Alter Ego #7 Preview

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5.95

In the the USA USA In

No. 7 WINTER 2001

“Crises On Finite Earths!”

Julie Schwartz And Chums On The

JLA and JSA!

Co Starring: Anderson ∂ Busiek ∂ Conway Dillin ∂ Ditko ∂ Friedrich Gallagher ∂ Infantino ∂ Kane Kirby ∂ Kubert ∂ Levitz ∂ Maggin Naydel ∂ NOdell ∂ O’Neil ∂ Ordway Perez ∂ Schaffenberger Sekowsky ∂ Swan ∂ Thomas ∂ Wein

All characters TM & ©2001 DC Comics.

Volume 3, No. 7 Winter 2001

JSA-JLA Section

™

Editor Roy Thomas

Associate Editor Bill Schelly

Design & Layout Jon B. Cooke GREAT SWAMP GRAPHICS

Production John Morrow Eric Nolen-Weathington

Consulting Editors John Morrow Jon B. Cooke

FCA Editor P.C. Hamerlinck

Comics Crypt Editor Michael T. Gilbert

Editors Emeritus

Jerry Bails (founder) Ronn Foss, Biljo White, Mike Friedrich

Cover Artists Rich Buckler C.C. Beck

Contents Writer/Editorial: The Super-Teams Supreme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 On the latest TwoMorrows trade paperback, The All-Star Companion, and our favorite Society.

All Schwartz Comics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Roy Thomas chats with DC’s great editor Julius Schwartz on his days in the Golden Age. Crises on Finite Earths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Complete with interviews, A/E examines every single JSA-JLA team-up from 1963-85.

Cover Color Tom Ziuko C.C. Beck

Mailing Crew

The Many Oaths of The Green Lantern . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 Craig Delich on prose & poetry and the sacred oaths of the Emerald Gladiator.

And Special Thanks to:

The Genius Jones Twins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Will Murray uncovers an unlikely coincidence involving Argosy, Lester Dent, and Mort Weisinger.

Russ Garwood, D. Hambone, Glen Musial, Ed Stelli, Pat Varker

Mike W. Barr Dave Berg Brian Boerner Ray Bottorff, Jr. Frank Brunner Rich Buckler Kurt Busiek Gerry Conway Craig Delich Al Dellinges Mark Evanier Ramona Fradon Mike Friedrich Keif Fromm Carl Gafford Jennifer T. Go Ron Harris Roger Hill Joe Kubert Paul Levitz Elliot Maggin Dave Manak Rich Morrissey

Will Murray Mart & Carrie Nodell Denny O’Neil Jerry Ordway George Perez David Raboy Ethan Roberts Bob Rogers Alex Ross Julius Schwartz Scott Shaw!

David Siegel Robin Snyder Flo Steinberg Marc Swayze Joel Thingvall Dann Thomas Len Wein John Wells Marv Wolfman Donald Woolfolk Ed Zeno

The 1964 Comicon—TwoViews. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Bill Schelly and Ethan Roberts look at the first bona fide comics convention.

Corrections to the All-Star Companion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47 Special Mac Raboy/FCA Part II Section . . . . . . . . . . . . Flip Us! About Our Cover: Just for a kick, Roy asked a favorite Bronze Age collaborator of his—Rich Buckler—to draw an homage to the very first JLA-JSA cover of all, as flawlessly executed in 1963

by Mike Sekowsky and Murphy Anderson. It looks a lot like the original, until you stop short and notice the greatly increased roll call in the upper half of the picture. But there are some subtle switcheroos in the bottom half, too, which you probably won’t notice till you compare original and homage! [JLA & JSA ©2001 DC Comics.]

Above: The JSA’s first meeting in 12 years, as served up by Schwartz, Fox, Sekowsky, and Sachs; repro’d from a photocopy of the original art, courtesy of Jerry Bails. [JLA & JSA ©2001 DC Comics.]

Alter EgoTM is published quarterly by TwoMorrows, 1812 Park Drive, Raleigh, NC 27605, USA. Phone: (919) 833-8092. Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: Rt. 3, Box 468, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: roydann@oburg.net. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices. Single issues: $5.95 ($7.00 Canada, $9.00 elsewhere). Four-issue subscriptions: $20 US, $27 Canada, $37 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 Canada.

FIRST PRINTING.

4

All Schwartz Comics

Article logo by Al Dellinges

A Conversation with Editorial Legend Julius Schwartz Conducted & Edited by Roy Thomas Transcribed by Jon B. Knutson [INTRODUCTION: Julie Schwartz needs no introduction to anyone who knows anything at all about the Silver Age of Comics, since as the original editor of The Flash, Green Lantern, Justice League of America, Hawkman, The Atom, The Spectre, et al., from 1956 through the 1970s, he practically invented the damn thing. Earlier, he was a science-fiction fan, then agent, in the 1930s and early ’40s; and from 1944 he was an editor at All-American Comics and later for DC Comics proper. (All-American, a company which included all comics featuring Wonder Woman, Flash, and/or Green Lantern, among others, lasted from 1939 to 1945, when it was wholly absorbed by National/DC; however, DC’s symbol had graced all AA covers during those years except for a brief time in 1945.)

[Julie, who is one of the people most responsible for (or guilty of, take your pick) helping Ye Writer/Editor break into the comic book field in 1965, graciously agreed to be interviewed this past August in conjunction with The All-Star Companion, and for this issue of Alter Ego. The limited purpose of the interview—his first since publication of his memoirs—was to be the JSA in the 1940s, and to some extent the influential JLA-JSA team-ups he initiated with writer Gardner F. Fox in 1963.

[My intention in what follows was simply to ask Julie all the questions I could think of about All-Star and the Golden Age JSA, which he edited from 1944-50. Julie has been swearing for decades that he remembers few details about individual stories or even the original series; but I felt I had nothing to lose by asking. Until I did, none of us could ever be certain he might not, under gentle prodding, recall some detail that had just never occurred to him before. And, indeed, while Julie is understandably uncertain about many events now more than half a century in the past, the reader is still likely to find a few surprises in what follows. I know I did…. —Roy.] ROY THOMAS: Basically, Julie, what I’d like us to talk about is the Justice Society, which means mostly All-Star Comics in the 1940s, but to some extent the JLA-JSA team-ups, as well. We’ll send you a free

copy of The All-Star Companion.

JULIUS SCHWARTZ: [laughs] I’d expect that “irregardless”! All right, go ahead.

RT: You’ve often told the story of how you bought three comics on the way to be interviewed at AllAmerican in 1944, and how that’s the only thirty cents you ever spent on comics in your life. Do you know what kind of comics those three were?

SCHWARTZ: What titles and issues? Only my memory bank knows. I don’t.

Photo of Julius Schwartz which he says was “taken August 10, 1945... how I looked in my All-Star days!”

And yes, he hyphenated “All-Star”!

(Below) Julie’s recent memoir, Man of Two Worlds: My Life in Science Fiction and Comics, written with Brian M. Thomsen, is a 200-page treasure trove for fans of the Golden and Silver Ages, available at better comics shops, via online booksellers, and through Bud Plant, among others. [©2000 Julius Schwartz]

RT: Well… did they help? With the interview, I mean.

SCHWARTZ: I guess I’d have to answer positively, because when Shelly Mayer interviewed me, my answers must’ve been good enough for him to hire me on the spot! [laughs] RT: So he did the actual hiring? You didn’t meet with [publisher] M.C. Gaines?

SCHWARTZ: No, no, no. Just Shelly. In fact, he offered me $60 a week. I never thought of mentioning that before. $60 a week was pretty good back in those days.

RT: ’Twasn’t bad. I started out at DC in ’65 for only $100 a week—$110 at Marvel—and that was twenty years of inflation later!

SCHWARTZ: I must have been doing well enough, because once he’d offered me $60 a week—it was during the War years—he could not raise me in salary [due to a Wartime wage freeze], so what he did was give me a $100 a month bonus after a couple of months.

RT: That was really good!

SCHWARTZ: Yeah, that was much more than I was making as a literary agent.

RT: Did the fact that you were a science-fiction fan and reader and agent probably help you get the job?

SCHWARTZ: It wasn’t the fact that I was a fan; it

A Conversation with Editorial Legend Julius Schwartz

5 RT: You mean she just thought of ideas for “The Atom,” for this character or that character, in spare moments, and wrote them on index cards?

was that I was a literary agent.

Writers would submit scripts to me, and if I liked one well enough to submit to magazine editors, I had the know-how whether the story was good or bad. Shelly knew I was wellversed in pulp magazines, with their strong plots, and that’s the type of stories AllAmerican was doing.

SCHWARTZ: Right! Let me tell you something about Dorothy. She married Walter Galli and later divorced him, her second husband, to marry Bill Woolfolk [prominent comic book writer and later a bestselling novelist]. Let me tell you an anecdote I probably should’ve put in my book….

RT: Did you know Dorothy Roubicek, whom you replaced as script editor under Shelly Mayer in 1944?

SCHWARTZ: Very well.

She had replaced Ted Udall a couple of years earlier. You know who Ted Udall is? His real name? If you check the early All-American Comics, there were several text stories written by “Ted Yigdal.” I believe that’s how you spell his real name. He was an editor for Shelly prior to World War II, and he wrote stories.

RT: Well, you can put it in the second edition.

SCHWARTZ: This is roughly in the early ’90s. After the San Diego conventions, I used to go up to Los Angeles and spend three or four days with Harlan Ellison, Gil Kane, and Forrest Ackerman.

I’d go to the Golden Apple comic book shop, and just hang out. I’d stay at the Holiday Inn in Westwood.

Before Ted Udall came along [in 1940—RT], I believe Shelly Mayer may have gotten some editorial help from— what was the name of that artist who did “Hop Harrigan”?

RT: Jon Blummer. He both wrote and drew it, I think.

Splash of All-Star Comics #26 (Fall 1945). Art by Joe Gallagher and Martin Naydel.

One day, exiting the Holiday Inn, to my stunned amazement, I see Dorothy! I say, “Dorothy?” She says, “Julie?” And we hug each other. Listen, is Dorothy still alive?

SCHWARTZ: Well, I think he [©2001 DC Comics.] may have helped Shelly with the RT: Yes. Bill and her son Don editing for a while, too, earlier. Now, when Ted Udall got drafted [in both wrote me recently that she is. [NOTE: Sadly, Dorothy Roubicek 1942—RT], that presumably is when Shelly hired Dorothy Roubicek.

Woolfolk passed away in Dec. 2000.]

What Dorothy had done before, I have no idea.

SCHWARTZ: I hadn’t seen her in twenty years! When she was back at The reason Dorothy was leaving in ’44 is, she was getting married to DC briefly during the 1970s, editing the romance books, I used to go a comic book artist named Walter Galli, and she gave notice; she was into her office and talk with her. just going to stay another week. As a matter of fact, I think it was a RT: You went to work for AA in ’44. Later that year, things began to short week. [laughs] I was hired February 21, 1944, and began working on February 23. February 22 was Washington’s Birthday, which in those days was a legal holiday. It wasn’t until years later that we instituted The quirky 1985 one-shot Presidents’ Day. Fifty Who Made DC Great For three days, as I roughly remember, Dorothy briefed me. She advised me that my main job would be plotting stories and editing them. I would not have to bother with the artwork, which was a relief.

