Alter Ego #112

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No.112 August 2012

Edited by ROY THOMAS The greatest ‘zine of the 1960s is back, ALL-NEW, and focusing on GOLDEN AND SILVER AGE comics and creators with ARTICLES, INTERVIEWS, UNSEEN ART, P.C. Hamerlinck’s FCA (Fawcett Collectors of America, featuring the archives of C.C. BECK and recollections by Fawcett artist MARCUS SWAYZE), Michael T. Gilbert’s MR. MONSTER, and more!

2012 EISNER AWARD Nominee Best Comics-Related Journalism

Other issues available, & an ULTIMATE BUNDLE with all issues at HALF-PRICE!

ALTER EGO: CENTENNIAL (AE #100)

ALTER EGO #101

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ALTER EGO #97

ALTER EGO #98

ALTER EGO #99

The non-EC Horror Comics of the 1950s!

From Menace and House of Mystery to The Thing!, we present vintage art and artifacts by EVERETT, BRIEFER, DITKO, MANEELY, COLAN , MESKIN, MOLDOFF, HEATH, POWELL, COLE, SIMON & KIRBY, FUJITANI, and others, plus FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT and MR. MONSTER, and more, behind a creepy, eerie cover by BILL EVERETT!

Spotlight on Superman’s first editor WHITNEY ELLSWORTH, longtime Kryptoeditor MORT WEISINGER remembered by his daughter, an interview with Superman writer ALVIN SCHWARTZ, art by JOE SHUSTER, WAYNE BORING, CURT SWAN, AL PLASTINO, and NEAL ADAMS, plus MR. MONSTER, FCA (FAWCETT COLLECTORS OF AMERICA), and a new cover by JERRY ORDWAY!

GEORGE TUSKA showcase issue on his career at Lev Gleason, Marvel, and in comics strips through the early 1970s—CRIME DOES NOT PAY, BUCK ROGERS, IRON MAN, AVENGERS, TEEN TITANS, HERO FOR HIRE, and more! PLUS: JIM AMASH’s interview with Golden Age Fiction House artist BILL BOSSERT, MICHAEL T. GILBERT in MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, FCA (Fawcett Collectors of America), and more!

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ALTER EGO #102

ALTER EGO #103

ALTER EGO #104

A/E celebrates 100 issues, and 50 years, of ALTER EGO magazine in a double-size BOOK! ROY THOMAS interviewed by JIM AMASH about ALL-STAR SQUADRON, INFINITY, INC., ARAK, other DC work, and more! Art by PÉREZ, McFARLANE, BUCKLER, ORDWAY, MACHLAN, GIL KANE, COLAN, GIORDANO, and more, plus Mr. Monster, FCA, BUCKLER/ORDWAY cover!

Fox Comics of the 1940s with art by BAKER, FINE, SIMON, KIRBY, TUSKA, FLETCHER HANKS, ALEX BLUM, and others! “Superman vs. Wonder Man” starring EISNER, IGER, MAYER, SIEGEL, and DONENFELD! Part I of an interview with JACK MENDELSOHN, plus FCA, Comic Fandom Archive, MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, and new cover by SpiderMan artist DAVE WILLIAMS!

Spotlight on Green Lantern creators MART NODELL and BILL FINGER in the 1940s, and JOHN BROOME, GIL KANE, and JULIUS SCHWARTZ in 1959! Rare GL artwork by INFANTINO, REINMAN, HASEN, NEAL ADAMS, and others! Plus JACK MENDELSOHN Part II, FCA, MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, and new cover by GIL KANE & TERRY AUSTIN, and MART NODELL!

The early career of comics writer STEVE ENGLEHART: Defenders, Captain America, Master of Kung Fu, The Beast, Mantis, and more, with rare art and artifacts by SAL BUSCEMA, STARLIN, SUTTON, HECK, BROWN, and others. Plus, JIM AMASH interviews early artist GEORGE MANDEL (Captain Midnight, The Woman in Red, Blue Bolt, Black Marvel, etc.), FCA, MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, and more!

Celebrates the 50th anniversary of FANTASTIC FOUR #1 and the birth of Marvel Comics! New, never-beforepublished STAN LEE interview, art and artifacts by KIRBY, DITKO, SINNOTT, AYERS, THOMAS, and secrets behind the Marvel Mythos! Also: JIM AMASH interviews 1940s Timely editor AL SULMAN, FCA, MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, and a new cover by FRENZ and SINNOTT!

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ALTER EGO #105

ALTER EGO #106

ALTER EGO #107

ALTER EGO #108

ALTER EGO #109

See comic art and script BEFORE and AFTER the Comics Code changes, with art

by SIMON & KIRBY, DITKO, BUSCEMA, SINNOTT, GOULD, COLE, STERANKO, KRIGSTEIN, O’NEIL, GLANZMAN, ORLANDO, WILLIAMSON, HEATH, and others! Plus: FCA, Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, BILL SCHELLY, JIM AMASH interviews Timely/Atlas artist CAL MASSEY, and a new cover by JOSH MEDORS!

DICK GIORDANO through the 1960s—from freelance years and Charlton “Action-Heroes” to his first stint at DC! Art by DITKO, APARO, BOYETTE, MORISI, McLAUGHLIN, GIL KANE, and others, Dick’s final convention panel with STEVE SKEATES and ROY THOMAS, JIM AMASH interviews Charlton artist TONY TALLARICO, FCA with MARC SWAYZE and ROY ALD, MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, BILL SCHELLY, GIORDANO cover, and more!

Big BATMAN issue, with an unused Golden Age cover by DICK SPRANG! Interviews SPRANG and JIM MOONEY, with rare and unseen Batman art by BOB KANE, JERRY ROBINSON, WIN MORTIMER, SHELLY MOLDOFF, CHARLES PARIS, and others! Part II of the TONY TALLARICO interview by JIM AMASH! Plus FCA, MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, BILL SCHELLY, and more!

1970s Bullpenner WARREN REECE talks about Marvel Comics and working with EVERETT, BURGOS, ROMITA, STAN LEE, MARIE SEVERIN, ADAMS, FRIEDRICH, ROY THOMAS, and others, with rare art!

DEWEY CASSELL spotlights Golden Age artist MIKE PEPPE, with art by TOTH, TUSKA, SEKOWSKY, TALLARICO Part 3, plus FCA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY, cover by EVERETT & BURGOS, and more!

Spectre/Hour-Man creator BERNARD BAILY, ‘40s super-groups that might have been, art by ORDWAY, INFANTINO, KUBERT, HASEN, ROBINSON, and BURNLEY, conclusion of the TONY TALLARICO interview by JIM AMASH, MIKE PEPPE interview by DEWEY CASSELL, BILL SCHELLY on “50 Years of Fandom” at San Diego 2011, FCA, Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, PÉREZ cover, and more!

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Vol. 3, No. 112 / August 2012 Roy Thomas

Editor

Bill Schelly, Jim Amash

Associate Editors Jon B. Cooke

Design & Layout John Morrow

Consulting Editor P.C. Hamerlinck

FCA Editor

Michael T. Gilbert

Comic Crypt Editor Jerry G. Bails (founder), Ronn Foss, Biljo White, Mike Friedrich

Editorial Honor Roll

William J. Dowlding

Proofreader

Murphy Anderson (plus Wayne Boring, Paul Cassidy, & Joe Shuster); layout by Arlen Schumer

Cover Artists

Arlen Schumer

Cover Colorist

With Special Thanks to:

Rob Allen Heidi Amash Bob Bailey Alberto Becattini Jack Bender Lee Boyette Roger Broughton Brett Canavan K.C. Carlson Dick Cassidy Larry Cassidy Anthony Castrillo Shaun Clancy Bill Cox Les Daniels Mike DeLisa Joe Desris Joseph Eacobacci Bruce Edwards Jim Engel Don Ensign Jon R. Evans Ron Ferdinand Shane Foley Ron Frenz Stephan Friedt Dave Gibbons Janice Gilbert Larry Guidry Jennifer Hamerlinck Mark Heike

Mel Higgins Bob Hughes Al Jaffee Arvell Jones Douglas Jones/“Gaff” Jim Kealy Dominique Leonard Jim Ludwig Matt Lunsford Mike Malhack Joe & Nadia Mannarino Chris Marshall Brian K. Morris Martin O’Hearn Jerry Ordway John G. Pierce Scott Rowland Randy Sargent Jeff Siemons Neil Slowik Marc Swayze Jeff Taylor Dann Thomas Michael Vance Neil Vokes Lawrence B. Vossler Loston Wallace Hank Weisinger John Wells Tony Young

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Contents Writer/Editorial: Man Of TwoMorrows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Requiem For Weisinger Comics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Arlen Schumer illuminates the Mort Weisinger era of Superman—and talks with his son Hank!

Or maybe his second—but either way, definitely a comics pioneer! Article by Mel Higgins.

Paul Cassidy—Superman’s First Ghost? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

“Spaghetti” Superman, a.k.a. The Nembo Kid—And Batman, Too! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 The Italian Man of Steel & Dark Knight in the 1950s & ’60s, explicated by Alberto Becattini.

Continuing Jim Amash’s epic interview with comic book, On Stage, & Annie artist Leonard Starr.

“Cartoonists Are Good Guys”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Michael Vance views the Joseph Eacobacci artifacts of ACG editor/writer Richard E. Hughes.

“Something…?” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Michael T. Gilbert showcases cataclysmic commission drawings of the Silver Age DC series.

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! Suicide Squad Task Force X! . . 55 Comic Fandom Archive: The “50 Years of Comic Book Fandom” Panel . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 Bill Schelly presents Mark Evanier’s hosting of an event at San Diego Comic-Con 2011.

re: [correspondence, comments, & corrections] . . . . . . . . . 68 FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America] #171 . . . . . . . . . . . . . .73 P.C. Hamerlinck shines the spotlight on a 1955 suspense story drawn by Marc Swayze.

On Our Cover: Artist/designer Arlen Schumer did such a great job combining Superman images by Joe Shuster, Paul Cassidy, Wayne Boring, and especially Murphy Anderson for the “splash” of his 16-page “Weisinger Comics” section that begins on p. 3 that we decided to use virtually the selfsame art for the cover of this Supermancentered issue. [Art © 2012 DC Comics; design © 2012 Arlen Schumer.]

Above: In a Bob Newhart routine from the 1960s, Clark Kent asked Lois, “Do you wanna see my Big Red ‘S’?”

Well, in Italy during the 1950s and much of the ’60s, nobody saw it, because the publisher had eliminated it, both on reprints and on homegrown stories of—“The Nembo Kid”! Read all about it (and see the entirety of this page drawn by Lino Jeva) in Alberto Becattini’s intriguing article that begins on p. 29. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

Alter EgoTM is published 8 times a year by TwoMorrows, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614, USA. Phone: (919) 449-0344.

Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: 32 Bluebird Trail, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices.

Eight-issue subscriptions: $60 US, $85 Canada, $107 elsewhere. All characters are © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © Roy Thomas. Alter Ego is a TM of Roy & Dann Thomas. FCA is a TM of P.C. Hamerlinck. Printed in China. ISSN: 1932-6890 FIRST PRINTING.

writer/editorial

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D

Man Of TwoMorrows

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hree issues ago, I wrote as a cover blurb: “Just When You Thought You Knew Everything There Was To Know About The JUSTICE SOCIETY OF AMERICA!”

Well, that goes double—more likely triple or better—for Superman!

As the most important super-hero of all time, the Man of Tomorrow has influenced every example of the genre that came after him—and, except for a few prototypes like Hugo Danner and John Carter and to some extent Tarzan and Doc Savage and The Shadow and The Phantom and Green Hornet, they’ve all come after him. Kal-L was the costumed, invulnerable, leap-tallbuildings, secret-identified funnel through which those earlier icons were all distilled, so that everything later— from the non-super-powered Batman and the same-but-different original Captain Marvel through this month’s “re-definition” by DC or Marvel or alternative-press or filmic derring-do— shows his influence, even if at times it’s been in an inverted or funhouse-mirror way.

other mythological models, you won’t be able to escape the fact that you’ll either be following in the footsteps (and cape-trail) of the Last Son of Krypton—or else you’ll be painstakingly avoiding treading in same. Might as well try to create a human jungle lord without referencing Tarzan—or a consulting detective without even a passing thought of Sherlock Holmes. Yeah, right.

What’s The Auction House’s Cut? Now-amusing words from the Man of Steel about the value of Golden Age comics on this detail of the 80-page giant cover of Superman #183 (Jan. 1966). Thanks to Jon B. Cooke. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

There’s no escaping it, whether under yellow sun or red. Even if you deliberately set out to do an “anti-Superman,” you’ll be influenced, even if only in a negative way. Even if you claim you’re going to “go back to Hercules” or to

All of which is just my roundabout way of saying that, in this issue of Alter Ego, we explore three more of the everfascinating facets of Superman: the Mort Weisinger era (and the philosophy of that legendary DC editor) that came to fruition in the late ’50s and ’60s—the even earlier work of Paul Cassidy, one of the initial two artists to assist Joe Shuster on the feature—and a long-in-coming look at the more-than-slightly oddball Italian incarnation of the Man of Steel.

With ultimate thanks to Arlen Schumer, Mel Higgins, and Alberto Becattini, respectively.

So, with this issue’s three-bagger, have we finally exhausted that particular Kryptonian gold-mine?

Like I said above: Yeah, right.

Bestest,

COMING IN OCTOBER CRY WOLFMAN!

#

113

MARVELOUS MARV’S EARLY CAREER— AND THAT’S JUST FOR OPENERS!

Marvel Characters, Inc.; Marvel Dracula TM & © 2012 Gene Colan. other art © 2012 Estate of

• Cover-featuring Marv Wolfman & Count Dracula (Marv’s the one with the beard)—as limned in pencil by the late great GENE COLAN! • MARV WOLFMAN in the ’60s & early ’70s—and the resurgence of horror comics!

Art by COLAN, CARDY, ADAMS, ANDERSON, BORING, SEVERIN, BUCKLER, BOYETTE, PLOOG, KANE, MORROW, AMENDOLA, BUSCEMA, et al.!

• “Tales from the Code”—the Fearful Follow-Up, by RICHARD ARNDT! More “before-&after” artifacts of the Comics Code (1954-2011)!

• RICHARD HUGHES, Part 2, by MICHAEL VANCE—and LEONARD STARR, Part 4, re On Stage, Annie, & Kelly Green, an interview by JIM AMASH! • P.C. HAMERLINCK’s FCA tribute to EMILIO SQUEGLIO—MICHAEL T. GILBERT—plus the conclusion of the 1960s Fandom Panel from San Diego 2011, presented by BILL SCHELLY—& MORE!!

Edited by ROY THOMAS • SUBSCRIBE NOW! Eight issues in the US: $60 Standard, $80 First Class • (Canada: $85, Elsewhere: $107 Surface, $155 Airmail). • NEW LOWER RATES FOR INTERNATIONAL CUSTOMERS! SAVE $4 PER ISSUE!

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19

PAUL CASSIDY— Superman’s First Ghost?

Starring Two Men Of Steel—And Cousin Hopalong, Too!

by Mel Higgins

A Superman For All Seasons Super-early Shuster assistant Paul Cassidy in 1927, more than a decade before he went to work for Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster—flanked by the Superman daily strip for April 11, 1939, and two panels from the “Superman” story in Action Comics #22 (March 1940). Cassidy probably contributed to both; see article for details. Among other things, he is generally held to be the person who added the “S” triangle on the hero’s cape, to match the one on his chest. Photo courtesy of Dick and Larry Cassidy, via Mel Higgins; the Superman strip is taken from Superman: The Dailies – 1939-1942, the 1998 hardcover published by DC Comics & Kitchen Sink Press; comic book panels reproduced from DC’s Superman: The Action Comics Archives, Vol. 2. [Comics material © 2012 DC Comics.]

he year was 1938, with the nation still in the clutches of the Great Depression, when a 28-year-old graphic arts teacher from Milwaukee answered an advertisement in the newspaper with hopes of supplementing his income. Paul Cassidy traveled from Milwaukee to Cleveland to interview with Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster about help they needed drawing comics.

Cassidy returned to Milwaukee with a part-time job and became probably the first artist to assist Joe Shuster with the production of comic art. This was the beginning of what would later be known as the Shuster Shop, home of the first, and greatest, super-hero ever created, Superman.

T

Life Before Superman

Paul Henry Cassidy was born on June 11, 1910, in Cherry Valley, Illinois. He was the son of Henry Thomas Cassidy and Stella Jane (Buck) Cassidy. Henry Cassidy wore many hats, including those of farmer, veterinarian, barber, horse trader, game warden, and even milk deliveryman, and was remembered for being able to swear a blue streak. Stella Cassidy was a very outgoing, tough, crusty woman. She hated the Democrats, especially Joe Kennedy. With Stella, you knew exactly where she stood on matters. When Henry Cassidy passed away in 1933, Stella lived by herself until she was

75, at which time she moved to Los Angeles to be with her older sister, Lyda.

To quote Paul Cassidy’s son, Dick Cassidy, Stella would “fry an egg, one egg, hard as linoleum, every day, and have one warm beer and a cake of brewer’s yeast, every day. But she was clear it was only one beer!” Stella Cassidy passed away in 1984 at the age of 104. Other members of Paul’s nuclear family included older brother Clayton Graham Cassidy (born 1905), and brother Thomas Cassidy, who died either at birth or shortly thereafter.

The Cassidy family moved to Rockford, Illinois, in 1917, when Paul was 7 years of age. It is from Rockford that Paul Cassidy would graduate high school in 1928. Paul did very well in school and was in the National Honor Society. Upon graduation from high school, Paul attended the University of Wisconsin/Madison between the years of 1928 through 1934. Paul Cassidy was drawing as early on as anyone could remember, and it was this interest that he pursued at University. It was there that he earned a bachelor’s degree in applied arts and a master’s degree in art education.

While at the University, Paul was an accomplished runner. His thin frame (Paul was about 5' 7" and weighed 132 pounds at university) helped him become an excellent half-miler. He even competed at the Penn Relays as a sophomore. Paul was also the staff artist/

20

The Story Of Two Men Of Steel—And Cousin Hopalong, Too!

There Were Giants In The Earth In Those Days…

(Above:) Writer Jerry Siegel (standing) and artist Joe Shuster in a vintage publicity photo. The revolution they started is mighty, still. Just look at what’s playing at the movies this year!

(Below right:) Dealer/collector Joe Mannarino sent this photo of (l. to r.) comics dealer & conventionmeister Phil Seuling, Siegel, Shuster, and DC’s Sol Harrison, of which he says: “[In 1976, Siegel] shoots off messages to the media deriding DC and bringing his and Joe’s plight public. [Jerry] Robinson and [Neal] Adams take up the cause; media uproar ensues. The final result: DC agrees to give Joe and Jerry credit on the film and pay them a pension. Part of the announcement was made [not long before the first Superman movie was to be released] at Phil Seuling’s 1978 convention; Phil, Jerry, and Joe sit before the crowd with Sol Harrison, then President of DC. Sol makes his statement and then proceeds to pull out ‘the only page of original vintage Superman art in their archives’ and presents it to them.

Naturally, Phil agrees to purchase the now-signed page immediately after the show.

“As I understood it from Phil, this page was originally slated to be the [frontispiece] of Superman #2, which contains all the elements present in the vignettes: the tree, the airplane, the military equipment. However, as noted in the center of the page, the art was pulled [instead] to be the cover of a Superman Scrap Book [from The Saalfield Publishing Co.], the first of which was published in 1940.” If you look closely at the image of that original art, also printed on this page, you might just be able to read the words “Superman Scrap Book” lightly scrawled in pencil right above where Joe Shuster signed the piece, years later. But Saalfield wound up utilizing a different Superman figure instead, and Mannarino adds: “I have not found the image published anywhere, which may be why it still exists…. Phil insisted that this was mainly Shuster and that this is the only true [early] Superman comic book page in existence. Who was I (or anyone else) to argue with Phil? I have owned it for over twenty years.”

The larger image of that 1939-40 masterpiece is also courtesy of Joe and Nadia Mannarino. Joe and Nadia own All Star Auctions LLC (http://www.allstar aucti0ns.net), which holds events featuring prime comic art several times a year. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

Paul Cassidy—Superman’s First Ghost?

21

cartoonist for the University paper named The Daily Cardinal.

The University of Wisconsin was also, more importantly, where Paul met his wife-to-be, Inez Jay Taylor. Inez Taylor would become the Lois Lane to Paul Cassidy’s Clark Kent.

Where Paul was quiet and guarded his emotions, Inez was a chatty, gregarious person. They met when Inez moved into Paul’s fraternity house. Paul helped her carry in her bags, and the rest was history. They married on August 8, 1934, in Lyons, Kansas, on what Paul would say was the hottest day on record.

Flatfoots And Feds Here are art specimens from three early Siegel & Shuster comic book features on which Cassidy worked beginning in 1938, not long before Action Comics #1 went on sale. As verified by comics historian Bob Hughes, who like Mel Higgins has spent years researching the artists of the Shuster Shop, Cassidy did an increasing percentage of the artwork on these for a time as his two employers got ever busier with “Superman” material—though it’s impossible to be certain how much of Shuster and how much of Cassidy and/or other assistants may be present in any individual story: This “Slam Bradley” episode, with probable Cassidy work, appeared in Detective Comics #27 (May 1939). We hear tell there was a somewhat more celebrated story of some kind in that issue, though, which has caused old back issues to be fairly expensive. Thanks to Bob Bailey for the scan, taken from the 1970s tabloid-sized Famous First Edition #2 [#C-28].

In 1934, after graduation from the University of Wisconsin, and newly “Radio Squad,” whose first page from More Fun Comics #45 (Aug. 1939) is depicted here. The image, taken from microfiche, married, Paul Cassidy is less than perfect. Bob Hughes, who supplied this scan and the next,believes this story contains Cassidy art. moved to Milwaukee. It was here that Paul started work “Federal Men” is represented by the splash page from Adventure Comics #40 (also July ’39). Bob feels this installment may be by Cassidy; after that issue, Wayne Boring took over the art. [© 2012 DC Comics.] as a graphic arts teacher at the Milwaukee Vocational School. This school would Cassidy arrived in Cleveland in 1939. The art department now become an important place in Paul’s life, as he would eventually consisted of Joe Shuster, Paul Cassidy, and Wayne Boring, who had return to teach at this school during two other stages of his life. arrived in Cleveland only a few weeks before Paul. As it turns out, Boring had responded to the same ad that Cassidy had seen in the newspaper in 1938. In a 1994 interview, documented by James The Birth Of The Shuster Shop Vance in the 1998 hardcover collection Superman: The Dailies, 1939It was in June 1938, while he was teaching at the Milwaukee 1942, Cassidy described the workspace as “a small setup”: Vocational School, that Paul Cassidy went to Cleveland to speak We had a reception room and a main office; Joe worked in with Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. The country was still in the there, and Wayne Boring and myself… Siegel and Shuster were Depression, times were tough, and Paul was looking to polite and good company, but everybody was too busy to do supplement his teaching salary. (By sheer coincidence, June 1938 much chatting or socializing. Joe was in every day. He’d spend was also the cover date of Action Comics #1, wherein “Superman” most of his time inking in the faces and eating candy bars. So first saw publication; of course, that issue actually went on sale at Wayne and I came in every day, got our scripts, kept our noses least two months earlier.)

