Alter Ego #118 by TwoMorrows Publishing

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

2012 EISNER AWARD Nominee Best Comics-Related Journalism

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

ALTER EGO #108

ALTER EGO #109

DIEDGITIIOTANSL E

BL AVAILA

ALTER EGO #105

ALTER EGO #106

ALTER EGO #107

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

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

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

(84-page magazine with COLOR) $7.95 (Digital edition) $3.95

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95

ALTER EGO #110

ALTER EGO #111

ALTER EGO #112

1970s Bullpenner WARREN REECE talks about Marvel Comics and working with EVERETT, BURGOS, ROMITA, STAN LEE, MARIE SEVERIN, ADAMS, FRIEDRICH, ROY THOMAS, and others, with rare art! DEWEY CASSELL spotlights Golden Age artist MIKE PEPPE, with art by TOTH, TUSKA, SEKOWSKY, TALLARICO Part 3, plus FCA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY, cover by EVERETT & BURGOS, and more!

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

SHAZAM!/FAWCETT issue! The 1940s “CAPTAIN MARVEL” RADIO SHOW, interview with radio’s “Billy Batson” BURT BOYAR, P.C. HAMERLINCK and C.C. BECK on the origin of Captain Marvel, ROY THOMAS and JERRY BINGHAM on their Secret Origins “Shazam!”, FCA with MARC SWAYZE, LEONARD STARR interview, Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, BILL SCHELLY, and more!

GOLDEN AGE NEDOR super-heroes are spotlighted, with MIKE NOLAN’s Nedor Index, and art by MORT MESKIN, JERRY ROBINSON, GEORGE TUSKA, RUBEN MOIRERA, ALEX SHOMBURG, and others! Plus FCA, MR. MONSTER, more 2011 Fandom Celebration, and part II of JIM AMASH’s interview with Golden Age artist LEONARD STARR! Cover by SHANE FOLEY!

SUPERMAN issue! PAUL CASSIDY (early Superman artist), Italian Nembo Kid, and ARLEN SCHUMER’s look at the MORT WEISINGER era, plus an interview with son HANK WEISINGER! Art by SHUSTER, BORING, ANDERSON, PLASTINO, and others! LEONARD STARR interview Part III—FCA—Mr. Monster—more 2011 Fandom Celebration, and a MURPHY ANDERSON/ARLEN SCHUMER cover!

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ALTER EGO #113

ALTER EGO #114

ALTER EGO #115

ALTER EGO #116

ALTER EGO #117

MARV WOLFMAN talks to RICHARD ARNDT about his first decade in comics on Tomb of Dracula, Teen Titans, Captain Marvel, John Carter, Daredevil, Nova, Batman, etc., behind a GENE COLAN cover! Art by COLAN, ANDERSON, CARDY, BORING, MOONEY, and more! Plus: the conclusion of our LEONARD STARR interview by JIM AMASH, FCA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY, and more!

MARVEL ISSUE on Captain America and Fantastic Four! MARTIN GOODMAN’s Broadway debut, speculations about FF #1, history of the MMMS, interview with Golden Age writer/artist DON RICO, art by KIRBY, AVISON, SHORES, ROMITA, SEVERIN, TUSKA, ALLEN BELLMAN, and others! Plus FCA, MR. MONSTER and BILL SCHELLY! Cover by BELLMAN and MITCH BREITWEISER!

3-D COMICS OF THE 1950S! In-depth feature by RAY (3-D) ZONE, actual red and green 1950s 3-D art (includes free glasses!) by SIMON & KIRBY, KUBERT, MESKIN, POWELL, MAURER, NOSTRAND, SWAN, BORING, SCHWARTZ, MOONEY, SHORES, TUSKA and many others! Plus FCA, Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, BILL SCHELLY, and more! Cover by JOE SIMON and JACK KIRBY!

JOE KUBERT TRIBUTE! Four Kubert interviews, art by RUSS HEATH, NEAL ADAMS, MURPHY ANDERSON, MICHAEL KALUTA, SAM GLANZMAN, and others, MR. MONSTER’S COMIC CRYPT, BILL SCHELLY’s Comic Fandom Archive, FCA’s Captain Video conclusion by GEORGE EVANS that inspired Avengers foe Ultron, cover by KUBERT, with a portrait by DANIEL JAMES COX!

GOLDEN AGE ARTISTS L.B. COLE AND JAY DISBROW! DISBROW’s memoir of COLE and his work on CAT-MAN, art by BOB FUJITANI, CHARLES QUINLAN, IRWIN HASEN, FCA (Fawcett Collector’s of America) on the two-media career of Captain Video, MICHAEL T. GILBERT in Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, BILL SCHELLY on comics fandom history, Cat-Man cover by L.B. COLE!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95

Vol. 3, No. 118 / July 2013 Editor

Roy Thomas

Associate Editors Bill Schelly Jim Amash

Design & Layout

Christopher Day

Consulting Editor John Morrow

FCA Editor

P.C. Hamerlinck

Comic Crypt Editor Michael T. Gilbert

Editorial Honor Roll

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

Proofreaders

Rob Smentek William J. Dowlding

Cover Artist Don Heck

Cover Colorist Tom Ziuko

With Special Thanks to:

Heidi Amash Henry Kujawa Sal Amendola R. Gary Land David Bachman Mark Lewis Bob Bailey Alan Light Blake Bell Michael Maikowsky Jerry K. Boyd Michel Maillot Tom Brevoort Jim McLauchlin Bernie Bubnis Mike Mikulovsky Rich Buckler Kurt Mitchell Brian Buniak Stephen Mitchell David Burd Will Murray Mike Burkey Michael Netzer Nick Caputo Owen O’Leary Mike Catron Jake Oster Shaun Clancy Barry Pearl Ernie Colón Ken Quattro Leonardo de Sa Lisa Ray Mark Evanier Ethan Roberts Wendy Everett Francis A. Justin Fairfax Rodriguez Bill Field Rich Rubenfeld Danny Fingeroth Joe Rubinstein Michael Finn Randy Sargent Shane Foley Arlen Schumer Janet Gilbert Ronn Sutton Grand Comics Ty Templeton Database (website) John D. Trawick Golden Age Comic Dann Thomas Book Stories Jim Vadeboncoeur, (website) Jr. Hero Initiative Dr. Michael J. Jennifer Hamerlinck Vassallo Heritage Comics Hames Ware Archives Len Wein Allan Holtz Robert Wiener Sean Howe Barry WindsorTony Isabella Smith Samuel Joyner Pat Yanchus Lou Kanegson Marv Wolfman Roz Kirby Estate Everson “Bud” Zell

This issue is dedicated to the memory of

E.C. Stoner

Contents Writer/Editorial: Of Peaks and Panthers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Daredevil Vs. The Avengers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Will Murray explores the likelihood that the Man without Fear was due to come out first!

Assembling The Avengers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Kurt Mitchell takes a look at the first decade of Marvel’s real answer to the Justice League.

The Origin Of Jack Kirby’s Black Panther . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

An art-essay by Arlen Schumer on Marvel’s (and the U.S. comics industry’s) first black super-hero.

E.C. Stoner – The Forgotten Trailblazer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Ken Quattro surveys the career of an early African-American comic book artist.

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! Evil Twins Two . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Michael T. Gilbert points out the doppelgängers of Gabby Hayes & Casper the Friendly Ghost.

Comic Fandom Archive: “I Started To Remember…” . . . . . 61

Bill Schelly invites Bernie Bubnis to tell us about the first comics convention—& Steve Ditko.

re: [correspondence, criticism, & corrections] . . . . . . . . . . . 69 FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America] #177 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 P.C. Hamerlinck presents the last comics story ever drawn by Marc Swayze.

On Our Cover: We thought it’d be cool to utilize the cover art that Don Heck penciled and inked for The Avengers #37 (Dec. 1966)—but which was not used at that time—as the cover of this issue that celebrates 50 years, and especially the first ten of those, of the super-hero group that was created specifically to incorporate several of Marvel’s greatest solo stars. But what to do about the somewhat narrower proportions of a comic book cover from that of Alter Ego? One answer, we decided, was to keep the Avengers art at its natural proportions—but to photograph an actual hand holding it. (That hand, by the way, belongs to TwoMorrows co-publisher John Morrow.) And so Dashin’ Don’s art was finally used as a color cover—47 years after it was originally drawn, with brand new coloring by veteran Tom Ziuko. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] Above: Because we wanted to toss you some Avengers art that hasn’t been reprinted in Marvel Masterworks hardcovers, Essentials softcovers, and/or myriad comic books, we latched onto this cover for the 1976 Avengers Annual (#1), published in Great Britain by World Distributors. Because it’s composed of figures that look to us like the work of Jack Kirby, John Buscema, and quite possibly one or two other U.S. artists, pasted up into a reasonably coherent whole, we thought it might be a good representation of the team’s first decade. But where’s the ever-Incredible Hulk? Thanks to the Grand Comics Database. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Alter EgoTM is published 8 times a year by TwoMorrows, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614, USA. Phone: (919) 449-0344. Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: 32 Bluebird Trail, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices. Eight-issue subscriptions: $60 US, $85 Canada, $107 elsewhere. All characters are © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © Roy Thomas. Alter Ego is a TM of Roy & Dann Thomas. FCA is a TM of P.C. Hamerlinck. Printed in China. ISSN: 1932-6890 FIRST PRINTING.

writer/editorial

Of Peaks And Panthers

hose 50-year anniversaries are piling up way too fast.

First, 2006 was the five-decade mark for Showcase #4 and the Silver Age of Comics, courtesy of “Flash” reinterpreters Julius Schwartz, Robert Kanigher, and Carmine Infantino. Then, for me personally, it was my 50-year high school reunion in 2008, where I reveled with old friends I hadn’t seen in a few (or more than a few) years, even if I was inevitably saddened to learn that one or two I had expected to see were no longer with us. Next it was the half-century mark of the early-1961 birth of comics fandom, at least in its not-just-EC phase, a landmark happily saluted at the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con, thanks to Jackie Estrada, Bill Schelly, and others. That same year saw the even more significant 50th anniversary of Fantastic Four #1, the Stan Lee/Jack Kirby flashpoint of what became a new way of writing and drawing super-heroes which still has echoes in virtually every comic book of that genre that comes down the pike—and now on the silver screen, as well.

Then came 2012 and the 50-year mark for Amazing Fantasy #15.

