Comic Book Artist #18 by TwoMorrows Publishing

COSMIC COMICS OF THE ’70s

No.18 Feb. 2002

$6.95

In The U.S.

STARLIN • ENGLEHART • WEISS • MILGROM • LEIALOHA • BRUNNER

M A R V E L ’ S

C O S M I C

C O M I C S

O F

T H E

’ 7 0 s !

Editor/Designer JON B. COOKE Publisher

TWOMORROWS

NUMBER EIGHTEEN

CELEBRATING THE LIVES & WORK OF THE GREAT CARTOONISTS, WRITERS & EDITORS

MARCH 2002

JOHN & PAM MORROW Associate Editors CHRIS KNOWLES DAVID A. ROACH CHRISTOPHER IRVING GEORGE KHOURY Contributing Editors ROY THOMAS JOHN MORROW Proofreader ERIC NOLEN-WEATHINGTON Cover Art JIM STARLIN, pencils/colors ALLEN MILGROM & ALAN WEISS, inks Transcribers JON B. KNUTSON BRIAN K. MORRIS SAM GAFFORD Logo Designer/Title Originator ARLEN SCHUMER Mascot WOODY by J.D. King Issue Theme Song SAIL AWAY David Gray

THE FRONT PAGE Last minute bits about the community of comic book artists, writers, and editors ..............................................1 EDITOR’S RANT: CRISIS ON EARTH-REAL Peter Kuper’s World War 3 Illustrated and Joe Sacco’s Palestine are lauded for dealing with reality ....................4 IN MEMORIUM: JOHN BUSCEMA, 1927-2002 Jon B. Cooke revisits a 1997 interview he conducted with the late artist as we salute Big John ........................5 CBA COMMUNIQUES: ATLAS ROCKS! ATLAS SUCKS! The diverse opinions of our readers regarding Atlas/Seaboard and other pressing matters of state......................6 MARGINALIA: THE BEST ARTIST YOU DON’T KNOW Our esteemed Welsh friend looks at the all but forgotten work of master comic strip artist David Wright..........9 FRED HEMBECK’S DATELINE: @!!?* Mar-Vell, Kree Warrior or Cosmic Dude? Our Man Hembeck is on the good Captain’s case! ............................13 MARVEL’S COSMIC COMICS OF THE 1970s CBA ROUNDTABLE: THE COSMIC CODE AUTHORITY SPEAKS A discussion with Jim Starlin, Alan Weiss and Allen Milgrom about those spaced-out Marvel comics! ..............14 STEVE ENGLEHART INTERVIEW: MARVEL’S THIRD WAVE The writer on his start in the biz and the rise of a new consciousness at the 1970s House of Ideas....................30 STEVE LEIALOHA INTERVIEW: LEIALOHA’S COSMIC DAYS The renowned artist on his debut in the field, working on Warlock, and on getting cosmic in San Francisco ....44 FRANK BRUNNER MINI-INTERVIEW: SORCERY SUPREME A short talk with the artist on his ’70s collaboration with Steve Englehart on Doctor Strange ............................54 LOST & FOUND: THE LOST WARLOCK #16 Selected panels from Alan Weiss’s exquisite pencil work on the missing Adam Warlock inventory book............56 Opposite page: Advertising art by Jim Starlin for The Death of Captain Marvel graphic novel. ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc. Above: Panel detail (sans word balloons) from The Avengers Annual #7 (1977) Words and pencils by Jim Starlin, inks by Joe Rubinstein. ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc. Both images courtesy of Jim Woodall. N E X T

I S S U E

—

I T ’ S

H A R V E Y

C O M I C S

Visit CBA on our Web site at:

www.twomorrows.com Contributors Jim Starlin • Florence Steinberg Allen Milgrom • Alan Weiss Marie Severin • Steve Englehart Steve Leialoha • Frank Brunner Pauline Weiss • Linda Fite Herb Trimpe • John Romita, Sr. Barry Windsor-Smith • Stan Lee Dennis O’Neil • Steve Skeates Marie Steinberg • Roy Thomas Trina Robbins • Les Daniels Fred Hembeck • Michelle Nolan John R. Cochran • Alex Toth Terry Austin • Christopher Irving Jim Woodall • Mark Cannon In memory of legendary comic artists

John Buscema Kurt Schaffenberger and the genius animator

Chuck Jones and to our gal everyday “queen of the comics”

Flo Steinberg and our pals

Al & Pauline Weiss

H O U S E

P A R T Y !

COMIC BOOK ARTIST™ is published 10 times a year by TwoMorrows, 1812 Park Drive, Raleigh, NC 27605, USA. 919-833-8092. Jon B. Cooke, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Editorial Office: P.O. Box 204, West Kingston, RI 02892-0204 USA • 401-783-1669 • Fax: 401-783-1287. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT the editorial office. Single issues: $9 postpaid ($11 Canada, $12 elsewhere). Six-issue subscriptions: $36 US, $66 Canada, $72 elsewhere. All characters © their respective owners. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © their respective authors. ©2002 Jon B. Cooke/TwoMorrows. Cover acknowledgements: Captain Marvel, Adam Warlock, Doctor Strange, Thanos ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc. First Printing. PRINTED IN CANADA.

CBA Communiques

Atlas Sucks! Atlas Rocks! Readers’ divergent opinions regarding Seaboard Periodicals Chris Gage via the Internet I picked up CBA #16 and it looks like another winner. I especially like the Colón cover. I’ve only skimmed it so far, but I love the oddball companies of the ’70s and your survey issues are always a delight, so I am sure I’ll love this one as much as all the others. By the way, don’t sell yourself short; Michael Chabon was right on! Your writing style is not only intelligent, clear and concise (as befits a journalistic mag like CBA), but also has a special quality about it that a) vividly conveys your love for the medium you write about, and b) really makes the reader feel like you are talking right to him, as if you were sitting on the porch having a beer and just shooting the breeze; like they know you and the people you write about personally. It’s the same kind of quality Stan Lee used in his early lettercols and Bullpen Bulletins pages that made readers feel like such an integral part of the “Marvel Family” in the early days of that company. It’s also used well by Stephen King, to make the reader feel comfortable and like they really know his settings and characters, before he lowers the boom with the scary stuff! And it’s a rare skill, so wield it with pride! [Thanks, Chris, and congrats on your recent wedding!—Ye Ed.]

Bruce Timm Hollywood, U.S.A. The Atlas/Seaboard CBA was the most enjoyable ish in a long time. Fascinating! I still treasure the memory of seeing Destructor #1 on the stands without warning, “What is this? A new comic company with new Ditko/Wood art? A whole line of new comics that I can collect from day one?! O’ frabjous day!” The excitement lasted a few months. Some books I liked more than others, most left me scratching my head, but I got ‘em all, though, and have the complete run (even the Vickis!) Don’t let anyone give you crap about devoting an entire ish to such an “Eh, who cares?” subject. The off-trail company coverage issues (like the terrific Charlton and Warren issues) have been some of the best CBAs so far. Looking forward to the Red Circle story. Why not cover the Dell/Gold Key heroes, too? (Speaking of which, Ernie Colón is dead wrong regarding his Doctor Solar issues! They rule!) [Yeah, well, we think Timm rules! Actually, CBA will be devoting an issue to Gold Key and we’ve asked Bruce to do a cover painting of Magnus, Robot Fighter for that one, coming this Summer.—Y.E.] Ruben Azcona via the Internet I consider this magazine a treasure, as I have always seemed to love reading about the creator’s lives even more so than comics themselves. On a negative note though, I just want to throw in my vote for the side that thinks you’re wasting too many issues that focus entirely on “defunct” publishers. Yes, in this day and age of political correctness, everybody on a message board like [the Comic Art List]