The interview took place in the Shuster family home, where young Joe was still living with his parents. The interview must have gone well, since Paul secured the part-time work he was looking for. Upon his return to Milwaukee, he worked nights and weekends at home, helping Shuster out artwise on such comic book features as “Federal Men,” “Slam Bradley,” “Spy,” and “Radio Squad,” all of which were Siegel & Shuster collaborations. Eventually, Paul began assisting on the Superman daily newspaper strip, as well, which started publication in January 1939. He had become likely the first “ghost” artist on Superman and probably became the first member of what would become the legendary “Shuster Shop.”

As “Superman” became increasingly popular in both comic books and strips and the artistic demands became greater and greater for Joe Shuster, it became obvious that he needed full-time help. Paul Cassidy was lured away from his teaching position in Milwaukee with an offer of $64 per week to work with Shuster and Siegel. By the time he left Milwaukee, he had worked on 149 Superman dailies.

to the drawing board, and turned in our jobs. I was doing thirteen pages a week and some of the dailies, so we couldn’t have had much time off if we’d wanted it. I’d do all kinds of stuff, from penciling to lettering to inking everything but the faces. Shuster’s vision was pretty bad then, but he still inked all the faces.

[Siegel and Shuster] were very easy to work with. They didn’t interfere in any way with how we interpreted the script. It was just at the beginning then, and I’m not sure they realized in the early days what they had going on for them, that Superman was going to become as big a deal as it did.

Jerry did most of his writing at home and would come in every once in a while with the scripts. The scripts would indicate what the action was and, of course, what the conversation was, but there was not too much guidance. The picturization of the script was basically up to Wayne and me. We were never asked to do anything over or change it.

This artistic freedom given to Paul Cassidy allowed him to bring his own style and make subtle modifications to the Man of Steel.

22

The Story Of Two Men Of Steel—And Cousin Hopalong, Too!

According to Bob Hughes’ “S” Marks The Spot “Who Drew Superman?”

If, as Bob Hughes suspects, Paul website, Paul Cassidy “supplied Cassidy ghosted both pencils and a more fluid line to Joe’s style, inks on one story in Superman #4 (Spring 1940)—except for Shuster’s with a bolder, darker line that drawing the faces—it’s most likely filled in details like Superman’s this third entry in the issue, which “S” symbol.” As seen in Action has a subtly different look from its Comics #6, Paul brought back fellows. Bob notes that, in the the five-cornered shield design. earliest “Superman” stories, “any He also made notable changes to panel that shows an ‘S’ on Superman’s cape. He was the Superman’s cape has some Cassidy first artist to add an “S” to the input,” since PC apparently added cape, made the cape more that symbol to it even when he merely inked. In that issue, all four dynamic by giving it folds, and tales have that trait. Repro’d from allowed the cape to fly every the hardcover Superman Archives, which way, even allowing it to Vol. 1. [© 2012 DC Comics.] cover Superman’s face! Where Shuster would draw the cape attached at two points and loosely hanging from the shoulders, Cassidy securely and closely attached the cape to the front of Superman’s jersey, having it bunch up at the back of the collar area.

Again quoting from Hughes’ “Who Drew Superman?” website: Cassidy had a totally different sense of layout and design than Joe did. He often drew Superman with both legs tucked under him and his arms outstretched sideways, rather than forwards or above his head…. Cassidy loved back views, cape tricks, and reclining figures and was clearly a superior draftsman to Shuster…. Cassidy twists and turns Superman’s body and delights in back bends, flips and other acrobatic displays.

Another identifiable trait of Cassidy’s was a knack for drawing heads turning past the point of what would normally be thought possible. Bob Hughes writes on “The K-Metal from Krypton” website about “the twisted necks…. [T]hose are Cassidy trademarks.”

Unfortunately, by 1940, Cassidy could no longer afford to continue on as an artist in the Shuster Shop. He had a family to support, and it was about to become bigger. First child Lawrence Michael Cassidy was born on April 27, 1937, and his second child was only months away from coming into this world. So, at the end of August 1940, Paul Cassidy left Cleveland to return to Milwaukee. His son Larry notes that these two years in Cleveland were not the best ones for Paul and Inez. They had come from out of town, knew no one, and felt a bit isolated. Paul was not making much money, either, which stressed the situation.

Even after his return to Milwaukee, Paul would continue to work for the Shuster Shop on a part-time basis, through the mail,

into 1942. In the end, his contribution to the Shuster Shop included “173 daily Superman strips and eight Sunday pages, plus 630 comics pages and seven covers—by [Paul’s] estimate, ‘about 8,800 pictures or panels’” in all, according to James Vance in Superman: The Dailies, 1939-1942.

As if to save the best for last, the final assignment that Cassidy penciled while in Cleveland working at the Shuster Shop would become one of the greatest “Superman” tales never told—the infamous “K-Metal Story.” This story has become a cult classic for many reasons, most notably because in it Clark Kent reveals to Lois Lane that he is Superman, and they agree to a partnership. It also includes the first use of kryptonite (called “K-Metal” therein). It would be three years later, in 1943, that kryptonite would be introduced to the public in The Adventures of Superman radio program.

And, as if this wasn’t enough, it is in this tale that the hero realizes he comes from another planet. On a minor note, it is also in this tale that Clark Kent’s editor is first called by the name Perry White.

Before this, the editor’s name had been George Taylor.

This story was completely penciled, inked, and lettered.

Unfortunately, the DC editors decided that these events— especially the secret identity revelation and the existence of deadly fragments of the exploded planet Krypton—were too dramatic to be introduced into the “Superman” storyline. The

Sundays In The Park With Superman Wayne Boring (the other candidate for the “second Superman artist”)—and the lead panel from the 18th Superman Sunday strip, published in newspapers in 1940. Boring probably did most of it, though most likely with Joe Shuster doing at least the faces.

Repro’d from 1998’s DC/Kitchen Sink hardcover Superman: The Sunday Classics, 1939-1943. During the 1950s, Boring’s version of the Man of Steel became the gold standard. [Sunday © 2012 DC Comics.]

Paul Cassidy—Superman’s First Ghost?

23

feature had only been in production for two years at this point, and they didn’t want to take a chance of messing up a good thing.

Life After Superman

Paul Cassidy’s second stint at the Milwaukee Vocational School ran from 1940 through 1945. During this time, his second child, Richard Taylor Cassidy, was born on February 12, 1941. By 1943, Richard would need to go into a tuberculosis sanitarium for two long years, living there while his parents and brother would make the trip for visits. Paul and Inez felt awful about putting their son in that It’s A Whirlybird—It’s A Model Plane—It’s Robotman! situation, but, as he said later in life, it was the While no credits were given with their original publication, it’s now assumed that the first “Robotman” story, in Star Spangled best he could do with the Comics #7 (April 1942), and perhaps the one the next month in #8—were scripted by Jerry Siegel and illustrated by Leo Nowak and Paul Cassidy. Bob Hughes says that Nowak drew pp. 1-5 of the origin (and thus the splash at top left), while Cassidy situation at the time. drew p. 6 (the page seen at right) and the rest of the 13-pager. The first of these scans was sent by Jim Kealy, the second by Thankfully, Richard Bob Hughes. [© 2012 DC Comics.] survived the scare, although he did have By 1959, a change was needed, and Paul took a new job at scarring to his heart. His older brother Larry noted that he only Grolier’s Book of Knowledge. This time, the family moved to New saw his father cry twice in his life. One of these was later in life York state. They lived in Bronxville, and Paul worked in New York when he was describing the whole TB situation. (The only other City. This was a tough period for him. He very much felt like a time Larry noted a tear in his father’s eye was a less emotional duck out of water, as he was a Mid-Western boy in the big city. The moment, when Paul ripped a nail clear off his finger!) job, too, was not to Paul’s liking. In New York, he was now the art editor for five publications, each of which had a Although he enjoyed his work in Milwaukee, an different boss for him to answer to. Paul felt this offer doubling his salary to $6,000 per year could was a bad set-up and that he had no real chance not be refused. In 1945, he moved his family to for success.

750 Western Avenue, Glen Ellyn, Illinois. He would work for Field Enterprises, in Chicago, By 1964, he decided to move to taking the commuter train in and out of the Milwaukee for the third, and final, time. city each day. At Field Enterprises, he Again he went to the vocational school for worked as an artist for World Book which he had twice worked, now called the Encyclopedia. Later, he moved into the Milwaukee Area Technical College (then position of art director and managing MIlwaukee Vocational School). Here he was director for Field Enterprise’s ChildCraft given full tenure and headed the graphic Books. According to a formal interview that arts department. According to Larry, Paul Richard Cassidy conducted with his father in was never happier than when he moved back 2001, Paul felt he was a very good art editor, to Milwaukee. In the late 1960s, Paul and Inez but that he was not as successful in the role of moved to Shorewood, Wisconsin, living on the managing editor. In the latter role, he was taken second floor of a duplex and renting out the first. away from his main interest and where his true Paul retired in 1972, and in 1991 the couple moved The Way We Were talent was. to Bradford Terrace, a retirement home.

Paul and Inez Cassidy in 1993.

It was in Chicago that Paul Cassidy developed a Photo courtesy of Dick and On August 28, 1996, Inez Cassidy passed away love for that city’s White Sox baseball team. A big Larry Cassidy, via Mel Higgins. on her 88th birthday. Paul and Inez had been change in the home occurred in December of 1949, married for 62 years. Years after her passing, Larry when the family purchased their first television set. Larry Cassidy asked his father if he ever thought of her. His response was a can remember often how he would watch the White Sox with his simple “Every day.” father on the old black-&-white console.

24

The Story Of Two Men Of Steel—And Cousin Hopalong, Too!

Although Paul Cassidy is most noted this revelation. He was touched. for working in the Shuster Shop, this Similary, when James Vance spoke was not the only example of comics with him in 1994 and subsequently work on his résumé. In 1938, he worked wrote the introductions to the for the Canadian company Howard Superman: The Dailies volumes, Vance Publishers, Ltd., penciling and inking a noted that Paul’s reaction to being feature called “Hemisphere Patrol.” In interviewed about his time drawing 1940, he worked for Centaur Comics, “Superman” was “amused nostalgia.” penciling and inking “Kern’l Kilgore.”

Vance had the impression that “he was In 1948-49, he worked for Fawcett a little flattered that anyone would care comics on Hopalong Cassidy. In 1951 he about a gig he’d held decades before…. drew Butch Cassidy and the Wild Bunch To him, it was a long-ago job held by a for Avon Periodicals. Around 1950, he younger and hungrier version of also developed his own comic strip, himself, and his pride was invested in called Fantasy, the Moon Boy, what he’d been doing in about an alien who could more recent years.” only be seen by the younger K-K-K-K-Metal! son in a family of a mother, (Above:) Jerry Siegel’s cover letter to DC co-publisher Jack Liebowitz, dated Aug. 7, Paul Cassidy would pass father, older and younger 1940, accompanied the 26-page script of the legendary “K-Metal Story.” Jerry away on May 15, 2005, in brother. Unfortunately, this singled out the work that Paul Cassidy was doing for the Shuster Shop, apparently Milwaukee, three weeks strip was never published. because it was of such importance to that super-saga. Thanks to Mel Higgins. before he would have turned

Cassidy was totally oblivious to his name being closely linked to the Superman legend and to his important role in comics history. He was, after all, probably the first ghost to pencil “Superman,” and only the second person to pencil “Superman” after cocreator Joe Shuster. For Paul, his short stay in the Shuster Shop was just one of many stops in life. He rarely, if ever, talked about this time with his children.

He kept no mementos of his time there. No stationery, no drawings, nothing.

It was not until a visit in June 2002 by son Dick and Dick’s daughter Katy Cassidy that Paul would begin to realize how important his work back in Cleveland had been, those many years earlier. Katy had brought along a portable computer and asked her grandfather if he had ever searched his name on the Internet. Having never done so, Cassidy was surprised, to say the least, when he saw countless links that contained his name. He had never realized that anyone even knew who he was or that he had ever drawn “Superman.” He was surprised and moved by

(Below:) This page of the “K-Metal Story” has, so far as we know, never before been published; the scan was sent to us by collector Jack Bender (who’s also the artist of the Alley Oop newspaper strip). Other known extant pages of this tale of tales were seen (very small) in Jim Steranko’s 1970s History of Comics and in Alter Ego #26, 37, 45, 51, & 79. Art researcher Bob Hughes recently wrote that various artists in the Shuster Shop worked on different pages of the story, often several on the same page—among them Shuster himself, Cassidy, Don Komisarow, John Sikela, Wayne Boring, and maybe Leo Nowak. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

95. A few days before he died, Paul took a bad spill getting into his wheelchair.

He suffered damage to an eye socket, but the effects were not considered lifethreatening. Paul was apparently told that they would have to take his wheels away.

Even at 94, Paul was still fiercely independent, and the thought of losing his mobility and independence was enough for him. The next day—two days after the accident—Paul announced to his doctor that he was going to die. He refused any medication to help ease any of his pain. Two days later, he was gone, having left on his own terms.

Paul Cassidy was a man who loved deeply, but, as was common among the men of his generation, he did not often show his emotions.

Although quiet, he also had a terrific sense of humor. He was not one to be the life of the party, but he was quick to apply his dry sense of humor.

Son Larry remembers staying up late as a child when his parents entertained guests.

He would listen to the laughter below when he was supposed to be sleeping upstairs. He could not hear what was being said, but he knew it was his father who was the cause of the uproar.

Besides loving the Chicago

Paul Cassidy—Superman’s First Ghost?

25

Figures And Faces Comic art dealer Joe Mannarino sent us a copy of a statement (left) he received from Paul Cassidy’s son Larry, which was written by Joe Shuster (with Jerry Siegel?) in 1940 to detail and verify the precise amount and kind of work that Paul C. did for the Shuster Shop. Because the statement is difficult to read in places (typed on a bad ribbon, perhaps, so that many letters tend to close up), it has been retyped below—though one or two of the numbers may have been misread: STATEMENT OF WORK DONE FOR SIEGEL AND SHUSTER August 27, 1940 During the period between June, 1938 and September 1940, Paul N. Cassidy worked in the capacity of an assistant on various features produced by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster.

These features are in magazine and syndicate publication.

The work falls into two phases, vis., Phase A-June 1938 to January 1940 (incl.)-page basis; Phase B-February 1940 to August 1940 (incl.)-full-time.

Phase A totals some 1730 hours of work, and Phase B amounts to 6½ months.

The drawing done ranged from pencil layout to completely inked work, all done by working with continuity script written

by Mr. Siegel Recapitulation of work done during Phase A: FEDERAL MEN ....................19 pages-all inked but figures and faces.

3 " " " " faces.

SLAM BRADLEY ..................26 " " " " figures and faces.

2 sample pages, completely inked.

SPY..........................................24 pages-all inked but figures and faces.

15 " " " " faces.

3 sample pages, ditto.

RADIO SQUAD ......................12 pages-all inked but figures and faces.

18 " " " " faces.

6 pages-ditto.

SUPERMAN............................192 pages-all inked but figures and faces.

149 daily strips-ditto.

TOTAL 343 pages and 149 daily strips.

Recapitulation of work done during Phase B: SUPERMAN............................52 pages-pencil layouts.

6 pages-all inked but figures and faces.

229 " " " " main figures and all faces.

4 covers-ditto.

3 " -all inked but faces of main characters 24 daily strips-all inked but main figures and faces.

5 Sunday strips-ditto.

TOTAL 287 pages, 7 covers, 24 daily strips and 5 Sunday pages.

GRAND TOTAL 630 pages, 7 covers, 173 daily strips and 5 Sunday pages, approximating 8,800 individual pictures.

White Sox, Paul was also an avid reader of history and historical novels. Throughout the years, Paul would draw what would become, arguably, the ultimate collection of historical weaponry, uniforms, and heraldry dating back to before the time of Christ.

These drawings were inked, colored in with colored pencils, and mounted on 6" x 4" cardboard cards. Paul had done thousands of these drawings. Much to his children’s chagrin, he decided to throw them all away one day, thinking no one would have any interest in them.

When asked how to best describe their father, both sons, Dick and Larry, mentioned how their father was a member of what author Tom Brokaw christened “the Greatest Generation.” He worked hard every day and had high standards, both for himself and for members of his family. Larry aptly wrote about his parents

Joe M. feels that final number may just be “5,800 individual pictures,” not “8,800”—but, either way, it was a fair amount!

Also on this page, from the DC/Kitchen Sink hardcover, are panels from a November or December 1939 Superman Sunday, during a period when Bob Hughes says Paul Cassidy was doing a lot of “ghost inking”—over pencils by Joe Shuster or Wayne Boring. Script, of course, by Jerry Siegel. It’s tricky to date the early strips exactly, because they weren’t dated, only numbered. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

in a 2001 seasonal letter, describing his “growing sense of their decency, dignity, courage, and integrity… how Dad always figured it out, took care of business, took care of us, and demanded that we take the high road. Damned hard work. Day after day. And how he has never, ever told us what to do since we left the hearth—but has always been there in the rare pinch.”

26

The Story Of Two Men Of Steel—And Cousin Hopalong, Too!

Well written, Larry. And with this, I remember Larry’s first email to me, which ended with the words: “You missed meeting a hell of a guy.”

And I believe I did.

Sources:

Bails, Jerry, “Who’s Who of American Comic Books, 1928 – 1999” web site, http://www.bailsprojects.com/(S(iysero45sf4rzp454iv0sm 55))/WhosWho.aspx.

Cassidy, Lawrence, various personal correspondence, Sept. 2008.

Cassidy, Richard, interview with Paul Cassidy, Feb. 10–11, 2001.

Cassidy, Richard, various personal correspondence, Sept. 2008.

Hughes, Bob, “Who Drew Superman” website, http://www.supermanartists.comics.org/superart/supermanart.htm, as of Sept. 2008.

Mclellan, Dennis, Paul Cassidy Obituary, Los Angeles Times, July 5, 2005.

Silvers, Amy Rabideau, Paul Cassidy Obituary, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 2005.

Vance, James, “A Job For Superman,” Superman: The Dailies, 19391942, Sterling Publishing Co., Inc, 2006.

Vance, James, personal correspondence, Sept. 2008.

“The K-Metal From Krypton” website, http://superman.nu/k-metal/ splash.php, as of September 2008.

Of Hemispheres And Hopalong Offered for your consideration: a dual demonstration of just how tricky it is to illustrate even a mini-biography of Paul Cassidy with relevant art.

(Top:) No, Cassidy didn’t draw this cover of Hawley Publishers’ Hi-Spot Comics #2 (Nov. 1940, the only issue); it’s by John Coleman Burroughs, the artist son of Tarzan creator Edgar Rice Burroughs. But the Grand Comics Database does list a 6-page “Hemisphere Patrol” story among that book’s contents, along with adaptations of ERB’s At the Earth’s Core and Jack London’s Sea Wolf, an “Alley Oop” episode (newspaper reprint?), and something called “Wonderland in Oz” which Ye Editor in particular would love to see, since in the 1980s he would conceptualize DC’s Oz-Wonderland War, starring Captain Carrot.

(Above:) Bob Hughes reports that this episode of Fawcett’s authorized version of movie cowboy “Hopalong Cassidy” (portrayed onscreen by William Boyd) is one whose artist is unidentified; thus, it may have been drawn by Paul Cassidy. This horse operetta saw print in Master Comics #92 (June 1948), during the period when Cassidy—Paul, not Hoppy—is reputed to have drawn stories in the series for Fawcett. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

Paul Cassidy—Superman’s First Ghost?

27

I, Robotman The seventh page of the “Robotman” origin from Star Spangled Comics #7. Art attributed to Paul Cassidy. The scripter was Jerry Siegel; but in the early 1980s he was unhappy enough about never being officially acknowledged by DC as the series’ creator that he politely declined a request from Roy Thomas to write a few lines about the character’s creation for an early text section of All-Star Squadron. Thanks to Jim Ludwig. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

Mel Higgins loves Superman art and has interviewed numerous friends and relatives of the artists who worked in the Shuster shop. It is his hope to one day write a book about the Shuster Shop artists, a group of highly influential and important talents who have never received the recognition they deserve. Born in 1965, he lives in the Boston area. He collects original comic art and Boston Red Sox memorabilia. He wishes to thank Paul Cassidy’s sons, Dick and Larry Cassidy, for their generous donation of time and information, which helped make this article as comprehensive as possible.

PAUL CASSIDY Checklist

[NOTE: The following checklist is adapted from information contained in the online Who’s Who of American Comic Books (1928-1999) website, established

by Jerry G. Bails; see www.bailsprojects.com. Information has been added to the entry based on communications with Mel Higgins, Dick Cassidy, Larry

Cassidy, William J. Dowlding, and Alberto Becattini. Key: (p) = pencils only; (i) = inks; (d) = daily newspaper strip; (S) = Sunday comic strip.]

Name: Paul H. Cassidy (1910-2005) (artist; writer)

Pen Name: Paul Graham

Education: B.S. (applied arts); M.S. (art education), University of Wisconsin

Print Media (Non-Comics): Editor & art director: Book of Knowledge (New York City); editor & art director: World Book Encyclopedia, Childcraft (Chicago)

Other Career Notes: Associate dean & teacher: graphic arts division, Milwaukee Area Technical College (retired 1972)

Kernels Of Wisdom The first page of the “Kern’l Kilgore” cloakand-dagger story by Paul Cassidy— moonlighting as “Paul Graham”—in Centaur Comics’ Amazing Mystery Funnies #20 (May 1940). Thanks to Alberto Becattini for making us aware of this ultra-rare solo-Cassidy entry—and to Centaur expert Lee Boyette, through his buddy Jon R. Evans, for getting us scans of the entire six-page, nevercontinued story. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

Syndication: Red Ryder (ghost p & i) two weeks for NEA; Superman (S) (ghost p & i) 1940 for McClure Syndicate

Comics Studio/Shop: Siegel and Shuster Studio (p & i) 1937-42 (in Cleveland through Aug ’40); was probably first “Superman” ghost COMIC BOOK CREDITS (Mainstream U.S. & Canadian Publishers): Avon: Butch Cassidy and the Wild Bunch (a?) 1951

Centaur Comics: Kern’l Kilgore (p & i) 1940

DC Comics: covers (p & i) 1939; Federal Men (p & i) 1938-40; Radio Squad (p & i) 1938-40; Spy (p & i) 1937-49; Superman (p & i) 1938-42

Fawcett Publications: Hopalong Cassidy (a?) late '40s Hawley Publications, Inc.: Hemisphere Patrol (p & i) Howard Publishers, Ltd. (Canada) (?): Hemisphere Patrol (p & i)

[NOTE: No independent confirmation of Howard Publishers, Ltd., or the publication of “Hemisphere Patrol” in Canada has yet been found. See the “Hemisphere Patrol”/Hi-Spot Comics art caption on the previous page for more information about this feature’s American publication, which is more definitely confirmed.]

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29

“Spaghetti” Superman, a.k.a.

The Nembo Kid—And Batman, Too! The Italian Man Of Steel & Dark Knight in the 1960s

by Alberto Becattini

T

here was a time when numerous “Superman” and “Batman” stories were produced in Milan, Italy, in the offices of Arnoldo Mondadori Editore.

One of Italy’s greatest publishers, Mondadori had entered the comics field in 1935, buying out the weekly tabloid Topolino (the Italian name of Mickey Mouse) from Mario Nerbini of Florence. The sole Italian Disney comics publisher from 1935-88, in April of 1949 Mondadori decided to turn Topolino into a monthly digest. The reason for such a change was merely practical. Now the Disney comic had exactly the same format as Selezione dal Reader’s Digest (the Italian edition of Reader’s Digest), which Mondadori had been publishing since October 1948. To print the monthly Selezione at his huge plant in Verona, Mondadori had bought an expensive new printing press; and to keep it working between one issue of Selezione and another, it was decided to use it for printing Topolino, too, whose sales had been dwindling for quite a while.