Now it’s 2013; and, along with another significant comics milestone—the first meeting of the Justice League and the Golden Age Justice Society—we come to the twin peaks of two 50-year Marvel anniversaries: the first-issue debuts of two (eventual) blockbuster franchises, The Avengers and The X-Men, who premiered in the selfsame week, no less! This time we’re honoring The Avengers; two issues from now, we’ll give Marvel’s merry mutants their due. I had hoped to complete in this issue my personal memories of the 70-plus issues I scripted of The Avengers, an account I began way back in A/E #13—but I’m knee-deep in writing a humongous account of Stan Lee’s life and times for the German publisher Taschen, and just couldn’t spare the time right now. Fortunately, Kurt Mitchell, who masterfully covered DC’s Earth-Two in A/E #93-94, has stepped into the breach and given us

an exciting overview of The Avengers’ first ten years. I also persuaded Will Murray to scribe an account of how The Avengers seems to have been an 11th-hour replacement for a totally different Marvel mag.

And, since The Black Panther joined The Avengers in 1968, we’re thrilled to include a piece produced by Arlen Schumer (who in A/E #112 gave us a singular study of Superman editor Mort Weisinger) on the origins of T’Challa. Still, as I’ve told Arlen, I feel obliged to state up front that I have reservations about one of his key assumptions—namely that, because Jack Kirby’s drawing of a Panther-like character called The Coal Tiger (probably) pre-dates FF #51, it can be inferred that the idea of introducing a black super-hero into Marvel’s flagship title was necessarily Jack’s rather than Stan’s. Because Arlen believes that can be inferred, I had little choice but to respond to that assumption. I strongly maintain that no assumption of Kirby priority can or should be made. For one thing, we know virtually nothing about the Coal Tiger concept except its visual aspect. To presume that Jack rather than Stan was the initiator of The Black Panther ignores the fact that Stan had long been instructing Marvel’s artists to include African-Americans in crowd scenes. I’ve no proof the impetus for a black super-hero came from Stan—but one can’t automatically assume it came from Jack, either. It’s equally possible that Stan came up with the idea, maybe even the name “Black Panther”—and if and when he did, there right in front of him was Jack with his very un-African “Coal Tiger” concept drawing (since there ain’t no tigers in Africa), ready to alter it in an instant into the dark garb of T’Challa, son of T’Chaka. That caveat aside, I think you’ll relish Arlen’s thoughtprovoking spotlight on the Wakandan Avenger… just as we hope you will the tours de force of Will Murray and Kurt Mitchell. Put on a CD of “The Anniversary Waltz”—and enjoy! Bestest,

COMING IN JULY

119

An FCA & Alter Ego Celebration Of

The Late Great MARC SWAYZE —Plus A Fabulous Fawcett Phantasmagoria!

• Color-splashed cover by SWAYZE—featuring art from his origin of Mary Marvel! • Special giant-size FCA section! A deserved and art-studded 100th-birthday tribute to MARC SWAYZE—who passed away in 2012 and has been an integral part of each of our first 118 issues! Re-presenting his very first “Phantom Eagle” story, from 1944—a photo album prepared by daughter JUDY & P.C. HAMERLINCK—and an interview with wife JUNE SWAYZE! Plus: the final FCA interview with SHELDON MOLDOFF—Captain Marvel scribe OTTO BINDER’s Memoirs of a Nobody—CM artist C.C. BECK’s advice for young artists—and a great interior cover by MARK LEWIS! • MEL KEEFER, artist for Dell (Zorro, Texas Rangers, etc.) & Toby Press, interviewed by ALBERTO BECATTINI—MICHAEL T. GILBERT on “The Men Who Would Be Kurtzman!”—BILL SCHELLY is interviewed for Comic Fandom Archive—& MORE!!

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Vs. And The Winner Was—The Marvel Readers! An Historical View by Will Murray

The Man Without Fear— Or Even A Boomerang

ne of Marvel’s mightiest adventure titles came about through a misadventure.

The Avengers debuted in the summer of 1963—on the very same day as The X-Men. (It was a big summer for super-hero teams. Over at DC, the first of the annual JLA-JSA team-ups was launched, as well.) Marvelites have long wondered why Stan Lee would make poor Jack Kirby, already burdened with Fantastic Four, Sgt. Fury, and other features, draw two additional team books.

Actually, as comics and TV writer Mark Evanier learned long ago from Kirby and from Marvel production head Sol Brodsky, that was not the original plan.

Seeing the FF and Amazing Spider-Man racking up solid sales, publisher Martin Goodman wanted editor Lee to replicate those successes. Goodman himself had an idea for the Spider-Man clone. The old Lev Gleason/ Charles Biro character called Daredevil had fallen out of trademark. He had been one of the top sellers of the Golden Age of Comics. Goodman instructed Lee to revive him—lock, stock, and boomerang.

was a great name. And if the name was free, that was terrific. So I just tried to come up with another character.” (Some of the Stan Lee quotations in this section of the article appeared in my piece “Daredevil Origins” in the April 2003 issue of the magazine WizBang, others in my survey “The Untold Origin of Daredevil,” in The Official Overstreet Price Guide, Vol. 37, from Overstreet Publishing.) Since Goodman was looking for another Spider-Man, Lee turned to the artist who had been so crucial to making Spider-Man a success: Steve Ditko. Ditko turned him down flat. The artist’s reasons are not known, but apparently he had no interest in the revival. Or perhaps he didn’t want to do a character who was calculated to be another Spider-Man. He was already doing Spider-Man! “I was sorry,” Lee admitted in 2003. “Steve would have been great. But I was lucky to get Everett.”

CAN THE COMBINED POWER OF

THE AVENGERS DAREDEVIL?

DEFEAT THE MAN WITHOUT FEAR—

The Avengers... Bah! I’ll Destroy You All!

When I asked Lee about this by phone in 2003, at the time of the release of the Daredevil movie, he remembered Goodman’s edict and his response to it. “So my first thought would be,” Lee explained, “‘Well, let’s do the character again.’ But I didn’t want to steal somebody else’s character. So I figured I’d use the name, but I’ll dream up something different for him. I didn’t want to use the same costume. I thought it

[Daredevil #1 art by Bill Everett & The Avengers #1 art by Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.; Daredevil & Avengers logos TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.; text adaptation by Chris Day]

DAREDEVIL! Prepare For Battle!

And The Winner Was--The Marvel Readers!

For Stan Lee’s second choice was Sub-Mariner creator Bill Everett, then drifting back into comics after a sabbatical. But all did not go swimmingly there, either. “I know [Stan] had this idea for Daredevil,” Everett told Roy Thomas in the early 1970s, in an interview published in 1978 in Alter Ego [Vol. 1] #11. “He thought he had an idea. And we tried to talk it over the phone, and it just... wouldn’t work. With a long distance phone call, it just wasn’t coming out right, so I said, ‘All right... I’ll take a day off and come down to New York.’” Conceptually, they reimagined a modern Daredevil. The character soon diverged from the Golden Age incarnation until all resemblances were gone. “Originally, I wanted him to be a great gymnast,” Lee recalled. “So I thought maybe I’d make him a circus acrobat. But I somehow decided that was a little unoriginal.”

Jack Kirby told Mark Evanier that he was brought in in an advisory capacity, which was confirmed by Sol Brodsky. “Kirby had a lot of input into all the looks of all these things,” Lee explained. “If I wasn’t satisfied with something and Kirby was around, I would have said, ‘Hey Jack, what do you think of this? How would you do it?’”

Daredevil Vs. Daredevil: The Prequel

While the circus background was eventually dropped, DD’s original yellow-and-red costume design, clearly modeled after a traditional circus acrobat’s outfit, survived as the new hero’s basic look.

Martin Goodman (on left) and Stan Lee (on right) eye, from quite different perspectives, the cover of Lev Gleason Publications’ Daredevil Comics #9 (April 1940), whose art is attributed to editor Charles Biro. The original Daredevil’s battle with an imitator foreshadows Goodman’s desire for a Marvel takeover of that character, while Lee would move increasingly toward creating a new hero simply sporting the same name. Still, by common consensus, the Golden Age DD had one of the coolest costumes ever; it was designed by his first artist, Jack Binder! [Daredevil cover ©2013 the respective copyright holders.] Incidentally, although the 1940s DD had a sometime secret identity (Bart Hill), the chances are that, even if his costume and boomerang had been retained, the Marvel incarnation would’ve had a different alter ego, since it was only the “Daredevil” trademark that had been abandoned by 1963, not necessarily every existing copyright, which would cover story materials. At least, that’s how the Marvel version of another earlier hero would be handled in 1966-67, when Magazine Enterprises’ Ghost Rider concept and even costume were appropriated by Marvel, but Rex Fury, roving U.S. marshal, became Carter Slade, schoolteacher. The photos of Goodman and Lee are from Marvel Tales Annual #1 (1964); with thanks to Justin Fairfax & Bob Bailey. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Mount Everett (Near right:) Bill Everett, in a photo that first appeared in 1969’s Fantastic Four Annual #7. Thanks to Fairfax & Bailey. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Far Right:) Wendy Everett signs copies of Blake Bell’s 2010 biography of her father, titled Fire & Water: Bill Everett, The SubMariner, and the Birth of Marvel Comics, from Fantagraphics Books. We dunno who wrote Wendy’s name on that signboard, but note that the “E” in her last name—and even the “W,” turned sideways— echo Bill’s famous signature. Photo by Blake Bell. Not mentioned in Will Murray’s account, because it isn’t germane to the Daredevil/Avengers matter, is Wendy’s recorded statement that, since she has been legally (though not totally) blind since childhood, it was her father’s idea that the Marvel DD be sightless. While it’s also quite possible that the blindness and compensating radar sense were Stan Lee’s concept quite separately, it’s not unlikely that Bill could’ve tossed that idea into the mix when the two men were discussing ways to differentiate the new hero from the old one.

Soon enough, Lee and his artists worked up a conception Goodman approved. Matt Murdock would be a blind lawyer with a radar sense similar to Spider-Man’s spider sense. The original Daredevil’s trademark boomerang became a fighting billy club. The latter was one of Kirby’s contributions.