will blast me for publically saying this, but the fact of the matter is that the “Big Two” are, and and always have been, the best. Now, while I always read every issue regardless of content, I have to admit that overall, I and the general populace couldn’t care less about Atlas comics. Let’s face it, the comics pretty much suck, and that has been proven over the years by the lack of people searching for back issues of the company. I don’t mean to pick on Atlas by the way, I’m just using them as one of the many examples. I mean, how many readers do you honestly think care to spend eight or nine bucks for an issue of CBA jam-packed with articles and interviews about Harvey comics??? I realize that this magazine is also a personal thing for you, and that gives you the right to do issues about topics that interest you personally, but I just think you should stick to issues on artists, characters, etc., from Marvel and DC. around 80% of the time. In other words, lessen the non-Big Two content to a ratio of around one out of every five issues. That being said, the overall list of upcoming issues looks good, but one trap I find every publisher falls into whenever deciding to do a specific era like ’70s Marvel for instance, is to always do the obvious, which is the whole Starlin/outer space/cosmic saga. There were so many other great moments and creators to do stories and interviews with! But don’t misunderstand, I’m still going to love the issue! I want you to know that it is a big plus that you’ve decided to mix up the content a bit and stop the trend of having each issue focus entirely on one topic. Your recent issue with Stevens, Wagner, Rivoche and the Hernandez Bros. is an excellent example! Let me put it this way, I always adored Stevens’ covers during the ’80s, Mage was a fun independent for someone not that big on independents, I never cared to even read Mister X but I always loved the covers and posters, and finally, my only exposure to Love and Rockets was reading the first black-&-white issue which I consider to be the worst comic I’ve ever read in my entire life. But you know what? Thanks to open mindedness, and as I mentioned above, I read every single page and once again proved to myself that interviews with creators can still be interesting even when they are creators of books I don’t care about! I thoroughly enjoyed the entire issue! Now, for fear that you may never get this far in my letter, I want to get to a couple of suggestions. One issue which I think deserves to become reality, and which is long overdue, is one which would focus on the Filipino Invasion! I mean, my God, these guys are some of the best inkers ever. And haven’t you and every other collector out there ever asked yourselves, how the heck did such a tiny impoverished country produce such an immense wealth of great comic artists? Starting with the best of them, the late, great Alfredo Alcala, and going on down the great list in no particular order is Ernie Chan, Rudy Nebres, Nestor Redondo, Tony DeZuniga, Pablo Marcos, Danny Bulanadi, Rafael Kayanan, Gerry Talaoc (though I personally despised his inks), Gerry Alanguilan, etc. These guys have always been underrated and there has always been a sort of “comic industry racism” for some reason. For instance, whenever a great American artist dies, we’re bound to get several tribute interviews, articles, remembrances, etc. But whenever a nonAmerican artist dies, the news rarely garners more than the usual tiny blurb or at most fraction of a page mention. (I’m referring to the comic news media in general by the way, not to you.) The point is, as much as I always love it, there have been several comic fanzines who’ve done interviews and articles on guys like Starlin, Byrne, Perez, etc. In fact, they’ve been done to death. Whereas in my 20-odd years in the hobby, I can’t recall any article or interview with any of the Filipino artists other than a one-pager on Alcala in Hulk! magazine from over 20 years ago. I’m not saying they have to get the attention of the acknowledged greats like the Starlins and Millers, but rather just planting the seed in your mind to let you COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18 Feb. 2002

know that you could really produce something truly ground-breaking with this idea. With a lot of deep digging and hard work, you could get in-depth interviews with most of these guys (while they still live) and since they always worked closely together and know each other, several of them are bound to have tons of great things to say about the deceased ones like Alcala. With an entire issue devoted to as many of these guys as possible, you would instantly gain attention and pride by basically being the first publisher/magazine to show the comic world an in-depth look into the lives and careers of these always overshadowed greats. Whereas every other similar mag like Comics Interview, The Comics Journal, Amazing Heroes, etc. never so much as wrote perhaps a tiny obituary or gave one of these guys a one-line mention, you could show these artists just how much fans, and the industry in general, appreciate them in one fell swoop! Jon, you know how I said that I wasn’t a big fan of devoting entire issues of CBA to defunct companies that no one really cares about anyway? Well you might ask yourself, “Why do you buy those issues then?” and my answer, aside from the fact that it’s because I really support what you’re doing, is because I’ve always been a fan of what goes on behind the scenes of comic books. I think the single greatest achievement by Stan Lee was the Bullpen Bulletins Page. Through that simple device, readers were given glimpses into the lives of all the creators whose names we kept seeing in the credits, and it made us all feel like we were part of the “Marvel Family.” So while I may get upset when I see an issue of CBA devoted to an entire company who I don’t care about, the reason I still buy it is because I think it’s still important to have a documented and published synopsis of the history of these publishers. As long as it’s just once and as in-depth as possible, so that we always have a “reference book” on the company that any fans can look to for info, and so that it doesn’t need to be revisited again for all the non-fans. This is what I’m suggesting with the idea of the Filipino Invasion. Nothing has ever been done on these guys, and one entire in-depth issue of CBA would be the first true attempt at showing we actually loved and cared about these guys, as opposed to giving them brief, one-line mentions throughout their careers. Anyway, I think you’d be surprised at how many art fans love the works of these guys and one thing is definite: You wouldn’t have trouble getting art samples from any of these guys, as they are not hard to find. I hope you haven’t fallen asleep, and just ask that you think about it. Hopefully (and especially if you’re a fan of any of these guys), the idea will fester in the back of your mind for a long time until you one day also come to realize as I did that an entire, in-depth look at the “Filipino Invasion” has been long overdue. [I agree, Ruben, that the Filipino school is a very necessary subject to cover and, with the able help of Mañuel Auad, we’re compiling that “Invasion of the Filipinos” issue as this is being written, but as to devoting 80% of CBA’s themes to just the Big Two? Nah, there’s just too much cool history to cover regarding the neglected companies to resist, but rest assured we will not neglect DC and Marvel.—Y.E.] Kurt Mitchell Tacoma, Washington If anyone doubts TwoMorrows’ commitment to customer service, send ’em to me. Barely a week has gone by since I renewed my subscription to Comic Book Artist and I’ve already received and read issue #16. Now that’s what I call turnaround! Before commenting on your coverage of Atlas/Seaboard, I’d like to respond to your “Editor’s Rant” column. Jon, you have nothing to apologize for. Your dedication to all aspects of comic book history is what keeps me coming back to CBA month after month. With all due respect to the talents responsible for the Kree-Skrull War and the Fourth World titles, these works are not the Alpha and Omega of comics history many fans seem to take them as. Your ventures into the more obscure corners of that history, your “monuments to mediocrity” as you dubbed them, are vital to understanding both the medium and the culture that spawned it. I think we can learn as much about the art form and its audience from Fightin’ Five and Morlock 2001 as we can from The Spirit or Watchmen, perhaps even more. So go right on doing what you’re doing. Future generations of comics aficionados will thank you. I remember vividly the handful of Atlas comics that found their way into my hands in ’74, specifically the first issues of The Brute, Ironjaw and Targitt. Though never a big part of organized fandom, I knew who Martin Goodman was and what a successful Atlas could March 2002

COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

mean to the industry. The books themselves were a disappointment. They struck me as wrong somehow. My attitude, then as now, was that if I wanted a Marvel comic book, I would buy a Marvel comic book. It wouldn’t be until years after the line’s demise that I would stumble across the jewels amidst the dross: Goodwin and Ditko’s The Destructor, Fleisher and Colón’s The Grim Ghost, Chaykin’s The Scorpion. And now, thanks to CBA #16, I have a few other goodies to track down, especially Thrilling Adventure Stories #2. Toth, Severin, Simonson and Heath? I’m so there! It is a shame that the Goodmans are gone. As thorough as your coverage was, the story of Atlas/Seaboard felt incomplete without those two much-maligned gentlemen’s perspective. We can speculate to our hearts’ content about “Vengeance Inc.” and tax write-offs and sinecures for talentless offspring but we’ll never know for sure why Atlas was born, why its short life was so troubled and why it ultimately died. Nonetheless, you did an extraordinary job of reporting the many different sides of this complex, almost tragic chapter in comic book history. While all of the interviews were interesting, your talk with Ernie Colón was the indisputable highlight of the issue. If every comics practitioner had even a tenth of Ernie’s versatility and work ethic, the industry wouldn’t be in its current sorry state. The man drew Richie Rich for 25 years and proud of it! Any man who says “I think ants and bees, the more there are, the more intelligent they are. Human beings, the more there are, the less intelligent they are” is a man I want to know. Sometimes, I think you have the best job in the world.

Above: Sal Amendola’s original cover art for The Phoenix #2 was adapted very closely by Dick Giordano, the final cover artist. Sal tells us, “My intent was to make it look like [the character] was overpowered but fighting valiantly. Dick leaned him forward to give much greater power to his punch (thus he needed to move the nowoverlapped little background figure; see him [located under the alien giving our hero a halfNelson]?)” Courtesy of and art ©2002 Sal Amendola. Phoenix ©1975 Seaboard Periodicals.