Much to Mondadori’s surprise, the format change was a success, and Topolino’s sales skyrocketed. Profiting by this unexpected success, the far-sighted Mondadori decided to acquire the rights to

Hail, Hail, The Gang’s All—In Italy!

The wraparound cover, by Italian artists Piero and Paolo Montecchi, for the giveaway “sticker-story” album S.O.S. – Earth Looking for Oil (1968), costarring Superman, Batman, Robin, Supergirl, and Batgirl, plus Krypto and Comet. See details on p. 32 & 37 about this comic that was created especially for the Italian company Total Gasoline. All art and photos accompanying this piece were provided by Alberto Becattini. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

publish DC/National Comics’ super-heroes in Italy. Which he did, in a digest-sized bi-weekly comic named Albi del Falco – Nembo Kid, whose first issue was cover-dated May 16, 1954. “Nembo Kid” was the Italian name that Mondadori had chosen for Superman, reportedly because the publisher thought that a literal translation of Superman, “Superuomo,” could suggest a connection with Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophical doctrine of the Übermensch–also translated into Italian as “Superuomo.” Whatever the reason, for about thirteen years every single “S” on Superman’s chest and on the back of his cloak would be deleted by a staff artist in each and every panel of every single story published in Italy until April 1967.

30

The Italian Man Of Steel & Dark Knight in the 1960s

Clark Be Nembo, Clark Be Quick The cover of the first issue of Albi del Falco – Nembo Kid (1954). Alberto Becattini tells us that “Albi del Falco” translates roughly into English as “Comics of the Hawk.” “I don’t really know why Mondadori chose that name,” he adds, “but at the same time he started a new series which featured Disney characters, calling it Albi della Rosa (Comics of the Rose). I guess the name for the series devoted to DC super-heroes was supposed to be more ‘aggressive.’” By the way, the word “nembo” is Italian for “nimbus”—i.e., a rain cloud or storm cloud. Apparently, the English slang meaning of “kid” by then was well enough known in Italy for it to be used instead of the Italian for “man.” [© 2012 DC Comics.]

From 1954-61, all of the DC Comics super-hero stories published

by Mondadori were American originals. But things changed in 1962, when Italian-made “Nembo Kid” adventures started appearing. The reason for producing them was probably the same that had given a start to a domestic production of Disney stories years before. At a certain point, the materials sent by DC were no longer sufficient to fill the 48 weekly pages of Albi del Falco–Nembo Kid (whose first weekly issue was #103, dated April 6, 1958), as well as the 64 monthly pages of Superalbo Nembo Kid (a comic-booksized title started in June 1960, which turned into the fortnightly Batman-Nembo Kid in August 1965, ceasing publication a year later).

Thus the editor, Mario Gentilini, decided to set up a small team of writers and artists to regularly Sole “Superman” produce supplementary “Superman” Carlo Cossio’s splash page stories, with the first one appearing in from his only “Nembo Kid” Albi del Falco–Nembo Kid #317 (May story: “The Liberating Quiz” (1962). Living from 190713, 1962). For about a year, these 1964, he was a prolific comic adventures were produced by artist and animator from the freelancers who had previously late 1920s until the early worked, or were still working, for ’60s. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

Mondadori. These were writer Piero Arnaldo (Pier) Carpi and artists Leone (Leo) Cimpellin and Enzo Dufflocq Magni (better known to Italian readers as “Ingam” from when he had drawn the adventures of the sensual jungle heroine Blonde Panther in 194850). Until 1963, Cimpellin and Magni drew a total of 18 stories, plus several covers. In 1962, one story was even drawn by comics veteran Carlo Cossio (this would be one of his very last works, as he died two years later).

Whereas the writers did their best to work in the wake of such American master storymen as Jerry Siegel, Otto Binder, and Edmond Hamilton, the A Carlo Cossio page. artists did not seem too familiar with the styles of Wayne Boring, Curt Swan, or even Al Plastino, and simply drew Superman/Clark

Kent, Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Perry White, Lex Luthor and all the others in their own styles. The Italian stories showed a nice variety of themes and situations. Naturally, most of them were set in outer space or concerned alien threats, but there was also a bit of time travel and treasure-hunting, for a change.

In 1963, 21-year-old Marco Rota, who had been on staff at Mondadori for less than a year, was entrusted with Superman covers and interior art, continuing to draw these stories until 1966. (Rota would later become, and still is, one of the best Disney comic writers/artists in the world.) Rota has recently revealed that his three-year “Nembo Kid” tenure began with the redrawn version of an American story, which Gentilini gave him “to get the hang of the character. Perhaps he wanted me to get acquainted with the American artist’s style, so that it would then come easier to draw the Man of Steel.” The story was a 20-pager entitled “Silent Language,” and it appeared in Albi del Falco – Nembo Kid #409 (Feb. 16, 1964). So far it has been impossible to determine which U.S. story it was a remake of, yet one suspects it was a Curt Swan story, as Rota evidently fashioned his style after Swan’s.

Anyway, it was Rota who later illustrated the “most Italian amongst Superman’s Italian stories,” that is “The Legend of Perseus,” which appeared in Batman – Nembo Kid #67 (Sept., 1965).

In fact, this adventure, written by Pier Carpi, was partly set in Italy.

Having to find a way to fight an alien menace on a faraway planet, Superman/Nembo Kid thought back to a holiday his alter ego, Clark Kent, and Lois Lane (actually it was Luisa Lane in Italy) had spent in Florence, where they had admired Benvenuto Cellini’s bronze statue of Prometheus holding Medusa’s severed head. Rota profited by this flashback to visualize some typical views of the Tuscan city (where, incidentally, the present writer was born and lives).

With issue #527 of Albi del Falco – Nembo Kid (May 22, 1966), the editorial chores were taken over by Enrico Bagnoli, an expert artist who had a deep knowledge of American comics, having drawn several stories for U.S. comic books published by Fiction House, St. John, and even DC/National from 1948-54.

Bagnoli considerably updated the looks of the weekly comic,

”Spaghetti” Superman, a.k.a. The Nembo Kid—And Batman, Too!

31

Buy Italian!

(Above left:) A page from the very first Italian-made “Nembo Kid” story, “Flashing News,” with art by Leo Cimpellin (whose photo is seen below it)… and (above right) a splash page drawn by Enzo Magni for “The Pirate’s Treasure.” Both stories were published in 1962, the first year in which any “Superman”/“Nembo Kid” adventures were written and drawn by Italians for Italians. Our author reports that Piero Arnaldo Carpi—seen in photo at right— wrote that first year’s worth of these home-grown yarns. [Comics pages © 2012 DC Comics.]

Leone (Leo) Cimpellin.

Piero Arnaldo (Pier) Carpi.

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The Italian Man Of Steel & Dark Knight in the 1960s

(Left:) Marco Rota. [Mickey Mouse & Donald Duck TM & © 2012 Disney Enterprises, Inc.; other art © 2012 Marco Rota or his heirs.]

If It Ain’t Broke…

(Left:) Though Marco Rota drew another “Nembo Kid” story before he did this one, the Rota-drawn tale “Broken Idol” (1964) was published before it. The selfcaricature of the artist above reminds us that he drew Disney characters, as well. [Comics page © 2012 DC Comics.]

and as of issue #529 (June 5, 1966) he changed its title into Superman Nembo Kid. As time went by, the “Superman” logo on the cover grew bigger and bigger, while the “Nembo Kid” logo was getting smaller. With issue #575 (April 23, 1967), the comic was finally called Superman–and, at long last, the “S” began to regularly appear on the Man of Steel’s chest! The average comicbook size was adopted, and it was published bi-weekly.

While these changes were taking place, Bagnoli hired other artists to draw more Italian “Superman” stories and covers. These included Lino Jeva, Sergio Tarquinio, Antonio Toldo, the brothers Paolo and Piero Montecchi (a.k.a. “Paul & Peter Montague”), and—athough Bagnoli, when asked, had no recollection of the fact—Raffaele Paparella. Together with Toldo, Bagnoli himself contributed to a couple of stories and several covers, besides drawing numerous interior illustrations. Again, Pier Carpi was writing most of these stories (some yarns were apparently provided by Roberto Catalano and Gian Giacomo Dalmasso), which were definitely more down-to-earth (meaning that they all took place on our planet) compared with those produced during the earlier part of the ’60s.

drawn by Paparella, wherein Clark Kent/Superman-Nembo Kid had to solve a blackmail/kidnapping case involving a goal-keeper and his girlfriend during the World Football (Soccer) Championship in London.

Other stories featured young rock star Ricky Bell, his blonde assistant Barby, and a host of teenage fans.

Besides these regular comic book adventures, a couple more appeared in 1968 and 1969 in the form of “sticker stories” drawn by the brothers Montecchi for two special promotional comics sponsored by Total Gasoline. Their titles were, respectively, “S.O.S. – Earth Looking for Oil” and “The Diabolical Invention.” The scripts for these were written by Enrico Bagnoli’s wife, Renata Pfeiffer.

Batman had first appeared in Albi del Falco – Nembo Kid in #33 (July 31, 1955), initially known as “Il Pipistrello” (“The Bat”) in a red costume, in a story that was the Italian edition of the “Superman and Batman” story from World’s Finest Comics #75 (March-April 1955). For another three years, Il Pipistrello/Batman continued appearing exclusively in team-ups from the same U.S. title (his first solo adventure ran in Albi del Falco – Nembo Kid #106, dated April 27, 1958).

The first Italian-made “Superman & Batman” team-up story, “The Earth Raiders,” appeared in #412 (March 3, 1964), as drawn by Marco Rota. Curiously enough, this was an Italian remake of the U.S. story “The Secret of the Captive Cavemen,” drawn by Jim Mooney for World’s Finest #138 (Sept.

1963). Another three “Superman & Batman” stories were published during 1964 which were either remakes or slightly altered, redrawn versions of U.S. stories (see checklist for details). The reason why these remakes were produced is uncertain. Judging by the second one, “The Living Crystals,” from

One example was “The Great Swindle” (#535, July 17, 1966),

A “D.E.M.O.N.” Of A Cover (Far right:) The cover of Superman Nembo Kid #557 (1966), by artists Antonio Toldo & Enrico Bagnoli. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

(Right:) Bagnoli, who was also the editor of the magazine by the time it made the name change from Albi del Falco – Nembo Kid, drew this portrait of himself. Several examples of his stellar artwork (and of Toldo’s, as well) done for U.S. publishers Fiction House and St. John were seen in Alter Ego #32. [© 2012 Enrico Bagnoli or his heirs.]

Enrico Bagnoli.

”Spaghetti” Superman, a.k.a. The Nembo Kid—And Batman, Too!

“The Beasts of the Supernatural” in World’s Finest #133, May 1963), where geometrical bodies replaced the original beasts, it would seem that Gentilini had asked artist Marco Rota to tone down the graphic impact of the original story, perhaps fearing that younger readers would be frightened. Yet several U.S. “Superman & Batman” stories including much more impressive alien creatures were published unaltered in Italy during those years.

The first Italian-made “Batman and Robin” solo story, entitled “City of Clay,” appeared in Batman – Nembo Kid #83 (April 25, 1966), drawn by Marco Rota. Yet another “Batman” story, “Merciless Circe,” appeared in Batman – Nembo Kid #85 (May 23, 1966), this time drawn by Cimpellin.

Late in 1966, when “Batmania” was spreading over Italy— largely thanks to the “camp” U.S. Batman TV series and

33

Sergio Tarquinio.

Didn’t They Have Phone Booths In Italy?

(Top left:) Lino Jeva’s version of Superman and Lois Lane, in “Deadly Friction” (1966).

(Top right:) Clark Kent and young Barby—a continuing character in the Italian stories who was assistant to a rock star—as drawn by Sergio Tarquinio in “Hypnotic Violence” (1966). Barby would’ve been right at home in a DC romance comic of that period. (left:) Nembo Kid goes back in time to 1944 and fights the Nazis again in “The Enemy Who Knew” (1966), also by Tarquinio. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

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The Italian Man Of Steel & Dark Knight in the 1960s

England Swings—And Nembo Kid Flies!

(Left:) Nembo Kid in a realistically rendered London, as drawn by Raffaele Paparella in “The Great Swindle” (1966).

(Above:) Dramatic cover by Antonio Toldo, in a very Curt Swan vein (which is hardly a bad thing), for Superman #587 (1967). [© 2012 DC Comics.]

movie feature starring Adam West and Burt Ward—Bagnoli decided to create a monthly comics magazine specifically devoted to the Dark Knight, whose first issue hit the stands on December 12, 1966. Again, most of the stories which appeared in it were culled from the DC comic books, new and old, yet from the very start there were Italian-made covers, usually drawn by Toldo and Bagnoli.

Whereas Sergio Tarquinio did a couple of “Batman” stories in 1967, the majority of them were drawn by the brothers Montecchi, who gave Bruce Wayne the face of French actor Alain Delon and excelled at drawing female characters. See, for instance, “Catwoman’s Claws,” in Batman #11 (July 9, 1967) and “The Trustworthy Governess,” in #74 (July 12, 1969).

Besides utilizing such classic villains as The Joker, The Penguin, and The Riddler, writers Carpi and Catalano also

created new ones like Maleficus.

Early in 1969, Enrico Bagnoli left his editing job at Mondadori to move on in his artistic career, and Italianmade “Superman” and “Batman” stories stopped being produced.

Following is a list of those somewhat light-hearted yet interesting adventures, which gave a touch of Europe to an allAmerican super-hero—just in case some curious readers might be interested in getting hold of them.

Holy Roman Empire, Batman!

Enrico Bagnoli’s cover for Mondadori’s Batman #1 (1966), in the era of the Batman TV series, which was seen in Italy, as well. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

”Spaghetti” Superman, a.k.a. The Nembo Kid—And Batman, Too!

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For Comparison Purposes Only American Jim Mooney’s and Italian Marco Rota’s respective splash pages for the “Superman & Batman” story “The Secret of the Captive Cavemen” (1963) and its Mondadori remake “Earth Raiders” (1964). Note Batman's red Italian costume here and below. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

THE ITALIAN SUPERMAN/NEMBO KID AND BATMAN STORIES: A CHECKLIST

Legend: TITLE (Years when Italian stories appeared in it) Issue Number (Month/Day/Year of publication) – “Italian Title” (“English Translation of Italian Title,” artist[s]. Notes) They’ve Got Him

A) “SUPERMAN” and “SUPERMAN & BATMAN” STORIES

ALBI DEL FALCO – NEMBO KID (1962-66) 315 (04/29/62) – Cover (?)

317 (05/13/62) – “Cronaca lampo” (“Flashing News,” Cimpellin) 318 (05/20/62) – “Matto da legare” (“Raving Mad,” Cimpellin) 319 (05/27/62) – “Il principe che doveva morire” (“The Prince Who Was to Die,” Magni) 320 (06/03/62) – “Il quiz liberatore” (“The Liberating Quiz,” Cossio) 321 (06/10/62) – “I pirati del cielo” (“Sky Pirates,” Cimpellin) 322 (06/17/62) – “Fuochi di artifizio” (“Fireworks,” Magni) 323 (06/24/62) – “Il tesoro del pirata” (“Pirate’s Treasure,” Magni) 324 (07/01/62) – “Yeeps il distruttore” (“Yeeps the Destroyer,” Magni) 325 (07/08/62) – “Base Segreta” (“Secret Base,” Cimpellin) 326 (07/15/62) – “Imprese spaziali” (“Space Feats,” Cimpellin) 330 (08/12/62) – “L’invasore

malefico” (“Evil Invader,” Magni) 331 (08/19/62) – “La legge del silenzio” (“Law of Silence,” Magni) 332 (08/26/62) – “Anno Mille” (“The Year 1000,” Cimpellin) 333 (09/02/62) – “Il terribile sospetto” (“Dreadful Suspicion,” Magni, costarring Supergirl) 347 (12/09/62) – “Segreto inviolato” (“Unrevealed Secret,” Magni) 353 (01/20/63) – “Arcipelago inesistente” (“The Archipelagus That Wasn’t There,” Magni) 355 (02/03/63) – “L’ultima profezia” (“The Last Prophecy,” Magni) 362 (03/24/63) – Cover (?)

375 (06/23/63) – Cover (Magni?)

388 (09/22/63) – Cover (Rota) 405 (01/19/64) – “L’idolo infranto” (“Broken Idol,” Rota) 407 (02/02/64) – Cover (Rota) 409 (02/16/64) – “L’idioma silenzioso” (“Silent Language,” Rota) 411 (03/01/64) – “Il folle tiranno” (“The Mad Tyrant,” Rota) 412 (03/08/64) – Cover (Rota); “I razziatori della Terra” (“The Earth Raiders,” Rota. Co-starring Batman and Robin. Remake of “The Secret of the Captive Cavemen,” World’s Finest #138, Sept. 1963)

Outnumbered!

Superman teams up with Batman, Robin, and Batwoman to fight Lex Luthor in “The Invincible Ape” (1964). Art by Marco Rota, who, says Alberto Becattini, was the sole artist on all the “Superman & Batman” team-up stories produced in Italy from 1963 to 1966. [Page © 2012 DC Comics.]

Marco Rota.

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The Italian Man Of Steel & Dark Knight in the 1960s

Catapulted To Adventure Leo Cimpellin splash page for “Anno Mille” (1962), a tale set in the year 1000 A.D. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

418 (04/19/64) – “I cristalli viventi” (“The Living Crystals,” Rota. Costarring Batman and Robin.

Patently inspired by “The Beasts of the Supernatural,” World’s Finest #133, May 1963) 423 (05/24/64) – Cover (Rota) 426 (06/14/64) – Cover (Rota) 429 (07/05/64) – Cover (Rota) 431 (07/19/64) – Cover (Rota) 433 (08/02/64) – Cover (Rota) 434 (08/09/64) – Cover (Rota) 437 (08/30/64) – “Barriera invisibile” (“The Invisible Barrier,” Rota. Costarring Batman and Robin.

Patently inspired by “The Band of Super-Villains,” World’s Finest #134, June 1963) 439 (09/13/64) – Cover (Rota) 447 (11/08/64) – Cover (Rota) 455 (01/03/65) – “Sfere magnetiche” (“Magnetic Spheres,” Rota) 462 (02/21/65) – “Prigione verde” (“Green Jail,” Rota. Co-starring Supergirl) 472 (05/02/65) – “Minaccia mortale” (“Mortal Menace,” Rota. Costarring Supergirl) 478 (06/13/65) – “Una vittoria su Nembo Kid” (“One Victory Over Superman,” Rota) 480 (06/27/65) – “L’eremita d’acciaio” (“Steel Hermit,” Rota) 486 (08/08/65) – “Il problema capitale” (“The Main Problem,” Rota) 488 (08/22/65) – “Da pavido ad eroe” (“A Coward Turns Hero,” Rota) 491 (09/12/65) – “Ladri di Bestiame” (“Cattle Thieves,” Rota) 512 (02/06/66) – “Le statue viventi” (“The Living Statues,” Rota) 518 (03/20/66) – “Un grande cacciatore” (“A Great Hunter,” Rota) 520 (04/03/66) – “Un giorno fortunato” (“A Lucky Day,” Rota) 528 (05/29/66) – “Attrito Mortale” (“Deadly Friction,” Jeva)

SUPERMAN NEMBO KID (1966-67) 529 (06/05/66) – Cover (Tarquinio); “Violenza per ipnosi” (“Hypnotic Violence,” Tarquinio) 530 (06/12/66) – Cover (Tarquinio?); “Agguato sul fondo” (“Ambush on the Sea Bottom,” Tarquinio) 535 (07/17/66) – Cover (Toldo); “La grande truffa” (“The Great Swindle,” Paparella) 539 (08/14/66) – “I rapitori” (“The Kidnappers,” Tarquinio) 543 (09/01/66) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?]); “Il nemico che sapeva” (“The Enemy Who Knew,” Tarquinio)

544 (9/18/66) – “La sfida dell’Innominabile” (“Challenge of the Unnamable,” Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

547 (10/09/66) – “La complicata eredità” (“A Complex Inheritance,” Paparella) 548 (10/16/66) – Cover (Toldo) 554 (11/27/66) – Cover (Jeva) 556 (12/11/66) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

557 (12/18/66) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?]); “Il volto del gangster” (“The Gangster’s Face,” Paparella?)

560 (01/08/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

564 (02/05/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

568 (03/05/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

571 (03/26/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?]); “Il superfuorilegge” (“The Super-Rogue,” Tarquinio.

Co-starring Batman) 572 (04/02/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

573 (04/09/67) – “Il derby” (“The Steeple Chase,” Paparella)

SUPERMAN (1967-70) 575 (04/23/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

582 (07/30/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?]); “Il colpo” (“The Heist,” Bagnoli) 587 (10/08/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?]); “Delta chiama l’O.N.U.” (“Delta Calling the U.N.,” Toldo [& Bagnoli]) 589 (11/05/67) – Cover (Toldo [& Bagnoli?])

643 (11/30/69) – “Il festival” (“The Festival,” Montecchi) 651 (03/22/70) – Cover (Montecchi)

SUPERALBO NEMBO KID (1960-64) 01 (06/20/60) - Cover (Massimo De Vita) 30 (11/20/62) – Cover (Magni); “Operazione Z” (“Operation Z,” Magni) 31 (12/20/62) – “L’inutile ultra-potere” (“The Useless Super-Power,” Cimpellin) 51 (08/20/64) – “L’invincibile orango” (“The Invincible Ape,” Rota. Costarring Batman , Robin, and Batwoman) 55 (12/20/64) – “Campagna diffamatoria” (“A Slandering Campaign,” Rota) BATMAN – NEMBO KID (1965-66) 67 09/13/65) – “La leggenda di Perseo” (“The Legend of Perseus,” Rota.

Partly set in Florence, Italy) 78 (01/14/66) – “Il genio di SandorSandor” (“The Genius of SandorSandor,” Rota)

“Clark Kent Vs. Clark Kent” The Toldo/Bagnoli cover of Superman Nembo Kid #560 (1967)—it did Mort Weisinger up proud! [© 2012 DC Comics.]

”Spaghetti” Superman, a.k.a. The Nembo Kid—And Batman, Too!

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TOTAL GIVEAWAYS (1968-69) 01 (1968) – “S.O.S. – Terra cerca petrolio” (“S.O.S. – Earth Looking for Oil,” Montecchi. Sticker story, sponsored by Total Gasoline, costarring Batman, Robin, Supergirl, and Batgirl) 02 (1969) – “La diabolica invenzione” (“The Diabolical Invention,” Montecchi. Sticker story, sponsored by Total Gasoline, costarring Batman, Robin, Supergirl, and Batgirl)

B) “BATMAN” STORIES

BATMAN – NEMBO KID (1966) 83 (04/25/66) – “Città di argilla” (“City of Clay,” Rota) 85 (05/23/66) – “Circe spietata” (“Merciless Circe,” Cimpellin)

The Cat’s Meow (Left:) Gorgeous Catwoman cover by Piero & Paolo Montecchi for Batman #11 (1967). Well, at least Batman was back to correct blue and gray by this time—probably because of the TV series.

(Right:) Splash page for “The Spider’s Web” (1969), likewise by the brothers Montecchi. Too bad Batman was never known as Pipistrèllo Kid, let alone as L’Uomo Pipistrèllo! (We figure you can guess what English word the foregoing “P-word” is Italian for.) [© 2012 DC Comics.]