Daredevil Vs. The Avengers

Earth’s Mightiest Stand-Ins Then, complications set in. Drawing issue #1 nights while he held down a day job, Bill Everett was falling inexorably behind schedule. When it appeared that Everett couldn’t make the summer release deadline, Lee brainstormed an emergency replacement title, one that used pre-existing characters and a villain already in inventory. It required no extensive preparation. Just an action plot and instructions for Jack Kirby to give it everything he had. Again, this story comes from Mark Evanier, who recently expanded upon it: “Kirby told me the story. When I interviewed Brodsky, he said, ‘Yeah, that’s how it happened.’ He also told me that he [Sol] had inked a lot of the backgrounds on [Daredevil], not just Ditko as is usually reported. “I asked Stan about it. Stan had, you may be surprised to hear, no memory of it... but when I took him through it step by step, he said something like, ‘Yes, now I seem to recall that.’ Based on all that and the fact that Dick Ayers recalled inking Avengers #1 in a great hurry, I concluded the story was so.” Thus was created a comic starring “Earth’s Mightiest SuperHeroes”—The Avengers. And Martin Goodman finally got the Justice League of America clone he had originally requested back in 1961! Stan Lee has never talked in much detail about the genesis of The Avengers. The earliest foreshadowing of the group appeared in the news-fanzine The Comic Reader #14 (Feb. 22, 1963), when editor Jerry Bails hinted: “EXPECT TO SEE: A meeting of all the Marvel Comics superheroes.” This may have been the first glimmering of the team.

In his 1974 book Origins of Marvel Comics, Lee wrote:

“After kicking it around for a while, we came up with what seemed like a perfect combo. We’d start with the Hulk, just to make it difficult. Then, we’d include Thor, ’cause there’s always room for a

“Action!” Jack Kirby, as he appeared in the photo section of the 1964 Marvel Tales Annual—and the 4th page of Daredevil #12 (Jan. 1966). Besides Kirby’s having reportedly served in an “advisory capacity” on the creation of that Marvel hero, John Romita has stated that editor/writer Stan Lee felt that John, then a new returnee to the bullpen, hadn’t put enough excitement into his pencils for this first Daredevil story he drew—so Stan had Jack (who else?) do layouts for the entire issue, over which Romita then did finished pencils and inks. Of course, it didn’t take Jazzy Johnny long to get the hang of things again! Thanks to Fairfax & Bailey for the photo scan, and to Barry Pearl for the DD page. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

God of Thunder. Iron Man would be able to supply them all with weapons and bread whenever they needed it, and we’d toss in Ant-Man and the Wasp just for the sheer lunacy of it.” Jack Kirby provided the greatest insight into the sheer improbability of the hastily welded together team when he told Ray Wyman (for the latter’s book The Art of Jack Kirby, Blue Rose Press, 1992):

From Sol’s Lips To Mark’s Ears Mark Evanier (left) says that Marvel production manager Sol Brodsky (right) confirmed to him years ago what Jack Kirby had told him: that The Avengers was put onto the schedule in a hurry when Daredevil #1 was running very, very late. Mark sent the 1982 photo of himself by Alan Light, while the photo of “Jolly Solly” is from the 1964 Marvel Tales Annual. [Brodsky photo ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“Here were several personalities that were designed to be solo heroes, and we had to produce an effective portrayal of them working together—closely. Of course, they’d argue. They might even come close to killing each other, but the idea worked and we managed to make a convincing story out of a very improbable situation.” It was so improbable that, as soon as Lee and Kirby got the inaugural issue to press, they started tweaking their weaker individual heroes.

And The Winner Was--The Marvel Readers!

The first to be reimagined was the weakest member, Ant-Man. Lee had confessed to The Comic Reader that the hero needed a boost. So, in his own strip in Tales to Astonish, Lee & Kirby gave him a new dimension in the form of size-changing capsules that enabled Henry Pym to shift between being Ant-Man and GiantMan at will. Giant-Man made it into Avengers #2, in time to battle The Space Phantom. Next, Lee teamed up with Steve Ditko to give Iron Man a makeover. In his original gray, then golden armor, he was essentially a mechanized version of the Hulk. To be an Avenger, he needed to be more nimble, and so was born the leaner, meaner, streamlined armor that was first revealed in Tales of Suspense #48 (Dec. ’63).

Strangely, Lee told The Comic Reader that Steve Ditko would debut a slightly modified new Iron Man in TOS #47. If changes were drawn, all of them but a new grilled mouth were lost under Don Heck’s smothering inks. The revitalized red-and-gold Iron Man showed up in the following issue—just in time to take on the Hulk and Sub-Mariner in The Avengers #3.

As rapid as these changes were, this was not the way the new versions were originally scheduled to be rolled out, according to Jerry Bails. In TCR #18 (Aug. 1963), and almost certainly acting on information provided by Lee, he reported:

Is There A Doctor (Strange) In The House? (Above:) Around the time the first issue of The Avengers was going on sale, Marvel was running this ad plugging all its super-heroes but the Hulk and Dr. Strange in such mags as Fantastic Four #19 (Oct. ’63). Three of them were now Avengers, as well. Art by Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, and an inker or two. Thanks to Barry Pearl. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“The second issue of The Avengers… will have this new group battling the Sub-Mariner and the Hulk. This story will see the Ant-Man in his new role as Giant-Man and Iron Man in a new costume.”

“Avengers Assemble!” (Above:) In 1963, Stan Lee initiated, on behalf of the newly christened Marvel Comics Group, a “Special Announcements Section” in the pages first of Fantastic Four—which Stan was making a vain and brief effort to keep as the only Marvel mag which printed readers’ letters. This section ran at the end of each “LP,” as fans then called letters pages. We’ll deal with Daredevil-related letters later; but here, from top to bottom, are the Avengers-relevant paragraphs from those sections, with thanks to Barry Pearl: In FF #17 (Aug. 1963) came a not-too-subtle hint at the end of Stan’s answer to a “Bring-Back-the-Hulk” petition that arrived at the Marvel offices. But was The Avengers already in the works by then—or was Smiley simply stalling? In FF #18 (Sept. ’63) readers saw the first mention of The Avengers and The XMen, both of which were slated to come out “at the same time,” i.e., in July. (FF #18 would’ve been on sale circa June.) [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Ant-Man had indeed become Giant-Man by Avengers #2; but since the Sub-Mariner didn’t join the festivities until issue #3, it sounds as if the original Avengers #2 storyline was bumped in order to give Lee and his crew time to revamp both Ant-Man and Iron Man in their own series. Given the hectic state of Marvel production in 1963, this is entirely plausible.

Will The Real Captain America Please Stand Up? But Lee and Kirby were not finished polishing The Avengers’ ever-fluid roster.

Since reviving The Sub-Mariner in Fantastic Four #4 a year before, Lee had been bombarded with reader requests to revive Captain America. Even Martin Goodman, when he had instructed Stan to develop the super-hero team comic that became FF #1, had been open to seeing the star-spangled hero of World War II

Daredevil Vs. The Avengers

Ad Libs (Above & right:) These two house ads for The Avengers #1 appeared in Fantastic Four Annual #1 (1963) and FF #18 (Sept. ’63)—the latter, seen on right, being the same issue in which a “special announcement” was made about Avengers and X-Men. Thanks to Barry Pearl. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Hope And Change— 1963 Marvel Style (Far left:) Ant-Man added two letters to the front of his name—and maybe ten feet to his stature—to become Giant-Man in Tales to Astonish #49 (Nov. 1963), as per this house ad from Fantastic Four #20, that same month. Art by Don Heck. (Near left:) Somewhere between two weeks to a month later, penciler Steve Ditko was called in to give Iron Man an overnight makeover, in Tales of Suspense #48 (Dec. ’63). Inks by Dick Ayers, script by Stan Lee. Thanks to Barry Pearl for both scans. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

And The Winner Was--The Marvel Readers!

Captain America Goes Clockwise (Above:) For undisclosed reasons, Stan Lee decided to ease into a revival of Captain America by having a villainous impostor portray him in the “Human Torch” story in Strange Tales #114 (Nov. 1963). Art by Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers. Somehow, Cap’s trunks got miscolored red—and Kirby decided this time around to have the stripes on his midriff go all the way around. But then, he hadn’t drawn the character in over two decades, so maybe he just forgot? (Right:) Only four months later, in The Avengers #4 (March 1964), Stan and Jack brought the true Cap back with a vengeance—and a credible backstory. In some (slightly earlier) places, that issue’s cover was advertised with the words “The Real” preceding the announcement that “Captain America Lives Again!” The actual cover— and later house ads—had dropped the lead-in. Art by Jack Kirby & George Roussos. Thanks to Barry Pearl, who else, for all scans. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

return—not surprisingly, since Cap’s had been Timely Comics’ topselling title during the World War II era. In our 2003 phone interview, Lee recalled Goodman as saying in 1961, “You could use our old Human Torch and Sub-Mariner and maybe Captain America.” Well, the Torch (or, at least, a new version thereof) and Prince Namor were now back—but how to bring back a super-hero so tied to World War II baffled Lee for a time. “The Sub-Mariner was easier to get a handle on,” he confessed. “His brooding nature was easy to work with. I just couldn’t get a handle on how to do Captain America.” After a test story in which a villain (The Acrobat) disguised as CA battled the Johnny Storm Human Torch in Strange Tales #114 (Nov. 1963), reader requests for a full-fledged return of the Sentinel of Liberty went through the roof. Stan leaked to The Comic Reader that his thinking ran to reintroducing him in an ongoing title, rather than in one of his own.

Lee wrote in his introduction to one of the Marvel hardcover reprints: “Then I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could make CA popular again?’ Because, over the years, we had tried to resurrect him, and he never worked. After World War II ended, he was just a guy in a dumb costume running around. I mean, that’s the way a lot of people perceived him....

Daredevil Vs. The Avengers

“Here Comes… DAREDEVIL, The Man Without Fear!” When it finally appeared after various delays (although there was no hint in any Marvel comic that Daredevil had originally been scheduled to come out in the spot eventually filled by The Avengers #1), Stan really went all out to push the new Man without Fear. (From top left:) The paragraph beginning “You’ve heard it rumored,” from the “Special Announcements Section” in the letters pages of Fantastic Four #25 (April 1964), was meant to build up a bit of last-minute suspense. Both the half-page (and DD-logo-only) house ad and the paragraph commencing “We’ve got a surprise for you” appeared in the “Announcements” section of The Amazing Spider-Man #11 (also April ’64). Notice the references to Spider-Man in these and other plugs. Publisher Goodman wanted Daredevil to appeal to Spidey readers—so Stan Lee was making sure they got the point! The Daredevil #1 ad in The Avengers #5 (May ’64) finally showed the cover—which lifted Bill Everett’s DD figure from the splash page and juxtaposed it with transplanted pics of both Spidey and (for good measure) the Fantastic Four, as well as images of Matt, Karen, and Foggy which aren’t duplicated on the interior pages. Even on the splash, though, that DD figure would be augmented by a reproduction of the cover of Amazing Spider-Man #1; Stan was taking no chances. The paragraph starting “By the time you read this” was seen the same month in Spider-Man #12. It was the first time Stan dropped a few clues regarding the “comedy of errors” in getting out DD #1—not that we suspect there was much laughter occurring at the time. Finally, in Spidey #13 (June ’64), came the enigmatic paragraph beginning “We listen to your beefs”… which must have puzzled many readers, as it doesn’t refer to any particular comic or situation. There can’t be much doubt, though, that the Avengers/Daredevil situation—and especially the problems experienced near the end with the latter—must’ve been the ultimate frustration that led Stan to write it. Sometimes you’ve just got to let off a bit of steam—especially after, if what Sol Brodsky told Roy Thomas circa 1965 is true, late charges on DD #1 had probably erased all chances of that first issue turning a profit! Amazingly, such was Stan Lee’s (not to mention Martin Goodman) respect for Bill Everett, even after all the deadline emergencies, that when the artist desired to return to Marvel full-time in the latter half of 1965, Stan welcomed him with open arms—and Sol Brodsky (easily) talked Roy Thomas into letting Bill stay five nights a week at RT’s and Gary Friedrich’s apartment in Greenwich Village! Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

And The Winner Was--The Marvel Readers!

have him join The Avengers,” Lee wrote in either his introduction to Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty or one of the Marvel Masterworks: Captain America volumes: “It would give Steve a new group of familiar characters to relate to and play off. Also, I had dreamed up a way to bring him back to life that really knocked me out, and it would need The Avengers to do it properly.”

“The Old Order Changeth!” The impromptu nature of the series, conceivably its greatest weakest link, ultimately proved to be The Avengers’ main strength.

“One great thing about the Avengers team is the fact that we could always change the line-up of heroes,” Lee has said. “We were able to send Iron Man on vacation and have Captain America come in to replace him. Then we had them kick out the Hulk because he became too unmanageable. Since kicking a Hulk out isn’t easy to do, it became the basis for an action-packed story.” Within sixteen short issues, the core team was dispersed when newcomer Captain America presided over the first of what would ultimately become many lineup changes, bringing in reformed villains from “Iron Man” and The X-Men.

It was a shocking turn of events, as experienced by first-generation Marvel readers back in 1965. Lee explained his reasoning this way: “I was finding it too difficult to seem to be realistic,” he related. “For example, in his own book, Thor might have been trapped in Asgard somewhere, and yet in The Avengers book, he’s here attending a meeting. I seem to remember, I did get mail from a lot of readers about that point, and I felt, ‘Maybe it’s destroying the pseudo-realism of the stories, where a character is dying in one story and in the other story he’s the chairman of the Avengers meeting.’”

And Here He Comes Again! In this day of Photoshop and the like, comics readers can digitally reimagine classic covers—and that’s what A/E reader Henry Kujawa has done with the cover of Daredevil #1 (April 1964), flopping the figures (and Karen Page’s head) and dropping the Spider-Man and FF material he considered superfluous. Nice work, Henry—although I doubt if you’d have gotten this version of the cover past Martin Goodman back in ’64! [Art, logo, & copy ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“So I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be fun to say he had been frozen in ice for these two decades or whatever it was, and now he’s back?’ I’m always trying to think of some way to give them a personality hook or a character trait that would make them unique, and I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great? Here’s a guy who’s been out of it for 20 years, and suddenly everything is changed!’ He never knew what a hippie was. There are hippies, there are guys smoking marijuana, and those things.... “And here’s a guy who’d be considered totally square. He believes in liberty and freedom and the flag. It was the Vietnam War, and nobody was interested in war any more. People were turned off. So I figured. ‘Let’s give it a shot.’ So that was the reason for that man out of time, out of sync.”

Captain America returned for real in The Avengers #4—actually several years, of course, before the U.S. became truly engaged in a war in Vietnam. “The first thing I decided to do was

Ironically it was the evolving “Thor” strip that seemed to be the trigger for this. His stories increasingly became Asgard-oriented, and even a thunder god cannot be in two places at once. Thor was embroiled in the “Trial of the Gods” sequence in Journey into Mystery, his early life as Dr. Donald Blake temporarily abandoned. The thunder god had no time for The Avengers.

As for Daredevil, he finally appeared early in 1964. Years later, he even became an Avenger for a time. But that’s no rare distinction. Almost every major Marvel hero has joined at one time or another. Both titles are still going strong fifty years later.

Will Murray is the co-creator of the unbeatable Squirrel Girl and the author of The Wild Adventures of Doc Savage series, whose most recent release, Skull Island, pits the Man of Bronze against the immortal King Kong.

Assembling The Avengers

A Look Back At The Formative Years of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes” by Kurt Mitchell

UTHOR’S INTRO: As a fan since the day the six-year-old me first read a tattered, coverless copy of The Avengers #4, I was jazzed when assigned the task of writing a brief history of the team’s first decade for this special issue of Alter Ego commemorating the 50th anniversary of the comic book’s premiere. To keep this article’s length and complexity within reason, I’ve assumed the average A/E reader has a nodding familiarity with the Marvel Comics super-heroes. And now, without further ado: Avengers assemble! (I’ve always wanted to say that!) —Kurt.

“The Coming Of The Avengers!”

oki, Norse god of mischief, frames the misunderstood monster called the Hulk for a train disaster as a ploy in his ongoing war with the mighty Thor. Hulk’s teenage pal, Rick Jones, radios the Fantastic Four for help. Loki diverts the signal so that Thor, in his mortal guise of lame physician Don Blake, receives it instead. Rick’s message also reaches millionaire industrialist Anthony Stark, secretly the armored Iron Man, as well as biochemist Henry Pym and heiress Janet Van Dyne, better known as the size-changing Ant-Man and the Wasp. Loki will come to regret that colossal (and convenient!) coincidence, for it heralds the birth of a team of superhuman champions destined to frustrate not only his insidious schemes but those of scores of other evildoers: the mighty Avengers! All that lies ahead. Here and now—the summer of 1963— The Avengers #1 (cover-dated Sept. 1963) has just hit the stands, the latest in a line of innovative super-hero comics by the creative team of editor/scripter Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby. Not content to simply mimic DC’s Justice League of America, which also features characters who have their own solo series, Stan and Jack use the opportunity to explore, explode, and expand the possibilities of the superteam concept.

The new strip’s quirkiness owes much to the shallow pool of Marvel heroes available for duty. The stars of Fantastic Four and the debuting The X-Men already belong to teams. The loner heroes drawn by Steve Ditko, The Amazing Spider-Man and Strange Tales’ Doctor Strange, aren’t joiners. That leaves just five: Thor, from Journey into Mystery; Iron Man, from Tales of Suspense; Ant-Man and the Wasp, from Tales to Astonish; and the surly green-skinned star of the recently canceled The Incredible Hulk. Three powerhouses and a couple of human insects wouldn’t seem to make for a wellbalanced team, and any time the brutish alter ego of nuclear physicist Bruce Banner is on hand... well, Hulk’s previous encounter with super-heroes (Fantastic Four #12) was no lovefest. Therein lies the genius of Lee and Kirby: they take the awkward fit of the founding Avengers and run with it. Avengers #2 (Nov. ’63) begins with a “big” change in the

The First 115 Issues Are The Hardest! The bodacious bookends to The Avengers’ first decade: the Jack Kirby/Dick Ayers cover of issue #1 (Sept. 1963), with coloring by Stan Goldberg—and that of #115 (Sept. 1973) by John Romita & Mike Esposito. Of course, there were a few Annuals and the like during that decade, as well. Great things were yet to come, and still are—but these were the ones that set the pace, the work of only three listed writers (Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, and Steve Englehart—plus a pair of synopses by Harlan Ellison and a bit of ghost-plotting by Len Wein and Chris Claremont) and fewer than a dozen pencilers. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

’Nuff Said! We could argue all day about who did what and who was more responsible for this and that and the other, but let’s just keep it simple: Writer/editor Stan Lee (left) and artist/co-plotter Jack Kirby (right) were one of the most influential teams in the history of comics—even if they were never really a “team” in the sense of Siegel & Shuster (or even of Simon & Kirby), because Stan, as editor, had the final say in all creative matters. Subject to “Merry Marty” Goodman, of course. Thanks to Danny Fingeroth for retrieving the Lee photo from the Stan Lee Archives at the University of Wyoming in Laramie; the Kirby pic is courtesy of the Roz Kirby Estate.

newborn team’s status quo. Teeny-weeny AntMan is now the 12-foot Giant-Man (cf. Astonish #49). Infiltrating their first formal meeting, the shapeshifting Space Phantom tricks The Avengers into fighting each other. “I never suspected how much each of you hate me, deep down,” the Hulk tells his teammates in the battle’s aftermath. “I could tell by the way you fought me... by the remarks you made!” Just like that, they are down a member. The green goliath makes common cause with Prince Namor, the SubMariner, that twosome’s showdown with The Avengers ended only by

With (Clockwise) Liberty And Justice For All! Whether Lee and Kirby had it in mind or not, The Avengers was as much a response to the early-’60s success of Justice League of America as Fantastic Four #1 had been. The JLA had debuted in The Brave and the Bold #28 (Feb.-March 1960), starring National/DC’s most celebrated super-heroes, though office politics decreed that Superman and Batman, the most famous of them all, be downplayed to the point of not even being depicted on most early covers. The Avengers started out with a similar all-star cast of what its first splash page termed “Some of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”—minus only Spider-Man, the FF, Dr. Strange, and the equally new X-Men; but by issue #16 Thor, Iron Man, Giant-Man, and The Wasp, who appeared in solo features elsewhere, had been banished from the pages of The Avengers in favor of a trio of lesser lights led by Captain America. Art by Mike Sekowsky & Murphy Anderson; with thanks to the Grand Comics Database. [©2013 DC Comics.] The ultimate inspiration for the name of the 1963 Marvel assemblage was, as Lee has cheerfully admitted, The Avenger, a Street & Smith pulp magazine launched with a Sept. 1939 cover date (above center) and featuring a chalk-faced hero who headed a group known as Justice, Inc. Is the cover artist H.W. Scott, noted pulp-master who did paint some later Avenger covers? [©2013 Advance Magazine Publishers Inc. d/b/a Condé Nast.] When DC, decades later, decided to adapt the pulp Avenger in comics form, it had to title the mag—you guessed it—Justice, Inc. The cover of issue #1 (May-June 1975) was drawn by Joe Kubert; with #2 the interior pencils for the remaining three issues were done by none other than Jack Kirby! [©2013 DC Comics or successors in interest.]

