We Didn’t Know... It Was The Golden Age! found myself doodling sketches of that confounded cape. I felt that Mary’s cape should serve as an identification with Captain Marvel… should therefore be displayed more prominently, particularly the floral design down the left shoulder. I pictured it as being of much lighter material than the Captain’s, and I attempted in my sketches to suggest that lightness with smaller ripples.
minute flight as a nervous guest in a Piper Cub. I was so naive as to begin the syndicate idea with an American bomber crew in action, over enemy territory, wearing dress uniforms with neckties! Oh well… who would have known? Or cared? I ignored the daily mail that lay on my little drawing stand that had once belonged to fellow artist Irwin Weill, to shuffle through the Lucky Bill work. I had six daily strips in various stages of completion, some panels inked and lettered, some partly inked, others only penciled. I had completed three weeks of scripts in longhand, with not the slightest idea how I would resolve the plot.
Her hair in the original sketches had been hastily done and offered very little to suggest how it might behave under different circumstances. I hoped in my nightly sketches to show it as billowing away from her ears at the slightest forward step or breeze. Ironically, little benefit came from those efforts. All of us were so busy at the office that the notes and sketches of the evenings before were ignored or forgotten. I drew the first Mary stories and was doing my regular Captain Marvel work at the same time. Writer Bill Woolfolk was heard saying to Mercy Schull of the editorial department, “Marc is in there drawing Captain Marvel with one hand and Mary with the other!” Not exactly accurate, but you get the idea.
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Then I looked at the mail. Holy Moley, Billy would have said… here was a message from Whitehaven, Tennessee. The Selective Service guys there had decided not to be so selective, and were inviting me to come on down and see what they had in store for me! I couldn’t refuse!
A page from Captain Marvel Adventures #18 (Dec. 1942)—the first appearance of Mary Marvel, drawn by Marc Swayze. [©1999 DC Comics.]
It was just not in the cards that I continue Mary Marvel. In the first place, my job was Captain Marvel. Secondly, I was a prime target for the military… healthy, unmarried. Perhaps executive editor Rod Reed suspected that, although he never mentioned it. Instead, he somewhat apologetically explained that I couldn’t be spared from the efforts to get the increasing load of Captain Marvel material to the presses. It really didn’t matter all that much. Flying around in my head and landing on my drawing board on West 113th was my newest idea, with which I intended to stun the New York newspaper syndicate… “Lucky Bill”… an American flyer… stranded in Nippon! During my years in comics I made about 14 stabs at the newspaper syndicates before finally getting the contract I wanted. Most of the features were, in one way or another, based in concept on my own experiences. “The Great Pierre,” for example, came from a hunting incident in a Louisian swamp, “Neal Valentine” from experiences as a professional musician, “Judi of the Jungle” from the profound impressions upon me by the writings of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Lucky Bill O’Brien, on the other hand, got on the drawing board simply because I thought a background like his might appeal to the 1942 newspaper readers. My own flying experience consisted of a single 20-
In our family we’ve always tried to look on the bright side of things.
During my growing-up years there were many times when we had to… and, believe it or not, I’m thankful for those days. Now, how could one, here in 1942, find anything to be thankful for in being yanked out of a civilian life he loved… to go into
A recent sketch of Mary Marvel by Marc Swayze. The master clearly hasn’t lost his touch! [Art ©1999 Marc Swayze; Mary Marvel ©1999 DC Comics.]