John Reiner

[1][2] Born in New York City, Reiner was raised on Long Island, where he graduated from Smithtown High School in 1974.

He attended the State University of New York at Stony Brook, where he was a contributing artist to Statesman, the student newspaper.

Mad cartoonist Mort Drucker, in 1974, encouraged him to consider cartooning as a career, and the following year, he began work on Joe Simon's humor magazines.

In 1984, he was an assistant[citation needed] on the comic strip Benchley, which Jerry Dumas and Drucker created to satirize the Washington political scene.

Bill Hoest needed an assistant for his strips and cartoons, and in 1986, he hired Reiner to help on The Lockhorns, Agatha Crumm and What a Guy!