Basic Information
| Field | Details |
|---|---|
| Name | Judith Kliban |
| Also credited as | Judith Kamman Kliban; Judith K. Kliban; sometimes shown as Judith Kliban-Bixby |
| Occupation | Artist, steward/manager of the Kliban Cats legacy, licensor/curator of merchandise |
| Famous associations | Spouse of cartoonist B. “Hap” Kliban (deceased); later married actor Bill Bixby |
| Key dates | B. “Hap” Kliban — died 1990; Judith married Bill Bixby in October 1993; Bill Bixby died November 1993 |
| Net worth (public) | Not publicly disclosed / no reliable figure available |
| Public presence | Product credits, merchandise licensing, fan communities, occasional local/charity mentions |
How I’ll tell this story — and why it feels cinematic
I’m telling this in first person because Judith’s life reads like a small, intimate film: a behind-the-scenes keeper of a famous cartooning voice, who stepped into other people’s spotlights and, quietly, kept a brand alive. Think of her as the archivist in a museum scene — the person who knows which postcard belongs with which laugh, who can place a wobbling ceramic cat beside a 1970s calendar and make both feel like a single, enduring joke. I love that tension — public art, private stewardship — and it’s where Judith’s story lives.
Family & Personal Relationships — introductions at a glance
Below is a table that introduces each family member and their relationship to Judith, with the short, human lines they deserve.
| Family Member | Relationship to Judith Kliban | Short introduction |
|---|---|---|
| B. “Hap” (Bernard) Kliban | Spouse (her husband until his death) | The cartoonist whose “Kliban Cats” became an icon — Judith later became the guardian of his creative legacy. |
| Kalia (Kliban) | Stepdaughter (one of B. Kliban’s daughters) | Part of the extended Kliban family circle after Judith’s marriage to B.; family ties that threaded through the artist’s estate. |
| Sarah (Kliban) | Stepdaughter (another of B. Kliban’s daughters) | Another member of the artist’s family network — a name that appears in biographical sketches of the household. |
| M. K. Brown | B. Kliban’s first wife | A fellow cartoonist and the mother to some of B.’s children — she appears in family context as the earlier partner in the Kliban story. |
| Bill Bixby | Spouse (married Judith in Oct 1993) | The actor famously linked to TV — married to Judith late in his life, their union noted in public records and obituaries. |
Those introductions read like dossier lines, but behind each is a household: collaborations, stepfamily ties, a few public events where private grief and publicity overlapped.
Career: artist, curator, and the business of a joke
Judith’s public life is anchored by one principle: keep the art working. After the death of her husband, B. “Hap” Kliban, she oversaw the licensing and merchandising that made the cats endure — calendars, postcards, printed ephemera, and that kind of branded joy that shows up on mugs you don’t mean to buy but do. Her name appears on product credits and on the business side of the Kliban Cats enterprise; she’s the person who trafficked in images of curled tails and blank, expressive faces and turned them into a stable, licensed brand.
Numbers matter here: decades of calendars, reprints, and merchandise — a slow but steady revenue stream if you keep designs in print and brands visible. Managing that requires attention to copyright dates, print runs, and licensing windows — the sort of administrative choreography that keeps a cartoonist’s voice in the public ear long after the original pen has stopped.
Timeline — the key public markers
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 1990 | B. “Hap” Kliban (the cartoonist) dies — Judith moves into a steward role for his work. |
| 1990s–2000s | Continued licensing, calendars, and merchandise production credited with Judith’s stewardship. |
| October 1993 | Judith marries actor Bill Bixby. |
| November 1993 | Bill Bixby dies; Judith is noted publicly as his spouse. |
That timeline is spare — the public record is thinner than a comic strip’s single-panel narrative — but those dates are the visible beats. Between them lay years of cataloging, licensing, and the small phone calls that keep a library alive.
Public profile, net worth, and the rumor mill
Here’s the blunt paragraph: there is no trustworthy, public net-worth number for Judith Kliban. She is not a celebrity with a Forbes profile; she’s the person who manages a celebrity’s output. That means public chatter — fan posts, marketplace listings, a few local news mentions — rather than headline-grabbing financial disclosures. Gossip appears mostly as conversational footnotes: “she married Bill Bixby” — a line of human interest — and “she runs the Kliban merchandise” — a line of commerce. The social media mentions are mostly fan nostalgia and collectors swapping postcards, not investigative financial journalism.
The texture of public mentions — what people say
If you scan the chatter, the vocabulary is consistent: steward, widow, manager, credited artist. Collectors mention Judith’s name on postcards and calendars; local event reports sometimes use a hyphenated last name (Kliban-Bixby) in human interest copy. It’s fan-club level attention, not fame-seeking: people who love the cats want the catalog complete, the credits right, and the M.O. kept honest. That’s a different kind of public life — quieter, more archival, yet still fiercely social in the ways collectors trade provenance like baseball cards.
What I find most interesting
What stays with me is the image of someone who prefers the backstage to the marquee — a curator of laughter. Judith’s life, as visible, is about maintenance: making sure the daily gag survives, that the cartoons keep printing, that new generations find Kliban’s deadpan whiskers. There’s something cinematic in that: the camera lingers on the one person who knows which box contains the original proofs and who can, with a quick phone call, put a cat back into print.
FAQ
Who is Judith Kliban?
Judith Kliban is an artist and the steward/manager of the late cartoonist B. “Hap” Kliban’s creative legacy, often credited on merchandise and print material.
Was Judith married to Bill Bixby?
Yes — she married actor Bill Bixby in October 1993; he died in November 1993.
What is her relationship to B. Kliban?
She was married to B. “Hap” Kliban and later took responsibility for managing and licensing his artwork after his death.
Does she have children?
Public records describe stepchildren (names such as Kalia and Sarah appear as part of the extended family), but she is primarily noted as a stepmother within the Kliban family network.
What does she do professionally?
She oversees the licensing, production, and crediting of Kliban Cats merchandise, and her name appears on various products and printed works.
Is Judith’s net worth public?
No — there is no reliable, publicly disclosed net-worth figure for Judith Kliban.
Is she active on social media?
She does not appear as a widely public social-media figure; mentions of her are mostly on fan pages, product listings, and local event write-ups.
Why does Judith matter to fans?
Because she preserved a comic voice — the Kliban Cat — keeping the calendars, postcards, and licensed items in circulation so the joke doesn’t vanish with the original artist.