I knew nothing about art.

She left behind a series of index cards containing plot ideas. Hey! Now that I think of it, I haven’t thought about this in years. You’re pretty good, Roy! RT: [laughs] It’s a gift, Julie.

SCHWARTZ: She left a series of index cards. If she had to plot an “Atom” story, she’d go to that index card and come up with a plot she’d already prepared. I don’t think I ever mentioned that to anybody before.

featured this photo of All-American’s original editor, Sheldon Mayer, then 68. The cartoon by Steven Petruccio depicts the historical event of a young (but prematurely bearded) Mayer pushing Siegel and Shuster’s “Superman” on Gaines et al. in 1938. Not only that, but six years later he hired Julie Schwartz! [©2001 DC Comics.]

6

All Schwartz Comics SCHWARTZ: I’m glad you asked me that question. Mort Weisinger always wanted to be a writer and an editor. So in the early ’40s there was a group of magazines called Standard Magazines; they put out Thrilling Mystery, and other “Thrilling” magazines. Mort submitted a short story to Thrilling.

Leo Margulies was the editor-in-chief. The way he worked was: When a script came in, it was read by a series of assistant editors. If three of them okayed the story, Leo bought it. So Jack Schiff read this story by Mort Weisinger, whom he didn’t know, and he asked him to come visit him at Standard. And that’s how Mort became an editor there; Schiff was the editor, really, of Mort.

Julie also sent what he says is “a [lousy] photo of Ted Udall and me in the DC office we shared… next to Shelly Mayer’s… taken the same day,” namely 8/10/45. Udall’s face is shadowy to the point of invisibility, but at least we know he wore glasses—and hey, when was the last time you saw a photo of old AA editor Ted Udall?

fall apart between the All-American group and DC. For seven or eight months, there was an AA symbol instead of a DC one on the books like All-Star, All-American, Flash, Sensation, Wonder Woman, All-Flash, Green Lantern, and Comic Cavalcade—plus a few humor and Bible titles—which finally made AA look like what it was—a totally separate company from DC. And then, late in ’45, suddenly everything folded into DC. It’s always seemed to me like two different periods. Were you aware of what was going on at the time? And what was going on, precisely?

SCHWARTZ: I was aware of it, but I had no knowledge of what was going on. All I can recall is, presumably at the end of 1944, Shelly Mayer told me we were moving uptown to 480 Lex [= Lexington], because we were now part of DC Comics. We moved uptown, and when you got out of the elevators, as I recall, the first office was Whit Ellsworth’s; next to him were the offices of Mort Weisinger, Jack Schiff, Murray Boltinoff, and Bernie Breslauer. Did you know Bernie Breslauer?

Henry Kuttner in the 1930s; also from Amazing World of DC Comics #3. (The obscured head is that of Psycho author Robert Bloch.) [©2001 DC Comics.]

RT: Only by name. He used to edit Leading Comics, among other things, for Ellsworth.

SCHWARTZ: And further down the hall I had my office with Robert Kanigher. Do you know how Jack Schiff got into DC Comics?

RT: Not really.

SCHWARTZ: Well, lucky you! I’m going to tell you! Because you just asked me, didn’t you?

RT: Yeah, sure. [laughs] SCHWARTZ: Ask me!

RT: How did Jack Schiff get into DC Comics?

Later, Mort switched over to editing comics for DC. When he was drafted, he persuaded Jack Schiff to take his place at DC until he got out of the service. Mort would get his job back, which was the law at that time. But after the War, DC had increased its output so much that they needed not only Mort; they needed to keep Jack Schiff, too. Somewhere along the line he brought in Bernie Breslauer, who was also an editor at the “Thrilling” group.

RT: It must’ve been good for you as a science-fiction agent to have your old friend Mort working for Standard.

SCHWARTZ: Sure!

RT: When he went to work for Standard, he gave up being an agent with you, right?

SCHWARTZ: Mort liked Henry Kuttner, whom he’d met while we were in California, and I persuaded Kuttner, who’d only been writing Previously-unpublished panels from one of those “Atom” stories Dorothy Roubicek might have plotted on index cards, circa 1943; art by Joe Gallagher. Some of the copy fell off before Marv Wolfman rescued this “written-off” tier three decades back. [Atom ©2001 DC Comics.]

stories for Weird Tales, to write science-fiction. So his first sciencefiction story was sold to Mort.

Henry Kuttner had a thousand pen names.

My favorite one—when he lived in Hastings-on-theHudson, a town on the Hudson River—was Hudson Hastings. [laughs] RT: Of course, he and his wife C.L. Moore together were Lewis Padgett.

SCHWARTZ: We’re going far afield from All-Star…

RT: That’s all right. The thing I was thinking before was—well, the given story about M.C. Gaines is that at some stage he was fighting so much with Harry Donenfeld and especially Jack Liebowitz that he insisted on them buying him out—but it seems to have been done in two stages, or else why is there more than half a year’s worth of a totally separate All-American line?

DC editor Jack Schiff in a 1950s photo taken at the DC!offices.

Courtesy of Ramona Fradon.

16

Crises on Finite Earths

ON FINITE EARTHS The Justice League-Justice Society Team-Ups (1963-1985)

by Roy Thomas [NOTE: This piece was originally written to be included in the recent TwoMorrows trade paperback The All-Star Companion. However, due to space limitations, most of the pages of that volume dealt with the 1940-1951 incarnation of All-Star Comics. A much shorter and far less complete version of this “reader’s guide” to the JLA-JSA team-ups appears in the Companion… with almost entirely different illustrations, but displaying all 50+ JLA-JSA covers!

The article that follows has been somewhat rewritten, yet no attempt has been made to disguise that it is in actuality a fuller version of a chapter of the 208-page book.

[In addition, the piece here goes beyond what was planned for The All-Star Companion, in featuring excerpts from my last-minute mini-interviews of most of the JLA-JSA writers (there were twelve, counting myself).

We contacted each of the living writers, and a hearty thank-you to each of the scripters who graciously responded. Happily, only Gardner F. Fox, the first and most important, and E. Nelson Bridwell have passed on; but both these are sorely missed for their talent and for their enthusiasm. An attempt was made to contact each of the other nine; Martin Pasko and Cary Bates did not respond, but I’m very grateful to the others for their time and memories.

[Much as I generally hate sidebars (when I run into them in magazines or books, I never know whether I’m supposed to go on reading the main text,

or whether I’m intended to stop and peruse the sidebar’s subject before moving on), I’ve resorted to them hereafter, placing the comments of each participant with the issues on which he worked. Because the sidebars get increasingly out of sync with the main text as the article progresses, I suggest you read the issue-info first, then skip to the interviews with the respective writer.

Between 1956 and 1961, editor Julius Schwartz of DC Comics (then officially known as National Periodical Publications) launched new, updated incarnations of The Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, The Atom, and The Justice Society of America (now The Justice League of America). Even so, a number of readers still clamored for the return of the original 1940s heroes of All-Star Comics.

Alter Ego’s founder Jerry G. Bails and I were among the most vocal and persistent of these, but ours were hardly lone voices calling out in the fourcolor wilderness. These mostly adult readers carried the bring-back-the-JSA banner both in comics fanzines and in letters to editors, particularly to Julie, godfather of the Silver Age of Comics.

A “family portrait” of the full roster of the Justice Society, by Murphy Anderson—who also drew this 1984 illo of Julius Schwartz, prime mover of the JLA-JSA team-ups. [JSA drawing ©2001 DC Comics; J.S. art ©2001 Murphy Anderson.]

Accordingly, in The Flash #123 (Sept.

1961), editor Schwartz and writer Gardner Fox startled comics readers by revealing that Jay (“Flash”) Garrick and Barry (“Flash”) Allen both existed in the DC Universe; they merely dwelt on two parallel Earths. These worlds vibrated at different speeds, and their inhabitants were thus totally unaware of each other—until three of

The Justice League-Justice Society Team-Ups Garrick’s foes (Fiddler, Shade, and Thinker) crossed over to Allen’s Earth to wreak havoc.

Thus was born the concept of “Earth-Two,” a world on which the heroes of the Golden Age JSA had been real, not mere figments of a comic book. (But surely that wonderful scene back in Robert Kanigher’s script and Carmine Infantino’s art for very first neo-Flash story, in 1956’s Showcase #4, wherein Barry reads an old issue of Flash Comics just before he is struck by a mixture of lightning and chemicals, had an influence on Flash #123 five years later.)

It seems likely that Fox was brought in for the very first time to script Flash #123 because in 1940 he had created the original speedster.

However, regular 1960s Flash writer John Broome had also written the human comet’s exploits in the late ’40s, as had origin-writer Kanigher.

“Flash of Two Worlds” was a sensation to new and longtime fans alike. Its cover became one of the most famous and most imitated of the decade. The world in which the older Flash lived was christened EarthTwo, and the younger Flash’s Earth-One; but that was merely an acknowledgment that Barry Allen was the main event, and Jay Garrick a pleasant sideshow.

In the second two-Flashes encounter (Flash #129, June 1962), Schwartz, Fox, and penciler Infantino teased the readers with a flashback sequence from All-Star #57’s “Mystery of the Vanishing Detectives,” the JSA’s last recorded case.

Predictably, readers clamored for more.

Finally, with the third two-Flashes story, came the full-fledged return of The Justice Society of America.

17

Julius Schwartz [EDITOR’S NOTE: In addition to his words in the interview published earlier in this issue of A/E, original editor Julius Schwartz had the following to say in the magazine Amazing World of DC Comics #14 (March 1977) about the JLA-JSA team-ups:] JULIUS SCHWARTZ: When we did it the first time, we Gardner (l.) and Julie (r.) in the Sid Greene-drawn minihad no inkling that there’d be a classic “The Strange Advensequel. But when the sales figures ture That Really Happened!” came in, we realized there was a from Strange Adventures #140 reader demand, so we dreamed (May ’62). [©2001 DC Comics.] up another crisis for the two teams. When that also did well, we decided to make it an annual affair. Of all the JLA-JSA crossovers we’ve done, with only one exception, they all did extremely well. It’s like a surefire sale….

The idea [of having the JLA meet the JSA] hit Gardner Fox and me in the spur of the moment. We showed the JSA in flashback in the Flash magazine—I think they even came out of retirement in one [Flash] issue—so it was a logical step to team the groups.

There follows an issue-by-issue recounting of…

THE SILVER AGE JUSTICE SOCIETY STORIES THE BEGINNING The Flash #137 (June 1963) “Vengeance of the Immortal Villain!” - 25 pp., 3 chapters Cover: Carmine Infantino (pencil) & Murphy Anderson (ink) Writer: Gardner Fox Artists: Carmine Infantino (p) & Joe Giella (i) JSA Roll Call: Flash, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Atom, Hawkman, Dr. Mid-Nite, Johnny Thunder THE STORY: The Flashes of two Earths team up to fight the Earth-Two Green Lantern’s old foe, Vandal Savage—and to free six captured members of the Justice Society. Afterward, the JSA decide to come out of retirement.

