Rupert Kinnard

Rupert Kinnard (born 1954) also credited as Prof. I.B. Gittendowne, is an American cartoonist who created the first ongoing gay/lesbian-identified African-American comic-strip characters: the Brown Bomber (a teenage superhero) and Diva Touché Flambé (his ageless lesbian partner). Kinnard is gay and African American. His book, Ooops...I Just Catharted! Fifty Years of Cathartic Comics, which was published in 2025, was nominated for an Eisner Award in 2026.