Andrew Wahl produced his first serious editorial cartoons during his senior year at Lake Stevens High School in 1987-88. While hed dabbled with the form once or twice before, it was while cartooning for the school newspaper, the Valhalla, that Andrews work started to mature. His first real editorial cartoon was Driving in the Land of the Free [Archive No. 8701], which appeared in late 1987; it would receive a first-place award in the Washington Press Association Excellence in Student Journalism competition in 1988.