NOTES: (a) Oddly, Johnny Thunder, rather than his 1948-51 replacement Black Canary, completes the JSA roster here. (b) Though The Atom wears his All-Star #42-57 costume, Hawkman sports the beaked and winged helmet he hadn’t worn since #41.

THE JUSTICE LEAGUE-JUSTICE SOCIETY TEAM-UPS (1963-1985) Before the ink was dry on Flash #137, the powers-that-be at National/DC had already made the decision to guest-star the JSA in the two summer issues of Justice League of America, a move which quickly proved so popular that the “JLA-JSA team-ups” became an annual tradition for the following twenty-two years!

Just as All-Star #3 had been one of the most important super-hero comics events of the Golden Age, ranking just behind the debut of Superman in impact, so the JLA-JSA pairings at least rivaled in impact all Silver Age DC super-hero events except the introduction of the second Flash in Showcase #4 (1956) and of the JLA itself in The Brave and the Bold #28 (1960).

Gardner Fox [Gardner F. Fox (1911-1986) is undoubtedly one of the most important writers in the history of comic books. He created or co-created the original Flash, Hawkman, and Dr. Fate, among others, and was the first writer of both The Justice Society of America in 1940 and The Justice League of America in 1960. In The Flash #123 (1961) he authored “Flash of Two Worlds,” the tale which introduced the Earth-One/Earth-Two concept, and he became the writer of the first six JLAJSA team-ups. The following remarks are excerpted from an interview conducted by Rich Morrissey for Batmania #22 (July 1977); Marvel Comics editor and writer Mark Gruenwald was present and makes a comment at one point, as well. That interview is ©2001 Rich Morrissey, and is used with permission.]

RICH MORRISSEY: Whose idea was it to bring back the Golden Age heroes?

GARDNER FOX: It was Julie’s. He gave The Flash and the others new secret identities and developed new characters. I later had the two Flashes meet in “Flash of Two Worlds.”

MARK GRUENWALD: Ah, yes! The very foundation of parallel worlds in comic books.

RM: How did that come about? Was the parallel-world setup your idea?

Somebody pen-named “Superswipe” combined a Gardner Fox portrait (originally by Gil Kane) with Dr. Fate in Batmania #22. Nice job. [Art ©2001 Rich Morrissey; Dr. Fate ©2001 DC Comics.]

18

Crises on Finite Earths

FOX: Yes. It was Julie who said, “I want a story with both Flashes,” but I thought up the parallel worlds. Of course, it was an old sciencefiction device.

MG: Didn’t Denny O’Neil quote you in his Secret Origins of the Super DC Heroes book as saying the parallel worlds were Julie’s idea?

FOX: I think it was my idea. The way we worked, details like that were usually left to me. But I’m not going to get into an argument. If Julie says it was his, fine. What’s the difference? It probably evolved out of one of those plot conferences when we batted ideas back and forth. I’m not sure, and I don’t think Julie is, either.

RM: What did you think of the artists who illustrated your stories at this time?

FOX: I was very pleased. Julie had some of the best artists in the business working for him: Carmine Infantino, Gil Kane, Murphy Anderson, Mike Sekowsky….

RM: You liked Mike Sekowsky? If only Mark Evanier and Mike Valerio were here to hear that! They’re both great Sekowsky fans!

FOX: Sekowsky wasn’t as polished as Murphy Anderson and some others, but he knew how to tell a story. A lot of today’s artists can’t.

Mike Sekowsky Mike Sekowsky (1928-1989) was one of the most versatile comic book artists ever. His first decade of work was done for Timely Comics, for whom at one time (1947) he drew characters as different as The Human Torch, Super Rabbit, Nellie the Nurse, and Georgie (an Archie type). In 1954, for Sterling Publications, he drew Captain Flash, whom Mike Sekowsky with an obviously inspisome consider the rational model in July 1969, during his first true Silver Age time drawing (and even writing and editing) the costume-less “mod” super-hero. Though Wonder Woman. Who says comic book he also drew for artists have it tough? [Photo courtesy of Western, Archie, Scott Shaw!—with special thanks to Tower, Seaboard, and Mark Evanier.] others, from 1952 on, much of his work was done for National/ DC, for whom he drew The Trigger Twins, Adam Strange, and many other features. He was the original penciler of Justice League of America, inked by oldtime All-Star inker Bernard Sachs. In the late 1960s he was the penciler (and later also the writer and editor) of a revamped, non-super-powered Wonder Woman who made a splash for a time. Later in life he worked on TV animation in Los Angeles.

That this twin-Earths teaming was a defining event of the Silver Age is underscored by the fact that the titles of the first three JLA-JSA issues (“Crisis on Earth-One,” “-Two,” and “-Three”) became the model for the 1985-86 series that put a cap on it all: Crisis on Infinite Earths.

From the very first team-up in 1963, a basic pattern was established, wherein JLA and JSA joined forces in two consecutive issues of JLA during the summer months, when sales were traditionally at their peak.

The first team-up to break that mold occurred in 1972, with a three-issue match-up which saw the two groups rescuing DC’s other 1940s super-group, The Seven Soldiers of Victory, from otherworld oblivion. In 1974 came the shortest team-up: a 20-page one-parter. But in 1976, 1980, and 1981 the addition to the mix of the Fawcett heroes, Jack Kirby’s New Gods, and the Secret Society of Super-Villains led to a trio of three-issue story arcs in JLA. And in 1982 came the only fiveissue teaming, when DC’s new/old World War II combo joined the party—for three issues of JLA and two of All-Star Squadron.

The final team-up of the original unbroken JLA-JSA run took place in 1985, in one issue of JLA and one of Infinity, Inc., the comics series which starred the sons, daughters, and heirs of several JSAers.

Oh, and just to prove we aren’t prejudiced against the editors of the team-ups—particularly since the first one was so crucial to their creation—here is the list of editors of the JLA-JSA matches: Julius Schwartz: 1963-78 Ross Andru: 1979 Len Wein: 1980-83 Alan Gold: 1984-85 Now, let’s peruse that wonderful 23-story sequence, which introduced so many readers to the Justice Society of America: Justice League of America #21 (August 1963) “Crisis on Earth-One!” - 25 pp., 3 chapters Cover: Mike Sekowsky (p) & Murphy Anderson (i) Writer: Gardner Fox Artists: Mike Sekowsky (p) & Bernard Sachs (i) JLA Roll Call: Atom, Aquaman, Flash, Green Arrow, Green Lantern, J’onn J’onzz, Superman, Wonder Woman JSA Roll Call: Atom, Black Canary, Dr. Fate, Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, Hourman The Crime Champions: The Fiddler, The Wizard, The Icicle of EarthTwo; Dr. Alchemy, Felix Faust, Chronos of Earth-One THE STORY: The Crime Champions of two Earths team up and capture the two Flashes. This leads to both worlds’ hero-teams likewise combining forces for the first time to oppose them.

NOTES: (a) The re-formed JSA has a rotating membership of no more than seven per meeting. (b) This time around, Rex Tyler spells his alter ego as one unhyphenated word: Hourman. In the old days it was generally “Hour-Man.” Justice League of America #22 (Sept. 1963) “Crisis on Earth-Two!” - 25 pp., 3 chapters Cover: Mike Sekowsky (p) & Murphy Anderson (i) Writer: Gardner Fox Artists: Mike Sekowsky (p) & Bernard Sachs (i)

36

The Many Oaths of—

THE MANY OATHS OF

Of Prose & Poetry and Sacred Oaths

by Craig Delich When evil threatened between 1940 and 1949, the Golden Age Green Lantern (just like his Silver Age counterpart) charged his ring at his magic lamp, then went forth to battle the forces of darkness.

Actually, we presume he did the same thing through late 1950, when his last appearance was chronicled in All-Star #57; but he was never shown charging his ring in the later Justice Society adventures, as he had earlier done in All-American Comics, Green Lantern, and Comic Cavalcade.

On occasion, Alan Scott merely touched his ring silently to the lamp before flying off. However, one of the unique aspects of his ring-charging was the oath he recited during his private ritual.

Mart Nodell, the artist who basically created The Green Lantern, has said he devised the original oath, which was used from the hero’s first appearance (in All-American Comics #16, July 1940) up till the end of 1943.

However, Nodell recalls that he showed the oath to editor Sheldon Mayer, who made some changes in it—and it’s possible, says Nodell, that writer Bill Finger may have had a hand in making adjustments to it, as well, since Finger was involved in the very first GL story.

The oath varied slightly when he spoke it the second time, in All-American #18 (Sept. 1940). As can be seen by examining the accompanying illustrations, the two versions are identical, except that the earlier one contains a second dramatic pause 2/3 of the way through—and then repeats the words “the light.”

The editor and/or writer must have felt the first way was better, for after #18 the dramatic pause and repetition were usually part and parcel of that oath. (The comma after “for” was dropped in the written version, as well, probably for the better.)

Still, during the early years, there were several minor variations of the oath. In All-American #23 (Feb. 1941), for example, the word “upon” is substituted for “over.”

(See illustration.) But is that a real change, or did Green Lantern— or maybe writer Bill Finger—just forget?

Without a doubt, the use of this solemn, almost grim oath contributed not only to the uniqueness of Green Lantern as a character, but also to his popularity, for no other hero of the 1940s had anything like it. The oath portrayed the commitment Alan Scott had to his Actually, all the reader ever new occupation in society... it stated Recent color illustration of Green Lantern by Mart Nodell, for a poster sold at got to read was what seemed to be his purpose in clear, distinct terms... comics conventions. [Art ©2001 Mart Nodell; Green Lantern ©2001 DC Comics.] the tail end of the oath, beginning it had mystical, maybe even religious with a dash (really, a couple of overtones. Captain Marvel’s hyphens) followed by an “and” that suggested there was more before “Shazam!” or Johnny Quick’s magic formula just didn’t match up. it. However, since no earlier words to the oath were never revealed, How could they? perhaps Alan Scott composed it that way, starting in mid-stream: Around the time Alfred Bester took over the writing of the strip “—And I shall shed my light over dark evil... for, the dark things cannot stand the light... the light of the Green Lantern!”

from Bill Finger in late 1943, Green Lantern suddenly adopted a new oath—one that rhymed:

—The Green Lantern!

37

regular authorship of the Green Lantern strip.

This writer, whoever he was, may have started on the “GL” feature as early as the story in Green Lantern #4 (Summer 1942). The Emerald Gladiator recited his oath only once in the entire issue-length story, and it was a shorter and less poetic version of the original oath. If this was someone’s idea of an improvement, he had a tin ear. (See next page.)

However, by Green Lantern #5 (Autumn 1942), this writer was in full swing, with no less than two highly unusual oaths found within this book-length tale. These two oaths have little in common with either the original oath, or with each other. The simplicity of the first oath was in danger of being lost. (See next page for this one too.)

It seems unlikely that Bill Finger would suddenly and so dramatically change a long-standing tradition in the Green Lantern mythos. So we must yet look elsewhere for this writer’s identity.

First two appearances of the oath, in All-American #16 & #18. [©2001 DC Comics.]

“In brightest day, in darkest night, No evil shall escape my sight!

Let those who worship evil’s might, Beware my power—Green Lantern’s light!”

