

Early life and education

Helen Linda Sutter^[1] was born in Greenwich, Connecticut, in 1941, to Suzanne Tenney and Clifford Samuel Sutter.^[2]

Sutter attended Vassar College where she was involved in the theater, appearing in productions of The Cherry Orchard^[3] and Arms and the Man.^[4] She graduated from Vassar in 1961.^[5]

Career

Sutter began her career working for NBC as a network radio producer.^[5] With NBC Radio Network's Monitor program, she produced a series on "the younger generation" and interviewed Senator Edmund Muskie in 1968.^[6][7] During the 1970s, she was a television reporter for Metromedia Channel 5 in New York City and was a radio journalist with the WINS station.^[5]

Brenda Starr

In 1980, Sutter was hired by Chicago's Tribune Media Services to produce the Brenda Starr, Reporter comic strip.^[8] Starting in 1982, she wrote the storyline for the syndicated comic strip, taking over from the strip's creator, Dale Messick. Ramona Fradon continued to provide the artwork during Sutter's tenure.^[9] She started the process of updating the Brenda Starr character to a career woman from a fantasy figure. Her initial storylines led Brenda Starr to California where she is kidnapped by Arabs after meeting a mad scientist with a revolutionary silicon chip that is hidden in a golf ball.^[10] Sutter created a character lampooning ABC executive Roone Arledge. Her district attorney character "Diane Drab" was likened to then-Brooklyn DA Elizabeth Holtzman.^[11] Sutter continued producing and writing for Brenda Starr until 1985, when Mary Schmich took over the storyline.^[12][13]

Personal and later life

Sutter married G. Raymond Empson in 1968. They had a son, Joshua C. Empson.^[14]

After she finished writing for Brenda Starr in the 1980s, Sutter studied at Harvard Divinity School, and planned to be ordained in the Episcopal Church.^[15] She died of brain cancer^[16] in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on December 18, 1995. She was 54.^[17]