An artist who sketched boats, furniture and other products advertised in the Chicago Tribune, Daniel Bourke worked in an era before computers and digital imagery.
“He worked in the days when artwork was done conventionally, with pens, brushes and pencils,” said Chuck Betzold, a senior artist in the Tribune’s marketing department who was hired by Mr. Bourke in 1983.
Mr. Bourke, 64, died, apparently of a heart attack, Thursday, Jan. 15, in Governor’s Park of Barrington nursing home, where he was undergoing rehabilitation therapy.
Born in Chicago, he graduated from Lane Technical High School in 1957. He took drafting at Wright College, and worked for a while at a book bindery in the city.
Mr. Bourke began at the Tribune in 1959, creating graphics and charts for the paper’s creative services division.
“He loved his job and the people he worked with,” said his wife Kathleen.
His job at the Tribune was interrupted when he was drafted into the Army in 1963. He served until 1965.
He was scheduled to go to Cyprus, where a conflict between Greece and Turkey was brewing, but on the boat heading across the Atlantic Ocean an officer asked if anyone knew how to draw, his wife said. The conflict died down and Mr. Bourke remained at a base in Augsburg, Germany, teaching art to the children of officers and drawing caricatures at parties.
The couple got married in 1965, several years after Mr. Bourke was set up on a blind date with his wife, who had a crush on him years earlier. They moved from Chicago to Palatine in 1971.
“I used to wash his car so he could take his girlfriends out,” she said, recalling when she was 14 and he was 17. “It was a case of puppy love.”
As an art director at the Tribune, Mr. Bourke oversaw about 15 artists producing graphics for stores and other advertisers that did not supply their own art.
“Dan was kind of a hard-nosed guy, but if he saw potential he was willing to work with you to develop it,” said Glenn Kaupert, a photographer in the Tribune’s multimedia department.
In 1987 he retired as art director, a title he held for roughly half of his 28 years at the paper.
“He was very effective at his job and a very good friend,” said Rich Polanek, a Tribune commercial artist.
An animal lover, Mr. Bourke would catch mice with live traps and release them in a nearby forest preserve.
“I remember him making four trips in one day; they were back before he got back here,” his wife said.
A longtime woodworker, Mr. Bourke spent hours in his shop, building end tables and other furniture.
“Wood to him was something to be respected,” his wife said.
Other survivors include two daughters, Laurie Joseph and Danielle.
Services will be held at 11 a.m. Tuesday in Smith-Corcoran Funeral Home, 185 E. Northwest Highway, Palatine.