This oath, too, even excluding minor variations in punctuation, had one slightly alternate version. By 1945, the word “blackest” had permanently replaced “darkest.”

It was this second version of the rhymed oath, of course, that was revived by editor Julius Schwartz and/or writer John Broome when Hal Jordan debuted as the second Green Lantern in Showcase #22 (Sept.-Oct. 1959), and which has been used ever since.

Who was responsible for this ultimate, longest-lasting Green Lantern oath? Mart Nodell or Bill Finger, perhaps? Definitely not!

I’ve spoken with many individuals who worked for DC during that period. No one who worked on the strip as a writer claims to have devised it. Most seem to feel that Alfred Bester created it, because that was the only oath he used when he wrote “Green Lantern” stories.

However, in his last published interview before his death, Bester denied creating it!

One thing few people are aware of is that, from mid-1942 until early 1943, as Bill Finger was packing his bags to go fight for Uncle Sam, Green Lantern began to use completely different oaths when charging his ring—oaths never used before or after this six-month period!

Note the preposition change in this E.E. Hibbard panel from All-American #23, the first issue not drawn by Mart Nodell (or rather, “Mart Dellon”!)... though still scripted by Bill Finger. [©2001 DC Comics.]

It is logical to assume that these oaths were written by one or more persons who worked on the strip only briefly—yet by someone who had the power to change the oath originally devised by Nodell, Mayer, and Finger—and by someone who might possibly have liked to assume the

From All-American #38 (May 1942), a pair of panels by Irwin Hasen, the second regular “Green Lantern” artist. Repro’d from photocopies of the original art, courtesy of Joel Thingvall. [©2001 DC Comics.]

In All-American Comics #45 (December 1942), we find yet another off-the-wall oath—extremely short, if not quite sweet. (See next page.)

At roughly the same time, in the “Green Lantern” story in Comic Cavalcade #1 (Winter 1942-43), this truncated oath appeared: “Let all power and triumph be mine in whatever right I do!”

More or less simultaneous with Comic Cavalcade #1, Green Lantern #6 (Winter 1942-43) contained yet another unusual oath recited by our hero: “The light of the Green Lantern pierces darkness and mystery, and its radiance will strike at the heart at evil!”

Finally, in All-American #47 (February 1943), a last unusual oath was recited by the Emerald Crusader. (See next page.)

Half a dozen versions of the oath in as many months. Something was clearly going on.

The identity of this mystery writer is uncertain, and probably always will be.

Paul Reinman illustrates the original version of the rhymed oath in The Big AllAmerican Comic Book, a 128-page, 25¢ 1944 one-shot. Note the word “darkest.” [©2001 DC Comics.]

40

The Genius Jones Twins

The Genius Jones Twins A brief look at the most unlikely coincidence

by Will Murray It’s no secret that many of the early Golden Age comics characters were inspired by, if not directly purloined from, pulp-magazine characters who came before.

Many of these “borrowings” (to use a polite term) are obvious. Some are not.

appearances, Genius Jones was nothing less than a naked ripoff of Lester Dent’s Argosy hero named—Genius Jones!

Lester Dent, as many comics aficionados know, was, under the pseudonym “Kenneth Robeson,” the co-creator and main writer of the major pulpmagazine hero Doc Savage, which debuted in the early 1930s; he wrote many other pulps, as well.

Few people know, for example, that the More Fun Comics serial, “Bob Merritt and His Flying Pals,” is really a DC’s humorous version of Genius Jones graced the covers of a number of DC Comics Dent’s Genius Jones first thinly disguised version of in the mid-’40s. This random sampling is from All-Funny Comics #7 (Summer 1945) appeared in an eight-part 1937 Street & Smith’s pulp hero, Bill and More Fun Comics #111 and #113 (June and August,1946). [©2001 DC Comics Inc.] Argosy serial called Genius Jones.

Barnes. Only the names were It told the wild tale of a redchanged—and not all of them— haired, red-bearded giant of a young man whom a luxury liner finds by publisher Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, who incidentally had created marooned on an iceberg. The sole survivor of a failed polar expedition, Barnes for Street & Smith before launching what became DC Comics. he is eventually rescued. It turns out he has been among the floes since One of the most blatant pulp-to-comics lifts is one you never hear childhood, reared by his half-mad father, with only a set about, but it’s about as pure a ripoff as the era ever spawned. of the Encyclopedia Brittanica to acquaint him with the civilized world!

Genius Jones debuted in Adventure Comics #77 (August 1942) and enjoyed a four-year run in that title, as well as in All-Funny Comics and More Fun Comics. His origin is brief: Jonny Jones is a young boy shipwrecked on a desert island, with only a set of the Encyclopedia Brittanica for company. Without anything better to do, he reads every volume cover to cover. By the time he’s finally rescued, he’s an expert on every subject under the sun. Upon his return home, he goes into business as a jack-of-all-answers.

The feature, whose art chores were the work of Stan Kaye, was unremittingly entertaining.

As the strip developed, Genius donned a purple outfit and white aviator’s helmet, becoming a sort of junior-grade, mostly humorous superhero along the lines of Street & Smith’s Supersnipe. Eventually he even adopted a “secret identity” of sorts, calling himself “The Answerman” when his goggles were pulled down.

But, in his origin and early

As Dent portrayed him, Jones is a humorous figure. Naive, possessing Herculean strength that would credit Doc Savage himself and a strong desire to do good, he has a lot of trouble fitting into the cynical world of Depression America. Coming into an inheritance from his late father, Polar Jones, and a good deal of fame, Jones naturally attracts a circle of admirers, gold-diggers, and greedy shysters.

Dent planned Genius Jones as a serial character. A second Jones serial was plotted in full, but either Dent got too busy with Doc Savage, or Argosy declined the sequel. Other than being reprinted in Dent’s hometown Missouri newspaper, the original Genius Jones has never been seen since 1937. Unless you count DC’s version of his “twin brother.”

Coincidence? I doubt it. There’s too much evidence to the contrary.

So who perpetrated this unpunished hijacking?

We know who is credited with creating DC’s Genius Jones, at least.

Alfred Bester was the original scripter and did the strip for much of its first two years—or so they say. Would the future award-winning science-fiction The original Genius Jones debuts on the cover of Argosy Weekly, author, who wrote the classics The Stars Nov. 1937. [©2001 Condé Nast] My Destination and The Demolished

42

Comic Fandom Archive Department

1964

The New York Comicon--Two Views Presented by Bill Schelly [EDITOR’S NOTE: For some years, Seattle-based Bill Schelly has been collecting, indexing, and recording artifacts of the comic book fan movement of the 1960s and early ’70s. This painstaking research has resulted in two editions of his landmark volume The Golden Age of Comic Fandom, as well as several other fandom-related publications.

(Do yourself a favor and see Hamster Press’ ad elsewhere in this issue.)

[Early on, founding father Jerry G. Bails proclaimed that comics fandom couldn’t count itself as truly organized until it had put on a national fan convention. And so, after a tentative outing or two, the first comics convention that could truly be called “national” was held in New York City, at that time home to virtually all comics publishers.

[While Bill was preparing a piece on the ’64 Comicon and its program booklet, collector/fan Ethan Roberts independently suggested that he himself write an article on that seminal event, which he had helped organize.

Bill has coordinated these two pieces, to give a closeup look at the 1964 New York Comicon… starting with the account of eyewitness Ethan.

—R.T.]

The 1964 New York Comicon: A Personal Reminiscence

by Ethan Roberts

Above: Metal button designed by Art Tripp for the first New York Comicon. Reprinted from Bill Schelly’s The Golden Age of Comic Fandom, courtesy of the author.

IND LL, D, and F subway lines all had stations there. Surrounding this island of the unique and the radical were the commercial interests of lower Manhattan, including the original store of the S. Klein department store chain.

I was there about to get involved in something that was then unique, a radical change for the comics business—the first real comic book convention.

It had started months earlier when I had seen notices in The Rocket’s Blast-Comicollector (RB-CC) and in some comics letters columns that a group of fans were trying to stage a get-together of comic book collectors. One afternoon in a Queens County candy store I finally got a name and a location—Bernie Bubnis, out on Long Island. It’s hard to believe how many outlets there were for comics then.

Newsstands sold them. Pharmacies sold them.

However, the most common outlets were the neighborhood candy stores, which typically had a soda fountain, candy (big surprise), greeting cards, sports and non-sports cards with bubble gum, and periodicals, including comic books in wire racks.

I’d been buying Batman, Flash, Green Lantern, Atom, JLA, other DC, and the newly interesting Marvel comics for years.

I knew about comic book fandom first from the letters columns in Julius Schwartz-edited DC comics and from buying Jerry Bails and Roy Thomas’ Alter Ego, Bob Jennings’ Comic World, and occasional other fanzines. I had already met some other fans and had been dealing with comic dealers Phil Seuling and Howard Rogofsky in New York, and Bill Thailing in Cleveland. But this getting together in a group was something new to me, so I grabbed my loose change and scurried to the pay phone in the back of the candy store. I looked up Bubnis in the Nassau County phone book and dropped in the proper change.

New York, New York, July 27, 1964. I Ethan Robert’s high school graduation picture. was an 181/2-year-old college junior who looked fourteen. What was I doing on 4th Bernie and I talked through several change deposits. He told me his Avenue just south of 14th Street, eyeballing strangers and handing out plans and the problems he was having, the chief of which was locating a white buttons with bold blue and red letters on them? site to hold the gathering. It had to be in Manhattan, to be close to the That neighborhood has an interesting history. 14th and 4th is the comics publishers and to provide transportation for those coming into southeast corner of Union Square, then a major site for radical politics “The City.” I told him I thought I could find a site. We started to disin New York. Anarchists, communists, socialists of various stripes, and cuss it when my supply of change ran out and we got cut off. Bernie labor union activists would literally stand on a soapbox to harangue wrote later that he thought me very excited and was surprised when we passersby, hoping to draw a crowd. Union Square itself was a trapezoid were cut off. I didn’t call him back. I had run out of cash; and besides, I stretching from 14th to 17th Street, with 4th Avenue as its eastern already knew what I had to do. border and Broadway on the west; it was a park with trees, bushes, I scrambled around for some sites and finally thought of the meetgrass, benches, concrete sidewalks, and subway station exits erupting ing place of my parents’ fraternal organization, The Workmen’s Circle, passengers or swallowing them. The Lexington Avenue IRT and the

The 1964 New York Comicon—Two Views a.k.a. Der Arbeiter Ring, Formed largely by working class Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, The Workmen’s Circle was a selfhelp group for people with little money or knowledge of English. Many spoke Russian, Ukrainian, Latvian, Hungarian, and other tongues; most also spoke Hebrew, but their language in common was the bastardized Middle High German called Yiddish. By the time I was born, the sons and daughters of those immigrants were beginning to take over the organization. They usually spoke English, and they maintained the Democratic-Socialist politics that had been common amongst the founders and which dominated the Union Square area.

My parents and relatives belonged to Branch 1001, the largest English-speaking unit in New York. Its office was on the second floor of a building located on the west side of 4th Avenue between 12th and 13th Streets. The entrance was little more than a door’s width wide. Once inside, you climbed a flight of stairs to get to Workmen’s Circle. The office area had a number of rooms, including a moderate-sized meeting room. I had been to children’s gatherings with Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop and to teenage group dating parties there.