CBA Roundtable

The Cosmic Code Talking with Jim Starlin, Alan Weiss and Conducted by Jon B. Cooke Transcribed by Jon B. Knutson The following roundtable discussion took place after an exceptional Italian dinner at Casa di Meglio on West 48th Street in New York City on Dec. 6, 2001. Many thanks to the artists who attended the feast, and to Alan’s effervescent wife, the ever-helpful Pauline (who assisted by facilitating the meal and copyediting the transcript) and kudos to this editor’s brother, Andrew D. Cooke, who took photos. While Alan remains silent for a portion of the interview, rest assured the renowned conversationalist does come into the discussion. We join our group of cosmic sojourners as coffee is just being served… Comic Book Artist: [to Allen Milgrom and Jim Starlin] You’re both from the Detroit area. Did you two know each other in high school? Jim Starlin: We met in junior high. We were probably 13 or 14. CBA: Did you grow up in the city of Detroit? Jim & Allen Milgrom: [simultaneously] Suburbs. Jim: He was in Huntington Woods, and I was in a place called Berkeley. We went to Berkeley High School together. CBA: Were you guys close at all? Allen: Yeah, as long as I didn’t approach him in public! [laughter] Jim: I used to hang with a different crowd than Allen. Allen: We’d get together and talk about stuff. And I’d run up to him at school and say [excitedly], “Jim, have you seen the latest Fantastic Four?” and he’d go… Jim: “Not now, not now!” [laughs] Allen: I used to creep Jim out. But he’d follow me home. All my friends knew I was into comics, and they didn’t care, but his friends would’ve been… I don’t know… mortified. Jim was ashamed to admit to others that he liked, read, and drew comics. CBA: He hung out with a rough crowd? Allen: They were like the greasers, and I was more like a frat boy, as they called them in those days. Jim used to do drawings of naked chicks and stuff, obscene drawings, and all his friends would go, “Oh, that’s good, Jim! Draw me one of those!” But at the same time, he 14

used to do 20-page Hulk stories, just for practice. I’ve got some of those pages somewhere around, too. If the price is right, Jim, I won’t show them. [laughter] CBA: People use the phrase “The Detroit Mafia” to describe the unusually high number of comics people who came from Michigan in the early 1970s. Was that an accurate description? Jim: Anybody who came to New York from that general vicinity, they just assumed we had been all living in the same house in Detroit. Allen: Jim and I were from that area. We met Rich Buckler and Mike Vosburg. Somehow, we did meet Terry Austin, just before we moved East. He was actually from the city, somewhere around Five Mile. Jim: There were a couple of other guys. Greg Theakston. And that other guy, a friend of Greg’s, who was a painter? Carl Lundgren. He was from that vicinity, too. Alan Weiss: Mike Nasser was also from there. Jim: Weren’t Arvell Jones and Keith Pollard from Detroit? Allen: That’s right. Jim: Well, the truth of the matter is, Detroit is such a cultural wasteland that the only art anyone got there was from the comic book spinner rack at the drug store. [laughter] Everybody ran off! Well, there was the Detroit Art Museum, the Institute of Arts. Allen: That’s not true! Jim: Which you can’t draw in. I remember going in there with some charcoals, and they thought I was a terrorist! They wouldn’t let me draw anything in there! They were afraid I was going to deface the art! [laughter]. We weren’t terrorists. We didn’t have any colors or anything like that. CBA: Was it mostly Marvels you guys read? Allen: Marvels, DCs. When I started reading them, there was nothing but DCs. Jim: That’s right. Allen: There was just Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, and later on The Fly from Archie Comics, and then they came along. The [Adventures of the] Fly #1 was one of the single greatest comics I’ve ever read. Man, I liked that book! There wasn’t much in the early days. CBA: What year did you guys graduate? Jim: 1968, I think it was, because I was in the service in ’69. Allen: But we were in the same grade. I graduated in ’67, though Jim may have graduated in 1968. Jim: I’ll take Allen’s word for it as he took a lot less drugs. [laughter] Allen: It’d be hard to take more! But no, we graduated in ’67. Jim went into the service, I went to the University of Michigan. CBA: [to Jim] When did you start contributing to fanzines? Jim: Well, Allen turned me on to fanzines. Allen: Really? I don’t remember that. Jim: Otherwise I would not have had any outlets whatsoever. COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

March 2002

Authority Speaks! Al Milgrom on those trippy ’70s Marvel Comics Allen did his first fanzine work somewhere during high school, then I did a series of contributions to them when I was in the service. Didn’t we do one for Star-Studded Comics back when I was in high school? CBA: Was that for Buddy Saunders? Allen: Yeah, the Texas Trio. Jim: We did “The Defender” and “Doctor Weird,” and then when I got into the service, I did a few more “Doctor Weirds,” and two issues of this thing called The Eagle. The third issue got blown up. CBA: “Got blown up”? Jim: I was drawing it in Camaron Bay, when I was in Vietnam… CBA: Oh, it wasn’t enlarged; it was literally blown up! Jim: It was blown up. I used to ink my work inside the beer locker, because when you laid the brush down in that humid weather, the ink would go pssssshhhh. One day I went off on a flight, and when I got back, all the Marines were going crazy because somebody snuck on the base and blew up the beer locker. They’re all running around going, “Beer! Beer!” and I’m going, “Drawings! Drawings!” [laughter]

CBA: You had your priorities. Jim: Yeah, it was all gone. I found little bits and pieces of it here and there. CBA: Did you get drafted? Jim: No, no, I joined. Allen: Well, there’s a story behind that, too, as I recall. Jim: Yeah, well, I had a little run-in with the law. Allen: You were given options. They said, “You could either join the service, or we may have to put you in…” Jim: “The hoosegow.” CBA: You Motown juvenile delinquent, you! Which branch? Jim: The Navy. CBA: How long was your hitch? Jim: I was in for a little over three years. I got out early. CBA: Were you in Southeast Asia for the entire time? Jim: For the last part of it. I was stationed in Sicily for the

This spread: Melange of cosmic heroes (and villain) taken from various Jim Starlin Marvel comics. Clockwise from bottom left: Pip, Captain Marvel, Warlock, and Thanos. Above: CBA hosted a dinner of “cosmic proportions” for Marvel stalwarts (from left) Alan Weiss, Jim Starlin, and Allen Milgrom (Alan is much nicer than he appears here!). Photo by Andrew D. Cooke. Characters ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc. March 2002

COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

CBA Interview

Marvel’s Third Wave Steve Englehart on the new consciousness in the ’70s Conducted by Jon B. Cooke Transcribed by Jon B. Knutson Steve Englehart is widely considered to be one of the greatest writing talents to emerge from the Marvel Bullpen in the 1970s. As did his fellow noted scribes Steve Gerber and Don McGregor, the writer made an immediate impact with fans of the House of Ideas, introducing some innovative concepts, probably ahead of their time, including the first multi-issue crossover with his Avengers/Defenders “war.” The writer was interviewed by phone on Dec. 16, 2001, and he copyedited the final transcript.

Above: Okay, okay, we know Stylin’ Steve Englehart didn’t write the debut story featuring the revamped Beast in Amazing Adventures #11 (from which penciler Gil Kane & inker Bill Everett’s superb cover is detailed above), but the series was Steve’s first regular assignments. Anyway, Ye Ed thinks this is one of the best comic-book images of the 1970s and it’s his mag, so… ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc. 30

CBA: It seems to be that every two decades or so, America fixates on the world 20 years prior. In the ’60s, people were into ’40s pop culture; in the ’70s, we were obsessed with the ’50s with Happy Days, etc. Steve: I’m not sure I understand what you mean. I see the 1960s as a unique time, a kind of super-heroic decade. The leaders we respected, like President John Kennedy, had a real “can do” attitude. If you read, say, John B. McDonald’s Travis McGee or other private detective novels of that era—what I was reading in the ’60s—these guys had all been in World War II, which had only ended 15-20 years prior, and there still were virile hero-type characters. They were very competent guys who took care of themselves and others, so it was