58 (04/27/68) – “La tela del ragno” (“The Spider’s Web,” Montecchi) 74 (12/07/69) – “Governante fidata” (“The Trustworthy Governess,” Montecchi. Featuring Superman and Batgirl)

BATMAN (1967-69) 04 (03/12/67) – “Lo Spettro” (“The Ghost,” Montecchi) 05 (04/12/67) – “La storia di Adam West” (“The Adam West Story,” Toldo & Bagnoli. Mini-bio of Batman TV series star) Covers: #1 (Toldo & Bagnoli), 6, 9, 11 (Montecchi), 14 (Toldo & 06 (04/30/67) – “La storia di Burt Ward” (“The Burt Ward Story,” Bagnoli), 58 (Montecchi), 59, 61 (unknown), 62, 74 (Montecchi) Montecchi. Mini-bio of Batman TV series co-star) 11 (07/09/67) – “L’artiglio della Gatta” (“Catwoman’s Claws,” Alberto Becattini was born in Florence, Italy, where he still lives Montecchi. Featuring Catwoman) today, with his wife and tons of books and comics. A teacher of English in 16 (09/17/67) – “L’impronta del Fantasma” (“The Ghost’s Mark,” high school, he has been collecting and studying U.S. comics, animation Tarquinio) cartoons, and illustration since he was a kid. From 20 (11/12/67) – “La superstizione” the 1970s onward, he has written hundreds of articles (“Superstition,” Montecchi. “A Miniand essays. He is a regular contributor of The Walt Mystery”) Disney Company Italy, for which he has edited, 21 (11/26/67) – “La sparizione di Robin” among other things, the Carl Barks and Floyd (“Robin Vanishes,” Tarquinio) Gottfredson story collections. He has translated 23 (12/24/67) – “Il grande colpo di Natale” Disney stories for Gladstone Publishing, has written (“The Great Christmas Robbery,” articles for Alter Ego, Comic Book Artist, Comic Montecchi. Featuring Catwoman, The Book Marketplace, Walt’s People, and Joker, The Penguin, and The Riddler); Fantagraphic Books. As an indexer he has “L’errore” (“The Mistake,” Toldo [& contributed to the Who’s Who of American Comic Bagnoli?]. “A Mini-Mystery”) Books (1928-1999), the I.N.D.U.C.K.S., and the 33 (05/12/68) – “Maleficus elimina Batman” Grand Comics Database. He has helped organize (“Maleficus Crushes Batman,” Montecchi) several comics conventions in Italy, conducting 41 (09/01/68) – “Batman e Robin insegnano lo panels with some of the artists he most admires. His judo” (“Batman and Robin Teach Judo,” books include monographs about Montecchi) Milton Caniff, Floyd Gottfredson, Bob 46 (11/10/68) – “La bomba esplode!” (“The Lubbers, Paul Murry, Alex Raymond, Bomb Bursts!,” Montecchi) Ramono Scarpa, and Alex Toth.

48 (12/08/68) – “L’incubo della giungla” Alberto Becattini. (“Jungle Nightmare,” Montecchi)

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“Cartoonists Are Good Guys” Part III Of Our Career-Spanning Interview With Artist/Writer LEONARD STARR Interview Conducted by Jim Amash

Transcribed by Brian K. Morris

Who Ya Gonna Call? “Ghost-Breaker”!

Leonard Starr (photo) drew the “Ghost-Breaker” feature in two different periods, nearly two decades apart.

(Left:) The series was called simply “Ghost-Breaker” (both with and without a hyphen) when he first illustrated it in such mags as Star Spangled Comics #127 (April 1952), although the hero’s name was already Dr. Thirteen. No matter; the mag would be cancelled with #130. Scripter unknown.

Starr’s cover for SSC #127 was seen in A/E #110. Thanks to Jim Kealy.

(Right:) With a May-June 1969 cover date, DC later revived the series as “Dr. 13 the Ghost-Breaker” in a resuscitated Phantom Stranger series. This time, Doc narrated the adventures; his name was spelled out in the stories themselves. Script by France “Ed” Herron. Thanks to Stephan Friedt. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

The photo of Starr is from Cartoonist PROfiles magazine #10 (June 1971); taken by Chet Hopper.

s related over the past two issues, artist Leonard Starr started out as a background artist at Funnies, Inc., quickly becoming an inker and then a penciler/inker. During the 1940s and ‘50s, his work appeared in comic books published by McCombs, Orbit, Parents Magazine Press, ACG, Avon, DC, Timely/Marvel, and St. John Publications, among others. He left comic books in 1957 to do the widely acclaimed On Stage newspaper strip which he had created; later he drew the venerable and eternally young Little Orphan Annie, as Annie. This issue, he discusses his attention-getting work for DC Comics and his time in advertising in the 1950s. Thanks to our mutual friend Tom Sawyer (whom I interviewed in A/E # 77) for giving me Leonard’s contact info.

—Jim.

A

“I Brought Samples Up [To DC], And They Hired Me”

JA: Do you remember how you started at DC Comics?

STARR: I brought samples up, and they hired me. It was probably Murray Boltinoff or Jack Schiff who hired me. Jack and Murray worked in the same cubicle, and they had their desks in front of a window. I think Jack Schiff handled the scripts, and Murray handled the artists. I liked both Murray and Jack a lot. Jack was very highly educated. He was a specialist on Virgil, if you can believe it. But he didn’t lay it on you with a trowel. Jack was not a show-off.

“Cartoonists Are Good Guys”

39

something, and he says, “Hessians, huh?” And I said, “Yeah.” He says, “I always hated those guys.” [mutual laughter] He was, of course, the first Hessian-hater I’ve ever run into. I’m sure there had to be many others, but none of them declared it.

JA: So they were lively back there.

STARR: Yes. When you get a bunch of guys who are there all the time, either it’s deadly silent and everybody’s suffering, or everybody’s going crazy. [chuckles]

JA: Mort Drucker worked back there for a while. Did you ever see Mort?

STARR: I know I met him, and he worked for DC there for a while. I liked his stuff a lot. His later celebrity didn’t surprise me.

DC Come, DC Go (Above:) This late-1951 photo, which originally appeared in A/E #98, depicts the DC editors with whom Starr had the most dealings, plus one. (Left to right:) George Kashdan, Murray Boltinoff, Jack Schiff, & Mort Weisinger.

Thanks to Joe Desris.

(Right:) This 1970s pic of DC production guru Jack Adler was seen in full when he was interviewed by Jim Amash for A/E #56. Sadly, Jack passed away in September of 2011.

JA: Murray’s been described to me as a guy who was hard to get to know.

What did you think?

STARR: I don’t know, we got along fine. The whole thing was deadlines. You brought it in on time. I remember once, he got me in trouble. Somebody else had come in very late, and I was standing there. I’d just delivered a job, and I was talking to Jack Schiff, and Murray said to the guy who was late, “What is this

Mort Weisinger was there, too, but I didn’t have to deal with him. His office was separate from Jack and Murray’s. Mort was something! A writer would pitch a story to him, and Mort would say, “Oh, that’s always good!” [laughter] So you can see he was a favorite of mine.

JA: I take it you dealt with Boltinoff more than Schiff.

STARR: Yes. Jack was lively, more so than Murray. Jack was very mobile, walking around a lot. Every now and again, Murray would feel that he had to do some editing, so he’d say, “Look at that drawing. Look at how fat that leg is.” First, I would argue with him, then finally, I thought, “I’ll just go in the back room and correct it,” and I’d put white on the outside of the line, not change a thing, and bring it back to him. He’d say, “See?” “Right, you’re right, Murray.” [Jim laughs] We all did that kind of thing. And that back room was quite something. That’s where Sol Harrison reigned [in Production]. Those guys were doing color separations and, to this day, I don’t know what the hell they were all doing there. But they kept busy.

Jack Adler was another favorite of mine. Since you know him, see if he remembers this: it was summer, and all of the guys had sent their wives to the country, so they’d have some freedom. But Jack didn’t send his wife away. The guys in Production were mad at Jack for not doing that, for getting away with not doing it. [chuckles] And they razzed him about it. “Boy, there’s Jack’s wife, just slaving for him all the year long, and he won’t even give her a little summer vacation.” We were all joking about it, and in the meantime, Jack kept his head down listening to all of this, continuing to do color separations. Finally, he said, “Well, I just thought, for that kind of money, I’d keep her home and **** her myself.” [uproarious laughter] The room went absolutely dead silent.

I thought, “This is my kind of guy.” [NOTE: Jack, who passed away after this interview was conducted, did confirm the story. —Jim.]

Once, I was doing a cover for some book. It was a period piece with Hessian soldiers. They wore those Pope-like helmets, and Sol Harrison walked over. I was making some corrections or

Indian Giver Some of Starr’s earliest work for DC consisted of back-up features in the new Tomahawk comic. This splash from #3 (Jan.-Feb. 1951) was provided by Stephan Friedt. Writer unknown. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

40

Part III Of Our Career-Spanning Interview With Artist/Writer Leonard Starr

STARR: [laughs] No, I think you’re wrong there. I would have remembered that last one.

The others are very likely. I vaguely remember “Captain Compass.”

JA: Well, you might have done some back-up stories there. “Davy Crockett” was a feature in Frontier Fighters that is attributed to you.

STARR: It’s possible I did that.

JA: “Dr. 13, the Ghost-Breaker.”

STARR: I remember the character.

JA: You also had work in Gang Busters, which was based on the radio show. I have you doing miscellaneous House of Mystery stories, “Manhunters Around the World,” and My Greatest Adventure, which was also a genre mystery kind of book. You also drew “Mysto, Magician Detective.”

Double Play A pair of DC splashes, with scripters unknown but art by Leonard Starr.

(Left:) “Manhunters around the World” from Star Spangled Comics #112 (Jan. 1951). Thanks to Jim Kealy.

(Right:) House of Mystery #16 (June 1953), with inks that sender Stephan Friedt feels may be by Sheldon Moldoff. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

crap? Listen, Leonard Starr does terrific work. He always brings it in on time. What’s the problem?” Whoever it was gave me a dirty look, and I didn’t really want to be a model for deadlines.

That’s all Murray wanted. He just wanted to make sure his desk was clean, your work was acceptable, you didn’t screw it up, and that was that. Aside from that, he was a very nice guy. Most of my work there was with Murray and Jack. It was very pleasant, and I think later on I inked a job, much much later, just because they were stuck, and I did it as sort of a tribute to Jack and Murray. My association with them was so pleasant that I was happy to help out. It was a “Superman” story.

JA: I have you down as doing that in 1988.

STARR: ’88, that seems a little recent. It could be. My memory isn’t what it used to be.

JA: Did you ever work for Julie Schwartz?

STARR: I did one job for Julie Schwartz. He had his own stable, and I was in Jack and Murray’s stable. I don’t think he liked what I gave him, and I found him not easy to work with. Julie was mean to people—made sure they knew he was the boss. I was just as happy that it didn’t work out.

JA: You never did work for Weisinger, did you?

STARR: No, I didn’t. I heard the stories about him. I avoided him.

JA: I want to run down some of the features that you did and see if anything sparks a memory. One of the characters was “Captain Compass”… “Casebook Mystery”… “Congo Bill”… and some work in Dale Evans Comics.

STARR: All of that runs together now, but it’s possible I did all of that.

JA: “Nighthawk,” which was a Western character.

STARR: DC had some sort of anniversary book of characters, and I did a Nighthawk page for them, but I barely remembered having done it in the ’50s. I remember they sent me some reference, so I knew what his costume looked like.

JA: That drawing was for the Who’s Who in the DC Universe books. I also have you drawing some “Phantom Stranger.”

STARR: “Phantom Stranger,” maybe.

JA: And “Pow-Wow Smith, Indian Lawman,” from ’51 to ’53.

STARR: I remember that one, but no details really come to mind.

The stories weren’t that special. You have to remember how many pages left our drawing boards. Once I finished a job, it pretty much left my mind. You’ve experienced the same thing working in comics.

JA: Yes, I have. Did DC pay the best of any company?

STARR: At that time, DC was paying me something like eighteen bucks a page, which was considered a pretty good page rate. When Ziff-Davis started their line, they were paying twenty, 21 dollars a page and wow, did we rush over there! But I don’t think they were really ever seriously into it. I don’t know how long their comic book line lasted, but it wasn’t long.

JA: About four years. They published stuff like Bill Stern’s Sports Comics, Red Grange Football Thrills, Bob Feller Baseball Comics, among so much other stuff.

STARR: True, but they weren’t primarily a comics publisher. They were only into comics to make money, and I don’t think they made

“Cartoonists Are Good Guys”

41

that much at it. They hired Jerry Siegel to be the editor, and he wasn’t cut out for the job. Jerry wasn’t tough enough to be an editor, and the whole thing started collapsing. But really, Jerry only had one idea, and that was “Superman.”

JA: Did you consider DC to be the top company when you freelanced there?

STARR: Yes, I did. They were ahead of Marvel at that time.

JA: Did you ever deal with Robert Kanigher?

STARR: Kanigher, yeah. I didn’t like him. He was not pleasant, and most of the guys were pleasant.

JA: Jack and Murray were very politically minded people. Did you ever talk politics with them?

STARR: Nope! Never. Not a word that I can recall. Whoever was in political office, they may have said lousy things about them or complimentary things, depending on which side of the spectrum they were, but everybody did that. If you didn’t like the President, you said it.

JA: They had an assistant editor named George Kashdan.

STARR: I remember George; he was a young guy then. All I remember is that he was there. I don’t know what, specifically, he did.

“What I Wanted To Learn Was Anatomy”

JA: He was an assistant script editor for them, and then he later edited his own books. I’d like to change the subject away from comics for a bit.

You told me you had studied under Frank Riley at the Art Students League. When did you do that?

STARR: I was about 27, 28. This is after I’d been a working professional for years. Dean Cornwell advised it. I was already a member of The Society of Illustrators, and he gave a talk. He’d been looking

The Dean Of Illustrators This painting by Dean Cornwell, who is considered one of the classic American illustrators of the 20th century, was done for an edition of the novel Never the Twain Shall Meet, by Peter B. Kyne. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

at the stuff that Frank Riley’s kids were doing, and it was very good, so I spoke to him about it. He says, “Oh, yeah, you really ought to take classes [at the Art Students League].” It was a good idea, but it was too late for me. I was already too busy working, and I think he died shortly after that, too. It was a strain to make the deadlines and also go to school. But the worst thing that ever happened to my career was to not go to the Art Students League, and study with Riley when I got out of high school. I went to Pratt.

The High School of Art was a very good idea, but the art teachers were not teachers. You would draw one of the other students. And the teacher would come around and say, “Well, that hand needs a little work, and that arm is too long.” No instruction at all, just that kind of thing, and what you got out of it was two periods of art a day where you drew all the time, and so the kids improved.

At Pratt, it was pretty much the same thing. They were more into service art. What I wanted to learn was anatomy, because I was very concerned about making a living, and there was none of that at all. The school had been given over to designers. There were classes on two-dimensional design and three-dimensional design, and I didn’t care about any of that. What I wanted to know was how to draw as well as I possibly could so I could turn it into bucks, and I wasn’t getting that. That’s when I saw the ad for Funnies, Inc., on the bulletin board, and you know where that led.

But I felt guilty about it, and there was a guy—I forget his name, Forrester, maybe—who was reputed to be a good anatomy teacher, and he was teaching at night. So I went to night school. It was the same thing: he would come in, set up the class, and leave, maybe come in at the end of the class. God knows what else he was doing the rest of the time. It was just as desultory as my daytime work had been, so I quit going. Pretty much everything I did, I learned on my own.

The Greeks Had A Picture For It! Frank Riley, mentioned by Starr in the interview, was another celebrated illustrator, whose work was utilized in this 1953 art for a Shell Oil advertisement. He also became a noted teacher of art. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

JA: What was Frank Riley like as a teacher?

STARR: Let me tell you the way he ran a class. First of all, he said, “There are only about ten mistakes that every student makes, but he makes them over and over so it looks like a hundred. So if you correct one mistake, you’ve corrected ten.” He would correct one student’s work a session, and everybody had to watch. So you saw

42

Part III Of Our Career-Spanning Interview With Artist/Writer Leonard Starr

Let’s Have A “Pow-Wow” “Pow-Wow Smith” began in 1949 as a series about an “Indian lawman” which was set in the Old West; but sometime before Detective Comics #181 (March 1952), it had clearly shifted to present day without benefit of time machine! Scripter unknown. Thanks to Stephan Friedt. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

four years after high school, I’d have been a better artist.

JA: Before I get into Johnstone & Cushing, you said that you had known Al Plastino and Jack Sparling at True Comics. Were you talking about the comic book? That was a magazine for Parents Magazine.

STARR: Yes, and they paid well, too. I don’t know that I actually did ever work for them.

JA: What do you remember about Jack Sparling?

STARR: I didn’t get to know Sparling that well.

JA: You mentioned to me that you knew John Giunta.

STARR: I thought I could get John to help me on On Stage early on, and we just had a different view of art. He was a very, very sweet guy. He was always deferential, which I didn’t think he needed to be, and he did very nice work, but it wasn’t what I had in mind.

“The Rate For Advertising Art Was Better Than What I Was Getting For Comics”

JA: Before we get to your newspaper strip work, I want to ask you how you got to Johnstone & Cushing, and when? I have around 1950.

exactly what the kid had done that was—well, “kid”—we were in our twenties, thirties, but it was a terrific way of teaching.

Everything was explained regarding where you went wrong. He didn’t teach anatomy, per se. He taught spacial relationships, so that what happens at the top of the head is very important to what happens at the bottom... how to plant the figure on the ground, it was just great, just great. And if I’d been getting that for three or

Tex Went Thataway!

(Right:) A signed Tex Blaisdell splash page from Youthful Magazines’ Captain Science #6 (Oct. 1961); thanks to Jim Ludwig.

(Above:) Screen capture of Blaisdell when he appeared on the popular TV series To Tell the Truth, circa 1970-71, drawing Little Orphan Annie. Thanks to Mike DeLisa. [Both items © 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

STARR: Yeah, early ’50s. The rate for advertising art was better than what I was getting for comics, and I was interested in that. So I went up there, showed them my stuff, they said okay, and I started working for them. That’s the way all of it worked. At that time, nobody was stealing anybody from anybody. In other words, I never got a call saying, “I’ve got this thing and I know you’re working for DC or whoever. Would you do this?” You went to companies and said, “I’d like to work for you.”

JA: How did you meet Stan Drake?

STARR: Tex Blaisdell had been working for me for years and years, and when Stan started [the comic strip The Heart of] Juliet Jones, Tex went to work for Stan.

Tex told Stan who he had been working for, and he showed him my stuff. Stan said, “Listen, send him up to Johnstone & Cushing, and tell them I said to look at it. That’s what he should

“Cartoonists Are Good Guys”

43

News Flash!

(Left:) In this Flash Gordon panel for Feb. 26, 1986, Flash and Dale Arden depart Mongo for Earth… and indeed, by this point, the high adventure instilled in that iconic sciencefantasy strip first by creator Alex Raymond, then by Mac Raboy, was already mostly in its past. Still, the Bob Fujitani art is nice; script by Dan Barry. No way, natch, could we track down that “week or two of dailies” Starr says he drew of the strip! [© 2012 King Features Syndicate, Inc.] (Far left:) Dan Barry on the French Riviera, June 1958, in a photo printed in David Anthony Kraft’s Comics Interview #81 or 82; with thanks to Jim Amash.

(Near left:) Dan’s brother Seymour “Sy” Barry, for many years the noted artist of The Phantom; see his interview in A/E #37. Thanks to Mike DeLisa.

be doing.

There’s more money in that.” Stan was the Ace up at Johnstone & Cushing. Man, he could draw a girl crazy about a refrigerator that was absolutely carnal. [Jim laughs once more] No kidding! I could never touch him. Never, ever touch him in that.

Stan was a terrific guy. He was the best joke-teller of all the cartoonists. His father [Alan Drake] had been a fairly famous radio actor, a man of a thousand voices, and Stan inherited the genes. So the highlights of cartoonists meetings were Stan’s latest gags.

JA: How did you meet Tex Blaisdell? You say Blaisdell was working for you. He was working for you on On Stage, right?

STARR: Later, he was. I met him when he was a production assistant at Hillman [Periodicals]. The dreaded word “inventory” came up, and of course, I ran right out and got as many jobs as I could from every other house, and I had like five scripts. It wasn’t until I got home that I realized that the deadlines were very close on all of them, and so here is the quandary: do I give back the scripts? Not a good idea. Can I do them? No! [laughs] I didn’t know what the hell to do.

Meanwhile, Tex was on hiatus as well from Hillman. You know, all of us were living from hand to mouth in those days. Tex called me if I knew anybody who could use some help on anything. I said, “Wait a minute. Do you think you could do backgrounds?”

He said, “Well, I never have, but I’ll give it a try.” He gave the backgrounds a try, and he turned out to be terrific at it. I never did backgrounds again for the rest of my life. [laughs] All of a sudden, I realized that I think I paid 20% for the backgrounds of the price or 25, whatever it was. But I could spend all of my time doing 80% work instead of the entire thing. At one time, we were turning out 18 pages a week. We became very close friends and our families became friends, and I loved him to the dying day.

He was a terrific guy, a very bright, very well-read, a good sense

of humor. He did backgrounds for me on On Stage, and he did backgrounds for Irwin Hasen on Dondi, and assisted Hal Foster. And he did a lot of work with Bob Oksner.

It was a lively relationship. We had a good time, and in the early days of working together, television had yet to become big, so we listened to the radio. On would come The Shadow, and the announcer would say, “Who knows what evil—?” And both of us would say, “Lurks!” [mutual laughter] That was the atmosphere, really, and not only with Tex and myself, but with all the cartoonists. The best thing is if you’re sharing a studio. It’s always very lively and raffish. Cartoonists are good guys. You know that, too.

JA: I sure do. Did Tex do your backgrounds on all your DC comics?

STARR: He probably did.

JA: So he was with you for quite a while, then.

STARR: Oh, yes! He lived in Whitestone and I lived in Centerport, so he was about an hour’s drive, but if the volume of work was heavy, he slept over. He was a regular at our table, and my thenwife was very fond of him, and we became very fond of his wife Lanie [Elaine]. It was very familial.

I had four assistants while I did On Stage, though only one at a time: Carl Anderson, Tex, Al McWilliams, and Frank Springer.

JA: When you were at Johnstone & Cushing, did you get to know Gill Fox?

STARR: I knew Gill Fox for a long time, but I don’t know if it started at Johnstone & Cushing. Gill was a real comics buff. He would examine trends to see what was popular and where comics was heading. One day, he came in and said, “Where it is right now is ambiguity.” [mutual laughter] “No kidding, Gill. [more mutual laughter] How’re you gonna handle that?” He says, “Well, you better get on it.” [even more mutual laughter]

“I Liked Seymour [Barry] and I Didn’t Like Dan [Barry]”

JA: Before you started drawing On Stage, you did some ghost art on Flash Gordon dailies. I guess Dan Barry was still in the country then. I know he was overseas for a long time.

STARR: He shared a studio with Johnny [Prentice] and me.

JA: What was Dan like?

STARR: Nobody’s favorite person. He was a very strange guy. He

44

Part III Of Our Career-Spanning Interview With Artist/Writer Leonard Starr

The Sorcerer’s Apt Prentice (Far left:) John Prentice’s cover art for Gang Busters #47 (Aug.-Sept. 1955). [© 2012 DC Comics.]

