Robert Leroy Ripley’s life was an unbelievable adventure. For over forty years, he explored the uncanny and witnessed the amazing. He was a world traveller who visited places few people had ever heard of, from the temple of heaven in China to a town in Norway called Hell! He was an artist and a reporter, an explorer and a collector. The stories he gathered would later appear in his popular Believe it or Not!® Cartoons.

The Ripley story begins on Christmas Day in 1893, when he was born in Santa Rosa, California. A talented self-taught artist, Ripley sold his first drawing to Life magazine when he was only 14! Ripley was also a natural athlete who longed for a career in baseball, but his dreams of pitching in the big leagues were shattered when he broke his arm while playing his first professional game.

After the accident, Ripley returned to his earlier goal of becoming a professional artist. He landed a job as a cartoonist covering sports for the San Francisco Chronicle, but soon after, he left California, and headed for New York City where in 1918 he landed a job on the New York Globe as a sports cartoonist, he created a collection of odd facts and feats. The cartoons, based on unusual athletic achievements, were submitted under the title “Champs and Chumps”. His editor, however, wanted a title that would describe the incredible nature of the sporting feats. After much deliberation, it was changed to Believe it or Not!® The cartoon was an instant success, and Ripley’s Believe it or Not!® was born.