Cartoonist and animator Greg Evans was born on November 13, 1947 in Burbank, California. An early interest in animation was partially inspired by his close proximity to the Disney animation studios. He graduated from California State University, Northridge in 1971 and, with his teaching credential, began teaching art at El Centro High School. In 1985 he and his wife Betty moved to Australia to teach for two years, then returned to the U.S., settling in Colorado. Evans found a job as a manager, cameraman, and graphic artist for the KRDO news and radio station in Colorado Springs, and in the meantime he took freelance cartooning gigs and continued to create and attempt to publish various cartoons.

Evans and his family moved back to California in the early 1980s, and Evans found work as a corporate entertainer-for-hire alongside his radio controlled robot he named "Maxwel." In 1985, gaining inspiration from the humorous antics of his young daughter, he began developing the comic strip "Luann." Though he considered it his best strip and sent it to various publishers for consideration, he didn't hold out hope for interest. His many years of rejections led to him abandoning the strip and working as a used car salesman. However, it proved interesting enough to News America Syndicate to publish it in March of 1985, to immediate critical acclaim.

The strip was commended for being espcially sensitive to, and deftly supportive of, the trials and tribulations of middle class girls and young women in America, and was one of the first strips to have a linear timeline in which the characters aged, if slowly. "Luann" earned Evans the Reuben Award for Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year by the National Cartoonists Society; later, it would be adapted into a musical produced by Concord Theatricals. He was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts degree by the Board of Trustees of the California State University and CalState San Marcos.

His daughter Karen, the original inspiration for the famed strip, is now a cowriter of "Luann" with her father. Greg Evans currently lives and works in San Marcos, CA.