James Patrick Toomey is an American cartoonist, creator of Sherman's Lagoon. The comic strip appears in over 150 newspapers in North America, including the Washington Post, the Seattle Times, and the Denver Post. The comic strip also appears in over 20 foreign countries and six languages. Toomey has produced 30 Sherman’s Lagoon books, published by Andrews McMeel, and most recently a travel memoir, entitled Family Afloat, about his two years sailing the world’s oceans with his wife and family.
In addition to drawing his comic strip, Toomey is active in ocean conservation and serves on several nonprofit boards, including the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. The conservation message in his comic strip earned him the Environmental Hero Award in 2000, presented by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration “for using art and humor to conserve and protect our marine heritage.” Toomey won the award again in 2010. In 2016, Toomey partnered with NOAA to create special award called the Silver Sherman, inspired by a similar award at NASA, the Silver Snoopy, based on Charles Schulz's comic strip Peanuts. Over the years, the Silver Sherman has been awarded by NOAA to individuals who have performed work above the normal requirements, achieved a milestone that contributed significantly toward the attainment of a particular program goal, or demonstrated immense leadership toward process improvement. In 2024, the Loggerhead Marinelife Center, in Juno Beach, FL, presented Toomey with the Eleanor Fletcher Lifetime Achievement Award for his work in communicating sea turtle conservation through media. His comic characters appear in educational materials and videos published by NOAA, the United Nations Environment Programme, Pew Charitable Trusts, and a variety of nonprofit organizations for the purpose of raising awareness of the oceans.
Toomey has done two TED Talks, the first in April, 2010 at an ocean-themed TED event in the Galapagos Islands, and the second in 2016 in Cannes, France. He has given similar talks at a variety of venues, from the Royal Society in London to Harvard University to the Monterey Bay Aquarium to his children’s kindergarten class. In 2008, Sherman’s Lagoon was made into a high school musical, which premiered at the Bentley School in Lafayette, CA.
Toomey earned a bachelor of science in mechanical engineering from Duke University in 1983. In 1995, he earned a Master of Arts from Stanford University, and in 2005 he returned to Duke to earn a Masters of Environmental Management.
Creative works Attack of the Jumbo Shrimp - Oct. 2026 A Giant Squid Walks Into a Bar... - Oct. 2025 You Got In! Now What? - 2025 (illustrator; written by James Hamilton) Crabbily Ever After - Oct. 2024 Things Are Looking Up - Oct. 2023 You Need This Book Like a Fish Needs a Bicycle - Oct. 2022 Family Afloat: Sailing the World with Two Kids and Two Captains - Jun. 2022 Adventures in Aquaculture - Oct. 2021 Evolution Is Hard Work! - Oct. 2020 If You Can't Beat 'Em, Eat 'Em - Oct. 2019 The Adventures of Superfish & His Superfishal Friends - Oct. 2018 Onward and Downward - Oct. 2017 Happy as a Clam - Oct. 2016 Tales from the Deep - Oct. 2015 Lunch Wore a Speedo - Oct. 2014 Here We Go Again - Oct. 2013 Think Like a Shark - Sep. 2012 Never Bite Anything That Bites Back - Sep. 2011 Discover Your Inner Hermit Crab - Sep. 2010 Confessions of a Swinging Single Sea Turtle - Sep. 2009 Sharks Just Wanna Have Fun - Sep. 2008 Yarns and Shanties - Sep. 2007 Planet of the Hairless Beach Apes - Sep. 2006 In Shark Years I'm Dead - March 2006 50 Ways to Save the Ocean - 2006 (illustrator; written by David Helvarg) A Day at the Beach - March 2005 Surfer Safari - Sep. 2005 Catch of the Day - Sep. 2004 Shark Diaries - Sep. 2003 A Lagoa de Sherman - Sep. 2003 (Spanish) Le Lagon de Sherman - Sep. 2003 (French) Greatest Hits & Near Misses - Sep. 2002 Surf's Up - March 2003 Greetings From Sherman's Lagoon - Sep 2002 Another Day in Paradise - Sep 2001 An Illustrated Guide to Shark Etiquette - Sep 2000 Poodle: The Other White Meat - Sep 1999 Ate That, What's Next? - Sep. 1997 Lagunen - Sep. 1996 (Norwegian) Sigges Lagun - Sep. 1994 (Swedish)
References
External links
Sherman's Lagoon website Jim Toomey website TED Talk - April 2010 Ocean Inspiration: 100-Second Tribute to Jacques Cousteau Pew Charitable Trusts: A Visual Glossary of Ocean Terminology Kathy Sullivan Explores podcast UNEP Video: Climate Change UNEP Video: The True Value of Our Oceans UNEP Video: Marine Litter UNEP Video: Blue Carbon UNEP Video: Nutrient Runoff UNEP Video: Adaptation to Sea Level Rise