JIM DAVIS was born on July 28th, 1945 in Marion, Indiana. He later attended Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana where he distinguished himself by earning one of the lowest cumulative grade point averages in the history of the university. (Incidentally, a fellow classmate named David Letterman earned the other). The Garfield strip was born on June 19th, 1978, syndicated in 41 US newspapers. Today it's syndicated in more than 2,500 newspapers worldwide with 263 million readers. Garfield is named after the author's grandfather, James A. Garfield Davis, a big, cantankerous, cynical man.