John Peck ’64

John Peck ’64, of Providence, R.I.; Mar. 15,  of a sudden illness. Many Brunonians know him for his iconic Providence poster: “Providence, Rhode Island, where it rains two days out of three except during the rainy season when it snows like a bitch.” At Brown, he was a well-known disc jockey by the name of “Dr. Oldie” on WBRU. Shortly thereafter, he cohosted “The Giant Jukebox” radio show until it ended in 1983. After graduating he went underground, forming a publishing collective known as Mad Peck Studios, whose cartoons, rock posters, humorous advertisements, and reviews were anthologized in 1987 by Doubleday & Company. His comic-strip music critiques appeared in Fusion, Creem, Rolling Stone and other music publications, and in The Village Voice. He had designed a T-shirt for the J. Geils Band that became the group’s logo. He made concert posters for Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin and, most notably, for the final concert in the U.S. by the British group Cream, in Providence in November 1968. During  the 1970s he had a weekly comic strip syndicated to underground newspapers and in 1971 he illustrated Comix: A History of Comic Books in America.