(Near left:) The first “Fireman Farrell” splash page from Showcase #1 (MarchApril 1956). Leonard reports that Prentice had been a Fireman First Class in the Navy during World War II—so it’s not his fault that, around the DC offices, this “Fire Fighters” issue was considered one of the all-time bombs. Script by Arnold Drake—who told us he didn’t much like the idea, either. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

had tremendous personal charm, and that’s what you saw right off. He’d be good company, and then later there would be little insidious things. Oh, we were using too much of his sugar…. It was a very odd thing. He went to Europe, and he had a hi-fi console. It was like a long bench, but it had everything in it; the turntable—no cassettes at that time—just phonograph records. We were living in a large apartment on Central Park West, so we each had our own room. When he went to Europe for, I think, three or four weeks, he locked the console up in his room. And finally, Johnny says something about the reason he travelled, “He can’t get away from himself because he takes himself wherever he goes.” That kind of thing…. It was too bad because when the charming side of him was predominant, he was terrific company. He was very bright and talented, and there’s absolutely no reason that he should have been such a jerk.

And he was absolutely appalling in how he treated his brother Seymour. Dan had come out of the Depression where his parents couldn’t provide for him, so they put him in an orphanage. Maybe Seymour was still raised with his parents? Anyway, Dan was a good-looking guy, much better looking than Seymour. Dan was good with the ladies, and Seymour was not. He was just a slip of a boy. [laughter] Well, so was I. What the hell? Dan was terrible, just terrible, to his brother, and Seymour was a nice kid. Ah, well. I liked Seymour and I didn’t like Dan.

JA: What did you do on Flash Gordon?

STARR: Pencils and inks. Just a week or two of dailies, I think.

JA: Did Dan give you any layouts, or was that all up to you?

STARR: No layouts. I was given a script. Dan wanted to go to Europe or something, and maybe he was late on his deadline.

Whatever the reason it was, he asked me to do it and I did it.

“You Go Through Pearl Harbor, And It Kills You Almost Sixty Years Later”

JA: Tell me about John Prentice, since you were so close to him.

STARR: John was from Texas, and he had been at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. He liked to draw, so he went to a school in Pittsburgh, which I’d later find had a very good reputation, when he came out of the Navy. He wanted to do illustration, like all of

us. I really wanted to be an illustrator. So he and I were getting divorced about the same time. His wife was giving him a very hard time. One of her complaints was that he was working all the time, and there wasn’t enough money.

Well, there’s no way out of that one, so one night, we were working. We had done a book on the 50th anniversary of powered flight for the Doolittle Committee. It started with Kitty Hawk, 1903 to 1953, so I guess that’s when we did it. We did another book about nuclear power. John was working on a full illustration board of a nuclear sub, and the rat-hole that we had rented had no airconditioning. It was the middle of summer, and it was about 1 o’clock in the morning, and we’re sweating like pigs.

We’re both working in our underwear, and the phone rings. It’s his wife and she’s making more demands and all that, and did a little yelling. Finally, John capitulates and says, “Okay. I’m gonna have to pay for a such-and-such-and-such [in addition to everything else].” He hung up the phone and said to me, “Well, easy come, easy go.” [mutual laughter] That was John. And of course, cartoonists bitch all the time about the drawing paper, or the syndicate, or it’s the lousy pen points, and you can’t get a damn brush—it costs a fortune. All that sort of stuff.

Anyway, my assistant at the time, Carl Anderson—Al Williamson was John’s assistant, and Howie Post would drop in to work, just to get away from his wife for a while—and Carl says, “How about tomorrow? We’ll see if we can come in and go through a whole day without complaining about anything?” Of course, total silence hits the room and finally, John says, “Well, if I can’t piss and moan, I ain’t comin’.” [riotous mutual laughter] So that’s the way that was. And we remained close friends until the end. Actually, what got him was asbestos.

In the Navy, John had been a Fireman First Class, spent most of his time down in the boiler room and there was a lot of asbestos in there then, and about fifty years later, it got him. He knew exactly what he was dying from. Think of an orange rind and there’s that layer of pith, that white layer, then there’s the orange layer. The asbestos cancer hits in the second layer, and so they knew exactly what it was. His son was a lawyer in San Francisco, and I think some claims were made. I don’t know what the outcome of any of that was, because John divorced his wife or his wife divorced him at one point, and he remarried. We weren’t as close as we were, although not alienated, so I don’t know what the disposition of all that was. What a bummer, huh? You go through Pearl Harbor, and it kills you almost sixty years later. [NOTE: John Prentice died in 1999. —Jim.] Anyway, aren’t we supposed to be talking comic books?

“Cartoonists Are Good Guys”

“I Don’t Know That [Outdoors Or Cityscapes] Made Any Difference”

JA: Well, the main thrust of the interview is supposed to be comic books, but your career outside of that is important, too. I don’t want people to think that Leonard Starr died in 1955. [mutual laughter] And you probably wouldn’t like that much, either. That would have ruined your next fifty years. [more laughter] When we were talking about DC Comics, and you were drawing things like “Davy Crockett,” and “Congo Bill”—which calls for a lot of exterior scenes— did you prefer that to Gang Busters, where you were drawing a lot of cityscapes? I was wondering if you had a preference.

STARR: I don’t know that it made any difference. Cities are a lot of buildings and windows, and those are a pain in the butt to draw. Outdoors is a lot of animals and cattle drives, and that’s a pain in the butt, too. So it’s just a matter of whatever came in, that’s what you did. Some were easy, some took a lot of time just because it was the nature of the assignment.

JA: How much research were you doing in those days?

JA: I had a teacher who told me, “Your hand is a flatiron,” and he held a hand up as if to say “Stop.” Then he said “Or it’s a vice,” and closed his hand as if he was holding something, and told us to think about the hand in those ways when animating it. It sounds like you were doing the same thing in a certain sense.

STARR: Well, pretty much. The hand does a lot of different things, and it’s a good thing to know a little bit about what it does.

JA: While you were in comic books, did you ever think about getting your original art back?

STARR: Never. There are guys who save every bit of drawing they ever did, right down to the crayon sketches they did in kindergarten, and other guys that don’t know where the hell it all went. I did some illustrations when I was 20, and I found some that had been returned, and so I’ve got them up on the wall. Why they were returned and why none others were, well, I didn’t ask for them or why I didn’t get the rest of them. The policy of one place would be to return them and the policy of the other one was to throw them in the garbage.

My favorite story was at King Features. They had a very interesting rug which is at The Comics Museum now, and it was all comics. A very nice, very handsome rug. This was in the reception room, and they felt kind of proprietary towards it, so on rainy days, they used to spread out Prince Valiant pages, which were enormous in size, to keep the water off the rug. Yet while they did this, we didn’t think anything about it.

STARR: We all kept a picture file. If we were doing the African jungle, we found something in the South American jungle that looked good, and that’s what we used. We weren’t terribly accurate about any of it.

JA: So you didn’t have anybody nitpicking, “You’ve got the wrong kind of foliage here.”

STARR: No, there was none of that. I don’t remember being questioned on any research. The one odd thing is that I was never offered, nor did I ask for, a super-hero. Why not? I have no idea. If they’d given me one, I would have done it. But apparently, they saw ahead of time that I was hopelessly earthbound, [laughs] which is how my career went.

JA: I’ll bet Hal Foster might have. [laughs]

STARR: Of course he would have, but we weren’t proprietary about it, and they weren’t collectibles in those days.

The kids would write in for an original, and we would send them one.

JA: Why did you leave comic books?

JA: When you had a feature like “Nighthawk” or “Pow-Wow Smith,” did you feel any more of a certain proprietary feeling for the character because you knew you’d be doing the character on a regular basis?

STARR: Nope.

JA: It just didn’t make that much difference, then.

STARR: No. One of the peculiar things about “Nighthawk,” was that I’d seen a million Westerns by that time, and I couldn’t figure out how the hell a Colt .45 was handled. So I got a model of one, and I realized it was like holding a banana, that the whole thing was in front of your fist. Once I understood that, I didn’t have to look at it any more.

45

Nighthawks At The Directory For the June 1986 Who’s Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #16 (or “Volume XVI,” as it says on the cover), DC editor Robert Greenberger reached out to Leonard Starr to draw The Nighthawk, a secret-identity Western hero the artist barely remembered. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

STARR: I went to make more money, and do less work. [Jim chuckles] Really!

Once I found that Johnstone & Cushing paid a lot of money for the same amount of work, I didn’t look back. Comic books at that time were the junk of the industry, and newspaper strips were the pinnacle of that art. And the comic strips, they’re all humor now. Right now, you couldn’t sell a story strip to an editor without an Uzi to his temple. That whole thing is over. Times change. It had its time, but now the comic books are being reviewed in The New York Times.

Jim Amash’s interview with Leonard Starr will conclude next issue.

46

“Something…?”

A Study Of Comics Pioneer RICHARD E. HUGHES

by Michael Vance Utilizing the Collection of Joseph Eacobacci

EDITOR’S Some of the mystery is due to the INTROuse of pseudonyms by artists, writers, DUCTION: In and editors in the early days of the art 2006, in issues form, because the general population #61-62, Alter Ego serialized Michael thought comic books were “kid stuff.”

Vance’s 1996 book Forbidden In addition, many considered them Adventures: The History of the just another passing fad in an American Comics Group—“the most industry where new magazines comprehensive history of one comic book appeared and disappeared frequently.

Hughes, Herbie, & Hughes publisher,” as the author phrased it in Therefore, bylines on stories were A newly discovered, undated color photo of comics editor & his preface. ACG was formally founded usually non-existent, sporadic, or writer Richard E. Hughes and a 1937 photo of his wife Annabel, in the years after World War II, but even misleading. flanking the cover of the ACG comic Herbie #22 (Dec. 1965-Jan. Vance’s book also dealt with the Sangor 1966), wherein the costumed Fat Fury encounters Nemesis and Richard E. Hughes is infamous for Comics Shop, which was formed in 1940 Magicman, a pair of more standard super-heroes. Art by Ogden using false names in the titles to produce comics material for several Whitney. All three heroes were co-created by Hughes. All art produced by the Sangor Comics Shop publishers, including Ned Pines’ accompanying this article was scanned by Michael Vance, from for several different comics company, which was also known at the collection of Joseph Eacobacci, unless otherwise noted. [© companies beginning in 1940 with various times as Thrilling, Nedor, Better, 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

Pines/Thrilling, and by the American or Standard. Prominent at both the Comics Group (ACG) from 1943 to Sangor Shop and the later ACG was 1967. Not only did this policy include his editorial use of pen Richard E. Hughes. The intention of this piece is to utilize a recently names for his own writers and artists; even “Richard E. Hughes” discovered mass of REH materials to further explore the life and career of was a pseudonym! His true name was Leo Rosenbaum. this comics-historically important figure.

A/E

Mystery Man

Comic book writer and editor Richard E. Hughes was a Mystery Man in the truest sense of that early term used to describe superheroes. But a recent, unexpected, and exciting package received at the offices of Alter Ego has shed new light on several aspects of his career.

Additionally, Hughes’ credit as a writer on specific ACG stories is still most often a mystery, because few records were kept of the creative or business activity in the young industry, and Hughes was no exception, which has added to the enigma surrounding his own body of work.

However, it is known that Richard E. Hughes—or at least Leo Rosenbaum—was born on November 5, 1909, and lived until

Something…?”

47

The unique Eacobacci collection holds some surprises, answers many questions—and creates new intriguing enigmas. Its more than forty items include mostly black-&white photographs from the 1930s of Annabel (and her possible friends or relatives, most of them unfortunately unidentified) and one later snapshot of Richard Hughes, the only known color photo of the comics pioneer—plus manuscripts, mostly typed on cheap newsprint, which were intended for radio and television, as well as a comic strip proposal, multiple copies of two novels, a short story, original greeting card verse, some comic book proofs— and several never-published comic scripts.

Cache As Cache Can

The Bad And The Beautiful Two of the American Comics Group’s cornucopia of titles were the trailblazing Adventures into the Unknown and the definitely non-PC Dizzy Dames. Michael Vance scanned these two printer’s proofs from the Eacobacci collection together, and we felt they well represented the gamut run by the company under Hughes. AITU #21 is cover-dated July 1951; Dizzy Dames #4, March-April 1953. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

Incidentally, the complete run of Adventures into the Unknown, as well as its fellow ACG horror title Forbidden Worlds, is currently being reprinted by the English publisher PS Artbooks in a quality hardcover package. Full disclosure: PS Artbooks recently named A/E’s editor its “series consultant” for future comics reprints, including three volumes of the complete Golden Age adventures of The Heap, on sale in September. See ad on p. 71.

January 15, 1974, when he died at the age of 65 of myeloribrosis, a rare blood disease. It was the observation of his wife and of the artists and writers with whom he worked that Hughes was always impeccably and fashionably dressed, was almost never found without his pipe in his mouth, enjoyed parties, loved to laugh (often at his own beloved puns), and was among the kindest, most considerate and professional editors in the business of comic books. It is also clear that Hughes and his wife Annabel were married on January 19, 1935—he was then 26 years old—and that their nearly forty years of marriage produced only one famous offspring: the American Comics Group. Hughes worked there until 1967.

It is now also known that, in 1942, when Hughes was 32 and his wife was 30 years old, they lived at 120 West 183rd Street in the Bronx, that he stood 5' 8" tall, weighed 170 lbs., and listed his occupation as “editor.” Annabel was 5' 4" in height, weighed 119 lbs., and listed no occupation. This personal information comes from their WWII ration books, part of a large package of Annabel’s personal possessions now owned by a Yonkers, New York, resident, Joseph Eacobacci.

Eacobacci recently purchased this amazing cache of materials from a former boyfriend of Annabel’s after her death and generously mailed this collection on loan to Alter Ego editor Roy Thomas for review and for identification. Roy in turn sent it on to me, with Joseph’s permission, because of my 1996 book Forbidden Worlds: The History of the American Comics Group (reprinted in A/E #61-62).

When my original study was written, however, relatively little was known about the elusive Richard Hughes.

Among the surprises are four photos of particular interest. One is of an architect’s drawing of the home of ACG owner (and earlier comics shop proprietor) B.W. Sangor, two are of the completed home, and one is of Sangor and two unknown men.

The latter is the only known photograph of B.W. Sangor!

The cache also includes more than a dozen printer’s proofs of ACG covers, and two black-&-white advertisements designed for publication in an undesignated trade magazine. The proofs are all of covers of American Comics Group titles from the early 1950s.

Printer’s proofs utilize a very high quality of paper, and are given to an editor by a printer for final approval before a title “goes to press.” The Eacobacci materials include proofs of: The Hooded Horseman #21, Cookie #32, Spy Hunters #12, Funny Films #16, Kilroys #33, Soldiers of Fortune #3, Lovelorn #13, Giggle #82, Ha Ha Comics #80, Operation Peril #5, Skeleton Hand #1, Romantic Adventures #23, Adventures into the Unknown #21, Dizzy Dames #4, Forbidden Worlds #15, and Out of the Night #1.

Accompanying the above proofs are three complete comic book stories: “Oakie O’Connor” in “One-Turtle Brain Trust” (7 pages, published in a funny animal title, art by Carl Wessler), “Natch in ‘It’s Love, Love, Love’” (8 pages, teenage comedy, published in The Kilroys), and “The Story of Tolerance” (11 pages, most likely a product of a division of ACG called Custom Comics, with art by Robert Oksner [1916-2007]).

In the “Oakie O’Connor” tale, a young boy earns notoriety as a “whiz kid” (i.e., a genius) until it is discovered that his talking turtle, Oakie, is the true mental giant. But the reptile’s new fame likewise fades, leaving him unfulfilled until he returns to his owner and learns that friendship is the real treasure of life. It was drawn by Fleischer Studios animator Carl Wessler (1913-1989), who continued to earn substantial credits as a comic book writer for multiple publishers, including horror stories for EC Comics. The back of each page of these “Oakie” proof sheets is stamped

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A Study Of Comics Pioneer Richard E. Hughes

The Sangor, Not The Song

So Where’s The Spanish Moss?

(Above:) Two photos of B.W. Sangor’s house, which looks to have been a pretty ritzy place with its Spanish architecture—and a wall, even. For keeping out freelancers, no doubt! Michael Vance writes: “I know that the house was located in Pinewald, New Jersey, and was burned down in the early 1950s. The picture is probably from 1926; local residents called it ‘The Spanish Mansion.’ Odd, since Sangor died in 1955! I know that there were rumors in the town about his mob connections. I also now know that Sangor went to jail for embezzling money from a bank (he sat on their board of directors) that was financing the construction of Pinewald.”

Gross Speculation Render Unto Sangor…

(Above:) This undated photo from the Eacobacci collection shows comics shop owner & later ACG publisher B.W. Sangor with two other men. A handwritten note on the back of the pic says “Caesar – Logan – Sangor,” which we take to mean that Sangor’s the one on the right in the photo.

Does anyone know any different?

(Above:) Here’s a related piece not from the Eacobacci collection: Michael spoke with Neal Slowik, who’s writing a book about Pinewald, NJ, and he informed us that Slowik has in his possession “a letter from [cartoonist] Milt Gross to Sangor recommending Sangor’s housing addition…. Now I understand the two Milt Gross Comics issues published by ACG! Payback!”

Thanks to Neal Slowik for permission to run the illustrated note. [© 2012 Estate of Milt Gross.]

Something…?”

49

Richard Hughes’ Comics & Stories (Far left:) The splash page of the “Oakie O’Connor” story. Neither the Grand Comics Database nor Googling “Oakie O’Connor” yielded more info as to where this yarn might’ve appeared; but the Eacobacci collection contains all seven pages, so it was probably printed somewhere! [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

(Left:) The Kilroys, which ran from 1947 to 1955, was one of the more ambitious Archie-wannabe comic books on the stands. If Natch Kilroy was “Archie,” his pal Jackson was a hepcat version of Jughead. Both “Natch” (short for “Naturally”) and “Jackson” (as in “Solid, Jackson!”) were jive terms of the day. While we don’t know in which issue this tale may have been printed, or the names of the writer or artist (Dan Gordon drew some “Kilroys” stories), the original publisher was B&I Publishing Co., Inc., a forerunner of ACG—and the indicia of issue #1 lists Richard Hughes as editor. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

“Sangor,” with the page number written in pencil, indicating where the story was to be placed within the title.

Natch Kilroy was the star of ACG’s answer to teenage comics superstar Archie Andrews, and he headlined its title The Kilroys.

This story is full of “jive” talk and teenage angst. In “Love, Love, Love,” Portly Portia wants Jackson (Natch’s best friend) for her own, but he rejects her and her invitation to a “kissing party”— only to accept the

Support “Tolerance” Or We’ll Kill You! The splash and an interior page from “The Story of Tolerance”—a super-rare story on which Richard Hughes actually took a byline!

The artist was the late Bob Oksner, well known for his work at DC and elsewhere (see A/E #67), but no other information about the piece is known. Any help out there? [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

invitation when he discovers some very attractive girls will attend.

Natch is disappointed in his buddy and lays a plan to spoil Jackson’s dreams.

Uncharacteristically, Hughes gave himself credit on the first

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A Study Of Comics Pioneer Richard E. Hughes

A Few Sticks of TNT

Eacobacci’s collection includes pencil sketches for a “T.N.T.” logo, complete with periods (featuring an October date, a 10¢ price, and a “Comics” under-hang)—and a wraparound cover on colored paper that must have held a copy of the first or second issue of T.N.T. and which was used to promote the publication of the second. It displays the cover of the second issue, and it is intriguingly possible though not probable that a limited printing of a second issue was produced for this promotional piece.

The cover of the tabloid-size magazine TNT, which Hughes edited and wrote, with cover art by someone signing himself “Francois.” [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

page of “The Story of Tolerance,” perhaps because it was a very serious, condensed history of intolerance and tolerance. Its emphasis is on religious bigotry throughout history, and it is an essay in comics format on America’s triumph of tolerance. There is no copyright on the piece, and, at this time, the person or group that commissioned this booklet or when it may have been published and distributed all remain a mystery.

Hughes was a pioneer in the comic book industry and during his lifetime was one of its most prolific and influential editors and writers. “Dick” created dozens of memorable characters, edited thousands of comic book stories, and most likely wrote well over a thousand of them in his career. Yet, when describing himself in his last résumé, prepared sometime after he left ACG in 1967, he wrote simply: “An experienced and competent editor . . . a writer who knows how to employ the right words. Public relations oriented.

Expert in visual writing. Able to wed words and illustrations with maximum effectiveness.”

Hughes’ career during the Great Depression of the 1930s is ignored in his résumé. Only his graduation in 1930 at age 21 from New York University with a Bachelor of Arts degree (English major, Economics minor) is recorded. His résumé lists no occupation before 1940 (when he was 31 years old). Thereafter, for one year, he worked as a sales correspondent for Standard Mirror and Metal Products of New York City. He was involved in catalog production, including writing product copy. He left this position “to secure higher wages” at Syndicated Features Corporation in 1941.

TNT And Cinema Comics Herald

That same year, Hughes edited and wrote a magazine of satire and comedy for publisher B.W. Sangor (1889-c.-1955) entitled TNT. Until now, almost nothing was known of this publication. It was a tabloid-sized magazine which listed Eric Godal (1899-1969) as its art editor. Godal was a German painter, political cartoonist, and illustrator who also drew covers for such magazines as Collier’s.

Under the Cinema Comics imprint, TNT sold for a dime, featured “cartoons on current issues and American and world politics, as well as burlesques of popular personalities, and was dedicated to debunking sacred cows.” These icons included “the snobs, the agents of oppression, the disseminators of political poisons.”

Exposé magazines were parodied, as well. At 32 pages, it was not a comic book, according to American Humor Magazines and Comic Periodicals (Greenwood Press, 1987; David E. Sloane, editor), and it

failed. No cover art has ever been found… until now.

It is not certain that the T.N.T. logo was meant for use for the actual magazine, although it seems probable that it was a new logo meant for the second issue. That wrap-around cover features, beneath the art for the second, likely-unpublished cover, the following sales pitch at the bottom of the pages: July TNT went off sale with a newsstand circulation of better than 100,000 copies. We know this is not the peak! But it does give TNT that permanent reader following so necessary to a new magazine. And, 100,000 circulation is a good start for a bigger sale on a better October issue, charged with the best in modern humor and satire.

TNT is not just another spicy, girly magazine. TNT’s 100,000 copies were sold on the basis of a dozen good clean laughs on every page. From cover to cover… it’s the modern type magazine, modern people are looking for—that’s how it’s designed to sell!

TNT is another of our big 6¢ publications that gives you an extra 1/2¢ on every copy sold. That’s 50% more than on the majority of 10¢ magazines which you distribute, and it means “profitable profits” for you! TNT with proper display… given a good distribution and a thorough recovery job will work for you in extra sales—extra profits!

Our publisher has given us a magazine in October TNT which contains the type of real humor people want. We pass it along to you tagged with the kind of profits which pays you the kind of dividends that warrants your getting behind it.

Also in 1941, B.W. Sangor began publishing what remains a puzzling magazine that may well have led to his entering the comic book field. A rare copy of Cinema Comics Herald produced by the Sangor Shop is part of the Eacobacci package. It is not certain whether Hughes wrote or merely edited these advertising comic books.

Cinema Comics Herald was a tiny promotional comic book used at first to advertise Max Fleischer’s animated film Mr. Bug Goes to Town at movie theatres. This publication may have initiated the productive relationship with several moonlighting Fleischer animators who would soon supply Sangor with artwork and stories for several comic book publishers, establishing Sangor’s comics shop as part of his overall company.