natural for them to become private detectives or salvage experts, like Travis McGee. They would go out and fight the bad guys. Then Kennedy came along and said, “We’re going to the moon,” and America was on top, the best was in front of us, the New Frontier. That’s one reason that I think that Marvel Comics, Doc Savage, the Batman TV show, all of that kind of heroic material popped up because it was very much of the time. Now, this is all different from the nostalgia crazes. People weren’t nostalgic for the ’40s when they got into comics in the ’60s. But it certainly is true, to follow your point, that everything goes through a cycle where it’s new, it’s hip, it’s happening, and then it gets refined, and it’s really cool, and just by nature of having the next thing come along, it becomes old-fashioned and out of date. But then you look back a couple of cycles, and you recall the ’30s or I Love Lucy from the ’50s, which may be old-fashioned, but some of that stuff was good. So, it gets resurrected, and people are always re-discovering things after they’ve written them off, and that’s how you gradually build up Western civilization. CBA: [laughs] The 1960s were obviously a tumultuous period, a time of change, and there also seemed a wistful, nostalgic desire to embrace again the standards we had all once agreed on, as a people. As opposed to today, Baby Boomers all basically grew up with the exact same pop culture, whether they grew up in Maine or Hawaii. Steve: It was the ’50s culture, so it was conformist in a sense, in that everybody did have a television, but what they got out of it was different in many cases. One aspect was a belief that the ’50s were just too f*ckin’ conformist, you know? Then comes the rebels, as early as the mid-’50s, Marlon Brando and James Dean, and that flowered. And by the ’60s, there were larger-than-life people, from the Beatles, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, John and Bobby Kennedy… it was a time when people were really stepping up onto whatever stage they were on, and they were intent on making a difference. CBA: And a lot of them being slapped down. Steve: Right. Most of those guys I mentioned ended up getting shot to death. Again, the times were very much like a comic book, in a sense. One theory underlying comics is, you’re walking down the street minding your own business, and a super-villain jumps out. That happens to super-heroes every month, you know? [laughter] It wasn’t always super-villains but a lot of larger-thanlife people jumped out on the stage in that decade. And I think it inspired those of us growing up then to want to be larger-than-life ourselves. People were getting shot, on the streets and in the war, and the Cold War loomed large... but we knew that was growing pains as the world got better. And it did, till after Watergate. Then people decided to pull back, and they’ve basically been pulled back ever since. We’re about due for some heroes again. CBA: Was there much anti-war sentiment as you were attending college [in Connecticut]? Steve: Sure. It wasn’t a hotbed, it wasn’t Berkeley, but I think it shared the general attitude of most schools. I couldn’t tell you now when the mood shifted, but it seems to me that by ’65 opinions were changing. Walter Cronkite went on the air, telling America he was against the Vietnam War, or at least not projecting an “Everything’s Great!” approach. COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

February 2002

CBA: Did you keep your eye on the situation in Vietnam? Steve: Yeah, because I’m interested in reality. There was the draft, of course, but you could be exempted for being in college. Obviously, as I went through my college career and got closer to graduating, it became more personal. From 1965 to ’69, it became very clear that this was a bullsh*t war, so all this sentiment was building up. We were fighting a war, people were going to war and coming back, so there’s that super-heroic vibe yet again at the time—heroes and villains—and it was an explosive thing. CBA: Certainly much of ’60s society chose to ignore Vietnam. It was happening half a world away—though some American boys were dying—but many just went ahead with their daily business, and it wasn’t until the early ’70s when a mass ground-swelling of dissatisfaction with the situation in Southeast Asia took place. Steve: When I graduated in ’69, I was accepted at Michigan Law School, and I called up my draft board, and said, “Do you suppose I’ll be able to get in a semester?” and they said, “You’ve got about three weeks. You’re not even going to get through the summer.” So, I did in fact go into the Army in the Summer of ’69, but at that point my political belief was, “I really don’t want to do this, because I think it’s bullsh*t, but I’m not going to run off to Canada, I’m not that kind of guy.” But when I really started hanging out with people who had been to Vietnam, and really got a first-hand view of what Vietnam was all about, I applied for discharge as a Conscientious Objector, in 1970, and in fact I was granted it. I got out after 16 months in the service with an honorable discharge. But when I went in, I didn’t hold such strong views. I had what I think was probably a very typical American boy’s opinion: “This sucks, but when you have to go, you have to go.” So it was while I was in the Army that I came to understand, “Well, this sucks, and there’s really no good reason to go.” CBA: When did you get out? Steve: October, 1970. CBA: Obviously after Kent State and the widening of the war into Cambodia. Steve: Yeah, Kent State happened during that time, and that was definitely a factor in my political consciousness. CBA: Was it viewed by your generation that, “They’re killing their young… they’re killing us”? Steve: Yes. I definitely identified with the students who were killed. What did they get shot for? The situation was clearly beyond control at this point. The people who were pushing the war, I think, knew they were on the losing side of history, and that leads people to extreme acts. But at the same time, there’s no good reason you should be shooting college students in Ohio! The students weren’t rioting, they weren’t doing anything other than protesting and going to class! Protesting at that time was a very common thing, a wellknown concept. CBA: Was it relatively rare to get out as a Conscientious Objector? Was it a testament to your writing ability? Did you have to write an essay for it? Steve: When I applied for C.O. status in the Summer of 1970, the rules said you had to base your reasons on religious grounds, and I have always believed there is a conscious unity to the universe—I believe there is an overall plan—but I do not believe there’s an old guy with a white beard running things. I’m not an atheist; I just believe in a more cosmic point. But at the time, I was going to have to argue it on Judeo-Christian grounds. Halfway through the process, not due to me, but due to the general way things were going, the Army changed it to ethical, rather than religious grounds. So I was able to argue it from a moral standpoint rather than what the Bible tells me. But it was difficult and unusual. Usually, people who wanted to do this, did it before they went in, and they never went at all. To be in the Army and to try and get out was difficult, yes. I had to convince a chaplain, a shrink and an “officer knowledgeable in matters pertaining to Conscientious Objection”—of which there are none [laughter]—that I was sincere. The chaplain decided I was, the shrink decided I was, but the officer that I went in front of was a WAC major. I thought, “I couldn’t do any worse,” March 2002

COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

because to be a WAC, you would have had to enlist. And to be a major, you would’ve had to have re-enlisted a couple of times, you know? [laughter] So I had to convince somebody who really believed in the military side of things. But I was able to convince her. Fortunately, I’m verbal by nature, I can talk on my feet, plus I did believe in what I was saying. I was able to put my objections across. The coda to that story is that she did recommend that I get out (and even then, the recommendations were sent off to the Pentagon for the final decision, and just like any other bureaucracy, there was a possibility I could’ve convinced the chaplain, the shrink, and the WAC, and the Pentagon could still say no, but they said yes), and I immediately went to New York to start working in comics. After a couple of months, I went back to visit friends of mine who were still in the Army, and I asked about the WAC major. They said, “Oh, she asked for discharge and got out.” I believe I talked her into it! [laughter] CBA: Are you a self-possessed person? Any acting background? Can you project yourself in front of an audience fairly well? Steve: Oh, yes. I have no acting background—other than acting in a sixth grade student play—but I am self-possessed. I’ve never had a problem getting up in front of an audience. When I did get into comics, I started going to conventions, and they’d bring me out on stage and say, “Here is the guy writing Captain America,” and it never really bothered me. I’m just talking to people… whether I’m talking to you on the phone, or to an audience, it doesn’t make a whole lot of difference… I’m just talking. How hard is that? CBA: It’s interesting that, as a teenager, you got out of comics, but you obviously got back into them again while you were in college. People who remain in comics throughout their adolescence and early adulthood—not to stereotype them—but a lot of them are nowhere near self-possessed, shall we say, and they’re not very good in front of a crowd. A lot of creative types are excessively shy, you know? Steve: It’s true, and I do think there is a connection. Being selfpossessed and having

Above: Around the time when the writer was hitting his stride as a scripter at Marvel Comics in the mid-1970s, this pic of a daring Steve Englehart was snapped. Steve told us to dig the funky glass frames! Courtesy of the scribe.

Below: Steve Englehart’s first professional writing assignment, “The Terror of the Pterodactyl,” saw print in Monsters on the Prowl #15. Here’s a detail from one of artist Syd Shore’s panels. ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc.

CBA Interview

The Cosmic Awareness of Stephen Leialoha The artist on his intro to the field, Warlock and a certain Duck Conducted by Jon B. Cooke Transcribed by Brian K. Morris

Below: Here’s a recent Howard the Duck illo by Steve Leialoha produced for a March 2002 Kansas City comic convention where the artist and writer Steve Gerber are guests. Courtesy of Steve Leialoha. Art ©2002 the artist. Howard ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc.

Could Steve Leialoha be the mellowest guy in comics? Partnered with cartoonist-author-feminist-you name it Trina Robbins, Steve is the quintessential, laid-back, San Francisco hippie cartoonist who exudes calmness, and he’s one fine artist to boot. Known primarily as an inker, he came of age during Marvel’s cosmic heyday in the mid’70s, a refreshing new talent blasting on the scene. This interview took place in December 2001 and it was copyedited by the artist. Comic Book Artist: Where are you originally from? Steve Leialoha: I was born and raised in San Francisco, although my father is Hawaiian, from Hawaii. CBA: What does your name mean? Steve: Well, it has any number of meanings but it’s made of two Hawaiian words: “lei” and “aloha”; “lei” being flower, and “aloha,” our handy, all-purpose sort of greeting, meaning “love,” and can also be “goodbye.” It’s kind of like “Shalom.” “Leialoha” is also a nickname, a term of endearment. CBA: Did you grow up in the city? Steve: Yep. Born in San Francisco and still here, although I moved to the suburbs when I was a kid. CBA: You were born in 1952? Steve: Yes. CBA: Did you start drawing at a young age? Steve: My mother told me I did. Apparently, I was always drawing, even before I can remember scribbling and doing stuff. I remember putting a mural on the front room wall of our house when I was a little kid, which my parents didn’t particularly appreciate at the time. [laughs] I was probably like two or three. So yeah, I was always drawing. CBA: Did you clue into comic strips at all? Steve: I was your basic reader of comics. When I was six or seven, I started to read comics. My father would give me old, used comics. I was reading but I didn’t really become aware of comics, per se, until I was 12 when I became a fan of comics. Up to that point, I read them and enjoyed them but it wasn’t from a particularly critical point of view. So I read comics but nothing that stuck out in my mind. CBA: What were you drawing?