I talked to my parents and my uncle, who had a prominent post in the organization. Branch 1001, somewhat bewilderingly, agreed to let us hold the meeting there.

I called Bernie and told him I’d located a place to hold the gathering. He was delighted. Arrangements were made and announcements sent out.

The morning of July 27th (a Monday) dawned bright and sunny. It promised to be hot, but not as humid as New York could be. I made my way down to Union Square by subway like a good New Yorker. I got there shortly after noon and went to check the meeting room to make sure everything was okay.

Others began to arrive. Unfortunately, Bernie was not there yet, and the crowd was still small. There was some confusion and anxiety.

We were supposed to start at 1:00 P.M. and the main organizer was late!

Art Tripp had already arrived with a supply of specially-made metal buttons, slightly larger than a quarter, white with the word “COMICON” in blue above and “1964” below in red. In order to relieve anxiety and make sure nobody got lost, Art and a few of us went up to 14th Street to watch for comics fans and to hand out buttons. It was blindingly bright and hot after being in a normally lit, air-conditioned building. We did collar some stragglers.

Finally Bernie showed up with Ron Fradkin, bearing gifts from major publishers. Some other fans came with them. The comicon scouts were drawn back into the meeting area. It was later learned that withdrawal combined with the narrow entrance and second floor location of the comicon led to a number of fans missing the gathering altogether.

At 2:00 P.M., with Bernie there and the dealers set up, the program began. The first formal speaker was Dave Twedt (pronounced “tweet”), a representative sent by Marvel Comics. He was an all-American type in a suit. Unfortunately, he didn’t know much about the comic book business in general or Marvel Comics in particular. He was just a college student intern, so the very first professional from the comics industry to address a gathering of fans was not impressive. We pelted him with questions anyway. He did his best to answer them. Nobody had any overripe fruit.

During this exchange, two more folks arrived from the Marvel Bullpen: Steve Ditko and Flo Steinberg.

43 Steve Ditko donated a Spider-Man drawing which later became this front cover of The 1964 Comicon Booklet; but since the program book was printed via spiritduplicator, con organizer Bernie Bubnis had to trace Ditko’s illo onto a ditto master.

[Spider-Man ©2001 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Ditko looked just like he drew himself in back-up Spider-Man features: tall, thin, balding, dour, with glasses. I had a one-on-one conversation with him. Over the course of the next thirty-six years of attending conventions, it ranks as the most depressing exchange I ever had with a comics pro. Even though I was majoring in Biology, a field in which I eventually earned a Ph.D., I confessed to Mr. Ditko that I was considering a career as a comic book artist. I think any comic book fan with modest drawing talent entertains that idea at some time.

After all, biologists do have to draw diagrams. Ditko proceeded to tell me how hard the job was; he also said it paid too little and had few lasting rewards. It was a real downer. I think we attendees had the same effect on Steve Ditko, because he never came to a convention again.

Flo Steinberg, on the other hand, was a delight.

She was as friendly as anyone could wish, and pretty, too.

When I told her I had received my Merry Marvel Marching Society membership card without a signature, she suggested I sent it to her at Marvel and she would get it signed. (She was as good as her word.)

The next organized event was a “chalk talk” by comics professional Tom Gill. Actually it was a double flip-chart talk. To me, Tom Gill will always be THE Lone Ranger artist. While Charles Flanders was the comic strip’s artist (and the first 37 issues of the Lone Ranger comic book were strip reprints), Gill drew the new stories Dell and later Gold Key published thereafter. If the Ranger’s uniform was blue-gray instead of red shirt and black pants, Tom was the artist. He drew the Tonto and Hi Yo Silver books, as well. His talk was wellrehearsed, as Gill regularly made trips to military bases and Veterans Administration hospitals to entertain One burning issue was resolved in 1964: The Silver Age Hawkman finally got his own comic (with a #1 coverdated April-May ’64) after three years of tryouts— as commemorated in the Comicon Booklet by fan artist Ronn Foss. [Hawkman ©2001 DC Comics.]

A Few Instant Corrections to the All-Star Companion Installment No.

by Roy Thomas

W

ell, The All-Star Companion is finally out, after a two-year struggle— only a few weeks before this issue of Alter Ego hits the mails and the comics shops. Unavoidably, it seems, a few errors slipped in, and this space will be used in future issues of A/E to list corrections— hopefully in a format which allows any reader so inclined to simply cut out a page or two of the issue and slip it into his/her copy of the Companion. (Of course, we assume said reader will purchase a second copy of that issue of A/E so as not to ruin his collection. You’re on your honor here.)

Naturally, while the book was being printed, and as soon as my own copies arrived by UPS, I found a few mistakes myself, so, with the last-minute forebearance of Jon B. Cooke and John Morrow, I’m shoehorning them in here. The page numbers below are those in The AllStar Companion: Page 14: All-American Comics seems to have been our particuAll-Star cover he drew was #11 (not #10). lar jinx. First we typoed that the “Ultra-Man” feature began in AllPage 45: I stated that “From #3-37… at the end of each solo American #18; in truth, it debuted in #8 (and lasted through #19). chapter, the reader is urged to read more of that hero’s exploits in Page 15: Another Ulra-typo: The pseudonym each issue of an anthology title” (such as Flash “Don Shelby,” used as the credit on “Ultra-Man,” is Comics, etc.). Instead of “each,” I should have writof course an anagram not of “by Shelly,” as stated, ten “many.” Those bottom lines were dropped totally but of “by Sheldon.” Typo or no typo, the main point from #26-29 and #35. was that the pen name stood for AA editor Sheldon Page 60: Actually, it was Chad Grothkopf, not Paul (Shelly) Mayer.

Norris, who drew the 1941 “Sandman” story in which Page 22: Despite an account I once read somethat hero first sported a purple-and-yellow costume. where and repeated in the Companion, there seems Norris illustrated the next couple of “Sandman” tales, to be no hard evidence that Dorothy Roubicek ever after which Simon and Kirby took over. My main scripted a “Wonder Woman” story in the 1940s. point, of course, was to correct the oft-stated misimHowever, as script editor of the All-American line pression that S&K were the ones who gave Sandman a from 1942-44, she probably did rewrite a bit of diatight-fitting costume and introduced Sandy. logue and captions from time to time. And, as Pages 71-72: Contrary to a parenthetical phrase, it’s detailed by Les Daniels in Wonder Woman: The unlikely that any Junior JSA members were “edited Complete History, she was kept busy by AA publishout” of the Spectre and/or Johnny Thunder chapters of er M.C. Gaines, coming up with suggestions as to All-Star #16; I was confusing that issue with #17, how Diana and other females in the tales could be where already-completed chapters were shortened due “confined or enclosed” and still “cut down the use of to a decrease in the story’s page count. chains by at least 50 to 75% without at all interfering Page 90: It was Hawkman, not Wonder Woman, with the excitement of the story or the sales of the who narrated the story of Dick Amber in All-Star books.” Surely that’s got to count for something! #24… but it was the Amazon who told Flash and Page 26: Howard Ferguson’s precise JSA credits Green Lantern that they’d be so proud of the JSA that were left off his bio-entry. He is presumed to have they’d become “fighting members” again. contributed to the inking of the Simon and Kirby Page 125: Should have mentioned that “Page U” of “Sandman” chapters in All-Star #14, at least. the JSA finale to the “lost” story “The Will of William Page 27: Due to a sloppily-worded phrase of Wilson” had been previously printed—with Yours mine, it is unclear whether some of the newspaper Truly as editor—in Last Days of the Justice Society of comic strips officially drawn by Frank Giacoia had America Special (1986).

DC’s All Star Archives Vol. 3 indicates that letterer actually been ghosted by himself for other artists, or Page 186: Hawkman’s name was somehow left off Howard Ferguson did some by others for him. The latter was the general case, as the list of JSA heroes who appeared in Justice League inking on some of Joe Simon covered in this issue’s interview with Julie Schwartz. of America #37-38. and Jack Kirby’s “Sandman” (In fact, the more I look at the last few issues of the Page 194: Gerry Conway is stated here to have chapters, such as this one Golden Age All-Star, the more I wonder if perhaps become the regular writer of Justice League of Amerifrom All-Star #14, at least.

Mike Sekowsky wasn’t involved in them, as well, ca in 1980; in truth, he did so by 1978, as correctly This information was inadvertently left out of The Allwith Frank getting the assignment and then having noted (twice) on Page 190.

Star Companion, page 26.

Mike bail him out on penciling, as Sekowsky often There! That wasn’t too painful. Only thing is, that’s [©2001 DC Comics.] did, with Frank inking. Either way, it’s nice-looking only the mistakes I caught at the 13th hour. Next issue work.) we’ll hear from the rest of the world. Fortunately, I Page 31: Due to a badly-placed prepositional phrase, the impresdon’t think too many of the errors are important, but I’ve been too sion is given that Mart Nodell used the pen name “Mort Dellon” on aggrieved in recent years by comics-related misinformavarious comics features he drew circa 1940; in truth he used it only tion being passed on as gospel in hardcover volumes, on early “Green Lantern” stories. Also, Sheldon Moldoff’s first and thus rarely corrected, to want to sweep anything Green Lantern story was in All-American #16 (not #17), and the under the rug myself.

An ALTER EGO Bonus!

by Roy Thomas

F

or technical reasons, at the eleventh hour, two tiers (rows) of Flash panels from the never-published 1945-46 Justice Society story “The Will of William Wilson” had to be omitted from The All-Star Companion. These panels, scripted by JSA co-creator Gardner Fox, drawn by Martin Naydel, and certainly edited by Shelly Mayer and Julie Schwartz, are printed here for the first time ever. “Will” was removed from the schedule circa 1946 and later “written off “ forever, in 1949. We begin with what was originally meant to be the bottom of Page 2 of the six-page Flash chapter….

After arriving sometime in the late 12th century on his “impossible” mission to retrieve “the sword of Genghis Khan,” The Flash spies a lone man being chased by two armed Mongols on horseback. For an instant he hesitates to let anything turn him aside from his quest—but then recalls that, with his speed, it won’t be a very long detour. So he leaps into action….

It goes almost without saying that artist Martin Naydel, who since 1943 had been drawing a turtle clone of The Flash called The Terrific Whatzit in Funny Stuff for his brother Larry Nadle [sic], DC’s editor for humorous comics, was an odd choice for a super-hero artist. His action scenes tended toward the stiff. (Of course, Gardner Fox had given him a hard scene to draw in the first panel on “Page 3,” if he had described Flash as reaching from behind to smite his foe. But Fox may merely have directed the artist to have the hero hit the Mongol. The precise way this was done, and the symbolic stars over the rider’s head, may have been the artist’s own idea.)

And so the Mongols (who practically lived on their horses) are sent running on foot toward a minimally-rendered horizon. For all his “cartoony” qualities, however, Naydel doesn’t forget to give the rescued man a shadow, which actually balances out other lines on the left side of Panel 2.

And there you have ’em—five more panels to go with the dozen-plus pages’ worth of previously-unpublished JSA art printed for the first time in The All-Star Companion. For the rest of the artwork and the story behind it—indeed, for more “Secrets behind All-Star Comics” than you ever dreamed existed—send for your copy of The All-Star Companion today!

Roy T Thomas homas’ Legendary Legendary Roy Comics F F anzine Comics anzine

Plus:

5.95

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In the USA

No. 7 WINTER 2001

With THESE MAGIC WORDS...

C.C. BECK • MAC RABOY MARC SWAYZE • BOB ROGERS DAVE BERG • OTTO BINDER ALEX ROSS • MICHAEL T. GILBERT

All characters TM & ©2001 DC Comics.

Volume 3, No. 7 Winter 2001

™

Second-In-A-Row Special Fawcett Section

Editor Roy Thomas

Associate Editor Bill Schelly

Design & Layout Jon B. Cooke GREAT SWAMP GRAPHICS

Production John Morrow Eric Nolen-Weathington

Consulting Editors John Morrow Jon B. Cooke

Contents

re:. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

FCA Editor

Munificent missives from Marty Nodell and others.

P.C. Hamerlinck

Comics Crypt Editor

“Nothing Was Ever Good Enough!” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Michael T. Gilbert

Roger Hill talks to Capt. Marvel Jr. artist Mac Raboy’s son, David, about his father.

Editors Emeritus

Bob Rogers in the 20th Century (Part Two) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Jerry Bails (founder) Ronn Foss, Biljo White, Mike Friedrich

Cover Artists

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Michael T. Gilbert presents two previously unseen C.C. Beck short prose stories (with illos!).

Rich Buckler C.C. Beck

FCA (Fawcett Collectors of America) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Cover Color

Another fun-filled Fawcett lineup courtesy of P.C. Hamerlinck.

Tom Ziuko C.C. Beck

Fawcett-to-Go . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Mailing Crew

Russ Garwood, D. Hambone, Glen Musial, Ed Stelli, Pat Varker

And Special Thanks to: Mike W. Barr Dave Berg Brian Boerner Ray Bottorff, Jr. Frank Brunner Rich Buckler Kurt Busiek Gerry Conway Craig Delich Al Dellinges Mark Evanier Ramona Fradon Mike Friedrich Keif Fromm Carl Gafford Jennifer T. Go Ron Harris Roger Hill Joe Kubert Paul Levitz Elliot Maggin Dave Manak Rich Morrissey

R.H. gives us the second portion of his interview with Raboy’s background artist.

Will Murray Mart & Carrie Nodell Denny O’Neil Jerry Ordway George Perez David Raboy Ethan Roberts Bob Rogers Alex Ross Julius Schwartz Scott Shaw!

David Siegel Robin Snyder Flo Steinberg Marc Swayze Joel Thingvall Dann Thomas Len Wein John Wells Marv Wolfman Donald Woolfolk Ed Zeno

An editorial potpourri assembled by Jennifer T. Go.

We Didn’t Know... It Was the Golden Age! . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 Fawcett artist Marc Swayze on the DC Shazam! reprint compilations.

The Fawcett Side of Dave Berg. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 The Mad artist/writer on his ’40s work for Fawcett and his World War II experiences.

The Marvel Family Battles Evil Incarnate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 Would-be Shazam! scripter C.C. Beck’s conflicts with the 1970s DC editorial department.

JSA-JLA Section. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Flip Us! About our cover: Roy says: “In the 1970s and ’80s C.C. Beck began to re-create classic covers—first those he himself had done, then those by other Fawcett artists, and eventually even heroes he had never drawn, like Batman. I loved ’em all, but when it came time to buy one, the only choice for me was Marvel Family Comics #1, which—JSA lover that I was, even at age 4-5—really knocked me out! It still does, hanging on my staircase every day!” [Art ©2001 Estate of C.C. Beck; Marvel Family ©2001 DC Comics.]

Above: Panel detail by Mac Raboy from the Captain Marvel Jr. story in Master Comics #29 (Aug. 1942), “The Iron Hill of the Hun!” See page 7 for a look at the entire page, repro’d from photocopies of the original artwork. [©2000 DC Comics.]

Alter EgoTM is published quarterly by TwoMorrows, 1812 Park Drive, Raleigh, NC 27605, USA. Phone: (919) 833-8092. Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: Rt. 3, Box 468, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: roydann@oburg.net. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices. Single issues: $5.95 ($7.00 Canada, $9.00 elsewhere). Four-issue subscriptions: $20 US, $27 Canada, $37 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 Canada.

FIRST PRINTING

“Nothing Was Ever Good Enough!”—

4

“Nothing Was Ever Good Enough!”

An Interview with David Raboy Conducted by Roger Hill me, and thus you, the reader, an opportunity to get to know Mac Raboy a bit better than we otherwise might. —R.H.] ROGER HILL: David, I appreciate you taking the time to talk with me about your father, Mac Raboy. I have to ask you right off—was his last name originally “Rabinowitz”?

DAVID RABOY: No. My great grandfather’s Ellis Island papers show the name was “Raboi.” These were the papers he brought with him. My grandfather preceded my great grandfather, and when he came over he departed Ellis Island with the name spelled “Raboy.” So I’m guessing that “i” became “y” on Ellis Island. It got “Anglofied.”

My grandfather came with one or two other brothers when they were quite young. There were nine brothers altogether, and after they had established themselves with jobs and so on, they brought the other brothers and my great grandfather across.

RH: And the name “Raboi” originates from where?

Detail of Raboy’s powerful cover for Master Comics #26 (May 1942). Thanks to Keif Fromm. [©2001 DC Comics.]

RABOY: Bessarabka.

RH: Do you know how to spell that?

RABOY: [laughs] No. All I know is that it is somewhere in eastern Romania.

RH: Was your dad’s name Emanuel, or Manuel?

[INTERVIEWER’S NOTE: When I first contacted David Raboy, son of legendary comics artist Mac Raboy, he wasn’t that thrilled to hear from me, let alone begin a discussion about his father. With gentle persuasion, he finally relented and allowed me to question him in depth about his father’s personal life and career working in the comics field.

[While growing up in the woods of Golden’s Bridge, New York, David learned much from his father about building things. Mac Raboy had a love for animals, a passion for conservation and science, and an awareness of all things that played into that. David developed similar interests during those years and today holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Animal Science and Animal Behavior.

[He currently works as a zoo director, which entails the planning and building of new zoos to replace old ones. David has loaned his abilities to the development of zoo facilities all over the United States, including the building of new zoos in Syracuse, New York, Waco, Texas, and New Bedford, Massachusetts. My utmost thanks to David for allowing

RABOY: Manuel. But all of my life, when he was alive, I never once heard him referred to as Manuel. No one ever called him anything but Mac. RH: I understand your grandfather’s name was Isaac [NOTE: misspelled “Issac” last issue.—R.T.], and that he worked in a hat factory and wrote several books.

RABOY: And essays, poetry, and political polemics, and so on.

RH: I believe he eventually moved to the Mid-West later on, didn’t he?

RABOY: He moved to North Dakota, which is probably a little further than what most people think of as the Mid-West. He was a horsehandler on a horse ranch just outside of Gladstone, North Dakota. He wrote a couple of books about that experience.

All his books were written in Jewish [Hebrew]. I don’t read Jewish.

Two of them, however, were translated into English. My Brothers is

—David Raboy Interview about him and his brothers coming to this country, and The Jewish Cowboy was more specifically about experiences in North Dakota.

He was there for just a year or a couple of years. The other brothers and their father had a fairly large dairy farm in Connecticut, and my grandfather had graduated from an agricultural college in New Jersey.

So he was asked by my great grandfather to return to Connecticut to manage the family dairy farm. Which he did… I think, probably, to his regret, but that’s beside the point. So he managed the dairy farm for a while, and worked in New York City, both in a hat factory and as a furrier. As his fame grew as a writer, he ultimately ceased factory work. He contracted TB and died in about 1943, when I was about three. I have just a couple of recollections of him.

5

RH: Did Mac ever discuss these prints with you or the family?

RABOY: Not at any great length. My mother was more willing to discuss them than he was. She was proud of the fact that they were there in the permanent collection of the Metropolitan. When I visited the museum they were not on exhibit, but I inquired and was shown them. They were very typical of his work during that period.

RH: Any idea how Mac and your mother met?

RABOY: Not a clue.

RH: Your mom’s name was Lulu Belle…?

RH: So where was Mac born? I’ve heard both New York City and the Bronx.

RABOY: The Bronx is one of the five boroughs that make up New York City.

Whether or not he was born in the Bronx, I honestly don’t know. He was born in New York City, somewhere.

RH: I heard that Mac was a graduate of De Witt Clinton High School in the Bronx. Yet, when a friend of mine tried to locate a picture of him in the high school yearbook records there, he couldn’t be found.

RABOY: The only thing I can tell you is my understanding that he graduated from De Witt Clinton. We would drive by it when we drove into the city to visit his mother, who was my grandmother. I can’t account for why there is no yearbook picture. Knowing my father as I do, I’m not surprised.

RH: Yes. From what I’ve learned so far, he was a little camera shy.

RABOY: [laughs] That’s being charitable.

My dad also went to the Cooper Union School and the Pratt Institute.

RH: Both are highly respected institutions for artists.

RABOY: I’m not aware that he graduated or received any kind of degree from either of them, but I suspect not.

RH: It’s very typical for artists to do a year or so at those schools and then move on quickly because of needing work and an income.

RABOY: I think that’s pretty much what he did. He was born in 1914, so he would have gone to those schools around 1932 or 1934.

RH: Are you aware of the wood engravings Mac did for the WPA back during the Depression?

RABOY: I am aware of them. I saw them many years ago at the Met [the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York City]. I went up there.

This Mac Raboy self-portrait was drawn for George “Inky” Roussos’ sketchbook sometime around 1944 or 1945. The late George Roussos, who went on to become a comic book artist himself (see A/E V3#5), took his sketchbook around to many of his artistic “heroes” of the Golden Age to get illos. Raboy did this pencil drawing at the time he was doing Green Lama for Spark Publications. Note the stipple beard and glum look on his face. Not much humor going on here, but then again, there wasn’t much going on in the world at that time to be humorous about. This is the first time this drawing has been reproduced totally intact.

(When first seen in Jim Steranko’s History of the Comics, the background images were eliminated.) [©2001 estate of Mac Raboy.]

18

Bob Rogers—

Bob Rogers In The 20th Century!--Part Continuing our groundbreaking interview with the artist formerly known as Rubin Zubofsky about his days as assistant to Mac Raboy

2

Interview Conducted & Transcribed by Roger Hill [EDITOR’S NOTE: Last issue we presented the first installment of Roger Hill’s lengthy and thorough interview with Bob Rogers, who changed his name from Rubin Zubofsky after World War II. Rubin, then often called “Ruby,” originally worked as an assistant to artist legend Lou Fine, who drew “Black Condor,” “The Ray,” and other top features for the Quality Comics Group. When Quality refused him a small raise, Rubin/Bob went to work for Fawcett in the very early 1940s as background man and assistant to Mac Raboy, the star artist of “Bulletman” and then “Captain Marvel Jr.” stories in Master Comics. As Bob explained it, contrary to popular belief, Mac Raboy never did any interior artwork on the full Captain Marvel Jr. title; other artists put that book together using tracings of Raboy’s work from Master, where the kid version of Captain Marvel had originated. Last issue he described how even Raboy, with his help, often put together “CMJr” stories using photostats of his own past work, to fend off the dreaded deadline doom. His story continues….—R.T.] ROGER HILL: Would Mac’s wife come into the art department now and then?