Cinema Comics Herald was a movie theatre giveaway, 71/2" x 91/4", that used line art and photographs to advertise movies produced

by Paramount, Universal, RKO, 20th Century-Fox, and Republic.

The movies advertised included Mr. Bug, Lady for a Night (starring John Wayne and Joan Blondell), and Reap the Wild Wind. Nine issues of these 4-page paper movie “trailers” were published under Sangor’s Cinema Comics imprint through 1943. The additional titles included Bedtime Story, Thunder Birds, They All Kissed the Bride, Arabian Nights, Bombardier, and Crash Dive.

Something…?”

51

1990). Hughes had also created and was scripting two additional super-heroes, “The Fighting Yank” and “Pyroman,” as well as “The Commando Cubs” and “Super Mouse” (the first super-animal, slightly predating “Mighty Mouse”), all solidly popular comic book features for the same publisher.

Hughes’ opportunity came as a result of being in the right place at the right time: New York City at the birth of a new art form. It was his talent, however, that secured him his position with Syndicated Features Corporation, one of the many branches of the Sangor Shop. In the beginning, Hughes listed his position as an editorial assistant, with proofreading, newspaper correspondence, and advertising copy writing responsibilities. Still, the Sangor Shop also produced finished art and stories for several comic book publishers, all hungry for material to sell to a growing audience.

Hughes’ achievements in this new medium were not specifically mentioned on his résumé, nor was it listed that he was writing and editing such features as “Doc Strange,” “Thunderhoof,” “American Eagle,” and “Supersleuths.” In addition, he was editing a staggering number of other features while employed as a “proofreader.” According to his résumé, these successes won him a promotion to the rank of editor at Syndicated Features in 1943. He refers to the company as The American Comics Group, although it did not actually exist under that name until 1946. Now Hughes was both managing editor and business manager. He was not listed as editor in any title indicia, however, until 1946, when the complicated and confusing handful of businesses owned by B.W. Sangor were all grouped together under the ACG insignia.

As a principal Sangor Shop editor, Hughes was writing and overseeing material not only for Pines but also for DC Comics, Rural Home, LaSalle, and Leffingwell publishers. His notes indicate that he was writing or editing “The Phantom Detective,” The Duke In Four Colors “Miss Masque,” and dozens of This four-page Cinema Comics Herald theatre giveaway, of which p. 3 is lesser-known features at this time.

depicted here, telescoped the story of the 1942 movie Reap the Wild Wind The title “Cinema Comics in a combination of art and photos (the latter consisting of heads stuck on Much of what is known of Herald” is nowhere present on art). At this point, John Wayne got second male billing to Ray Milland—and Hughes is due to the extensive Eacobacci’s rare copy of the “died” after saving Milland from a giant squid or octopus or something; notes, diaries, and records he kept “paper trailer” for Reap the Wild the film was based on a story that had appeared in The Saturday Evening during his career. After his death, Wind, a Paramount film staring Post. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.] most of these were donated by his Ray Milland, John Wayne, and wife to the Fairleigh Dickinson Paulette Goddard. Director Cecil University library at Madison, New Jersey. While this collection B. DeMille introduces the movie on the first page, and tiny photos was sold by the University some years ago, it once offered detailed of the faces of the chief actors are pasted on the line art of all four insight into his work habits and duties, as well as into the of its pages. Two-thirds of the final page has no image, allowing profession as a whole, spanning a period of almost three decades. the local theatre to stamp its name and the dates the film would be He wrote his personal records in a tiny, cramped script or in shown there. In this case, it was the Fairyland Theatre in shorthand.

Warrensburgh [state uncertain], and the film was scheduled for “Sun, Mon, Tue, Aug. 16, 17, 18” [1942].

From these notes, it is obvious that an editor’s job during this time included proofreading, altering, and correcting finished pages Even more exciting and rare is a script for an unpublished issue of art and story. Hughes paired writers with artists when necessary, of Cinema Comics Herald for the movie Tales of Manhattan starring blending their styles. Stories written at Sangor’s New York City Ginger Rogers, Charles Laughton, Edward G. Robinson, Charles offices were assigned mostly to freelance artists, and a massive Boyer, Rita Hayworth, Henry Fonda, Ethel Waters, Paul Robeson, correspondence with these freelancers was maintained. and Rochester (of Jack Benny radio show fame)! It is fascinating to wonder whether this issue was ever actually produced and if the Hughes’ editorial comments were not met with universal enthuart still exists somewhere. siasm by every artist and writer. Human nature accepts criticism grudgingly, at best, and creative people are not known for being Richard Hughes the best judges of their own talents. But Hughes was held in high regard by most of the professionals he hired. It was his responsiAnd The American Comics Group bility, after all, to occasionally rewrite and correct dialogue and By 1942, Hughes had become the best-selling writer and creator captions, as well as to negotiate pay scales and raises for his staff. of “The Black Terror,” an early super-hero who first appeared in Hughes also oversaw these payments, as evidenced by his daily Exciting Comics and America’s Best Comics, comic books produced calendars. As editor, he also scheduled story and idea sessions with by the Sangor Shop for pulp magazine publisher Ned Pines (1905-

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A Study Of Comics Pioneer Richard E. Hughes

freelance talent located in or traveling to New York City.

It is difficult to imagine where Hughes found time to review new submissions, proofread color mats from the printer, schedule stories for each issue, and review readers’ letters to be included in ACG letter pages. Since each comic book featured at least four stories, and often many more than four, and since he edited many titles for the Sangor Shop, one marvels at how he found time to write, as well.

Not long after Hughes named the comic book publishing side of Sangor’s conglomerate of businesses the “American Comics Group,” a postwar downturn in comic book sales, the threat posed by television, and public concern over comic book content convinced Sangor to close down his shop, which he did in 1948.

Hughes’ principal efforts would thenceforth be focused on expanding his little giant, ACG.

He began to broaden the titles released through the American Comics Group. Eventually, he would create, edit, or write for 34 different ACG titles. In all, 1,010 comic book issues would be released by the end of 1967 (not including either Custom Comics or Modern Comics books). At ACG’s peak, in 1952, Hughes edited and wrote for at least 16 titles. During his career with ACG, he helped create the first continuing horror series in comics, Adventures into the Unknown. He also created the features “Herbie,” “Magicman,” “Nemesis,” and (possibly) “John Force, Magic Agent.” The comics Herbie and Forbidden Worlds won Alley Awards (presented by organized fandom) in 1964 as superior publications, and Hughes’ patriotic stories even prompted a letter of thanks from the White House.

Herbie

One of ACG’s most popular comic book titles sold on magazine racks was Herbie, published for 23 issues from 1964 to 1967. Herbie Popnecker first appeared in the lead story (titled simply “Herbie”) in ACG’s Forbidden Worlds #73 (Dec. 1958), reappearing in issues #94 and #116 before he won his own book because of an outpouring of reader demand. This ACG title was written by Hughes (under his pen name “Shane O’Shea”) and was drawn by pioneer comic book artist Ogden Whitney (1918-197?) who used himself when a young boy as the model for the title character.

Herbie won an Alley Award for Best Humor Title in 1964.

Some comic book critics and fans believe that Herbie was ACG’s finest moment and certainly its most original humor book. Annabel Hughes fondly remembered her husband’s love for the character and his laughter when he was

I’ll Take Tales Of Manhattan…

The first page of what is probably Hughes’ script for the Cinema Comics Herald adaptation of the 1942 movie Tales of Manhattan. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

writing Herbie’s satiric adventures.

Teenaged Herbie Popnecker was short, fat, physically awkward, uncertain, socially shy, and an embarrassment to his parents. He was drawn in Whitney’s distinctive, minimalistic style, and although Herbie’s age was never revealed, he was probably twelve or thirteen years old, and embodied the self-image of most adolescent boys. But “the little fat nothing,” as he was referred to by his father, was also secretly magical (his powers gained from bizarre lollipops produced in the “Unknown”—an equally bizarre afterlife populated by Frankenstein’s monster, Dracula, geeks, and angels). He was also cosmically known by all living and nonliving entities as the most dynamic, heroic, powerful being in the universe—known and admired by everyone (especially women) except his ignorant mom and dad. Herbie was every young boy’s power fantasy—a premise with some variations that lies at the heart of most escapist literature.

Three Out Of Four Axis-Bashers Say…

Hughes co-created at least three of the four major Nedor/Pines heroes depicted on the cover of America’s Best Comics #13 (April 1945): Black Terror, Fighting Yank, and Pyroman. So how did Doc Strange ever spring into existence without him—or did he? See our extended Nedor coverage last issue! [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

When confronted with a situation beyond his understanding—a mystery—Herbie would shrug his shoulders, raise his arms to waist height with his palms open and up, and say: “Something…?!”

As the costumed Fat Fury in later issues, Popnecker donned a toilet bowl plunger (complete

Something…?”

53

Tiddlewumpus. He travels to Miss Appleknocker’s childhood hillbilly home, only to discover that the feared Tiddlewumpus is not the cute little fuzz-ball he’d imagined.

“Herbie and the Humperdink Ray!” (9 pages) is Hughes’ unpublished recounting of a “crazily science-fiction type of machine” invented by the Plump Lump’s next-door neighbor, Professor Flipdome. Invented to kill worms, it instead replaces Herbie’s head with that of a bull, then a donkey, because the machine is short-circuited by a hungry mouse gnawing on its power cord. Even in Herbie’s subtly surrealistic world, this can present problems when battling super-villain Mr. Mystery.

“The Fat Fury in Bughouse Blues” (12 pages) finds Herbie in his satiric super-hero costume and in a pickle, as usual. A “big, fat, caterpillar” admires The Fat Fury from a distance and becomes The Fat Furry in imitation of Herbie’s secret identity after discovering the secret of Popnecker’s magic lollipops. Same costume. Same fat.

But evil. Lowering himself to the occasion with the help of Professor Flipdome, Herbie shrinks in size and enters the Kingdom of Insects to do battle with the mock marvel to save his own reputation.

So end the adventures of one of Hughes’ greatest creations. But the package of materials acquired by Joseph Eacobacci added three additional mysteries to the life and work of Richard E. Hughes. We now know with certainty that he wrote and edited other noncomics related material despite his amazing workload.

Part II of Michael Vance’s study of the Eacobacci collection of Richard E. Hughes artifacts will see print in the next issue of Alter Ego. Notes and other acknowledgments will be listed at that time.

Cache And Carry The first page of one of the three Richard E. Hughes "Herbie" scripts that turned up in the "Eacobacci cache." For how it might have looked drawn if

by Ogden Whitney or someone channeling him, just turn the page. [© 2012 the respective copyright holders; Herbie is a trademark of Roger Broughton.]

with handle) on his head, a blue mask under his eyeglasses that covered everything but his eyes, ears, and mouth, red “Long-John” underwear emblazoned with “Fat Fury” on a yellow circle that covered most of his rotund torso, and a blue cape. His feet were bare. Often called “The Plump Lump,” he was very, very, “beautifully” fat, often taunted with the insult “fat, fat, water rat,” and had no additional super-powers beyond the ones he already possessed

The Unseen Herbie

Then as now, it is a standard practice among publishers to produce stories well in advance of publication, and among the recently discovered ACG materials purchased by Joseph Eacobacci are three unpublished “Herbie” manuscripts! Two were scheduled for the 24th issue of the title; one was scheduled for an earlier issue, but was not published. Their titles are: “Cute Li’l Tiddlewumpus!” (intended for Herbie #24), “The Fat Fury in Bughouse Blues” (also intended for Herbie #24), and “Herbie and the Humperdink Ray!” It is unknown if artwork for any of these three “Herbie” adventures was ever produced.

In “Cute Li’l Tiddlewumpus!” (14 pages), Herbie offends his new teacher at school, Miss Appleknocker, and tries to appease her by finding a replacement for a pet she adored as a child, the

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A Study Of Comics Pioneer Richard E. Hughes

Herbie Flies Again!

Roy Thomas couldn’t resist asking—and they couldn’t resist accepting! Fanartists Shane Foley and Larry Guidry have done any number of well-received pieces of new art for Alter Ego in the recent past, including Shane’s “maskot” drawings and faux covers designed by both gents, solo or together. So we invited them to try their hands at illustrating splash pages for the three unpublished “Herbie”/”Fat Fury” scripts in the Eacobacci collection (see previous page for details), and the results can be seen clockwise from top left: “Cute Li’l Tiddlewumpus!” – script by Richard Hughes; pencils by Larry Guidry; inks by Shane Foley; colors by Randy Sargent.

“Herbie and the Humperdink Ray!” – script by Richard Hughes; full art & color

by Larry Guidry.

“Bughouse Blues” – script by Richard Hughes; full art by Shane Foley, coloring

by Randy Sargent.

Hey, wouldn’t it be great to see these tales finished and published in a future comic or hardcover from Dark Horse? [Scripts © 2012 the respective copyright holders; Herbie/Fat Fury TM & © 2012 Roger Broughton; other art &/or color elements © 2012 Larry Guidry, Shane Foley, & Randy Sargent, respectively.]

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I Dream Of Genie (Right:) The Crypt’s own Michael T. Gilbert takes a crack at the Team Supreme! [Suicide Squad TM & © 2012 DC Comics.]

56

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

Suicide Squad: Task Force X!

by Michael T. Gilbert

ost kids love reading Superman, Batman, and Green Lantern comic books. But if you’re like me, you also loved comics that were a little out of the mainstream. Many fans have their own off-brand favorites, be it Dell’s Brain Boy, AGG’s Herbie, or Marvel’s Millie the Model.

M

Bill Cox loved DC’s Suicide Squad––the Rodney Dangerfield of team comics.

Suicide Squad never got much “respect” because it never sold many copies. Task Force X (the team’s official name) lacked the staying power of DC’s Justice League, Teen Titans, Challengers of the Unknown, or The Doom Patrol. “The Suicide Squad” first appeared in The Brave and the Bold #25 (Aug. 1959), courtesy of writer/editor Bob Kanigher, with dynamic art by Ross Andru and Mike Esposito.

Despite starring in six issues of DC’s Brave and Bold tryout book, the Squad never sold enough to get its own continuing series.

The team consisted of three men—Col. Rick Flag, Dr. Hugh Evans, and Jess Bright—and one woman— Nurse Karin Grace. The four engaged in secret military missions, which usually meant fighting giant monsters! Before accepting each assignment, the members were warned about their slim-to-none chances of surviving the mission, hence their fatalistic nickname. I’m guessing the Squad’s government contract provided no retirement benefits. Why waste the ink? But despite the Squad’s name, no one in the original book ever actually died.

Another classic DC Comics “bait and switch”!

But this nine-year-old didn’t care. So what if the heroes had no costumes and survived every

[Continued on p. 59]

We’ve Got You Covered!

(On this & facing page:) All six of the original Andru & Esposito Suicide Squad covers. Left to right: The Brave and the Bold #25 (Aug.-Sept.

1959), #26 (Oct.Nov. 1959), #27 (Dec.1959-Jan. 1960), #37 (Aug.-Sept.

1961), #38 (Oct.Nov. 1961) and #39 (Dec. 1961Jan. 1962). [© 2012 DC Comics.]

Another Suicide Squad?

(Above:) Yes, and by the same creative team, no less! This new series began in Star Spangled War Stories #116 (Aug. 1964). Different team members, but the same old giant monsters, courtesy of Kanigher, Andru, & Esposito. [© 2012 DC Comics.]

Suicide Squad: Task Force X!

Dennis Vs. Menace!

(Above:) In a clever re-do of the very first “Suicide Squad” cover (previous page), Ron Ferdinand draws Dennis the Menace and his parents as they battle a giant dragon! Is that good ol’ Mr. Wilson in the background?

[Suicide Squad TM & © 2012 DC Comics; Dennis the Menace TM & © 2012 Hank Ketcham Enterprises, Inc.] (Right:) The team tackles Gorgo, courtesy of Neil Vokes. [Suicide Squad TM & © 2012 DC Comics; Gorgo TM & © 2012 the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

57

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Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

’Saurs, Snakes, and Stingers… Oh My! (Above:) Two stunning commissions by Loston Wallace.

(Right:) Neil Vokes has the Squad battling giant bees. Hope you’ve got your Benadryl, boys!

(Below:) A cartoony version of the team by Mike Malhack. [Suicide Squad TM & © 2012 DC Comics.]

Don’t Look Now, But… (Above:) Matt Lunsford focuses (twice!) on poor Space Medicine Nurse in Distress Karin! (Below:) Two Marvel-inspired covers by Ron Frenz (left) and Anthony Castrillo (right). [Suicide Squad TM & © 2012 DC Comics; Marvel monster & Hulk TM & © 2012 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

[Continued from p. 56]

assignment? Did I mention they fought giant monsters? I became an immediate fan!

But my affection for the Squad pales before that of art collector Bill Cox. Over the past few years, #1 fan Bill has commissioned new Suicide Squad art from dozens of cartoonists for display on his virtual art gallery. Recently I asked Bill what prompted his grand obsession with the Squad. His reply: Hey Michael. Well, I have always been attracted to monster comics and I had collected pre-hero Marvel books for quite some time. Once I finished collecting all the Marvel monster books, I started to focus on DC. I always liked the non-super-hero team books—Challengers, Rip Hunter, Sea Devils, Cave Carson, and of course, Suicide Squad!

Suicide Squad was my favorite.

First, because I am a huge fan of Ross Andru and Mike Esposito; second, because I always like the premise—a fearless Air Force colonel, two scientists, and a hot babe (who always seems to be losing a shoe when she is in peril!) vs. the most horrible menaces ever imagined.

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Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

I started out having artists do re-creations of Brave & the Bold #25, the Squad's first appearance. It was fun to see different takes on that classic cover. After a while I thought I would branch out and commission original cover concepts. I like to think that I am channeling an alternative universe where the Squad's popularity skyrocketed and they took over Brave and the Bold (OK, so the JLA could have just as easily have premiered in Showcase!)

Sometimes I suggest what I want to see, other times artists pitch me ideas and I go with the flow! Most of the time, it turns out great! I've mashed up the Squad with classic ’50s monster movies, Marvel monster covers, and various splash pages.

I can’t tell you how many of the artists I've commissioned said that they would love to draw a retro-series of the original Squad.

Hopefully someone at DC will get the hint. I must say that I am having much more fun collecting Suicide Squad commissions than I ever did collecting comics!

—Bill

You readers can look forward to more Suicide Squad covers by putting in the keyword “Suicide Squad” into the search box at Bill’s ComicArtFans Gallery at: http://tinyurl.com/kryn19 And Bill—watch out for giant monsters. They’re everywhere!

Till next time...

Tanks For The Memories!

(Top:) Original Andru/Esposito cover to SSWS #90 (April 1960). (Above:) The same scene starring the Suicide Squad, spectacularly illustrated by Jeff Siemons. The Nazi dinosaur was inspired by T-Reich, a character in the short-lived DC hero parody comic Major Bummer. [Art © 2012 Jeff Siemons; cover © 2012 DC Comics.]

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The Comic Fandom Archive presents…

The “50 Years Of Comic Book Fandom” Panel (Comic-Con International 2011: San Diego) Introduction

e are proud to present a transcript of this panel, which occurred on July 23rd, 2011, earlier on the same day as the Fandom Reunion Party that we highlighted in A/E #108 & 109 to begin our several-issue coverage of the “50th Anniversary of Fandom” events at Comic-Con last year. (This is installment #5, if you’re keeping track.)

W

MARK EVANIER: I’ll begin by praising the audience turnout here. You people have class and taste for coming to this panel. [audience laughter and applause] You’re not like those people waiting in line in Hall H to find out what’s on ABC next week. [laughter] It’s frightening that we have a panel called “50 Years of Comic Fandom.” It’s frightening comic fandom has that much history. It’s frightening that comic fandom, which I always interpreted to be done by teenagers in their basements, is done by people with gray hair or no hair or by people who’ve enjoyed it so long.

Let me introduce the dais to you. These people made a vital contribution, and we’ll go through what those are. This is Miss Maggie Thompson, ladies and gentleman. [applause] This is Dick and Pat Lupoff. [applause] Mr. Richard Kyle. [applause] Bill Schelly. [applause] Roy Thomas. [applause] And Jean Bails. [applause] Before I ask questions, I would like to introduce you to one of the people who’s responsible for this convention, a gentleman in charge of all the printed publications.... This is Mr. Gary Sassaman. [applause, as Sassaman steps up to an adjacent podium]

GARY SASSAMAN: Thank you, Mark. Comic-Con is incredibly proud and pleased to be able to gather these founders of comics fandom to celebrate this anniversary. Over the years, we’ve picked out epochs of some of our many special guests. A few people that have kind of slipped away from us. I don’t think the Lupoffs have been with us for many, many years, so we want to rectify the fact that we’ve never given them an Inkpot Award. And so, for achieve-

NOTE: This is the fifth installment of our extended, multi-issue coverage of the "50th Anniversary of Comics Fandom" events at Comic-Con International 2011 (San Diego).

Panel moderator Mark Evanier welcomed the convention’s Guests of Honor: Jean Bails, Roy Thomas, Maggie Thompson, Richard Kyle, Dick Lupoff, Pat Lupoff, and myself. This is Part One of Two. It was transcribed by Brian K. Morris, and has been edited slightly for length, and because some parts of the proceedings were indistinct on the tape.

These are often covered by ellipses.

—Bill Schelly. ments in fandom services, I’d like to present the Inkpot to Dick and Pat Lupoff. [audience gives a standing ovation]

Yeah, they’ve been remodeled over the last few years. [NOTE: Gary S. is referring to the design of the award statuette. —Bill.] One other person I’d like to acknowledge today is a very important part of putting this whole thing together this year, and also a man who literally wrote the book about comics fandom and Golden Age comics fandom, Mr. Bill Schelly. [audience rises and gives another standing ovation]

BILL SCHELLY: Thank you.

EVANIER: [referring to the audience] And because you people were smart enough to show up here, we have an Inkpot for every one of you! [audience laughs] You guys, think about the budget. You know, the Inkpot Awards were started out almost as a joke, and it became a very important part of this convention.

I want to tell a real fast story here, because, to me, if I had but one incident to [mention from] the entirety of these conventions that tells what comics fandom was about, it was this. A few years—I don’t know, this had been ten, fifteen years ago—I was talking on the phone with Dave Siegel, who is sitting out there [in the audience] now. And ... we were talking about comic book artists who had disappeared and had never been to a convention, had never been honored, and didn’t know they had any fans. One of us mentioned Fred Guardineer. A lot of people in this

Splash Panel On the dais (left to right): Mark Evanier (moderator), Maggie Thompson, Pat Lupoff, Dick Lupoff, Richard Kyle, Bill Schelly, and Roy Thomas. Not seen at right: Jean Bails. Photo by Aaron Caplan.

Fandom Reunion 2011: The Golden Age of Fanzines Panel

room know who Fred Guardineer is. If you don’t, he did “Zatara the Magician.” This is a guy who had work in Action Comics #1. It doesn’t get any more Golden Age than that. Dave is brilliant at tracking people down. He’s a finder of lost artists and found Fred, who was in a nursing home in northern California?

It’s An Honor

DAVE SIEGEL: [from audience] Well, actually not a nursing home. I found him at home. [At this point, David made a few brief comments about finding Fred Guardineer. Unfortunately, David wasn’t near a microphone, so it’s not possible to transcribe his exact words. He said he had first brought Guardineer together with colleagues from the Golden Age on May 19th, 1992. —Bill.]

