[1] His cartoon characters are characterized by extremely exaggerated anatomy, including big heads, skinny legs, and large feet.

Bill, he drew for the campus newspaper and helped launch an off-campus humor publication, Bullsheet, which he described as "not political or anything but just something with risque jokes and cartoons."

[4] In 1949, Davis illustrated a Coca-Cola training manual, a job that gave him enough money to buy a car and drive to New York.

Attending the Art Students League of New York, he found work with the Herald Tribune Syndicate as an inker on Leslie Charteris's The Saint comic strip, drawn by Mike Roy in 1949–1950.

After rejections from several comic book publishers, he began freelancing for William Gaines's EC Comics in 1950, contributing to Tales from the Crypt, The Vault of Horror, The Haunt of Fear, Frontline Combat, Two-Fisted Tales, Piracy, Incredible Science Fiction, Crime Suspenstories, Shock Suspenstories, and Terror Illustrated.

In 2011, Davis told The Wall Street Journal about his early career and his breakthrough with EC:[5] I was about ready to give up, go home to Georgia and be either a forest ranger or a farmer.

]Davis was particularly noted for his depiction of the Crypt-Keeper in the horror comics, revamping the character's appearance from the more simplistic Al Feldstein version to a tougher, craggier, mangier man with hairy warts, salivating mouth and oversized hands and feet, who usually did not wear shoes.

Others, like "Tain't the Meat, It's the Humanity", "Death of Some Salesman", "Fare Tonight Followed by Increasing Clottiness", "Tight Grip" and "Lower Berth", were Crypt-Keeper classics.

His wrinkled clothing, scratchy lines, and multi-layered layouts were so popular in the 1950s that other artists at rival companies began copying the style—notably, Howard Nostrand in Harvey's horror comics.

His style of wild, free-flowing brushwork and wacky characters made him a perfect choice when Harvey Kurtzman launched Mad as a zany, satirical EC comic book in 1952.

Davis contributed to other Kurtzman magazines—Trump, Humbug and Help!—eventually expanding into illustrations for record jackets, movie posters, books and magazines, including Time and TV Guide.

Davis illustrated two children's picture books, Bobby and the Magic Pen and The Misadventures of Don Quixote (both still available online).

In 1965, he illustrated Meet The North American Indians by Elizabeth Payne, published by Random House as part of their children's Step Up Books line.

But when editor Harvey Kurtzman quit the magazine following a dispute with publisher Bill Gaines, Davis chose to leave with him.

His first cover for the magazine came in 1968, when he depicted a tribute to Andy Griffith, in which the actor was hoisted on the shoulders of his costars, Don Knotts and Jim Nabors.

I couldn't wait to get in my little MG and drive from New York out to the magazine's offices in Radnor, Pennsylvania, to show the editors my latest design.

[2] Davis created the cartoon bee which (in decal form) appears on the flanks of all the buses in the Bee-Line running from Westchester to New York City.

Similar synchronicity happened when Mad moved to 1700 Broadway, where the magazine's fifth-floor production department was next to a wall three feet away that had previously been the location of an immense Davis cartoon for a bank, an advertisement that towered six stories over 53rd Street.

In 1964, Davis created the cover art for The New Christy Minstrels album for Columbia Records which featured songs from the light-hearted Western comedy Advance to the Rear.

Davis also created album artwork for such musicians as The Guess Who, Tito Puente, Sailcat, and The Cowsills, as well as for such comedians as Bob and Ray, Archie Campbell, Don Imus, and Myron Cohen.

[9] In 1974, Davis provided artwork for Atco Records' printed advertisements of the Genesis album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway.