Editing Little Nemo (section)

==Legacy==
[[File:Little_Nemo_in_Slumberland_mural_downtown_Cincinnati,_OH_Oct_2016.jpg|thumb|right|alt=Mural of a Little Nemo in Slumberland comic in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio|Mural of a Little Nemo in Slumberland comic in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio]]
Comics historian [[R. C. Harvey]] has called McCay "the first original genius of the comic strip medium". Harvey claims that McCay's contemporaries lacked the skill to continue with his innovations, so that they were left for future generations to rediscover and build upon.{{sfn|Harvey|1994|p=21}} Cartoonist [[Robert Crumb]] called McCay a "genius" and one of his favorite cartoonists.{{sfn|Young|2000}} [[Art Spiegelman]]'s ''[[In the Shadow of No Towers]]'' (2004) appropriated some of McCay's imagery, and included a page of ''Little Nemo'' in its appendix.{{sfn|Heer|2006}} [[Federico Fellini]] read ''Little Nemo'' in the children's magazine ''[[Corriere dei Piccoli|Il corriere dei piccoli]]'', and the strip was a "powerful influence" on the filmmaker, according to Fellini biographer Peter Bondanella.{{sfn|Bondanella|2002|p=10}}

McCay's original artwork has been poorly preserved.{{sfn|Heer|2006}} McCay insisted on having his originals returned to him, and a large collection survived him, but much of it was destroyed in a fire in the late 1930s. His wife was unsure how to handle the surviving pieces, so his son took on the responsibility and moved the collection into his own house.{{sfn|Canemaker|2005|p=253}} The family sold off some of the artwork when they were in need of cash. Responsibility for it passed to Mendelsohn, then later to daughter Marion. By the early twenty-first century, most of McCay's surviving artwork remained in family hands.{{sfn|Canemaker|2005|pp=253–254}}