Darnell Rehberg

Darnell Schultz Rehberg (February 19, 1913 – January 14, 1985) was an American producer, animator, and secreenplayer famous for his character, Mayor Hochmeister, created in 1949. He began his career as an animator in 1936, working at, having worked with on the early  and  shorts. At 40s, he left Universal and created his own animation company (Rehberg Animation) based in, , where he created his most famous character.

Born into an upper-middle-class family, Rehberg was an only child and only studied until he completed high school, where he already demonstrated mastery in animation and had good grades in arts.

The main phase of fame of Rehberg's work came in the 50s and 60s, having been somewhat eclipsed from the 70s onwards, although popularity still remained for himself and his magnum opus, since he produced a total of 23 scripts of Mayor Hochmeister's misfortunes and stories, 9 of which were in film format, and the rest as TV specials. Another factor that reduced his weight in animation in the 70's was thanks to the disorders which he was diagnosed in 1975, which forced him to leave much of the production of new animations and dedicate himself to plotting.

He died on January 14, 1985, aged 71, having left one last animation of Mayor Hochmeister unfinished, The Mayor and Madam Demon, the screenplay for this however was released in book format in 1998. In 2002, his name was inducted into the Walk of Fame alongside his character's name, and in 2010, the name of the town hall of, his hometown, was renamed the Darnell Rehberg Executive Salon.