Steve: I would just draw anything that was around. It wasn’t cartooning. In the third grade I drew a buffalo I was particularly proud of. Stuff like that. I can remember drawing a house and that led to my first encounter with an art critic. Someone told me the perspective was wrong, although I knew it wasn’t wrong. [laughter] CBA: What comics got you hooked? Steve: Probably around 1961 or ’62, I became a big fan of DC artists Carmine Infantino, Gil Kane and Murphy Anderson. In retrospect, it was all of Julie Schwartz’s comics that interested me, although after awhile I wasn’t quite so particular. I just wanted to read all the comics that came out. I was a big fan of Wayne Boring’s Superman, for example. Not that I knew any of their names early on, but I was able to figure out certain styles. I remember I didn’t care for Joe Kubert initially, although I love his stuff now. When I was a kid, I liked the clean… well… CBA: Not the organic Kubert look? Steve: Exactly. I tended to gravitate towards that more slick style of inking: Bernie Sachs, Frank Giacoia, Murphy Anderson and, eventually, Joe Sinnott. CBA: Did you have friends who were like-minded? Steve: A couple. There were three or four of us in our little neighborhood. By that point, I was living in Pacifica, a little community south of San Francisco. These days, it’s all one great metropolitan, sprawling mass of houses, but then it was the next little community down. One of my collecting pals was [inker] Al Gordon who lived around the corner. I probably met him somewhere around 1961 or ’62, when we were both little kids. We used to reinforce each other’s comics collecting mania by the time I started actively collecting. When I was in high school, I didn’t really have access to older stuff, but suddenly, there are all these EC reprints with Frazetta covers, all the Burroughs books, and a whole range of old material was in print again. It was a good time to be a young comics fan because there was also so much stuff that started up in that point. CBA: San Francisco is renowned for its used book shops. Did you haunt those? Steve: Well, it was a little tricky to get into San Francisco. So every couple of weeks, me and Al would go into the city and check out some of the used bookstores. The old used comics were 5¢ apiece. In particular, I remember finding a couple of mint copies of Jack Kirby/Wally Wood issues of Challengers of the Unknown, which I still have, as well as just old comics in general. After awhile, we were able to get a fair sense of the history of comics. CBA: Were you into other genre material, like Doc Savage? Steve: Oh, yes. All of that stuff. It started with Andre Norton science-fiction novels, and eventually I discovered Ray Bradbury and all the classics. That’s when they started reprinting Burroughs and Robert E. Howard, and so on. I was your basic sf/fantasy fan. CBA: You later had a brush with Ray Bradbury? Steve: Yes. I was one of the contributors to the Bradbury Comic Chronicles, which was a lot of fun, adapting his short stories. I drew the adaptation to “October Country,” the one where the little kid is the only human in a family of werewolves and vampires. He’s feeling left out because everyone is special, except for him. [chuckles] It’s a cute little story. Early on, during the Star*Reach days, Mike Friedrich sent out copies of the books and Bradbury wrote me a letter of encouragement, which was very nice. This was probably in the mid-’70s. I know he’s the kind of guy who, when he sees stuff he likes and he lets people know. That meant a lot at the time, and it still does. It was certainly nice of him. COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

February 2002

CBA: When you were in Pacifica, you were able to go into San Francisco frequently? Steve: Fairly frequently. It’s only minutes away by car but when you have to rely on public transportation—which was pretty pathetic in those days; a Greyhound bus—it took an hour to get into the city. CBA: Did you have enough freedom to go to town by yourself? Steve: Oh yeah. I grew up in the city and knew San Francisco so my parents didn’t mind me just going off and wandering around. I wasn’t the type to get into trouble. CBA: The city is renowned for its Bohemian culture. It’s called the Paris of the West, right? Steve: After a while, I also became a music junkie so I would go into San Francisco as often as possible, by the time I was 15, to see as many of the bands as I could. I did manage to see most of them at one time or another. CBA: You were coming of age during the Summer of Love in 1967, right? Steve: As they called it. Although, who knew at the time? [laughs] I remember when I first heard about the Hippies, Haight-Ashbury, and all that stuff, I really only had the vaguest idea of what they were talking about because when you were really there, it didn’t quite seem as that big a deal. Of course, in retrospect, growing up in San Francisco, it was only until I got out of the city that I realized it was a bit different than the rest of the country, at least in those days. CBA: How would you characterize it? Steve: Well, like you said, the Bohemian lifestyle. More tolerant of radical arts, and stuff like that. CBA: And in retrospect, did you absorb any of that attitude? Steve: I think so. Well, I’m still not sure how, exactly, but my politics are considerably farther to the Left than a lot of people, but not as much as some. [laughs] I always thought of myself as a Conservative in San Francisco. I always remembered U.S. Senator Diane Feinstein being referred to as a “flaming Liberal,” but people here think of her as a middle-of-the-road Conservative. [laughter] CBA: Depends on what wing you’re standing in, I guess. Steve: So, as often as possible, I went to see The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and anyone else that was playing. CBA: Did you clue into the underground comix emerging at the time? Rick Griffin was doing posters, right? Steve: I was a huge Rick Griffin fan from the very beginning. I remember his posters beginning to show up. What I like about the so-called hippie thing, was that you got all these psychedelic posters. [laughs] Thursday and Sunday were free poster nights at the Fillmore West, so I usually tried to go then. I have a huge stack of Rick Griffin stuff, dating back to ’67, maybe ’66. CBA: Did you ever meet Rick? Steve: I did get to know him. He was a pretty nice guy who had his own interesting take on Christianity. I always thought of it as the Church of the Surfing Jesus. [laughs] CBA: Was he really the blonde Adonis type? I just always imagined him as this golden surfer dude. Steve: Well, he certainly was in those days. Later on, he seemed more like a biker kind of guy. I remember at one point, he moved to San Francisco from southern California and we found out about it as we were crossing the street. This motorcycle roars up and the guy takes off a helmet and, hey, it was Rick! He was a really nice guy. CBA: Oh, he knew you? Steve: Yes. Actually, the first place I ever met him was at a Katy Keene convention in Santa Barbara. [laughs] You know, that was pretty weird because I don’t think either of us actually planned to be there. [laughs] Well, I was with Trina and she’s a fan of Katy Keene. Bill Woggon is a really nice guy and Rick’s then-wife was a Katy Keene fan as well. So he was there, that’s where I met him. We got to chatting about the old days. I told him I did comics and he thought that was interesting and I told him I was a big fan of all of his poster work, and so on and so forth. You know how these things go. CBA: So you were able to give him his props? Steve: Exactly, and I got to hang out with him a little bit. CBA: Did you have any chance to hang out with any other underground cartoonists? Steve: I wasn’t really a big fan of underground comix, per se, March 2002

COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

but over the years I did meet a lot of them. Of course, a lot of them lived in the Bay Area and you end up at parties and these people would just show up. For example, S. Clay Wilson is a neighbor of ours who lives a block away, so we see him all the time. He’s a nice guy, believe it or not…. CBA: What was it about the undergrounds that didn’t interest you? Was this a remnant of your attraction to the slick artwork of Julie Schwartz’s books? Steve: I think so. Even as a kid, I gravitated towards the polished stuff and science-fiction stories. Although as an adult, I have a much wider interest than I did as a kid. You start off being very set in your ways, but as you get older, you learn to relax a bit. CBA: Obviously, cartooning was in vastly different places during your youth. There was Topps trading cards, Mad magazine, CARtoons…. Steve: Early on, I was a big fan of Mad magazine, which I started reading in 1960. So I got to recognize work by Wally Wood and Jack Davis. Later, I did get to meet Wally Wood. One of the things I like best about being a professional cartoonist (or artist, however you want to phrase it) was being able to meet all the other artists. CBA: That’s why I love my job. [laughs] Steve: You get to talk to everyone about all the stuff that you want to talk about. CBA: When I first saw your work, I was really impressed by it, from the word go. Steve: Well, that’s nice of you. I also think of it as I got

Above: The artist Steve Leialoha in an outtake from the Eclipse Comics artists trading card photo session by Mark Leialoha. Courtesy of Steve. Below: Panel detail (with slight computer manipulation) of penciler Jim Starlin and inker Steve Leialoha’s Adam Warlock from Warlock #12. ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc.