Assembling The Avengers

Hulk’s reversion to Banner (#3). That adventure in turn leads to the revival of Captain America, frozen in an ice floe since the day in 1945 when his kid sidekick, Bucky Barnes, died in action. A starspangled Rip Van Winkle, Steve Rogers finds a home with The Avengers and a friend in Rick Jones (#4). Said friendship doesn’t sit well with the Hulk, who grows more paranoid and dull-witted issue by issue. The behemoth rampages through Manhattan, demanding his former partners meet him in combat. The FF and Avengers quarrel over jurisdiction as the Hulk and the Thing brawl their way across the city (FF #25-26). A final encounter during a short-lived invasion of Lava Men ends in an uneasy rapprochement between heroes and Hulk (#5). This six-part story cycle epitomizes the sprawling multi-title action and operatic bombast of the Lee/Kirby school of superheroics. The plot feels organic and spontaneous, driven by the larger-than-life emotions of its characters. The art is stark and dramatic. The inkers on these issues, Paul Reinman (#2-3, 5) and George Roussos (#4, FF #25-26, credited in all as “Geo. Bell”), capture the raw power of Jack Kirby’s pencils in a way more polished embellishers like Dick Ayers (#1, 8) or Chic Stone (#6-7), do not. It is the right look for this story.

With Captain America aboard in Hulk’s place, The Avengers settles into a creative groove. Issues #6-7 feature the first supervillain team to challenge The Avengers. Organized by Baron Zemo, the hooded Nazi scientist responsible for Bucky’s death, The Masters of Evil include Iron Man’s nemesis, The Melter; GiantMan’s foe, The Black Knight; and The Radioactive Man, whose aura can repel Thor’s hammer. When they are captured, Zemo recruits the exiled Asgardians known as The Enchantress and The Executioner. Issue #8 introduces Kang the Conqueror, the timetraveling warlord many consider the Avengers villain (first seen, in his guise of Pharaoh Rama-Tut, in Fantastic Four #19). The spotlight next falls on Wonder Man, an accused embezzler named Simon Williams given super-powers by Zemo. Told that he will die without regular treatments from the ex-Nazi’s machines, Williams befriends The Avengers in order to destroy them from within. Regretting his treachery, Wonder Man sacrifices his life to save them from the Masters’ death-trap (#9). Baron Zemo and his cronies ally themselves, to their eventual chagrin, with Immortus, Master of Time, whose motives are as arcane as his origins (#10). The repercussions from these five issues will echo throughout Avengers history.

Many story elements we associate with The Avengers are not yet in place in these early issues. Tony Stark’s Fifth Avenue townhouse debuts in #2 but won’t become known as Avengers Mansion until #38. Faithful butler Edwin Jarvis, introduced in the “Iron Man” story in Tales of Suspense #60, makes only a handful of appearances (#16, 18, 38, & 48) in the title’s first 50 issues. The team’s battle cry “Avengers Assemble!” is not heard until #14, their A-1 Priority identification cards not issued until #16. Noticeable by their absence at this stage are The Avengers’ futuristic vehicles, the members either traveling under their own power, chartering planes, or borrowing the occasional bathyscaphe from Stark Industries. They briefly use a helicopter, first glimpsed in FF #25, but it is destroyed in Avengers #7. The “jet-stream cruiser” in #17 is the first in a series of custom aircraft that will go through various redesigns and renamings (rocket-jet, air car, scout ship, wing jet) before settling on the “aero-car” in #34. These would in turn be replaced by the ubiquitous “quinjet” as of #61.

Avengers #9 finds a new hand at the drawing board: original “Iron Man” artist Don Heck, aided by inkers Dick Ayers (#9-10, 1213) and Chic Stone (#11). If from this point on the book no longer delivers the kind of explosive action that is Kirby’s forte, Heck has

“Captain America Lives Again!” The fiendishly clever if retro-anachronistic device of Captain America having been frozen in ice from 1945 till the “present” was dreamed up by Lee and/or Kirby—and was carried over, in a spirit faithful to the comics, in the 2011 film Captain America: The First Avenger. Was that “First Avenger” part intended to foreshadow the next year’s even-greater-blockbuster movie The Avengers—or was it just to differentiate it from that awful Captain America flick of 1990? But why did this “Cap-on-ice” scene make us think of a heavily-made-up James Arness emerging from ice as the 1951 Thing from Another World? Thanks to Michael Mikulovsky. [Still ©2013 Marvel Studios & Paramount Pictures.]

his own strengths, particularly in pacing and staging. The contrast in their storytelling styles can best be appreciated by comparing Heck’s art in these issues with that in #14, in which he works from Kirby layouts. After the burst of creativity giving us Kang, Wonder Man, and Immortus, the series briefly runs out of steam. Issue #11 is an unexciting tale of Kang using a Spider-Man robot against The Avengers, though at least it guest-stars the real Spidey. The odd and ineffective team of The Mole Man and The Red Ghost provide #12’s requisite villainy. The stakes escalate when aristocratic mob boss Count Nefaria frames The Avengers for treason. Clearing their names proves costly: The Wasp is “mortally” wounded (#13). In the conclusion, ominously titled “Even Avengers Can Die,” her teammates race the clock to rescue the only surgeon who can save her from her alien captors (#14). All ends well, with no hint of the groundbreaking shake-up lying just ahead.

“The Old Order Changeth!” What begins as a rematch with The Masters of Evil concludes with the death by avalanche of Baron Zemo and with the founding Avengers taking leaves of absence. Captain America alone remains of the previous team, alongside a trio of unlikely replacements (#15-16). Hawkeye the Marksman had set out to be a hero until Natasha Romanoff, the seductive Russian spy code-named the Black Widow, led him astray. Mutant twins Quicksilver and The Scarlet Witch (a.k.a. Pietro and Wanda) had been reluctant henchmen of the mutant terrorist Magneto. The new line-up is viewed with skepticism by the general public (and perhaps to some extent by departing members Thor, Iron Man, Giant-Man, and the Wasp), and with open contempt by the old

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

Taking Care Of #1 A procession of “Avengers #1” issues, most (but not all) of which reprinted early issues of the Marvel mag. (Clockwise from top left:) The Avengers #1-and-only from the Australian company Howitz in 1965, with an original Kirby-influenced cover; artist unknown… Another Avengers #1-and-only, from Thorpe & Porter in England, 1966—but featuring UK TV’s Avengers, John Steed (Patrick Macnee) and Emma Peel (Diana Rigg), from the series that had debuted on British telly in 1961, and probably reprinting black-&-white newspaper strip dailies… When America’s Gold Key reprinted colorized British strips in 1968, after the aforementioned series had become a modest cult hit on U.S. TV, naturally they couldn’t call their comic book The Avengers, even though the English series had begun nearly two years before Marvel’s hero-group—so they titled it John Steed and Emma Peel. There was no second issue. In the 1970s Marvel launched its own British imprint—Marvel UK—which utilized Jack Kirby art for its first (reprint) issue… This one’s from the Newton company…also Australian, this time in 1974 (looks like somebody figured Thor’d look better with bare legs)… And finally, yet another Aussie outfit—Yaffa, this time—started its “#1” out in 1978 with a re-colored version of the cover of Marvel’s Avengers #2. [Marvel covers ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.; TV Avengers covers ©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

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Assembling The Avengers

team’s enemies. The new guys in town soon take Stan Lee’s trademark squabbling to a higher level. Hawkeye relentlessly challenges Cap’s authority, mocking him as an over-the-hill hasbeen. Quicksilver, too, has a chip on his shoulder and is creepily overprotective of his sister. The Scarlet Witch is torn between loyalty to Pietro and a growing admiration for Steve Rogers. All three newcomers are prone to impulsiveness and temper tantrums. Cap’s responsibilities wear on him. The team is a powder keg, lacking only a spark to go off.

Avengers #16 is the last bow of co-creator Jack Kirby, who will remain as cover artist through #30 but will never again lend his soaring imagination to the team’s actual adventures. The Avengers is now Don Heck’s book, and the roster change has a salutary effect on his penciling. He produces some of the most atmospheric art and assured storytelling of his career, handling scenes of emotional conflict and action set-pieces with equal aplomb. It doesn’t hurt that his tenure features some of the best inking his pencils ever receives, including Dick Ayers (#17-18, 25-26), Wally Wood (#19-22), John Romita (#23), Frank Giacoia (#27-31), and Heck himself (#32-37).

Following a tepid baptism of fire against Mole Man and his pet minotaur (#17) and a forgettable fight with a Chinese-built robot called the Commissar (#18), the new Avengers face true adversity. Iron Man’s arch-enemy, The Mandarin, manipulates the team into accepting The Swordsman, the mysterious masked rogue who trained Hawkeye in archery, as a member. His attempt to defuse Mandarin’s planted bomb being misinterpreted, the sinister swashbuckler gets the boot (#19-20). “Too bad it had to end this way,” Swordsman broods. “There’s something about being an Avenger— even a bogus one—that seems to get into your blood and never let go!” The Enchantress and her super-powered boy toy, Power Man, wage a secret PR campaign against the Avengers, making them look irresponsible and out of control, until the City Council orders them to disband (#21). A dispirited Captain America exonerates them, then quits the reunited team (#22), returning when the new kids are time-snatched by a lovestruck Kang (#23). The foursome are soon fighting alongside the Conqueror against his own army to protect his beloved, the beautiful Princess Ravonna (#24). Back in our time, they are lured to Latveria as bait in Dr. Doom’s latest trap for the Fantastic Four but hold the armored dictator at bay long enough to escape (#25).