EVANIER: I’m going to tell the Fred Guardineer part of the story. Fred was in a wheelchair, and he was on the Golden Age panel [at Comic-Con], and I think we had Joe Simon on the panel and we had...

Shelly Moldoff, I think, was on it that year. Anyway, an Inkpot was handed to me to present, so I presented the Inkpot Award in a room about this size, I would guess, to Fred Guardineer. Now Fred was in a wheelchair to my right, and there’s a podium to either side of me. People were applauding and Fred starts to get up. I said, “You don’t have to stand up for this,” and he said, “Yes, I do. This is the first award I ever got in my life.” And he stood up—Dave can attest to this— I’m holding the back of his pants. He made the most touching speech. I looked out at his family—his kids and his grandkids were in the audience—and they were crying. It was the first time, maybe the only time, that Fred Guardineer ever got any real recognition for what he had done.

(Above:) The Inkpot is Comic-Con International’s official award. In recent years, it was re-designed; this is how it looks now.

(Gary Sassaman designed the badge seen on the preceeding page.)

And that, to me, has been probably the essence of comic fandom, that intersection of the people who made the comics and people who loved the comics. And you know a lot of these guys didn’t get paid very well. In a lot of cases, we were their pension. They [fans] were coming up at the conventions and buying their art prints or buying commissions or original art. We financed the retirements of a lot of these people. There are comic book artists whose work we loved who would not have been able to afford their health care in their later senior years if not for comic book fandom. Or who would have thought their work was disposable. And we—us in this room, those of us who had come up with fandom— obviously, we’ve all done a lot of the things for our own pleasure and ambition and the fun of putting out fanzines and the fun of researching this stuff and writing articles. But that [story about] Fred Guardineer— it’s not the only one. If you came the year we had John Broome here, same type of thing, almost the exact, same type story.

[It was] the only

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time he ever in his life realized how much his work impacted people.

Now I would like to ask each person on the dais to tell us briefly where they were in their lives when the event occurred which you feel was your entré to comic book fandom. What were you doing for a living? What did you want to do for a living? Where were you living? If you want to talk about how old you were, that’s not mandatory. And then, when you started getting involved in it, what was the event when you went, “Okay, now I’m part of this little, strange group here of strangers all over the country.”

Maggie?

The Way They Were The late artist Fred Guardineer was in attendance at the 1998 San Diego Comic-Con—and at the banquet of the American Association of Comic Collectors held in conjunction with it. Above is a detail from a posed photo of sixteen Golden and Silver Age professionals.

Standing, left to right, are: Joe Simon of Simon & Kirby (“Captain America,” “Boy Commandos”), Shelly Moldoff (“Hawkman,” “Batman”), and Murphy Anderson (Buck Rogers, “Hawkman”). Seated, l. to r., are Vin Sullivan (who as DC’s editor had a hand in launching both “Superman” and “Batman” in the late 1930s) and Fred Guardineer, artist/creator of “Zatara the Master Magician” in Action Comics #1.

Guardineer later drew “The Durango Kid” for Sullivan’s company Magazine Enterprises. For the entire panoramic pic, see Alter Ego, Vol. 3, #10.

[Photo © 2012 Bruce Edwards; from the website of the American Association of Comic Collectors.]

MAGGIE THOMPSON: It started when I was 4½ years old and I had a dime. I went up to the newsstand on the corner and I bought a comic book. My mom... read to me from that comic book for the next week ‘til I had another dime and bought another comic book. On the seventh night, she found that she liked the story and the writing, so... my mom wrote a fan letter to the editorial offices at Dell. It was a fan letter to Walt Kelly. And he responded, and there began a collection, because it was the Kelly Collection, and she put little notes in the front of it. They had to be kept separate from the other comic books. So at 4½, that was the start.

EVANIER: Maggie, tell us about the first moment you started corresponding with and intersecting with people, with strangers, who were interested in comics.

THOMPSON: Well, my mother was a science-fiction writer you’ve never heard of. Her name was Betsy Curtis. We went to sciencefiction conventions when we could. Dad was a college professor, so he didn’t have any money. But the concept of mimeographing a publication for your friends A Fandom Volunteer began with her. I put the front page of the first Rick Norwood of Manuscript Press issue of [her fanzine] on my website (publisher of Comics Revue) arrived maggiethompson.com. She was discussing what early for the “50 Years of Comic I was reading in comic books at that age. My first Fandom” panel. After all, he had convention with a comic book connection was traveled all the way from Tennessee to Worldcon in 1955 in Cleveland. There was a attend the West Coast event, and dealer there named Howard DeVore, and he had wanted a good seat close to the an Animal Comics I didn’t have. I went up to him action! Photo by Aaron Caplan.

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and asked, “How much is that Animal Comics?”

He said, “It is literally priceless.” This being 1955, there was no price.

You could not find another one at that point, so it’s either worth a fortune or it’s worth nothing. And he handed it to me.

EVANIER: Dick and Pat, where were you professionally when you got into comic fandom? What were you doing? Where were you living?

PAT LUPOFF: Well, I had always loved comics. When I was twelve years old, I Animal Magnetism snuck out of our New Animal Comics featuring Pogo and his York apartment, went friends by Walt Kelly was a favorite comic down to the stationery book in the Curtis household, where the store, and bought more mother of Maggie Curtis corresponded with comics. Then I found I the brilliant writer-cartoonist. This is issue was locked out of our #23, dated Oct. 1946. [Characters TM & © 2011 the Walt Kelly Estate.) apartment. I won’t repeat that... [NOTE: Pat told this story in the “Golden Age of Fanzines” panel, published in A/E #110-111. –Bill.] I didn’t realize comics [sounds like: were a big deal] until we did our first fanzine [Xero] and we did “The Big Red Cheese” about Captain and Mary Marvel, and we got all this response. I mean, we thought nobody was going to read this, nobody would be interested, and suddenly people were writing back letters to us, and I was frankly very, very happy and totally amazed.

EVANIER: Dick?

DICK LUPOFF: I want to tell you I was a real connoisseur from earliest childhood, [because] I had an older brother who was into comics. So I was always leaning over his shoulder, trying to figure out what did those little marks mean in the speech balloons, until I learned how to read. But when I was maybe junior high school age, I had my first true inkling that there were creative people behind it.

For a small child, they’re just there. You know, it’s just a given: “The sky is blue.” “All right, okay.” They’re just there. When I was around twelve, I picked up a copy of Captain Marvel Adventures and there was a little text story that nobody ever read. It was “Jon Jarl, International Police”—maybe it was “Policeman”—by a word that I read as “Eando Binder.” [NOTE: Dick pronounces “Binder” with a long “i.” —Bill.] And I thought, “Whoever ‘Eando Binder’ is, he wrote this story. Therefore, there’s somebody... who must have written the other stories and somebody must have drawn the pictures,” and so forth.

Years went by and I did the first issue of Xero.

[NOTE: Xero #1 was published in September 1960. — Bill.] Captain Marvel had always been my favorite, so I wrote this article, “The Big Red Cheese” about Captain Marvel. At that point, “Eando Binder” was the editor of a magazine called Space World, published in New York. We were living in New York, so I took a copy of the first issue of Xero to the office

there to give to him. And very pleasantly, I was greeted by [a woman who] I later realized was Ione Binder. [NOTE: Ione was the wife of Otto Binder, who had written the ‘Jon Jarl’ stories under the pseudonym of Eando Binder. —Bill.] I handed her a manila envelope with the fanzine in it and said, “This is for him.” She said, “Oh, well, [he’s in] the other room in there.” I said, “No, no, no,” and I just shoved it in her hand and literally ran out of the office [audience chuckles] because I was terrified to actually be in the presence of this godlike figure, you know. If I could hand him the envelope, that would be all right. But if he insisted on shaking hands, I would have really turned to some sort of pile of ashes! So I ran out.

Shortly thereafter, we received a letter from Otto, saying, “I really enjoyed your article. I thought there were a few little mistakes in it”... and he outlined, you know, three or four hundred of the most obvious and serious. [laughter] And we started corresponding back and forth, and they invited us to dinner at their home in New Jersey. This was the first time that we’d actually physically met these people. And the first thing I said, I shook hands and said, “Oh, Mr. Binder...” and he said, “Actually, it’s ‘Binder’ [NOTE: Pronounced with a short “i.” —Bill.]. It’s a German word. It means ‘binder’ [NOTE: With a long “I.” —Bill.].” [more laughter] We had a lovely time with them. I mean, we visited back and forth.

At the time, Pat and I were members of a group in New York called The Fantasy Film Club. There were no VCRs then, there were no home videos, there was no such thing. Once a movie was gone, it was gone. But we had a friend named Chris Steinbrunner, who was the film library manager for a television station in New York, and he and a friend had started this club. They had a movie projector in Chris’ basement, and he would set up programs and there would be club meetings. One week, he would set up an Agatha Christie program; another week, he would set up a Boris Karloff show. We’d start early Sunday afternoon, watch two feature films, have a dinner break, watch a third feature film, and then everyone would go home. Alternately, we would sometimes run serials. If there was a 12-chapter serial, we’d run eight chapters, a dinner break, and then the last four.

Chris got hold of a print of Adventures of Captain Marvel and we invited the Binders to come over as guests of honor for the showing that day. At that point, the club was meeting in our apartment in Manhattan. We were married and we’d had our first child, who was a little baby in diapers. And being, by this time, an experienced Captain Marvel costumemaker—everyone who was here yesterday knows that story—I made a costume for our little son. I got a pair of tiny red tights, stitched on a yellow lightning bolt, and put them on over his diaper. So when

Lift-Off For Lupoff Otto Binder and Dick Lupoff sitting together at a panel at John Benson’s 1966 New York Comicon. Otto’s “Jon Jarl” stories in Captain Marvel Adventures inspired Dick to become a science-fiction writer. Photographer unknown.

Fandom Reunion 2011: The Golden Age of Fanzines Panel

the Binders arrived—Otto, Ione, and Mary, their daughter—I ran into the other room, brought out our little baby, and said, “Here’s Captain Marvel Baby!” [laughter] Otto was just absolutely thrilled. He also told us that they’d never seen the serial. This was the first time he got to see it. So we had a wonderful relationship with them.

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Whiz Kids Capt. Billy’s Whiz Bang (June 1924) was a post-World War I publication founded by William Fawcett, and laid the foundation for the publishing firm inherited by his four sons—which, in turn, brought the “Whiz” word forward to name its first comic book, Whiz Comics, at the turn of 1940. As for the words “Captain” and “Billy”—well, they found a use for them, too! [© 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

As for the broader fan community, it all came to us through Xero. As Pat mentioned, that first article, “The Big Red Cheese,” was more or less an experiment, you know. If nobody had cared, nobody had gotten into it, that would have been the end of it right there. Instead, the letters kept on coming. It was astonishing and people kind of volunteered. They said, “Dick, I want to write about Planet Comics.” Jim Harmon said, “I want to write about The Justice Society of America.” Bill Blackbeard said, “I want to write about Popeye. He’s the first super-hero of all,” and this just kept on growing month after month. Roy Thomas did a great one for us called—what was it called, Roy?

ROY THOMAS: I believe someone gave me the title “Captain Billy’s Whiz-Gang”—[that] being you.

DICK LUPOFF: Right. Because, long before Whiz Comics existed, Billy Fawcett, who was an officer in the First World War, published a magazine called Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang. Years later, he published Whiz Comics. So we had all these people, they were just falling over each other to get into the pages of the magazine. Don Thompson did “O.K. Axis, Here We Come!” on the Timely heroes.

EVANIER: At that point, where did you research? What were the sources of information about these comics, aside from your own collections and looking at books?

DICK LUPOFF: It was minimal. It was mainly just looking at old comic books. I remember heading down to Times Square to used book shops and [asking] Denny Holder, the manager [of one of them] “Do you have any old comic books?” He would lead me to the back of the store and then there’d be, you know, last month’s Adventure Comics. And I would say, “Oh, no. I mean really old ones.” He would scratch his head and maybe find one two months old. [audience chuckles]

Fortunately, I stumbled across a store in New York called The Memory Shop, run by a man named Mark Richie, who sold what we think of as cultural antiques, rather than physical antiques. You didn’t get beautiful old chiffoniers from him, you got Life magazine back issues or old newspapers. He sold comic books going back to the very early 1940s. He had a standard price structure: whatever comic book you were buying from him—title didn’t matter, condition hardly mattered—it depended, really, on the [year it was published]. The price was a dime a year. A 20-year-old comic book would cost you two dollars. If you wanted a 25-year-old comic book, it would cost you 2½ dollars. That’s the way he sold the comics and that’s the way we did research.

EVANIER: Roy, where did you get research for the articles you wrote?

Obviously you referred to the comics, but where did you find out who wrote and drew some of those things?

THOMAS: When I started, I was so unsophisticated at the age of 19 going on 20 that my first three letters to a comic book were sent out at the same time with quasi-identical wording, each time retyped and no such things as photocopies, to the editor of Green Lantern, the editor of The Flash, and the editor of Justice League of America. Of course they all wound up on Julie Schwartz’s desk. I

was asking if they had any old All-Star Comics lying around the office that they didn’t mind getting rid of?

You know, I might have been able to scrape up a dime a copy for them or something. I also asked if I could find out who wrote the Justice League. I got a note from him [telling] me that [it was] Gardner Fox. Julie wrote, “By the way, Gardner Fox also wrote the first several dozen ‘Justice Societys.’” It was the first time I’d ever had any inkling [who] wrote that or “Hawkman.” That led to Gardner Fox, who said, “I sold [my copies of All-Star Comics], the bound books, to a young guy in Kansas City. Now he’s in Detroit, Michigan. He might enjoy hearing from you because he likes the Justice Society.” Gardner sent me Jerry Bails’ address. So I sent this letter off right before my 20th birthday, and Jerry responded by sending me a nice letter and three issues of All-Star Comics he happened to have lying around as triplicates, really; two of them incomplete but that was great.

As far as research, when we started Alter-Ego a few months later, I didn’t really write an article until the second issue. Then I wrote an article about the only one of the two “All Winners Squad” stories that we could find, Marvel’s group of Captain America, the Torch, and Sub-Mariner. When I wrote the [“Whiz-Gang”] article a year or so later for Xero, my research was just about the same thing that Richard Kyle had been doing. Dick [Lupoff] sent me a bunch of Fawcett comics and I used those, plus my memories of them.

Maybe I had a couple, a few of them, by then, not too many. I’d been reading Fawcett Comics since the mid-’40s.

At the time, we were still doing it mostly as kind of nostalgia but, you know, sort of edging towards history. It was more than nostalgia. We were interested in the history of the field, whether like me, you were really interested in history as an academic pursuit or just because you liked history. I think everybody who wrote articles in “All in Color for a Dime” [the Xero series on comics] was interested in the actual history of the medium. “Who wrote them?” “Who drew them?” And we’d go further and further back. One person that Dick had in the second issue of Xero was another guy really interested in the history, probably more than most: Ted White. He put out a wonderful early job chronicling the whole history of DC Comics which probably had never been done before: “The Spawn of M. C. Gaines.”

RICHARD KYLE: Bill Spicer wrote me about his fanzine Fantasy Illustrated. It was newly-written comics—and some adaptations of

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professionally written stories—with surprisingly good artists in it. [NOTE: Richard wrote a column called “Graphic Story Review” in Fantasy Illustrated after writing the article “The Education of Victor Fox” for Xero. —Bill.] From then on, I really was associated very closely with Bill’s magazine, but I would say Xero itself and meeting Bill [influenced me] to become a fanzine writer and publisher eventually.

My first experience with comic books was in 1934, and it was in a mom-andpop book store here in San Diego. I lived in northwest northern California at that time. I came into the store with my stepfather, and by the cash register there were two piles of this strange-looking magazine, and they were comic books.

There was something instantaneously transforming in the experience, because they were new. Somehow or other, I knew they were new. They hadn’t existed before, and apparently I either saw one of the issues of Funnies on Parade, which was a promotional product, or it was the first issue of Famous Funnies. But I didn’t ask my stepfather to buy it because it was the Depression and you could get two loaves of bread for a dime and you get a quart of milk for a dime. And since I couldn’t read, I thought that would be a little chancey.

panel the people who were the Baby Boomers, the whole group of people that were kind of the rank-and-file part of fandom, the younger set, and many of us here today were part of that group. The Baby Boomers were the ones who I think fueled the Silver Age in terms of sales. I was twelve years old, so I had just started junior high, and life had suddenly gotten complicated, you know?

Changes were happening around me and to me, and getting along with people in junior high got to be kind of problematic.

I didn’t really have very many friends. So when I discovered comics fandom, it was like suddenly there was a way that I could be part of something and have a network of people that I knew, people that wouldn’t make fun of me for reading comics, who loved them, and no one was going to tell me that I couldn’t be part of it.

Getting Graphic Richard Kyle’s “Graphic Story Review” column began in Fantasy Illustrated #4 (1965), providing serious analysis of the comics—or, as he called them (and he coined the term), “graphic stories.” (He had introduced this phrase in pages of CAPA-alpha in 1964.) Fantasy Illustrated was published by Bill Spicer, who in 1969 helped Kyle launch the fanzine Graphic Story World. [Art © 2012 the respective copyright holders.]

But anyway, the other thing about it that’s true is that the kids in school, we knew who the writers and artists were [if their names] appeared in the magazines.

We didn’t know bylines, but we knew Bill Everett and Carl Burgos and Bob Davis. When I was eight and nine years old, I can remember talking with these other kids who were equally familiar with them. I was just in love with Centaur Comics, and Bill Everett was the managing editor there. and all of the people—it was just a wonderfully cracked-brain series of magazines that they came out with. But they first came out with Funny Picture Stories and Detective Picture Stories. Even then, somebody was trying to change the name of comics to something else. We’d talk about it, we knew about them.

Guys in the neighborhood kept really large collections, generally in their attics or someplace like that. Initially, comic books weren’t frowned on by adults. That was created somewhere along the line; maybe the people here know when comic books’ image went completely wrong. It was well before Dr. Fredric Wertham attacked comics. In any event, I was a fan from before I could read, and when I met Bill and I read Alter-Ego and Xero, that was the beginning of my involvement with fandom and [with] beginning to express myself in a non-professional way, because I always separated my professional from my non-professional work.

EVANIER: Mr. Schelly, same question for you. Where did you get into this whole mess?

SCHELLY: Well, I wasn’t exactly employed when I got into fandom. I was twelve years old. I think I probably represent on this

I mean, at one point, my mom pointed to a fanzine I got and asked, “Is this dirty?” [laughter] I said, “You can look through it. I don’t know what you mean.” She said, “Well, I just got a little worried. You’re getting these things from strange men in other cities.” [laughter] But basically, the only hurdle I had to pass was to keep my grades up. As long as I did that, I could publish my fanzine.

Of course, at twelve I had nothing to say, I knew nothing about old comics, but I was going to publish something because I wanted to and I was determined to and I could. This gave me the beginning of learning how to become a writer, learning how to publish, learning how to draw and present things to other people, and correspond. I mean basically, I was a little entrepreneur at thirteen years old.

For me, one of the key things in fandom for information was the Rocket’s Blast Special series of fanzines that Gordon Love published.

He did Rocket’s Blast-Comicollector, but he also published these Rocket’s Blast Specials that consisted of long articles, usually by Raymond Miller, about All-American Comics, Timely Comics, and so on. I think Love must have sold several thousand copies of that Timely one, over the years. He reprinted it over and over. These were basic information sources that helped us learn the basic framework and piece together the history of comics of the past.

The information was sketchy and often memory-based, but it was the beginning. That’s different than nostalgia. It had to do with the history, the details. But fandom was still forming when I got involved with it. I wouldn’t call myself a founder of fandom. I’m here because I write about the founders of fandom. I was just a kid who was thrilled to discover fandom and it changed my life.

EVANIER: Jean, tell us your experience.

JEAN BAILS: Do you want me to tell Jerry’s story or my story?

EVANIER: Why don’t you tell Jerry’s story, and we’ll go to your story.

BAILS: Okay, I think Jerry got very interested in All-Stars when he was about seven or eight. Anyway, when he could read.

Fandom Reunion 2011: The Golden Age of Fanzines Panel

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story. Ever since that time, he’d been trying to bring back All-Star.

It Was A Blast!

EVANIER: All right, now then, where did you get involved in comics?

G. B. Love’s Rocket’s Blast Special #1 presented Raymond Miller’s attempt to chronicle the history of Timely/Marvel Comics. The ditto edition in 1964 proved so popular—fans were desperate for basic information about comics of the Golden Age—that it was reprinted several times, ultimately in photo-offset in 1967, as depicted here. Cover art by Buddy Saunders. [Human Torch, Captain America, & Sub-Mariner TM & © 2012 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

EVANIER: What year was Jerry born?

BAILS: He was born in 1933. By the time he could read, he wanted to get hold of them, and so he used to dress up his brother a few years later to go down to the comics store where they had a major [newsstand] and say, “Do you want to donate to the poor?” And so he got comics that way, and during the war drive it was patriotic to turn in the comics. You weren’t supposed to keep any kind of papers, but he’d go around with a little wagon and say, “Would you like to donate something to the war drive? You have any comic books?” [audience laughter and applause] He really loved All-Star. He loved the stories, he thought the stories had a moral to them, and they were wellwritten. His father didn’t think he should be collecting comics and said, “Give those things up!” But Jerry persisted, and that was his

BAILS: Oh, my golly. Well, like some of the other panelists, I got Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories by subscription, folded up. Before I could read, I was making up the stories to go along with the pictures. Later on, first the Archie, Betty, and Veronica series.

So every time we went to Kresge’s or Woolworth’s, we’d pick up some of those. And then I got into my brother’s Mad magazines when they were still in the smaller format, before it became large. And let’s see … Well, I didn’t get into super-heroes too much. I did read Superman. But I got into it, of course, big-time with Jerry. We used to read the comics together, everything… everything that came out in, let’s see, ’66, ’67, ’68, ’69… and I really got into it. It was interesting because sometimes, he would read it, you know, with inflection like “POWWWW!!!” So yeah, that’s about it.

That’s it for now, folks—but the conclusion of this panel transcript will appear in the next issue of Alter Ego. —Bill.

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significant events in comics history, the exact details ar Leonard Maurer, Norm’s older brother, remembered in a later intervie was in the car when Kubert floated this idea. Other accounts suggest Leonar Maurer was brought in afterward to deal with the technical issues of the printing process, since he had experience in that area. In any produce 3-D comics, and it took all three of them to mak The first step was to sell Archer St. John on the pr was solving the many technical and practical issues inv quickly worked up a sample “Abbott “Abbott and Costello” page using clear acetate to create different laay yers. K Kubert ubert did a single-panel s character Tor the Hunter. He dated his sample Mar The 3-D process works because human eyes about two-and-a-half inches apart, each seeing objects fr angle, allowing us to perceive objects in depth. When one looks at a 3-D comic book without the glasses, one sees off-register red and gr glasses with one red and one green lens, a monochr illusion of multiple laay yers at different depths is achie St. John was thrilled with the effect and committed to publishing a 3-D comic book to both test their ability to produce it and find out if it w

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[correspondence, comments, & corrections]

hane Foley (artist) and Randy Sargent (colorist) have come through once more to head up the letters section for our Superman-influenced “maskot,” inspired by a great 1970s Man of Steel drawing by Neal Adams.Thanks, guys! [Alter Ego hero TM & ©2012 Roy & Dann Thomas; costume design by Ron Harris.]