BOB ROGERS: I never met his wife at that time.

RH: Did he ever talk about the War or about his political beliefs while you guys worked together at Fawcett?

ROGERS: No. I never knew that he had any sort of feelings about it until later when we worked on Flash Gordon together. It never came up before then.

RH: What kind of pencils did you and Mac draw with?

The cover of Master Comics #24 (March 1942), on which Bob Rogers did backgrounds for Raboy. [©2001 DC Comics.]

and Mac utilize for your inking?

ROGERS: I probably remember more about what I inked with while working with Lou Fine than when I worked with Mac. But when I started with Mac, I was already using the WindsorNewton brushes. If you really want to know what size, I’ll run downstairs and tell you. I still have my brushes!

ROGERS: HBs. That’s the medium type of lead.

RH: I assume you guys were using Windsor-Newton brushes on your work. What size brushes did you

RH: You still have the original brushes? I’ll wait!

Recent photo of Bob Rogers, who in 1942 was Mac Raboy’s first assistant.

[Photo courtesy of Keith Fromm.]

[Bob runs downstairs, and returns in very short time.]

—In The 20th Century!

ROGERS: Now let me see here.

Okay, we have a number 3, and some that are a little smaller. Lots of number 3s here. Yes, so I was using a number 3, and Mac was sort of… I remember sometimes I would take the brush out of his hand, or he would take the brush out of mine, and he’d show me a certain way to do something. So it was sort of like we were using the same brushes.

RH: Did Mac show you certain tricks that you could use when inking his pencils?

ROGERS: Oh, sure. I bowed to his talents, and I made no bones about it.

And he was very satisfied with my work. When I worked with Lou Fine I did a great deal of work with shadows. I love shadows! And I always had one light source in my head. And all the shadows always went in one direction.

19 ROGERS: There was a fellow there who helped out for just a short period of time, by the name of Al Jetter.

He became my assistant. He basically got the menial job of erasing pages and doing the white-out. He was very agreeable to whatever had to be done and we got along just fine. That was for a period of time up until I went into the service. He went on to become an art editor at Fawcett. His name appeared later in the credits of Captain Video comics that Fawcett published.

RH: Yes, I have the run of them in my collection; I believe it only ran for six issues. So Jetter started out as a clean-up artist for you and Mac? ROGERS: Right. I think Fawcett initially took him on because of his capabilities, but in the meantime they had him helping us out as my assistant. Anything to get Mac and me a little closer to that deadline. We’d burn the midnight oil when we had to. We’d work until around 9:00 at night. I’d go home to Brooklyn and Mac was living in the Bronx at the time.

So then I came to work with Mac and Mac looked at my work and—of course I’m paraphrasing here—and he would say something like, “You know, that’s very nice, but did you ever stop to think that when you look at an object, it isn’t all in shadows and You know, I just remembered that, Light and shadow on a page from Master Comics #32, repro’d from it isn’t all in light? Shadows don’t within the first two weeks I worked photocopies of the original art. Sorry a line or three has dropped always fall the same way. You’ll have a there, I became somewhat of a gopher out. [©2001 DC Comics.] play of light and shadow on the same for him. surface, with the same light source, RH: You mean because you were running back and forth to the Fawcett because you’re getting reflected light off of other objects.” And so I library and morgue for him? began to use that technique where I’d have a varied play of light. This would help to create a mood. So it was all a learning experience. That’s ROGERS: Oh, no. No, I had to run up to the police department in the how I eventually got to where I could duplicate Mac’s style. It was also Bronx to pay a traffic ticket for him. from Mac that I learned the technique of holding up a mirror: RH: So he had you running those kinds of errands for him so he could You’ve got your artwork there in front of you. Now you reverse stay at the drawing board? your body. You turn around and look at the opposite side, and you hold the mirror up so that now you’re looking at the work backwards. The ROGERS: [laughs] Exactly! mistakes will jump out at you.

RH: Did Al Allard, the art director there at Fawcett, RH: So Mac taught you how to do this? ever put the pressure on you guys to get the work done?

ROGERS: He taught it to me, but as I’ve learned since, ROGERS: I can only answer that from my own it’s an old technique. And it’s experience. He never put any pressure on me whatan amazing thing, so I always soever. He was always fine with me. Now, if he had a mirror. Sometimes I’d say put pressure on Mac, which is a possibility, I to myself, “Oh, that’s what’s never saw it. Mac would gripe sometimes about been troubling me. It’s right us not being able to meet a deadline, or from the there. I’ve got to fix that.” Your point of view of being late. But I don’t rememeyes become so accustomed to ber him ever saying that Al was after him, or what you do as you work on the thing, that when you reverse it, Al Jetter is credited as “art editor” in you’re looking at a whole strange Captain Video #3 (June 1951). This George new picture.

Evans-drawn tale about an indestructible RH: Did you or Mac ever get any kind of help on “Captain Marvel Jr.” from any of the other artists working there at Fawcett?

robot is one of A/E editor Roy Thomas’ favorites; like, he’s long admitted he swiped its climax as a way to defeat Ultron-6 in The Avengers #68 (Sept. 1969). [©2001 the respective copyright holders.]

26

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt presents—

Master Anachronous The Unwanted

by C.C. Beck

Magicians have been around ever since, or perhaps even before, there was anyone around at all. There are thousands of them at work today carrying people through the air, speaking in voices which can be heard all over the world and even on the moon, and doing such marvelous things as washing your clothes in magic solutions, serving you food and drink in the twinkling of an eye, and putting you to sleep with secret potions if you want them to.

A long time ago, before magicians were so commonplace, there was one called Anachronous The Unwanted. He was a fine magician who could do many fine tricks, but nobody wanted to see them. He would go to fairs and carnivals and set up his stand where he offered flasks of pure water, healthful foods, diets, and exercise courses for the asking. But nobody ever asked for them. The people bought marvelous patent medicines from the snake doctors, magic turnip peelers and salami slicers from the manipulators, and junk food from the purveyors, but they never went near Anachronous’ stand.

Anachronous threw away all of his stock of goods and decided to try his hand at making money directly instead of by working for it. He tried various spells and formulas which didn’t work, then stumbled on one which was so simple and obvious that anyone could use it. But, like all magic formulas, if used it produced certain side effects which were very unpleasant, such as loss of friends, attraction of crooks and robbers, production of nasty offspring, and other evils. He buried the formula and it has never been found, although people are still looking for it.

“What magic trick can I offer that people will buy, or even take free?” he asked himself. “A great powerful servant that will work for nothing? Everyone could use something like that. I’ll make one.”

He took the magic servant he made to the king, who was horrified.

“Why do you suppose everyone in the kingdom works day and night— except me?” he roared at Anachronous. “That’s so they can support me. If everyone could stop working, they wouldn’t need me. Guards, throw this magic servant down a well and throw his master into jail!” Then Anachronous disappeared (nobody ever found out how) and appeared again in a distant country. This time he had a little gadget he had made, which he demonstrated to the ruler of that country.

“With this gadget I can make magic pictures or look into a drop of water and watch the invisible beasts that live there swimming around, Your Majesty,” he explained. “I can put two of these gadgets into a magic tube, thusly, point it out the window, and see for miles—even to the stars. Wouldn’t it be of great use to Your Majesty?”

“How?” asked the king. “I already have artists to make pictures for me. The palace is full of their work—I’m sick of looking at pictures. As for watching beasts in drops of water, I have enough beasts in my forests and lakes to keep me busy.

“And why, pray tell, should I look out my window? If anything’s happening out there, I’ll find out about it soon enough—I always do. As for looking at the stars, I’ll leave that to my astrologers. They’re crazy enough without my help.

“No, Master Anachronous, I see no use whatsoever for your magic gadget.

Take it away, but don’t show it to anyone else, on penalty of death. Begone!”

Anachronous went away and found himself a cave. There, after some experimentation, he managed to summon up a genie from another world.

“Take me away from this world, Genie,” Anachronous ordered.

“Okay,” the genie said, “get on my shoulders.” The magician did so, and they disappeared together in a flash of unearthly light.

—Whimsical Stories by C.C. Beck

27

by C.C. Beck

“Hello, Urlyburd,” the buzzard

A little bird once hatched out

said. “When did you

of its shell long before it was sup-

get here?”

posed to. It couldn’t wait; it

“Three hours

pecked its way out and said,

ago. My goodness,

“Here I am! What’s happen-

folks are sure lazy

ing?”

around here, aren’t

“Nothing,” said the mother bird. “Go

they?” the urlyburd

back into your shell. You’ll wake your father

said. “You’re the

bird.”

only one up.”

“Tweet tweet! Wake up, wake up, dear Father Bird. I’m here, or

“I’m just coming in...

haven’t yet you heard? I’m here, your little Urlyburd,” sang the urly-

I’ve been up all night,” the

burd.

“Oh, shush!” grumbled the father bird. “Go find me a

buzzard said, settling down. In another moment he was fast asleep.

worm.”

The urlyburd married him and was very happy.

She got up every morning at 4:00 A.M. and made his

The urlyburd spread her little wings and flew down to the ground. She pecked all around, and

breakfast (worms on toast), which was always cold

stamped her little feet, and cocked her little head,

and yucky by the time the buzzard woke up. She

but no worms appeared. It was too early.

made lunch at ten in the morning, and dinner at four; sometimes she made two breakfasts and

About three hours later all the worms came

three lunches and dinners in one day and went to

out of their holes as usual. By then there were

bed at 3:30 in the afternoon.

hundreds of other birds waiting to gobble them up

She was so early in everything she did that

and the urlyburd had to scramble to catch one.

before she knew it the urlyburd had used up all her

“Sorry, Father Bird, I ate it,” she said back in

time. She died of old age and went to bird heaven.

the nest. “But I was there early. Aren’t you proud of

“What are you doing here?” Saint Peter asked. “I

me?”

“Of course. You haven’t any feathers, and you look sort of froggish, but you’ll be all right— I hope,” the father bird said.

The urlyburd’s feathers came in early, and long before she was supposed to, she was quite grown up. She was still only a few months old when she met an ugly old buzzard. He came to the birdfeeder where the

wasn’t expecting you yet. Kindly wait in the waiting room.”

“Okay,” said the urlyburd. “I guess I’m a little early, as usual. How long will I have to wait?”

“Oh, about ten years.”

“Good heavens! I’ve been early all my life,” the urlyburd said.

urlyburd was waiting for the Kindly Human to come out and fill it with

“Now that I’m dead, I’m earlier than ever before. I’ve broken

birdseed.

my own record!”

copyright 2000 DC Comics

no. 66

We Didn’t Know… It Was the Golden Age!

37

The two Shazam! books not only stirred an interest in that past; they enabled me to learn more about two characters I thought I knew… Captain Marvel and C.C. Beck.