“Never Bug A Giant!” What of the founding members, you ask? Iron Man and Thor are doing just fine in their own mags, thank you, but Giant-Man and the Wasp have dropped off the radar since losing their slot in Tales to Astonish to the “Sub-Mariner” strip. It is there, ironically, that Hank and Jan reappear (Astonish #78). En route to New York to alert The Avengers of Subby’s latest threats, the Wasp is captured by Attuma and his water-breathing barbarians. Cap and crew no sooner thwart Attuma’s plans than they’re kidnapped by The Collector, an immortal alien obsessed with adding them to his eccentric collection (#26-27). Previously robbed of his shrinking powers by The Forbidden Man (Astonish #67), his life endangered by the stress of changing size, Pym nonetheless resumes his costumed identity (but now calling himself Golliath) and thunders to the rescue. This triumph leaves Hank stuck at 10 feet (#28). The Black Widow’s return as the brainwashed pawn of the Red Chinese turns Hawkeye’s world upside down, the heartbroken archer allowing Natasha and her henchmen, Power Man and Swordsman, to escape. Captain America sympathizes. “And that’s

The Lonely Crowd At the time this house ad for all the Marvel titles appeared in The Avengers #6 (July 1964), every one of the company’s heroes was locked into a superhero group except Spider-Man, Dr. Strange, and Daredevil—and of course Millie the Model, Patsy and Hedy, and the three Western gunslingers. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scan. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

the guy I’ve been riding for months,” the caustic-tongued bowman thinks. “I wish the ground could swallow me up—right now!” (#29). Quicksilver and The Scarlet Witch depart for Transia, their Balkan homeland, in hopes of restoring their fading super-powers. Black Widow, her love for Hawkeye overcoming her conditioning, defects to the West (#30). Goliath’s quest for a cure lands The Avengers in a desperate struggle with the Incans of El Dorado to quench their sacred cobalt flame before it consumes the planet (#30-31). Hank hires African-American biochemist Bill Foster— later the second Giant-Man—as his research partner. Bill’s ethnicity makes him a target of The Sons of the Serpent, an army of costumed racists The Avengers take fierce satisfaction in thrashing (#32-33). Thinly disguised stand-ins for the Ku Klux Klan spouting rhetoric only slightly more inflammatory than that of The John Birch Society, the Serpents are a daring choice in villainy for the summer of 1966. The assemblers’ scrap with the Living Laser, an off-kilter physicist with a yen for the Wasp, seems downright anticlimactic (#34-35), despite the restoration of Goliath’s full powers. Along the way, The Avengers propose Spider-Man for membership, an honor the web-slinger reluctantly declines (The Amazing Spider-Man King-Size Special #3).

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

“Avengers Assemble!” (Above:) Kirby’s powerful all-star cover for The Avengers #16 (May 1965), with inking credited by the GCD to either Dick Ayers or Sol Brodsky. To say that this issue was a bombshell to mid-’60s comics fans would be a masterpiece of understatement. Its impact on Marvel fans would be difficult if not impossible to duplicate today. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Top right:) A rare Kirby Iron Man figure—rare because the penciling and the inking are apparently both by Jack. This unpublished drawing was created for the Marvelmania corporation circa 1968; thanks to Mike Burkey. [Iron Man TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Bottom right:) This Kirby pencil of Cap was inked by Barry Windsor-Smith for Greg Theakston/Pure Imagination’s 1994 book Jack Kirby’s Heroes and Villains. Barry, of course, would later pencil several Avengers issues himself. [Captain America TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Marvel’s success keeps editor and company spokesman Stan Lee too busy to continue co-plotting and dialoguing the entire superhero line himself. Thus The Avengers #35 finds a new scripter on the series. Roy Thomas, already writing Sgt. Fury and The X-Men, finishes the Living Laser story begun by Lee in the previous issue before making the book his own. A former high school English teacher, Thomas brings an air of erudition to the proceedings, lacing his scripts with classical allusions, quoting Shakespeare, Donne, Byron, Shelley, Tennyson, Yeats, Frost. Only 26, he is more in tune with the young readership, dropping knowing references to Tolkien, McLuhan, Wonder Wart-Hog, and other counterculture idols. Comfortable with a large cast, Roy returns a revivified Pietro and Wanda to the fold and begins an acrimonious debate among

Assembling The Avengers

Ironing Things Out (Left:) “Debonair Don Heck,” in his photo from the special Bullpen section in Marvel Tales Annual #1 (1964), and his most important comics page ever—the splash of the very first “Iron Man” story, from Tales of Suspense #39 (March ’63). Even if, as seems not unlikely, Jack Kirby designed the future Avenger’s initial armor, it was Heck whose drawings of it were first seen by readers—at least, after Kirby’s cover for that issue. Thanks to Justin Fairfax & Bailey for the photo scan, and to Nick Caputo for the splash page. (Right:) This colored Heck/Iron Man art appeared years later, as cover art for the newszine The Comic Reader (#210, May 1982); with thanks to Nick Caputo. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Old Masters—When They Weren’t Really All That Old (Left:) Two masters supplied the covers of The Avengers #28 # 32 (May & Sept. 1966)— Jack Kirby and Don Heck, respectively. Well, actually, three, if you count Frank Giacoia, who inked the former; Don inked his own art. A/E’s editor admits that in ’66 he immediately preferred the name “Goliath” to “GiantMan”—and still does. The twopart “Sons of the Serpent” storyline, with its theme of racial and ethnic tension, even while relatively tame in the Comics Code-ruled 1960s, stood out from the usual comics fare of the day. It’s difficult to properly gauge this arc’s impact or its longterm importance without taking careful note of what went before it—and what has come after. [©2018 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

One Heck Of A Cover—And How Gil Raised Kane With It Roy Thomas, who was handed the scripting reins of The Avengers #35 (Dec. 1966) after it had already been plotted and penciled, is seen here with wife Dann in a computer“cartoonized” photo from a formal “do” at a local museum. Roy in a tux with a goodlooking redhead on his arm—that’s about as close as he figures he’s ever gonna come to living the high life à la Tony Stark! Above the photo, which Dann customized, are two versions of the cover of issue #37 (Feb. ’67). In the 1990s Roy and Dann co-wrote Avengers West Coast. (Left:) Heck’s penciled-and-inked cover for The Avengers #37 (Feb. 1967)—which we used to front this issue of Alter Ego—has been re-colored here by Henry J. Kujawa, an A/E reader and inveterate restorer. Henry says he made a conscious attempt to “channel Stan Goldberg,” who would have added the hues if the cover had been used in 1966-67. And, by George, we think he's got it! (Roy's always believed the cover was nixed because it didn't show any of the male heroes' faces.)

Ares, the Greek god of war, helps The Enchantress enthrall his hated half-brother, Hercules. Freed of her influence but exiled from Olympus, the son of Zeus accepts an invitation to stay at Avengers Mansion (#38). Hercules’ grandiose ego tries his hosts’ patience. Hawkeye, already upset about Natasha going back behind the Bamboo Curtain for the hi-tech espionage agency S.H.I.E.L.D., butts heads with the Prince of Power from Day One. The Olympian’s very presence foils the meticulous plans of The Mad Thinker and his Triumvirate of Terror, anonymous henchmen wearing ugly-ass armor (#39), but his incessant boasting puts the

(Right:) Artist Gil Kane just happened to walk into Marvel’s office, looking for non-DC work, on the very day that Stan decided he wanted a different cover for that issue—so he walked out with what Roy T. believes was his first Marvel Age cover assignment. Kane’s cover was colored by Stan Goldberg. The photo of Gil is from the 1969 Fantastic Four Annual, with thanks to Bob Bailey & Justin Fairfax. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

the members about admitting The Black Widow (#36-37). Perhaps encouraged by their appearance in the Spider-Man Special, he begins a stealth campaign to return Thor and Iron Man to active duty, guest-starring them as often as editor Lee, who still scripts both heroes’ solo series, will allow. Denied the god of thunder for the nonce, Thomas turns to a different branch of mythology for a reasonable facsimile.

“In Our Midst... An Immortal!”

Assembling The Avengers

From Hercules To “Hyboria” The 1980 photo of artist par excellence John Buscema, seen at right with his young granddaughter, presides over the first and last of his collaborations with writer Roy Thomas—both of which involved super-hero teams. With thanks to Michel Maillot. (Left:) It was editor Stan Lee who decided that recent artist-returnee John Buscema would spell Don Heck as Avengers penciler while Dashin’ Donnie drew the very first Avengers Annual. Roy wishes he’d been able to save a copy of the penciled art that was dumped into his hands—because, even though John had previously drawn a couple of “Hulk” and “S.H.I.E.L.D.” stories, the instant the Rascally One beheld the penciled splash, it was love at first (or maybe second or third) sight. Roy’s typed synopsis had indicated several Avengers working out in their gym, with Hercules not having to exert himself—but it was John who came up with the precise image of new recruit Hercules absent-mindedly bouncing a weighty dumbbell up in the air as if were a toy balloon. To this day, RT half regrets having lobbied with Stan to leave John on the monthly and move Don to another feature when the Annual was completed—but he just plain couldn’t help himself! Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scan from The Avengers #41 (June 1967). (Right:) From that day until John’s death from cancer in January of 2002, Roy worked with him every chance he got—first on Avengers and Sub-Mariner, then for much of the ’70s on the two Conan comics (three, by 1980)—and finally at DC in 2001, where John and Roy had finished the plotting and pencils for the first issue of a Justice League of America/Elseworlds limited series that obliquely answered the musical question “What If Superman Had Landed on Earth during Conan’s Hyborian Age Rather Than in the 20th Century?” In this early scene, Kal-El handles opponents a wee bit differently from the way the Cimmerian would have; the other JLA types (and a villain modeled after the original Captain Marvel) would’ve entered the tale a bit latter. Sadly, John passed away before the pair had begun the second issue, and DC chose to extol Buscema’s virtues in editorials but not to honor him by publishing his last artwork—despite Roy’s plea that his brother Sal Buscema and/or others be allowed to finish the series with him. It’s still not too late, DC! [©2013 DC Comics.]

reality-altering Cosmic Cube in the hands of the Sub-Mariner. The Cube is lost in an undersea chasm during Namor’s scuffle with The Avengers (#40). Issue #41 is the first penciled by John Buscema. His superb draftsmanship and compositional sense, combined with a newly acquired dynamism gained from studying Jack Kirby’s storytelling, bring a fresh new look to The Avengers, classic yet contemporary. One of the rare “inker-proof” pencilers in comics, Buscema’s work remains beautiful and powerful under the inky gloom of George Roussos (#41-43), the feather-light touch of Vince Colletta (#44, 46), and the crisp brushstrokes of George Tuska (#47, 51-54, also full art on #48) alike. Often citing himself as his favorite inker, his solo art job in #49-50 suggests why.

