Flintstones cartoonist Barbera dies, aged 95

Joseph Barbera, a co-founder of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon company that created memorable characters like the Flintstones and Scooby-Doo, died on Monday, aged 95, Warner Bros. film studio said in a statement.

Barbera founded Hanna-Barbera with William Hanna nearly 50 years ago and it grew to become one of Hollywood's best known names in animation.

He died at his home in the Los Angeles suburb of Studio City with his wife, Sheila, by his side, Warner Bros. said. No further details were disclosed.

Barbera and Hanna, who died in 2001, met at the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studio in the late 1930s and first collaborated on a cartoon called Puss Gets the Boot which led to the creation of Tom and Jerry. They won acclaim in the 1940s when they got the animated Tom and Jerry to dance on movie screens alongside Gene Kelly in Anchors Aweigh, but left MGM and formed Hanna-Barbera Studios in 1957, where they created The Flintstones and Scooby-Doo.