FA B U LO U S

FLO STEINBERG &

NUMBER EIGHTEEN

THE 1960s

MADCAP MARVEL

BULLPEN!

CELEBRATING THE LIVES & WORK OF THE GREAT CARTOONISTS, WRITERS & EDITORS (AND GAL FRIDAYS!)

MARCH 2002

Editor/Designer JON B. COOKE Publisher

TWOMORROWS JOHN & PAM MORROW Associate Editors CHRIS KNOWLES DAVID A. ROACH CHRISTOPHER IRVING GEORGE KHOURY Contributing Editors ROY THOMAS JOHN MORROW Proofreader ERIC NOLEN-WEATHINGTON Cover Art & Color Guide MARIE SEVERIN Cover Color TOM ZIUKO Transcribers JON B. KNUTSON BRIAN K. MORRIS SAM GAFFORD Logo Designer/Title Originator ARLEN SCHUMER Mascot WOODY by J.D. King Flip-side Theme Song IT’S A BEAUTIFUL DAY U2

Contributors Fabulous Florence Steinberg Marie Severin • Stan Lee Herb Trimpe • Linda Fite Barry Windsor-Smith • Les Daniels Trina Robbins • John Romita, Sr. Dennis O’Neil • Steve Skeates Marie Steinberg • Roy Thomas Jim Warren • Arlen Schumer Aaron Sultan • David Schwartz Andrew D. Cooke • Patty Willett

QUESTION OF CONTENT: THE 2002 COMIC BOOK ARTIST READERS SURVEY Please fill out our Q&A form to better help improve our humble magazine, and you could win a prize! ..........1-B MICHELLE’S MEANDERINGS: THE MARVELOUS EPOCH OF LOVE Ms. Nolan checks out the Marvel romance comics that flourished when Fabulous Flo was young ....................4-B SPECIAL FABULOUS FLO STEINBERG CELEBRATION SMILEY & CO.: ALL IN THE MARVEL FAMILY Voices of the real MMMS in this transcript of Stan, Flo, and the Bullpen’s “Voice of Marvel” recording..........6-B FLO STEINBERG INTERVIEW: ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS Our favorite Florence on her half-decade tenure at the House of Idea between 1963-68 ................................8-B CBA ROUNDTABLE: GOING WITH THE FLO Flo, Herb Trimpe, Linda Fite, and Barry Windsor-Smith break bread and yak about Marvel’s good ol’ days....19-B PEER APPROVAL: THE FAB ONE’S MARVEL DAZE Smilin’ Stan, Mirthful Marie, Jazzy John, Stylin’ Steve, Rascally Roy, Declarative Denny, Happy Herb, Loveable Linda, Terrific Trina, Leapin’ Les, and Marvey Marie S. yak about Steinberg the Stunning! ..............22-B Left: Courtesy of Aaron Sultan, a MMMS pin. ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc. Opposite: The lady in question in a December 1964 photo taken in the Marvel Bullpen. Hey! Face front, Flo fan! Keep ye eyes off her slip, y’hear? Courtesy of Fab Flo. H A P P Y B I R T H D A Y , F A B F L O S T E I N B E R G ! COMIC BOOK ARTIST™ is published 10 times a year by TwoMorrows, 1812 Park Drive, Raleigh, NC 27605, USA. 919-833-8092. Jon B. Cooke, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Editorial Office: P.O. Box 204, West Kingston, RI 02892-0204 USA • 401-783-1669 • Fax: 401-783-1287. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT the editorial office. Single issues: $9 postpaid ($11 Canada, $12 elsewhere). Six-issue subscriptions: $36 US, $66 Canada, $72 elsewhere. All characters © their respective owners. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © their respective authors. ©2002 Jon B. Cooke/TwoMorrows. Cover acknowledgements: Art ©2002 Marie Severin. Florence Steinberg ©2002 Mom & Pop Steinberg. Stan Lee ©2002 Joanie Lee. First Printing. PRINTED IN CANADA.

CBA Interview

Absolutely Fabulous Reminiscing with America’s favorite comic book sweetheart Conducted by Jon B. Cooke Transcribed by Brian K. Morris & Sam Gafford

Below: Pic of Flo Steinberg taken in the Marvel offices, February ’64. for use in the Bullpen photo gallery in Marvel Tales #1. Courtesy of Roy Thomas.

TO FLO S.: Flo, you just gotta forgive me for this terrible betrayal. I led you to believe—for months!—that this special tribute section of Comic Book Artist was merely a general 1960s Marvel Bullpen retrospective, when in fact, it’s all about you, sweetie-pie! We had hoped to get this out in time for Valentine’s Day but thank heaven your birthday is in March so that’ll do quite nicely. Mutual pal Herb Trimpe tells me you don’t like surprises, but don’t kill me for producing this blatantly sentimental and affectionate love letter to one of my favorite people not only in comics, but in the entire universe. We love ya, F.S.!—Y.E.

8-B

As Ye Editor realized in the course of compiling this special issue, Florence Rae Steinberg just might be the most influential “civilian” in the history of comics—that is (excepting her one-shot stint as an underground comix mogul in the mid-’70s), someone who is neither an artist, writer, editor, or publisher. The Fab One was interviewed via telephone on Dec. 5, 2001, and she copy-edited the transcript. Comic Book Artist: Let’s start with The World According To Flo. You’re from Boston? Flo Steinberg: I am. I grew up in Boston, in Dorchester and Mattapan. CBA: I used to work in off Neponset Circle in Dorchester! I lived in Hyde Park. Flo: No! CBA: Yeah! Flo: I know Neponset Circle very well. I went to movies at the Neponset Drive-In. CBA: Where you grew up: Was it a mixed neighborhood or mostly Irish? Flo: When I grew up in Boston in the 1940s and ’50s, there were lots of different kinds of people, each in their own neighborhoods. My area’s main street was Blue Hill Avenue, mainly a Jewish neighborhood. Everybody got along, it seemed. It wasn’t very ethnically mixed, and it all seemed placid on the surface. CBA: Did you stick to your neighborhood or did you venture downtown much? Flo: In high school, we got out a little bit. The groups mixed and everyone got along very well. I went to Roxbury Memorial High School for Girls. At that time, you could go to gender-separate schools and it was wonderful. CBA: Was that a private school? Flo: No, Boston Public, to which I owe a solid, well-rounded education. In those days, you really got a good basic education in English, Spelling, Grammar, stuff like that. That’s where I got the skills I use today. I grew up there and it was great. I’m still in touch with some high school friends. CBA: Were you active in high school? Flo: I was! I was President of the Student Council, Jon. CBA: Whoa! [laughs] Cool. Flo: Someday, I’ll show you my high school yearbook. It’s a riot. CBA: Were you popular in school? Flo: I guess. I had friends and we all belonged to clubs then. There were some community centers around and everybody belonged to

either a girls’ clubs or a boys’ clubs. We all had jackets. The main reason for the clubs was getting jackets. [laughs] At socials, the boys would stand on one side in their jackets and the girls in theirs would be on the opposite side of the room. CBA: Did you do any travelling or did you pretty much stick to Boston? Flo: We mainly stayed in the city. During Summers and vacations, I worked. We were just working class families. When it came time to choose a college, I went to the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. CBA: Wasn’t Amherst quite a long trip for you? Flo: It was. Actually, I had the choice of going to a school in Boston or going away. The idea of going away was so exciting, all the way out to the western part of the state! I mean, who’d ever been there? [laughter] CBA: Did you have siblings? Flo: I had one sister, Ruthie, who was about five years older than me. My parents, my sister and I—that nuclear unit—had a very extended family of my mother’s sisters and cousins. We would get together once a week in my mother’s ancestral homeland of Chelsea. [laughs] I have many happy memories of Chelsea with my aunts, uncles, cousins and grandfather. Everyone got along fine. My cousin, Carol (Shore) taught at Chelsea High School for 35plus years and just retired. So I’ve a lot of connections to Chelsea. [laughs] And then college at UMass opened up great stuff for me. CBA: What did you take at UMass? Flo: Well, just Liberal Arts. I was a History major and had a general college education. I graduated in 1960. CBA: That was the beginning of a transitional time for young people in this country. Flo: Extremely. Civil Rights was becoming important. CBA: You had Cosmopolitan with Helen Gurley Brown…. Flo: That wasn’t quite the ’60s. CBA: But wasn’t there some sense of emancipation for young, single women? Flo: Well, yes. Maybe not in college because it was still the Eisenhower Years. The Sit-In movements were starting in the South, which we heard about but, unfortunately, I didn’t have much of a social conscience at the time. Things like the Peace Corps and VISTA didn’t happen until after John Kennedy was elected in ’60. That was the first year I voted in a Presidential election! Very exciting. CBA: Were you at all attracted to the irreverent comedy of Mort Sahl and the more beatnik attitudes going on at the time? Flo: I didn’t even know about them, at least in college. You know, I just didn’t realize what was going on. There was a coffeehouse that served cappuccino in Amherst! CBA: Whoa! [laughs] Was your college experience somewhat conformist? Were you in a sorority? Flo: Yes, it was pretty traditional in the 1950s. I belonged to Sigma Delta Tau sorority. We had people from all over Massachusetts. The COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