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

Annual Planet Though John Buscema had inherited The Avengers soon afterward, Don Heck had done a masterful job in artistically bringing the Kirbyenvisioned Hercules into the series. For the very first Avengers Annual in 1967, Heck drew and Roy Thomas added words to these dramatic pinups of the Prince of Power, and of the old and new Avenger teams. (Actually, on the cover the comic was called simply a “King-Size Special,” and the indicia merely referred to it as “The Avengers,” with a confusing “Vol. 1, No. 1, September 1967 issue” buried in its teeny-tiny text.) Also repro’d here from that mag: autobiographical sketches by its penciler and scripter. Roy was particularly proud that, with the 49page adventure in that Annual, he had written what was indeed, to that date, “the longest story in the Marvel Age of Comics”—utilizing, though he didn’t stress this in conversation with Stan Lee, the chapter/team style of later issues of his all-time favorite title, DC’s Golden Age All-Star Comics, and its tales of the Justice Society of America. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Buscema’s first issue pits the team against the immortal alchemist Diablo and his android servant, the monstrous Dragon Man. In China, Black Widow falls victim to the Psychotron, a hallucination generator that could win the Cold War for the Communist bloc (#41-42). Complicating The Avengers’ rescue mission is The Red Guardian, the Maoists’ answer to Captain America and the Widow’s supposedly deceased test-pilot husband. The Psychotron is destroyed, its creators dying in the explosion, as the Guardian sacrifices himself to buy The Avengers time to escape (#43-44).

Assembling The Avengers

uncle’s inventions for good. Mounted on his winged horse Aragorn, the new Black Knight tries to warn The Avengers of Magneto’s return, but the assemblers mistake him for their old foe (#48). Persuading the twins he wants to make peace between man and mutant, Magneto stage-manages a rumble with The Avengers at the United Nations that leaves Wanda amnesiac from a bullet wound and Pietro howling for revenge (#49). Hawkeye, Wasp, and Goliath are little more than onlookers for Hercules’ confrontation with Typhon, the vengeful titan responsible for the Olympians’ disappearance. Forgiven by Zeus for his past transgressions, the prince of power returns to Olympus (#50).

“Behold... The Vision!”

Knight And Daze (Above:) George Tuska from that 1969 FF Annual, and his “sketchagraph” drawing of the three most popular Avengers. The illo is courtesy of Dewey Cassell, author of the out-of-print TwoMorrows book The Art of George Tuska. (Right:) Howard Purcell (seen in a photo sent by Mike Catron) never drew The Avengers as such. But, in Marvel Super-Heroes #17 (Nov. 1968), he drew the origin story of the modern-day heroic Black Knight—whose first appearance had been penciled by George Tuska in Avengers #48 (Jan. ’68)—in a story originally intended for John Buscema to draw. [Photo, Thor, Captain America, Iron Man, & Black Knight TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Don Heck, meanwhile, has been illustrating The Avengers KingSize Special #1, a 49-page Annual extravaganza featuring all eight Avengers, plus Hercules, opposing The Mandarin and his cadre of super-henchmen: Swordsman, Power Man, Enchantress, Executioner, Living Laser, and the gigantic android Ultimo from “Iron Man” continuity. He also pencils its sequel in #45, wherein Hercules formally joins the team during a special “Avengers Day” ceremony disrupted by the Super-Adaptoid, a shapeshifting android with the combined powers of the entire team. (The Black Widow, extended the same offer behind the scenes, chooses to retire her costumed identity.) Aside from laying out Special #2 for its penciler, Werner Roth, Heck won’t draw The Avengers again for nearly seven years.

Avengers Day will be the last happy moment the team enjoys for quite some time. Hints of the trouble ahead drop during their tussle with Whirlwind (Giant-Man’s old enemy, The Human Top, in snazzy new duds), as radiation exposure renews the degeneration of Goliath’s growth powers and bystanders’ anti-mutant jibes inflame Quicksilver’s long-suppressed bigotry against humans (#46). Captain America abruptly resigns from active duty, and a homesick Hercules finds Mount Olympus deserted. Magneto and his sycophantic flunky, The Toad, returning from exile on a distant planet with the unwitting aid of research scientist Dane Whitman, lure The Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver into a trap (#47). Whitman, nephew of the villainous Black Knight, has pledged to use his late

Thomas and Buscema waste little time building The Avengers back to fighting strength. The Collector restores Goliath’s powers (“Do you think I want a flawed Avenger in my collection?”) before Thor and Iron Man help the others chase him off (#51). The Grim Reaper, vengeance-crazed brother of Wonder Man, frames a new Avenger, The Black Panther, for the group’s “murders,” requiring all the costumed African monarch’s power, intellect, and courage to clear himself. The Panther is the first hero of color to join a super-team, another step forward for Earth’s mightiest heroes (#52). The search for The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants pits The Avengers against the magnetically hypnotized X-Men. The Toad, avenging years of physical and emotional abuse, is the unlikely hero who ends the menace of Magneto before vanishing into the night with Quicksilver and The Scarlet Witch (#53 and X-Men #45). A new Masters of Evil teams

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

“AvenJerks Assemble!” (Above & top right:) Kurt Mitchell extols the introduction of the parallelworlds theme by Thomas and Heck in what is now referred to as Avengers Annual #2 (1968)—and Roy was indeed proud of ending DC editor Julius Schwartz’s de facto monopoly on that theme in comics. But the truly amazing thing about that issue to Roy was John B.’s obvious talent for parody in the vein of Mad magazine’s Mort Drucker, et al., in the humorous creative-team stories that Stan decreed appear in all Annuals that year. Big John beautifully skewered Roy’s pre-marriage affectation of a goatee and Nehru jacket—put Don Heck in cowboy gear (he knew Don would rather draw Westerns than super-heroes any day)—and self-deprecatingly garbed himself in Hawkeye’s gear. That splash panel made Roy guffaw the first time he saw the pencils—and he’s never looked at it since without grinning. Thanks to Barry Pearl. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

old hands Melter and Radioactive Man with Whirlwind, Klaw (the being of solid sound who is the Panther’s blood-enemy), and the new Black Knight (posing as his uncle to spy on them), all under the command of the mysterious Crimson Cowl. After using a hypnotized Jarvis as a decoy, the Cowl is unmasked as Ultron-5, a “living robot” with a big hate on for The Avengers (#54-55). George Klein, fresh from a celebrated collaboration with penciler Curt Swan on DC’s Superman titles, joins The Avengers crew as inker with #55. Swan and Buscema share an illustrative approach to comics, so it is no surprise that Klein’s clean inks complement Big John’s pencils. The Thomas/Buscema/Klein team embark on a run of classic tales (#56-62, with Mike Esposito pinchhitting in #60) highlighted by the debut of one of the most popular Avengers of all time, a bold reimagining of a Golden Age Simon & Kirby character.

Visions Of Loveliness—Or Is It Sugar Plums? (Above:) Some years back, John Buscema combined various Avenger poses, including his famous Vision stance from the cover of #57 (Oct. 1968), in this commission drawing. Thanks to Owen O’Leary, who was John’s art agent during the last several years of his life. [Captain America, Vision, Thor, Iron Man, Black Panther, & Scarlet Witch TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Assembling The Avengers

Even An Original Art Collector Can Cry! (Top left:) In this photo taken at the Gateway Comics Convention in St. Louis, Missouri, in summer of 1968, a fan is seen perusing John Buscema’s original splash page pencils for The Avengers #58 (Nov. ’68)—a rare sight, since there are few copies of Big John’s penciling from those days still extant. Roy T. had taken it to the con in his home state. Thanks to Michel Maillot. (Top right:) John Buscema’s cover for Avengers #58 was rendered by Joe Jusko as a painting for the cover of the 42nd edition of The Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide for 2012-2013. (Above left:) Michael Finn, who’s commissioned a number of pros to draw scenes that happened “One Minute Later” than some classic covers or action scenes, got artist (and Buscema fan) Michael Maikowsky to interpret the follow-up of the cover of Avengers #58, utilizing figures based on those done by Big John. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Above right:) Not to be outdone, Roy accepted a challenge from Jim McLauchlin of Hero Initiative, the comics industry’s own charity org, to pencil an Avengers drawing to be auctioned off, with Marvel’s blessing. Naturally, Ye Ed chose to put the Marvels and Ultron in the situation of Irwin Hasen’s classic Justice Society of America cover for All-Star Comics #33 (Feb.-March 1947). Jim had the drawing inked by relative newcomer Ty Templeton—gotta give the new kids on the block a break! The amazing thing is—somebody actually purchased the piece! Well, it was for a good cause. See Hero Initiative’s ad on p. 68. [Avengers & Ultron TM & ©2013.]

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

Colan-oscopy Gene Colan (on our right in photo) is seen above a few years ago at a comics convention with his friend and benefactor Clifford Meth; with thanks to Marvel Comics: The Untold Story author Sean Howe. The photo is flanked by two commission illos that Gene drew late in life—“painting with pencil,” as the expression about Gene went: (Above:) A re-creation (with a difference) of the splash page of a story from Captain America Comics #73 (July 1949). That’s Betsy Ross, the Golden Girl—latterday replacement for Bucky Barnes—in the center foreground. Thanks to Shaun Clancy.

Plagued with doubts about Bucky’s death, Captain America and The Avengers journey to 1945 courtesy of Dr. Doom’s time machine (#56). Confirming that Bucky died on that fateful day (yeah, I know, Winter Soldier, blah blah blah), Cap and company return to what they think is the present but is actually an alternate timeline, a world in which the five original Avengers have become virtual dictators under the unsavory influence of our old pal Kang in his latest guise of The Scarlet Centurion (The Avengers King-Size Special #2, the second Annual). This is Marvel’s first attempt at the kind of parallel worlds storyline that has become a staple of Justice League of America, Roy Thomas hitting it out of the park his first time at bat.