By

mds& (c) [Art

logo ©2001 Marc Swayze; Captain Marvel ©2001 DC Comics]

Another gift that I prize highly is The PhotoJournal Guide to Comic Books, published in 1989 by Gerber Publishing Co., Inc. This two-volume set, consisting of beautiful, full-color reproductions of thousands of comic book covers, has been a help toward answering a question that has bugged me for years: Which of the Fawcett Captain Marvel covers of 194143 were rendered by yours truly?

Essays in the DC books are so scholarly written, so well researched, so obviously dedicated to accurate comic book history, that I dare not take issue with one word in either. if anything appears here contrary to that, it’s an accident. My intention has been to look closely at the artwork, as closely as I possibly could, in sincere effort to determine what it might tell us. I believe that in the art style, the rendering, the technique, and the changes that occurred therein and thereof, are messages about Captain Marvel and his creator that, if we don’t capture them now, may be forever lost.

[FCA EDITOR’S NOTE: From 1942 through 1953, Marcus D. Swayze was a major artist for Fawcett Publications’ comics department, being the first artist to visualize Mary Marvel and illustrating her first stories, but primarily working on Captain Marvel and, later, as a freelance artist and writer, producing The Phantom Eagle in Wow Comics and scores of stories for Fawcett’s romance comics, such as Sweethearts and Life Story… all the while drawing Bell The early pages of both Shazam! books Syndicate’s Flyin’ Jenny newspaper strip, crecontain reproductions of the very first Capated by his friend and mentor Russell Keaton. tain Marvel images… the Captain Thunder Marc’s ongoing professional memoirs have Captain Marvel. When I saw them, the reacbeen FCA’s most popular feature since his first tion was, “That’s Tom Tyler!” column in issue #54 in 1996. Last issue Marc Tom Tyler had been my favorite cowboy told of: Returning to the South in 1944, where actor. He had been in films since the ’20s and he produced in his home studio The Phantom I remembered him in a lot of westerns. And Eagle and Flyin’ Jenny; recruiting his sister what a daredevil rider! I’d be willing to bet he Daisy as his letterer; making improvements on put more Hollywood stunt men out of work The Phantom Eagle; Keaton’s amazing backthan any other actor. grounds and techniques; continuing to pursue I was amazed at the resemblance. Nothhis goal of having a syndicated newspaper ing like the Captain Marvel I had known… comic strip of his own creation; and meeting and drawn… in the later ’40s, so similar howWalt Kelly, creator of Pogo, in the late ’40s.

Staff artist Marc Swayze, Fawcett Comics Dept., ever to the 1940 version.

In this issue’s column, Marc backtracks and Paramount Building, New York City, 1941. (Photo discusses the genesis of Captain Marvel, and originally published in FCA #56, Summer 1996.)

But did C.C. Beck draw those first CapC.C. Beck’s artistic approach and possible tain Marvels to resemble Tom Tyler? I don’t influences. —PCH.] think so. I believe it was the other way around.

C

omics have been good to me. A few years ago I received as a gift a 1977 book titled Shazam! from the Forties to the Seventies.

Then, more recently, a couple of generous friends saw to it that I received a second book, The Shazam Archives, Vol. 2, published in 1999.

Those books have provided a view into a period of comic book history of which I knew little, and cared little… until now. When I joined Fawcett Publications my interest was in Captain Marvel as he appeared right at that time. I was not concerned about what he might have looked like leading up to that time, and I don’t think my employers were. The young super-hero was showing signs of popularity far beyond expectations. Why look into the past?

Consider this: Fawcett probably published more movie fan magazines than any other house. When the Hollywooders came to town, they were usually put up at the Astor Hotel just across the street. Due to the fan magazines and, I suspect, the insistence of their publicity people, they were frequent visitors in the Fawcett offices. When they came through, the big ones, it was top drawer all the way, with Al Allard, Fawcett art director, acting as tour guide, our 24th floor magnates tagging along.

Far left: The 1977 hardcover book compiled

by E. Nelson Bridwell for DC Comics and Crown Publishing Co. Cover by Kurt Schaffenberger. Left: The cover of The Shazam!

Archives, Volume 2. [©2001 DC Comics.]

40

Fawcett Collectors of America

The Fawcett Side of Dave Berg The FCA Interview by P.C. Hamerlinck [The famous Mad magazine cartoonist talks about his early comic book career and his work as a Captain Marvel staff artist for Fawcett in the early 1940s.]

P.C. HAMERLINCK: Where were you born and when did you become interested in art? Did you have any formal training?

DAVE BERG: I was born in 1920 at the far end of Long Island, a small town called Brooklyn. I started drawing at the age of three. In elementary school, the teacher sent for my parents: “The kid might have some talent. Send him to art school.” At the age of ten, I was put in an adult art class. At age twelve, I received a scholarship to Pratt Institute. In 1940 I went to the Cooper Union Art School at night. There my teacher said I was good enough to be a professional. I was ashamed to tell him that I was already a working professional, drawing crude comic books.

PCH: So you had already broken into comics by then. Where were you working during the daytime?

BERG: I was fortunate to get a job with the genius Will Eisner. I worked on his staff in Tudor City studio. When I was hired, Will had just started two magazines (Hit Comics and Military Comics) in partnership with Quality Comics. I also drew some backgrounds of sequences for The Spirit. The deadline demand on Will in those days was so hectic that everyone in the shop pitched in to help each other.

One day, Will gave me a script to re-write for one of his comic books. After I finished rewriting the story, Will said the words that changed my life.

“You’re a writer!” he said. He then handed over a feature for me to do, called “Death Patrol.”

When it was first published, to my amazement, I got fan mail.

Then Will gave me the big job. He was starting a comic called Uncle Sam. I “[Will Eisner] was starting a comic called Uncle Sam. I was to write and pencil it.” So did Dave Berg work on this particular story? Who knows? [©2001 DC Comics.]

was to write and pencil it. During that period, I couldn’t wait to come to work. There was such a thrust of inspiration that I seemed to float two feet off the ground.

PCH: How long did you work for Eisner?

BERG: Until the shock of Pearl Harbor came. Gradually the Eisner studio broke up, since many of the artists went off to war. I volunteered for the Air Force. But my draft board needed a quota. They made my volunteering null and void, and gave me a draft date months into the future. While I waited to go into the service, I filled up my time freelancing. I did a feature for the lovable, amiable Stan Lee called “Baldy.”

PCH: At this time you also began to do some freelance work for Fawcett, correct?

“Today I’m still built… especially around the equator!” Dave Berg caricatures himself as the Big Red Cheese in a 1980 drawing, originally published in FCA #15.

[Art ©2001 Dave Berg.]

DB: Yes, I did some fillers called “Sir Butch,” “Spooks,” and some others. These were done through an agent. Soon thereafter, I went down to the Fawcett offices in New York at the Paramount Building.

Because of the War having broken out, there were openings on the Captain Marvel staff.

PCH: Is this when you first met C.C. Beck? What do you remember about joining the Captain Marvel staff at Fawcett? What were your job duties?

BERG: Yes, after I met C.C. I got the job drawing and writing Captain Marvel stories. C.C. knew he was going to lose more artists in the months to come. The demand for Captain Marvel stories was great, so C.C. worked out a mass production system. My arrangement was to write a script at night. The next morning, I would roughly pencil the story, which was passed on to the letterer, and on to the next artist who tightened the penciling, then on to C.C. who drew Captain Marvel, Billy Batson, and other major characters, along with reworking any panels that needed it, and then on to the inkers. Beck was to oversee everything before it left our department. Artist Marc Swayze did his own layouts/penciling, inking, and lettering.

PCH: I understand you had an unofficial job task on the Captain Marvel staff which the readers of FCA may be interested in.

BERG: Besides writing, penciling, and inking, I did have one more duty.

When Captain Marvel was in a difficult position to draw, I would take off my shirt and pose for the artists. In those days, I was built—I was

44

Fawcett Collectors of America

The Marvel Family Battles Evil Incarnate The Final Showdown Between C.C. Beck and DC Comics

by P.C. Hamerlinck

C.C. Beck needs no introduction. In 1940 Beck’s clean and simple artwork brought Fawcett Comics’ Captain Marvel to life and changed the course of comics history. The magic ended in 1953; the wisdom of Solomon told Fawcett that comic books weren’t as lucrative a business as they used to be. In addition, Fawcett, disgusted by the never-ending litigation with Superman’s publisher which had brought suit against them, decided to fold their entire line of comic books. Captain Marvel and The Marvel Family faded into oblivion.

the police, saying he will appear to testify at the trial. He turns into Billy Batson and finds himself in the underground hall of statues of the Seven Deadly Enemies of Man. Shazam appears and tells Billy that, though the bodies of the seven evil spirits are imprisoned in the statues, they still roam the Earth and are plotting new revenge. (A flashback sequence shows Captain Marvel fighting the seven evil spirits in previous stories.) As nothing new in the way of evil seems to be happening yet, Billy goes home to bed, somewhat worried.

Twenty years later, DC Comics, the very company whose attorneys had campaigned in the courtroom to While Billy sleeps, the evil seven are holding kill Captain Marvel, were reviving him in a new comic a meeting and discussing ways to get rid of book called Shazam! C.C. Beck, after being asked to Captain Marvel. A witch appears and says that magic may submit samples (!), came on board as the artist for the work against him. She puts an evil spell on a picture, which revival. Beck quickly became dismayed at the poor is given to Billy as a present for Captain Marvel. Billy scripts he was asked to illustrate. He clashed often puts it on his desk and the spell starts working. As he with editor Julius Schwartz. Everyreads the paper, he sees that the warething came to a screeching halt when The Marvel Family—a 1975 convention drawing by C.C. Beck. [Characters house thieves have been released from ©2001 DC!Comics; art ©2001 estate of C.C. Beck.]

Beck refused to illustrate two stories jail by a criminal lawyer, who happens slated for Shazam! #11—stories that to be one of the evil seven. Billy loses he called “worthless”—involving Captain his temper. He turns on the radio and hears another Marvel eating gelatin and talking to Santa Claus. member of the evil seven saying that Captain Marvel [EDITOR’S NOTE: For more details, read “Can doesn’t even exist. Billy changes into Marvel and Lightning Strike Twice?” from Comic Book Artist confronts the two, who run away. He finds another #1, reprinted in Comic Book Artist Collection— of the evil seven threatening to foreclose on Station Volume 1.]

WHIZ, which he is helpless to prevent.

In 1974, after Beck had stopped drawing for DC, editor E. Nelson Bridwell extended him an invitation, informing him that if he wanted to submit a script, and if it was approved by the editorial staff, they would let him draw it up. Beck immediately wrote and sent in a Marvel Family script called “Captain Marvel Battles Evil Incarnate.”

The story opens with Captain Marvel catching some thieves at a warehouse. He turns them over to

Captain Marvel now begins to see how the forces of evil are working against him and is so frustrated that he punches a hole in the wall in anger. He is starting to crack up. He gets so mad that he tears up the picture, thus removing the spell that was on him and Billy, although neither of them knew this.

Charles Clarence Beck, 1979.

The evil seven summon up a horrible demon named Odius and send him off to destroy Captain Marvel. A tremendous fight takes place, the demon is knocked through a window, and Marvel changes