[1] As a child he appeared in a number of films including comedian George Wallace's Gone to the Dogs, Our Gang, an RTA commercial co-starring Gloria Dawn and Forty Thousand Horsemen.
At eighteen, Tanner was sent to Japan by the editor Brian Penton to work at BCON – the Occupation Force Newspaper – as a cartoonist and journalist.
[2] Pidgeon had introduced him to the works of Hokusai and other ukiyo-e artists, including Utamaro; and much of Tanner's spare time and staff sergeant's pay was spent buying as many woodblock prints as he could whilst there.
It was in Japan, that Les Tanner also met his lifelong friend and fellow artist, Gus McLaren, when he was sent to interview him about his role in teaching art to the Japanese in Osaka.
But the cartoon and editorial achieved even greater prominence in the public domain when ABC television ran a story on it and the banned Channel 9 program that night, under the banner of censorship of the press, much to the glee of both Tanner and Coleman.
[5] Back in Australia, he took his early interest in clay modelling to new heights, producing several tongue in cheek busts of Sir Robert Menzies.
When Graham Perkin Editor of The Age newspaper in Melbourne offered him the position of Chief Political Cartoonist, Tanner agreed and for the next thirty years until he retired in 1997, he satirized politicians and gained a large fan base for his efforts.