S

Only time to cover correspondence re one issue this time—but hey, it was a double-sizer, so it’s really like covering two, right? So here we go with commentary on A/E #100, which showcased both the centennial of Vol. 3 and the 50th anniversary of Jerry Bails’ and my A/E V1#1 in 1961, plus Jim Amash’s lonnnng interview with Yours Truly (Roy T.) about his experiences writing and editing for DC Comics in the 1980s—not to mention a few other subjects, as well, which we’ll mention as we rocket along. We begin with a very welcome letter from one of my favorite all-time collaborators, Jerry Ordway of All-Star Squadron and Infinity, Inc. fame (though we hear tell he’s done a thing or two since, as well): Hey Roy,

Just wanted to say how much I enjoyed the centennial issue of Alter Ego. Really fun to read your interview especially, and the anecdotes about All-Star Squadron and Arak.

I had one minor quibble about your story of how I became the penciler of All-Star Squadron, and it’s a minor point, but a personal issue to me. A little backstory first: I had been trying to get penciling work from the time I started at DC, and while finishing All-Star Squadron, I didn’t have a lot of spare time.

Anyway, I had drawn a short story that eventually wound up in House of Mystery, and wanted more. I didn’t want to be pigeonholed as an inker, to be honest, so I sent some pencils samples to Len Wein, and also made noises to Karen Berger, who was the editorial coordinator at the time.

bump Adrian Gonzales from his assignment, and Len said he would shift Adrian over to Arak, and that he’d be glad not to have to draw crowds of heroes on every page. I wanted his assurance that no one would lose work over this, so I assume he called you at this point and talked it over.

Next thing I knew, instead of starting in the relative safety and obscurity of a back-up in the Flash comic, I had to debut on a popular title, with a 22-page deadline and a lot more pressure. But I’m glad how things worked out, because the book’s fans are a great and appreciative group, and the stories we did together are still being talked about and referenced thirty years later.

re:

Jerry Ordway

Even better than that, Jerry—they’re being reprinted! Well, at least the issues of All-Star Squadron that you inked have been collected in a recent black-&-white Showcase volume—and hopefully a second volume, re-presenting the stories and covers you penciled, will follow while we’re still young enough to cash the checks for ourselves. I myself don’t recall quite how Adrian Gonzales wound up penciling Arak – Son of Thunder, but I do know that Dann’s and my DC sword-and-sorcery comic needed a new penciler at that stage, just as I became its editor as well as writer with #15. So when Len suggested Adrian pencil Arak, it seemed like a good idea to me, as well.

Things worked out very nicely for both mags!

The following letter from Brett Canavan will have to serve as an articulate representative of the cyberspace mountain of mostly favorable missives that we received on our hundredth issue:

Dear Roy,

First, I’d like to say that I am honored to have corresponded with you these past few years, however briefly. Perhaps the feeling I get in sending a letter to you, one of my favorite Silver Age authors, is not unlike how you must have felt exchanging letters with Gardner Fox all those years ago. I’d like to join One day out of the blue I got those who paid tribute to you in A/E a call from the then-editor of The #100. You wrote one of my favorite Flash (Nick Cuti, or was it Ernie storylines of all time, the Kree-Skrull Colón?) asking if I wanted to War, and started my favorite, the draw the new “Creeper” back-up Vision & Scarlet Witch romance. It’s they were planning for the book. I over 40 years later and no plotline has thought it over, long and hard, touched me more since. You and figured I could pencil and Steve Englehart (with and ink, and not go broke your artistic collaborators) Being A Sport About It! with seven pages a month did work that has stood the You could’ve knocked Ye Editor (Roy) over with a feather when someone mailed him the of work. I then called Len, test of time. splash of a fourth “Batman” story he worked on (not counting a “Superman & Batman” the editor of All-Star, and team-up) in his early DC days: “This Sporting Death!” from Batman #338 (Aug. 1981). It On to A/E itself: I’m told him I was going to wound up, like a couple of the others, being dialogued by Roy’s pal and screenwriting sorry that so much of your quit in order to pursue partner Gerry Conway. Art was by Irv Novick & Frank McLaughlin. The term “plot assist” experience at DC was penciling. He said that if I may indicate that RT supplied Gerry with anything from a rough outline to a full-blown unpleasant, at least as far as plot. Roy recalls only that he’d wanted to develop an Earth-One equivalent of Green wanted to pencil, why not editorial/company support Lantern’s old foe, The Sportsmaster. Thanks to Hoy Murphy and Scott Rowland for the pencil All-Star Squadron? I went. As a reader, I felt some scans. [© 2012 DC Comics.] told him I didn’t want to

re:

of it, because when so much of the old JSA timeline got ret-conned [out of existence], I felt cheated. It bothered me with Legion of Super-Heroes, too, a title I know you didn’t care for, but for us readers there was a feeling of community with that series and its back history. I’ve always thought that the reason why the JSA and the LSH remain my favorites is that almost all their history mattered. I was so glad to see a lot of it revived in recent months and happier still that some of your Infinity, Inc. work is now in continuity once again.

You were blessed with some great artists at DC, though—Rich Buckler, Jerry Ordway, Gene Colan, Todd McFarlane, Rick Hoberg, and Dick Giordano himself—a group of talents beyond compare. I wish Jonni Thunder could have had another series; it’s one of your “hidden gems,” I believe.

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behind-the-scenes stories we’d told before (mostly in the four TwoMorrows volumes of The All-Star Companion) sounded to you like plugging plain and simple.

Plugging it was, I suppose, but hardly pure and simple. Jim and I wanted to avoid repeating information that was easily available elsewhere—not so much to get you to buy those books (though all but the first of them are still in print), but because if I had yakked on at length about things I’d already said and/or written about All-Star Squadron, Infinity, Inc., Young All-Stars, and Secret Origins (not to mention the in-depth study of Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew! in A/E #72), we’d have had no room left to relate all the stuff about Arak, Jonni Thunder, Wonder Woman, and the “Superman” and “Batman” stories I scripted while Squadron and Arak were in preparation.

Now for a few brief notes on #100, a few of which came in from folks you may have heard of (with my own comments printed in italics):

I enjoyed all the stories you had to tell in #100, although I have one minor gripe. At times you would say you’d talked about a certain matter in this book or in that book, although I have all but one issue of A/E. I hate to nitpick, but more than a few times it came off as continuous plugging and grew tiresome. My opinion, of course.

It was also great to hear about your collaborations with Dann—and man, it’s hard to believe how long that’s been going. I remember well when you two were first a couple—jeez, now I’m feeling old. Please pass my compliments along to Dann for her fine “Raven” work in the Singer T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents books. I wish those had continued, because that guy had the right idea—top talents and a quality package with respect for the past. Certain creators today could learn a lesson about respecting their predecessors.

I loved Alex Wright’s contributions, of course. Sexy superheroines—what’s not to love?

Kudos must also be paid to Jim Amash and Michael T. Gilbert for their forays into their own histories.

Brett Canavan

Thanks for the kind words, Brett.

Sorry if our frequent mentions of

Keeping Up With The Jones’—Artwork, That Is! Arvell Jones, the mid-’80s penciler of a number of issues of All-Star Squadron and the “Guardian” re-tell in Secret Origins, sent his own congratulations on Alter Ego reaching 100 issues: “I still remember getting an issue from Professor Bails at a Detroit Triple Fan Fair in the late ’60s. The same convention that Rich Buckler invited me to after I met him at an old bookstore in Hamtramck, Michigan. We were both looking at the art books, and that bookstore had a collection of old comics that we both went for, which started our conversation. You know, when I think about it, that’s how I met a lot of the comic fans that became pro creators, either at that bookstore or at the Triple Fan Fair.

“I have to tell you that you fulfilled a childhood dream of mine of drawing such comic book characters as Captain Marvel, The Guardian, Batman, Starman, Doc Mid-Nite, and Hourman. There were a few stories I’d have liked to have seen done—like this drawing I did a few years back. A fan saw it before I could finish it and snatched it up, all excited about the concept.”

And so were we, Arvell, when you sent us the above scan of your potential cover! Dann and I still remember you and your new bride Wanda stopping by our place in San Pedro, California, in the 1980s and our taking you, as a wedding present, to dinner on the Queen Mary, docked in the nearby harbor. Not all the memories are in only four colors, are they, old buddy? [Heroes TM & © 2012 DC Comics.]

Dave Gibbons [artist/cocreator of the celebrated Watchmen and various other features]: “Just downloaded the 100th issue of Alter Ego and wanted to congratulate you. My first issue [of the original volume of A/E] was the one with the green cover and the Kubert Tor drawing; I don’t think I’ve missed one since. It’s still my favorite magazine about comics, by a mile, and always rekindles that sense of wonder I used to have as a kid. Thanks for all your efforts, and long may you and A/E continue!” That green/Kubert/Tor issue was Alter Ego [Vol. 1] #6, Dave—Ronn Foss’ second and final issue, published around the end of 1963. You’ve clearly been reading comic books and magazines about them for way too long, fella!

Al Jaffee [he of the Mad fold-ins, among many other writing-and-art accomplishments]: “Just a quick thank you for the complimentary copy of Alter Ego Centennial. I enjoyed it immensely, and you deserve congratulations for a job well done over many years. It was a trip down memory lane for me in that I re-met many of the talented cartoonists I had the good fortune to know many, many years ago and who are no longer with us. To use an uncool old cliché… thanks for the memories.

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[correspondence, comments, & corrections]

But, of course, there’s very little new under the sun.

Here’s to another 100 issues!”

Les Daniels, who, alas, passed away only a few months after #100 came his way, sent us his congrats and “one egocentric quibble. In Bruce MacIntosh’s interview with Jim Amash, someone gave the title of my first book [in 1971] as “The Comix: An Illustrated History of Comic Strip Art.” Actually, it’s called Comix: A History of Comic Books in America. It’s a small point, no doubt, but this was one of the first books to chronicle comic books, as opposed to books on the strips, which had already been around for decades.”

Agreed—and I still feel that Les’ 1991 history of Marvel is one of the better books written about comics—mainly because nobody at Marvel paid any real attention to it until after it came out, so that Les was allowed to write the book that he felt should be written. Alas, that experience wasn’t repeated a couple of years later with his volume on DC Comics, with the result that Les’ book on that company, valuable as it still is, is marred by an irrelevant reliance on two-page spreads (with the result that several things that didn’t fit into such spreads got glossed over or missed entirely) and a distinct over-coverage of DC characters in other media at the expense of the comic books themselves. I know that Les felt very, very much the same. I miss our occasional talks and e-mails, my friend.

Don Ensign: “On page 16 there is a reference to the ‘sons of thunder’ being Christ’s followers. This comes from the Gospel of Mark 3:17, which says, “And James, the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them the name Boanerges, which means ‘Sons of Thunder’)— [New American Standard Bible.] James and John, of course, were two of Christ’s disciples/apostles.” I never doubted it, Don. But even if the phrase is in the King James version—the one I’ve read quite a bit of—I don’t recall ever encountering (or even hearing about) the expression “Sons of Thunder” at the time I made it the subtitle of Arak. I thought I’d made it up!

Douglas Jones, a.k.a.

“Gaff” [and formerly Carl Gafford] wrote: “Mystery solved—but not much of a mystery. I’m the ‘John Drake’ who colored that ‘Supergirl” story you wrote for Superman Family back in 1980. I was still working days full-time as Marvel’s typesetter, so when the offer came to do some fill-in coloring at DC, I resurrected my old alias and filled in on that story as well as on an issue of Teen Titans (#8, I think) and Green Lantern (too lazy to look up that number). I’d first used that alias in 1974 (derived, of course, from Patrick McGoohan’s Secret Agent) to color an issue of Marvel Premiere with “Iron Fist.” DC didn’t carry coloring credits, but Marvel did; hence the alias.

Instead of a pen name, was it a ‘brush’ name?”

My Thudd, DC’s Blunder?

Above is a John Costanza drawing of a humor concoction dreamed up by Roy Thomas for DC circa 1984, as printed that year in Comics Buyer’s Guide #550.

In A/E #100, Ye Ed mentioned two concepts he’d come up with for DC when publisher Jenette Kahn had asked for some comics proposals aimed at “younger readers.” She loved both of Roy’s notions (just as she had adored Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew!), a deal was struck, and a pittance of money changed hands. Reader John Wells recently dug up info from said CBG #550 about an announced, but soon aborted “line of comic books aimed at children, spearheaded by a revival of Sheldon Mayer’s Sugar and Spike. Although material for the title already existed thanks to the stories Mayer had prepared for the European market, DC postponed the launch so that it would coincide with the release of its other, still-in-development kid titles, thus establishing more of a presence for the sub-line at newsstands.”

The remainder of the titles were described in The Comic Reader #218 around that same time. One was to be: “Thudd and Blunder, by Jim Engel and John Costanza. Co-created with Roy Thomas, Jim will script and John will draw the adventures of a hapless apprentice to an evil sorcerer (Blunder) and his unlikely crony, a barbarian named Thudd.” (Roy had originally intended to script both this and the following series he’d also conceived, but realized he was too busy, so he contacted Jim Engel, one of the funniest people he knew.) TCR continued: “Gary Friedrich and Stan Goldberg will do another Roy Thomas co-creation called powers!, which apparently stars a group of wacky teens.” (Two earlier—and in RT’s mind preferable—titles for that projected series about Archie-style super-heroes had been The Oddballs and The Misfits.

A Goldberg drawing of them accompanied his interview in A/E #18. Roy was to have been editor of Thudd and Blunder, and John Wells reports that Nick Cuti was slated to edit powers!)

Jim Engel adds that “a first issue of Thudd & Blunder was done… My villain in that book was called ‘Wretchwolf the Wrotten.’ I recall having a 3-issue ‘play or pay’ agreement with DC, but of course was stiffed on the other two issues.” Jim says that, till he saw a write-up about it (in our sister mag Back Issue #57), “I forgot there was another ‘kids’ line’ in the works after [Dick] Giordano went back on his promise to Mike Tiefenbacher, Chuck Fiala, and me that the DC kids’ line we were working on, reviving the DC funny animals (that never got past Funny Stuff Stocking Stuffer), was happening.”

[Art © 2012 DC Comics.]

Jon B. Cooke, who did the layouts on this very issue (as he did a few years ago on his own great magazine, Comic Book Artist), scribes: “Superb ish! Roy, I’m particularly happy that in my testimonial you retained my abbreviating Alter Ego as “A/E,” with the slash, a sentimental nickname by yours truly! I do it in honor of both you and Jerry, as the name of the zine lost its hyphen along the line. It’s my way of nodding to both A/E eds.” And I use the “A/E” for much the same reason, Jon—as a reminder of that AWOL hyphen, and of Jerry Bails, who created and named this fanzine in early 1961.

John G. Pierce says, among other things: “‘The Wright Stuff’ was quite enjoyable, especially his Pearl Frush-based Mary Marvel. I even e-mailed Alex, complimenting him on it and asking for a scan of the Mary pic so I could use it as [digital] wallpaper—a request with which he generously complied.

And ‘Longarm of the Law’ was a good story, one which should have been accepted. It’s entirely appropriate that A/E’s #1 interviewer [Jim Amash] gets his own chance on the other side, and a fine interview it turned

re:

out to be. It is sad to lose yet another old-time pro in Mike Esposito; I’ve since come to realize that the Andru-Esposito version of Wonder Woman was better than I thought at the time.

“And finally, of course, everything in FCA was terrific reading, though I have to wonder if any sharp-eyed readers noticed that, on the one hand, I stated that Superman/Captain Marvel team-ups should have gone no further than the ‘Make Way for Captain Thunder’ story, while also praising efforts such as your own work in DC Presents and the All-Star Squadron stories. I tend to regard myself as part Marvel Family purist, part comics historian, and part fanboy. And in the latter two capacities, I can appreciate good crossovers, even if the purist side of me is somewhat reticent.”

Mark Heike: “The last thing I read in the issue was ‘Longarm of the Law.’ I was a little disgruntled because Larry Guidry, who penciled it, had done a number of ‘Femforce’ stories for AC Comics three or four years ago, but never drew anything this good. Sigh—I guess he just likes you better. All kidding aside, I loved the story. It absolutely took me back to 1965 and reading the ‘Elongated Man’ back-ups in Detective. You had the tone of that character tuned in perfectly; it’s the best ‘EM’ story I’ve read since 1967!”

Shaun Clancy [re Golden Age artist George Wilhelms, mentioned in the “re:” section of A/E #100 as someone that his fellow Fiction House artist Lily Renée might have been trying to remember in her own interview back in #85]: “I contacted George Wilhelms back in 1997….

I no longer have any record of what we talked about except from memory…. [In the 1970s print edition of Who’s Who of American Comic Books], he was accredited to be related to a ‘Lily Wilhelms.’

George stated he absolutely had no relation to anyone with that name. In 1997, George’s doctor told him he had six months to a year to live, and so he was on an eating splurge. He was bragging about eating a well-done steak with lots of butter after hearing the news. I was glad to see that he lived up until June of 2001. [Circa 1998] he told me that he did see Lily Renée at Fiction House, as she was very attractive, and he remembered her based on that. No further clarification.”

Jeff Taylor writes, re the second letter of his we printed in #100’s letters column, which dealt with Mick “Marvelman” Anglo’s character Superhombre/Miracle Man: “I’m afraid the paragraph got a bit scrambled somewhere along the way, because at no point had I originally said that the character had ever been called ‘Captain Miracle’ (a completely different character of his creation), and the fact that before being reprinted in England as ‘Miracle Man’ Superhombre had been known in Holland as ‘Mirakel Man’ was also completely removed.” Thanks for clearing that up, Jeff. Between Marvelman and a couple of Miracle Men and Superhombres, guess I got a bit confused. Not for the first time. And thanks for the praise for Larry Guidry & Shane Foley’s able artistic rendering of my Julie-Schwartzrejected “Elongated Man” script as “Longarm of the Law”—and for the kind words re the reprint of Bernie Bubnis’ 1964 Super Hero Spectacular Calendar: “These kind of old fandom things are impossible to find, so God bless Bill Schelly for giving us all a chance to see it in Alter Ego!”

Tony Young wrote: “I regret to inform you that Phil Castora, whom you credited for his Hawkman research in an All-Star Companion, passed away at the age of 75 sometime in July of 2009. I have been a member of LASFS [the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society] for quite some time and had gotten to know Phil.” We were sorry to hear it, Tony. Phil was the fan who first made Jerry Bails realize that a number of the 1940s “Justice Society of America” stories had been published out of order. He and I finally established contact not too many years back, and he was both pleased and bemused by all that he had set in motion with that original short article—especially when I sent him a copy of The All-Star Companion [Vol. 1] to show where Jerry and I had taken the matter since. And I’m still working on it!

71

Thanks also to those responsible for some enthusiastic online reviews of Alter Ego #100: K.C. Carlson at the Comics Worth Reading website, and host Chris Marshall at the Sunday Review site. There were probably a few others we’ve neglected to mention, but believe us—we appreciated them!

GIVING FANDOM THE FINGER Dept.: Coming out this month is Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman, by Marc Tyler Nobleman, the first-ever book in any format on Bill Finger, the uncredited co-creator, original writer, and costume designer of the Dark Knight. It features a plethora of unpublished material about Finger (who also co-created Green Lantern and Wildcat), Bill F.’s verbatim response to Bob Kane infamous 1960s denial that Bill had co-created Batman, and the story of how Marc discovered Finger’s lone and previously unknown heir! Illustrations by Eisner nominee Ty Templeton.

Send those bouquets and brickbats re this issue to:

Roy Thomas e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com 32 Bluebird Trail St. Matthews, SC 29135

ATTENTION, ALTER EGO FANS! For advance news and informed discussion concerning features in A/E, check out the Alter-EgoFans chat list at group.yahoo.com/group/alter-ego-fans. Or, if you encounter any problems getting on board, just contact web co-overseer Chet Cox at mormonyoyoman@gmail.com and he’ll lead you right to it! Alter-Ego-Fans is where the Golden and Silver Ages still live—and talk to each other!

KIRBY

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No. 171

August 2012

Special Swayze Section

This month, we’re devoting FCA’s full eight pages to the work of Marc Swayze, who for more than a decade and a half has written his “We Didn’t Know… It Was the Golden Age!” column for these pages. Our cover illo is a Swayze sketch of Mary Marvel, a superheroine he visually created for Fawcett Publications in 1941-42; it was drawn in 2006 for Belgian fan/collector Dominique Leonard.

Thanks to Dominique for sharing it with us—and to Randy Sargent for coloring it especially for this issue.

[Shazam girl TM & © 2012 DC Comics.]

The remainder of this edition of FCA is devoted to a 7-page story Marc illustrated in 1955 for Charlton Comics—but for a comic book title which had originated at Fawcett— about which we’ll tell you more as we move along, page by page….

—P.C. Hamerlinck, FCA Editor.

[Art by Marc Swayze. Shazam heroine TM & © 2012 DC Comics.]

© 2012 the respective copyright holders.

74

Though it’s unsigned, Marc Swayze has identified this story from Charlton’s This Is Suspense #26 (August 1955) as being his art; its scripter is, alas, unknown. In fact, at present, the online Grand Comics Database doesn’t identify Marc’s role in things, either… but that’ll probably change, now that we’ve “outed” him.

© 2012 the respective copyright holders.

75

As we said, Charlton’s This Is Suspense had a Fawcett heritage. With a June 1952 cover date, Fawcett had launched a horror comic titled Strange Suspense Stories. It lasted through #5 (Feb. 1953), not long before the company discontinued its comics line, and featured art by the likes of Graham Ingels, George Evans, Mike Sekowsky, Bob Powell, Lou Cameron, and Bernard Baily….

© 2012 the respective copyright holders.

76

In 1953-54, Charlton purchased from Fawcett a number of its comics titles and even a sizable chunk of fully drawn stories. Charlton revived Strange Suspense Stories with a new logo and a cover date of Jan.-Feb. 1954— though it was relaunched not with “#6” but with “16.” While the Derby, Connecticut, company was noted for perplexing numbering of its comics, this decision wasn’t as quite capricious as it may seem. Read on….

© 2012 the respective copyright holders.

77

You see, in 1953, Charlton had published issues #10-15 of a comic named Lawbreakers Suspense Stories (continuing from one called simply Lawbreakers); so when it decided, for whatever reason, to begin utilizing the name of Fawcett’s earlier title, it continued the numbering from its own comic rather than from the Fawcett one. The new Strange Suspense Stories ran from #16 through #22 (Nov. 1954)… and then it was time for another name change….

© 2012 the respective copyright holders.

78

With issue #23 (Feb. 1955), Charlton’s Strange Suspense Stories became—This Is Suspense. Why? You tell us! This Is Suspense ran for a grand total of four issues—through #26 (Aug. 1955), the issue in which “The Big Mistake” appeared—incidentally, the second issue under the new Comics Code Authority. Then, with #27 (Oct. 1955), again for reasons obscure, the title was switched back to Strange Suspense Stories.

© 2012 the respective copyright holders.

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The quartet of This Is Suspense issues contained a checkered contingent of new stories and old. TIS #23 reprinted two tales illustrated by a very young Wally Wood: an adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and another story from a 1950 Fox comic… and TIS #26 reprinted a Don Heck-signed effort that had appeared in Comic Media’s Danger #1 (Jan. 1953).

© 2012 the respective copyright holders.

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And that wraps up our annotated reprinting of one of the stories Marc Swayze illustrated for Charlton’s This Is Suspense. Our thanks to the Grand Comics Database, from which we obtained the indexed info from which we wove the foregoing mini-history of Strange Suspense Stories—as well as the scan at left of the cover of TIS #26, which was drawn by future Charlton editor Dick Giordano.

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