March 2002

student body wasn’t as internationally diverse then. And being in the country, you could hear cows and stuff. It was thrilling! CBA: Even today, there’s a Bohemian atmosphere in Amherst. Were there elements of that at the time? Flo: I don’t remember that. It may have been going on but I really wasn’t a part of it. My experience was more traditional. You wore your little Shetland sweaters, went to classes and did social things, like charity events, building parade floats for homecoming, and things like that. Really, the Kennedy years changed things for me. I became a little more socially aware and it was great. I was political to some degree when I grew up in Boston—Ward 14—at the time. It was the most heavily-Democratic ward in the nation after Cook County, Chicago. Eisenhower came to Ward 14, Adlai Stevenson, John Kennedy. Ward politics were important then. CBA: You had a Democratic family? Flo: Oh, yes. Everybody was that I knew. I didn’t meet a Republican until college! CBA: Did you ever see JFK? Flo: I did. When he was running for Congress. On Blue Hill Avenue, there was a huge delicatessen, a focal point for the neighborhood, called the G&G, where all the politicians would come to visit and meet voters. CBA: What did you think of Kennedy? Flo: We loved him! We loved all the Kennedys. [laughs] CBA: He was a true favored son of the city, right? Flo: He was. A rich son of the city. [laughs] The Kennedys had big bucks and everything. The whole family was like Irish royalty. I lived back in Boston for a couple of years after college, in the early ’60s, and my roommate and I worked for Ted Kennedy’s first U.S. Senatorial campaign. That was quite a good experience. After I came to New York in ’63, I worked in a minor way for Bobby Kennedy’s New York Senatorial campaign the next year. CBA: Did you know people connected with the Kennedys? Flo: Mostly through the Democratic club. Actually, I was mostly stuffing envelopes! CBA: Did you get a chance to meet Bobby? Flo: No, not personally. I met Ted Kennedy when he was thanking volunteers for helping out. I never actually shook Bobby’s hand. He was at meetings when I was in the office, but I never got the full brunt of those baby blues. [laughs] CBA: My mother used to be a model for the Ford Agency back in the ’50s; she recalls walking through the U.S. Capitol building, and who gave her the onceover with the up-and-down with the eyes but none other than Jack Kennedy. Flo: Oh, he was a connoisseur. [laughs] It was a magical time. CBA: Was there an invincibility in the air? Flo: It was as if all things were possible. We were bravely marching toward the future. Of course, a lot of that probably had to do with being so young. Things were good and there was hope. President Kennedy handled the Cuban Missile Crisis well, so we felt pretty safe. It really was a time of magic. CBA: You were ready to take the challenge of going out on your own upon graduating UMass? Flo: Yes. I lived for two years in Boston, working for the New England Telephone Company. It was my first job. I enjoyed college very much and loved the experience, but it was time to go to work which was what people did. Liberal Arts degrees didn’t really prepare me for anything practical in the real world, so I got a job with the phone company as a service representative where I would answer customer calls. I got to meet a whole new bunch of people and bought my first car. It was very exciting. CBA: Did you look at it as a short-term job? Did you look at New York City as a Mecca? March 2002

COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

Right: Pictures of Flo as a child. Top is her sitting on the hood of her father’s Boston taxi cab. Next is Flo with a pup. Bottom is Flo and her older sister, Ruthie. All courtesy of Flo.

Flo: I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I never look too much towards the future. It seems safer, you know, as long as the present is okay. I lived in my first apartment on Commonwealth Avenue in Brighton and that was fun. After a couple of years, there was nowhere really to go in that job, and my roommate, Bobbie (Shwom) Niss, was getting married so I thought, “Oh well, why not try New York?” Some friends were driving down and I caught a ride with them. I stayed at a YWCA in the city for a few months; I got a room and two meals a day. It was great. CBA: What did your parents think about you striking out on your own? Flo: Well, they were surprised because most people in our family stayed around Boston, got married and had a family but my mother was always supportive. It was something she might have wanted to do as a girl but just couldn’t because of circumstances. CBA: Did you get a sense of independence from your mother? Flo: I did. As a young woman in Chelsea, in the 1920s, she had her own business as a public stenographer, with a sign up and everything. People would come in, dictate letters and she would type them up. CBA: She had her own career? Flo: A little one, yes, and she always worked in offices. She was pretty cool, and so was my father. He was a taxi driver. CBA: In downtown or all over? Flo: All over. My sister and I had the nightly job of rolling all the pennies, nickels, and other change into rolls. [laughs] It’s funny. I haven’t thought of this stuff in a long time! CBA: Did you ever travel around with your father when he was on the job? Flo: Sometimes, because the cab was also the family car. I was probably the only kid that got a cab ride up to Amherst, halfway across the state. [laughs] CBA: After you arrived in New York in 1963…? Flo: I lived for a few months at the Y and went job hunting. At that time, a job search went through employment agencies. You went to agencies, registered and they sent you out on interviews. You would pay them something like a week’s salary if you got a job. So I went on job interviews in my little black dress and pearls, maybe even white gloves! That’s the way you did it then. After a couple of interviews, I was sent to this publishing company called Magazine Management. There I met a fellow by the name of Stan Lee who was looking for what they called then a “gal Friday.” I don’t know if there were any “guy Fridays.” [laughter] CBA: Only for Robinson Crusoe. Flo: I always thought gal Friday meant a woman who couldn’t take

Below: In case you might’ve missed it, our wonderful cover by Marie Severin is a pastiche of Jack Kirby & Joe Sinnott’s legendary cover of Fantastic Four #51, containing many a Marvelite’s favorite all-time FF tale, “This Man, This Monster.” Many thanks to the Mirthful One. ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc.

9-B

Peer Approval

The Fab One’s Marvel Daze That old Marvel Bullpen gang talks about their “gal everyday” Interviews conducted by Jon B. Cooke Transcribed by Brian K. Morris & Sam Gafford

Stan Lee

Below: At comic conventions, Flo is still being treated as a Marvel celebrity, most recently as a guest of the New York City show, The National. Here’s a glamourous pic of her at the 1974 New York Comic Art Convention, where she was a guest on the “Women in Comics” panel. Courtesy of Flo.

writer/editor-in-chief/art director To Flo: I think I’m a prophet. Everything I write seems to come to pass. I nicknamed Jack Kirby “King” Kirby, and now the whole comic book world thinks of him as the King. I nicknamed Herb Trimpe, “Happy” Herbie, and all of a sudden he became the Bullpen’s smilin’ sunbeam. I nicknamed that skinny little John Buscema “Big John,” and immediately after that he became a two-hundred pound weightlifter. And of course, my greatest feat: I nicknamed a nice, sweet, unassuming, little girl “Fabulous Flo,” and immediately thereafter she became so fabulous that she developed her own loyal coterie of fervent fans all around the world, especially right in the Marvel Bullpen—fans that have insisted, nay demanded that we give her this spectacular surprise testimonial. So, here’s to the most loyal, lovable, laudable, legendary assistant a guy could ever have— as well as the most faithful, fanciful, fearless, funky, fabulous female a guy could know. I could say lots more of course, but hey, I’ve got a jealous wife! Here’s to you, Flo— we all love ya! Excelsior!

