Jack T. Chick

From 1953 to 1955, Chick drew a single-panel cartoon, whose text was written by P. S. Clayton, titled Times Have Changed? It thematically resembled the B.C. comic strip and The Flintstones animated cartoon, but predated both. These were syndicated by the Mirror Enterprises Co. in Los Angeles area newspapers.

After converting to Christianity, Chick wanted to evangelize others, but he was too shy to talk to people directly about religion. Chick heard from missionary Bob Hammond, who had broadcast in Asia on the Voice of America, that the Chinese Communist Party had gained significant influence among ordinary Chinese in the 1950s through the distribution of palm-size sequential picture books known as lianhuanhua. Chick also began working with a prison ministry and created a flip chart of illustrations to use with his presentation. He hit upon the idea of creating witnessing tracts, which could be given to people directly or indirectly.

While working for the AstroScience Corporation (a maker of tape recorders and avionics for the U.S. government) in El Monte, California, he self-published his first tract, Why No Revival? in 1960. He paid for it with a loan from his credit union. He published his second tract, A Demon's Nightmare, in 1962. He decided to create more tracts and began "using his kitchen table as an office and art studio". Christian bookstores were reluctant to accept the tracts, but they were popular among missionaries and churches.

He officially established Chick Publications in 1970 in Rancho Cucamonga, California. Initially, Chick wrote and illustrated all of the comics himself, but in 1972 he hired another artist to illustrate many of the tracts. Fred Carter illustrated tracts anonymously until 1980, when he was identified in an issue of Chick's newsletter Battle Cry. Carter also painted the oil paintings seen in The Light of the World, a film Chick produced that related the Christian gospel.