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About the Kennedy's

A brother and sister team, Kim and Doug Kennedy have always been hooked on pirates. When they were children, their dad would take them sailing on the bayou behind their house. Doug would pretend to be a buccaneer, looking over his family’s shady bank in search of the perfect place to bury treasure. Plenty of times did Doug draw a treasure map and then have his brothers and sister count out paces in their backyard, just to discover that the “buried treasure” was something from their rooms!

Pirates' tales of Captain Hook and Long John Silver inspired Kim to write about pirates, just as the artwork of Howard Pyle and his drawings for Treasure Island inspired Doug to draw and paint his own versions of buccaneers.

To create the illustrations for the Pirate Pete books, Doug first made character sketches of Pete and his parrot, and then sculpted clay models of them. These models allowed Doug to visualize the characters---how they would move, sit, “pace.” He then sketched each scene. Doug then transferred these drawings to canvas and completed the paintings in oil.