Marie Severin Marvel artist/colorist/cover editor/art editor/art director Comic Book Artist: When did you join up with Marvel? Marie Severin: I know I was there in 1964. CBA: So you joined up about a year after Flo? Marie: I don’t know if she joined up two years before me but she was there when I arrived. I know I came in ’64. CBA: Flo started in March of 1963. Do you remember if Sol Brodsky was in the office? Marie: Prior to the Marvel job, I had been over at the Federal 22-B

Reserve Bank, doing a film strip for them. This was after Stan’s company nearly went ka-blooey in ’57, you know? I was there for a couple of years and then this film strip company hired me away from the Federal Reserve. Then business got bad so I went back to comics and I went first to Harvey Comics, who did Casper, the Friendly Ghost. I thought I would probably fit in there, but I was interviewed by this guy who was, well, not all there and he was not even interested. So I figured I would just hook up with Stan again because I had been there before. CBA: You just interviewed once over at Harvey? Marie: Yeah. If I had been interviewed by [Harvey editor, later Star/Marvel editor] Sid Jacobson (who I didn’t even know at the time), I’m sure he would have hired me and the whole commute would have been different! But I went over to Stan and he hired me on the spot because he knew I could do production work! [laughs] He never looked at my portfolio! So I figured, what the hell, I’ll do some stuff here for a while while I’m looking for something steady. I had met Sol years ago when I first worked for Stan and after I left Mad [EC Comics]. When the Comics Code came through, we all lost our jobs. Stan just had a skeleton staff. Anyway, I went in there in 1964, Stan hired me and I came in when Sol needed me and then he hired me full-time. It was Stan, Flo, Sol and me. Morrie Kuramoto would come in periodically, as did Artie Simek. And, of course, there were the regular freelancers who would come in. The first time I met Kirby was around then. CBA: Would Morrie come in to just do corrections or would he letter whole stories in the Bullpen? Marie: Oh, he’d letter whole stories, but he wasn’t on staff at the time. There was another guy at the time, who had the same name as a famous ball player, who also did production at the time. I just can’t remember his name. Then, a couple of months later, John Romita came in. CBA: Johnny came in a few months after you? Marie: He came in 1965. I don’t even know what month it was. Later, John Verpoorten came in and he brought in Herb Trimpe and Stu Schwartzberg and they came on staff and meanwhile the comic business was booming. In between all that I would meet different people like Stan Goldberg (whom I hadn’t seen in about a thousand years). CBA: Was Stan G. over at Archie before working at Marvel? Marie: I’m not sure. He was drawing Patsy & Hedy and those types of books. Then Marvel dropped the girlie books but he wasn’t upset about that because he was getting a lot of work elsewhere. But he was also doing a lot of coloring which he always did. CBA: So you would do the coloring? Would you work with Dr. Martin dyes? Marie: Oh, yeah! I never worked with anything else in the comics. When they started doing these poster things I would use the poster colors and stuff, but I never went into acrylics or oils. I would touch up some of those jobs as they came in if it was requested but I always preferred that the artist touch up his or her own work. They have the materials and they have their own technique. It meant changing somebody’s artwork and I would be upset if anyone did that to mine, you know? Unless it was something minor like a frown instead of a smile on a character but sometimes they wanted whole figures or backgrounds and I didn’t like doing that. But color-wise, for the inside of the comics and the covers, I always used Dr. Martin’s. CBA: You colored straight onto the silverprints? Marie: Yeah, and then they were starting to use Xeroxes. I said it COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

March 2002

would be a heck of a lot faster instead of bothering the guys in the photostat room for me to just use Xerox copies on good paper. That’s when we started that, and it really made everything a heck of a lot faster because everyone was using the photostat machine for blowups and all kinds of tricky stuff. Then Stu (who ran the photostat camera) was loaded down with the comic work because everyone was doing changes and the company was growing. So we colored on the Xeroxes which I think everyone does now. It made it so much faster. CBA: Were you using a brush? Marie: Oh, yeah. I always use a brush. CBA: You never went with Magic Markers? Marie: No. I know they do that now. It would work pretty well except that with Magic Markers, I don’t think you can make corrections all that easily. I’m so used to a brush that I can fly through pages. CBA: Is this second nature to you? Can you look at a page and say, “This is 40% yellow”? Marie: Sometimes, but I’m not sure about some of the dot variations. At this point, with the coloring being done by computer, I don’t know what the color breaks are! [laughs] In the old days, the colors didn’t come out that bright because the paper was cheaper but you sort of knew what was going on. Now it has to have decent papers because they’re using the finest screens. It’s a technical thing. I think they have a wonderful range of colors but I don’t think they have to use them all. It’s nice but you’re not reproducing postage stamps with all this fancy art. CBA: Sometimes the simplicity of comics gets lost amongst all that complexity of production? Marie: Yeah. I think it’s okay if some of the books are really heavy duty artwork, you know what I mean? Like some of the books that are experiments using actual paintings, that’s fine. But the regular run-of-the-mill comic books should just be a little fancier than it was in the old days but it’s a waste of time to have too many blendings because the eye will be more interested in reading the story. In the ’80s, they had books with so many blendings and special effects that your eye gets confused and doesn’t know which panel to go to to read the story! CBA: It interfered with the storytelling? Marie: I think so, yeah. CBA: Was there such a thing as a typical daily routine at Marvel? Marie: It would depend on the deadlines. Because we’re dealing with humans, you never know when the jobs would be coming in or if they get lost in the mail or a character can’t be used because someone else is using it! The routine was not really routine. You might do something in the morning that usually comes in the afternoon. A lot of times the routine of how to produce a comic remains the same but the timing of what came in would change. Because I had worked in comics so long I could do corrections in artwork and lettering—I could design pages—I was all around which was why I was so valuable to them because I knew so much about the production. I could do so many things. CBA: Would particular artists be very late with stuff. I know you had artists like Kirby whom I’m sure was always on time with his assignments. Marie: He was no problem. CBA: Did you anticipate that, “Well, Wally Wood’s inking this job, so we need to build that into the deadline.” Marie: I didn’t make up the schedule. I didn’t assign artwork. Sol did that and they knew which guys to tell a lie to whether they would be late or not. Flo would March 2002

COMIC BOOK ARTIST 18

know more about that than I because she probably wrote a lot of that up for Sol. They would lie to some of the artists telling them that they needed the stuff before they really did. They still do that! CBA: [laughs] Well, they’re artists, right? When a job would come in, would it immediately go and have silver prints made? Marie: I would think that they would be looked at first. In the beginning, Stan would look over everything. Then they started having editors look at it, sure. They might say, “Well, let’s make stats of it so it’s ready to go,” but then they might want to make changes or corrections. They didn’t like to have it colored and then have to have a sequence redrawn, particularly if it’s late. They would if something was very late, and they’d tell someone to color it, then just change a panel if they had to but they didn’t like to do that. That was rare because usually there was pretty tight control on stuff. CBA: So you would make the color guides and they were sent to Bridgeport? Marie: In the early days, yes. They went to Bridgeport well into the ’80s, I believe. CBA: You had a courier show up every day? Marie: They used to send a courier every day. The Chemical Color pick-up was at a certain time and then it started getting FedEx’d and all that, then it was a whole different routine by the mid-’80s or so. CBA: Virtually all of the same comics publishers, except Charlton and Western/Gold Key, used the same printer, World Color out in Sparta, Illinois. The covers of Marvel comics in the mid-’60s had a distinct vibrancy… it’s not fair to to characterize them as muddy but there was a lot of gray covers, brown covers, purple cover… covers using a lot of colors that were unique to Marvel. Marie: Well, I colored a lot of covers but I think George Roussos did too. Also, there was a change later on with the mattes they used. I think that they went from metal and rubber to plastic. I wasn’t involved in the technical stuff that they did. I only wanted to do my original color and then we’d get color proofs of them. I didn’t color all of them but we did want to have a little more mood to them than was normal so it wasn’t all red, yellow or blue. I like the little gray when you’re doing an adventure strip. It makes the

Above: But where’s the cash? Bossman Stan Lee treats Flo with a homemade holiday card composed especially for her during their Bullpen days. Courtesy of Flo.

Center inset: Stan the Swinger during the First Age of Marvel. Note he is grasping a copy of Fantastic Four #46.

YE ED’S NOTE: While this section is primarily a discussion of “That Gal… That Sweetheart,” Florence Steinberg, there’s quite a bit of conversation surrounding the way it was in the ’60s Marvel Bullpen. One interview in particular, with the vivacious and delightful Linda Fite pretty much covers her entire comics career as we may not be visiting the lovely wife of Herb Trimpe—and accomplished scribe in her own right, I must add—for the mag any time soon. As well as the aforementioned interviews, some entries are testimonials—like our first entry from Stan the Man —were written expressly for this issue and some of those are by folks who didn’t necessarily work in the House of Ideas but we knew it would be fun to include ’em anyway. We’ve tried to list the Bullpenners in a chronological fashion adhering to when they joined Marvel, though we may be a tad off here and there. The job titles refer only to their positions during that swingin’ decade. Thanks to all who helped.—Y.E.

23-B