We know he worked on the “Rosey the Robot” episode because his name is preserved in the cartoon’s review in Daily Variety (whether the frame to the right is Lusk’s, I don’t know). Expert Howard Fein says he also animated on one of my favourite Jetsons, “Elroy’s TV Show.”
Lusk was born in California on October 28, 1913, the second son of Percy Knox and Louise Opie (Ross) Lusk. His father was from Brooklyn and his mother from Canada. His father died when he was young, his mother remarried and was left a widow again. Don was supporting his mother and grandmother while at Disney in 1940, pulling down $3,900 a year. One of his assistants at Disney was Gene Hazelton, who later ran the comic strip department at Hanna-Barbera.
There are so few veterans of the early days at Hanna-Barbera still around; background artist Sam Clayberger, who worked on some of the first Huckleberry Hound cartoons, died earlier this year.
Our sympathies go to the Lusk family.