Avengers #57 introduces The Vision, a crimson-skinned “synthezoid” with a sepulchral voice and the power to alter his own density. Built by Ultron-5 to slay The Avengers, the amnesiac android instead heeds his nascent conscience, smashing his robotic master to bits in a duel to the death. Ultron, they learn, is the creation of Henry Pym, a psychotic robot with an Oedipus complex who wiped all memory of its creation from Hank’s mind. Vision’s electronic brain contains the recorded brainwave patterns of Simon

(Left:) Goliath busts loose, in a 2011 Colan drawing related to his brief era on The Avengers. When Stan decided to draft John Buscema into drawing The Silver Surfer, it meant removing him from The Avengers—and to soften the blow to Roy a little, The Man “gave” The Boy an artist he knew he liked working with, namely Colan. Gene wasn’t an ideal fit for a team super-hero book, though, and Gene was happy to get off the book after three issues. Roy had mixed feelings about his leaving, since Buscema still wasn’t available to come back—though youngster Barry Smith turned out to fill the bill nicely. Tom Field sent the scan. [Captain America, Golden Girl, Goliath, Thor, Iron Man, Yellowjacket, Black Panther,, and Vision TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters; other art ©2013 Estate of Gene Colan.]

Williams/Wonder Man, thus his capacity for moral choice and other human traits. Concluding that “we ask only a man’s worth... not the accident of his condition,” The Avengers unanimously elect him to the team. No one who has seen it fails to remember the powerful final shot, an understated portrait of the Vision embodying the issue’s title, “Even An Android Can Cry” (#58).

Following a hilarious cameo in Not Brand Echh #12, The Avengers face the enigmatic Yellowjacket, a super-powered vigilante who claims to have murdered Goliath (#59). The Wasp inexplicably agrees to marry him. All becomes clear after Yellowjacket is unmasked as an alternate personality of Henry Pym, driven to a nervous breakdown by stress (#60). Seen in that light, Roy Thomas’ subtle wording of YJ’s story of killing Goliath displays a wealth of psychological insight. While the Pyms honeymoon, the remaining Avengers help guest stars Doctor Strange and the Black Knight prevent the Asgardian monsters Surtur and Ymir from laying waste to Earth (#61) and end M’baku the Man-Ape’s tyrannical regency of the Black Panther’s kingdom (#62).

Assembling The Avengers

“Let the Game Begin!” From a sleek new cover logo to the innovative layouts and sinuous figure work of interim artist Gene Colan, Avengers #63-65 proclaims a new era for the title. Hank Pym abandons his Goliath identity for that of insect-sized Yellowjacket. The Black Widow, back in costume and on assignment for S.H.I.E.L.D., is captured by the criminal scientist Egghead and his partners, The Mad Thinker and The Puppet Master (their roles in this conspiracy playing out in Sub-Mariner #14 and Captain Marvel #14). While the others pursue a false lead, Hawkeye impulsively downs Pym’s improved growth serum and, donning a new Wasp-designed Goliath costume, rescues Natasha (#63). Egghead’s scheme to seize absolute power via his undetectable orbiting death ray is foiled, not by The Avengers, but by notorious gangster Barney Barton, to whom Egghead trustingly told his space station’s coordinates. Accompanying the good guys on their raid of the station, Barton is mortally wounded, dying in the arms of his estranged kid brother, Clint—Hawkeye’s hitherto hidden true identity (#64). The new Goliath brings Egghead to justice in the following issue, finally besting his former mentor, The Swordsman, for good measure (#65). Barry Smith, still in the Kirby-influenced infancy of his career, handles the pencils for #66-67, the start and middle of a three-part battle between The Avengers and Ultron-6, resurrected via a post-hypnotic command in The Vision’s programming. Much of the plot turns on the introduction of Adamantium, the indestructible metal alloy out of which the reconstructed Ultron is built. The concluding chapter features the debut of Sal Buscema, John’s talented younger brother, at the drawing board (#68), aided by the polished inking of Sam Grainger. Looser stylistically than his sibling, Sal brings a solid sense of pacing and an unpretentious clarity to his storytelling.

Barry B.C. (Before Conan) Barry Windsor-Smith, seen in a photo taken at Phil Seuling’s 1976 New York Comic Art Convention, is surrounded by ghosts of his past, when he was a talented young artist learning his trade in the late 1960s. This pic is courtesy of the Great American Comic Book Stories website. (Top left:) A Giant-Man pinup drawn by Barry (or so we’re told) for a Marvel reprint comic in his native England, either before he first journeyed to America circa 1968 or after his return to London circa ’69. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Top right:) Of similar vintage is this half-inked illo Barry drew of the villainous Grim Reaper, probably during the period when he and Roy were prepping a super-group series they hoped to launch starring Rick Jones, Red Raven, Quicksilver, and a couple of other minor Marvel heroes. (Pages from that never-realized project were seen years ago in Jon B. Cooke’s TwoMorrows mag Comic Book Artist.) The Grim Reaper was introduced by Roy and John Buscema in The Avengers #52 (May 1968). When the new Thomas/Smith team mag proved a non-starter—maybe partly because Barry was soon penciling important titles like The Avengers and would ere long hit his stride with Conan the Barbarian—the young Brit generously gave Roy the drawing. Roy’s had it framed on his wall for years as a memento, but it’s never before been published; our thanks to Barry for his permission to do so. As we all know full well, he got lots and lots better—but there was dynamism in his work from the very beginning. [Grim Reaper TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] For actual published Avengers pages drawn by Barry—well, they’ve all been reprinted in Marvel Masterworks and Essentials volumes. (Besides, see p. 32!)

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

Sal-utations! Sal Buscema (from that 1969 FF Annual) and two of his earliest Avengers appearances—and a later approximation of Sal’s early work on the series. (Clockwise from above left:) This splash page from Avengers #68 (Sept. 1969) is probably the first penciling of Sal’s ever to see print, even though the sample pencils that got him the gig would be published months later in Avengers #78! Sal had been inking for Marvel for some time but wanted to get into penciling—and he did. Inks by Sam Grainger; script by Roy Thomas. Thanks to Barry Pearl. These pencils for the last page of Avengers #71 (Dec. ’69) were printed in that summer’s “Seulingcon” program book, some weeks before the inked comic went on sale. Thanks to the Great Comic Book Stories website. The split cover of the Marvel UK weekly The Avengers, which appeared in 1975, sported an illo whose Avengers/Ultron half was based on Sal’s art in the U.S. Avengers #68, though rendered by a U.S. staffer of whose identity we’re uncertain. By this time, others—including Dr. Strange, Shang-Chi/Master of Kung Fu, and now the super-popular Conan—often shared cover space with the group in this British b&w edition. The “living robot” is easily the most enduring of the villains co-created by Roy T. for The Avengers—as witness Marvel’s current big event The Age of Ultron. [Avengers art ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.; Conan art ©2013 Conan Properties International LLD.]

Kang recruits The Avengers as his chessmen in a match with the enigmatic Grand-Master (#89). For his players, the alien gamesman creates The Squadron Sinister. Hyperion, Nighthawk, The Whizzer, and Dr. Spectrum are affectionate parodies of the JLA’s Superman, Batman, Flash, and Green Lantern, a wink to the many fans dreaming of a showdown between the teams. The Avengers win three rounds (#70), but the unwitting interference of The Black Knight in the fourth forces extra innings, matching Yellowjacket, Black Panther, and The Vision against the 1940s incarnations of Captain America, Sub-Mariner, and The Human Torch (later retold from the Golden Agers’ POV in The Invaders Annual #1). For his part in their victory over Kang, the Knight is finally made an Avenger (#71).

Avengers #72 is an impossibly crowded done-in-one, guest-starring Captain Marvel, that not only resolves the dangling plotlines of the canceled Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. series but also introduces Zodiac, an international crime cartel headed by twelve brand-new costumed villains. Roy Thomas later admits that the story is his and Sal Buscema’s “tongue-in-

Assembling The Avengers

Dennis O’Neil. Thanks to Sean Howe for the photo.

The First Inter-Company Crossover? (Left:) In 1969 Marvel writer Roy Thomas and DC writer Denny O’Neil made a friendly, half-inebriated pact at a Manhattan party to surreptitiously “gueststar” each other’s heroes in mags they scripted, since Denny was then scribing Justice League of America. Roy designed and had artist Sal Buscema introduce The Squadron Sinister in the final panel of Avengers #69 (Oct. ’69) as homages to/swipes of Green Lantern, Superman, Batman, and The Flash; in retrospect, he feels he should’ve tossed in a Wonder Woman type, as well. Inking by Sam Grainger. Thanks to Barry Pearl. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Rest of the page, below:) However, Denny wasn’t virtually his own editor as Roy was, so he decided the most he could do is give the JLAers traits like certain Avengers. Thus, in JLA #75 (Nov. ’69), they battle evil doppelgängers of themselves: Hawkman refers to “transistors” à la Iron Man... Batman hurls a garbage can lid as if it were Cap’s shield…The Atom grows like Goliath (and refers to himself as such)… Black Canary discovers a Scarlet Witch-like hex power (sonic, in her case)… and Green Arrow—well, he tangles with the equivalent of The Avengers’ Hawkeye—himself! Repro’d from the hardcover Justice League of America Archives, Vol. 9. [©2013 DC Comics.]

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

and preachy. Not so Avengers #73-74. The Sons of the Serpent, more reprehensible than ever, use The Black Panther as the centerpiece of their campaign to incite a genocidal race war. Roy Thomas and pencilers Frank Giacoia (#73) and the returning John Buscema (#74) create a nuanced tale of moral ambiguity in which the media are as guilty of exploiting fear, ignorance, and bigotry for personal gain as the true believers under the Serpents’ hoods.

Frank Giacoia; pic from the 1975 Marvel Con program book.

“The World Is Not For Burning!”

Avengers #75 begins with the assemblers saying farewell to Yellowjacket and The Wasp, off to Alaska on a governmentsponsored scientific mission, and ends with The Scarlet Witch kidnapped by Arkon the Magnificent, “imperion” of the extradimensional realm of Polemachus. An early attempt at bringing the sword-and-sorcery genre to comic books, one does not have to look terribly hard to see in Arkon a precursor of Roy Thomas and John Buscema’s legendary collaboration on Marvel’s Conan The Barbarian later in the decade. Buscema’s art on this two-parter, served well by inker Tom Palmer’s broad palette of textures, is a visual feast of brawny swordsmen riding dinosaurs across alien landscapes and toothsome women slinking through the streets of exotic cities.

Panthers And Pencils—And Push Coming To Shove Artist Frank Giacoia, one of the best inkers in the business, asked Stan Lee for a shot at penciling a comic, and he got his shot in Avengers #73 (Feb. 1970). Alas, however, he was too dependent on swipes, and too prone to procrastination, to pencil a regular series. (On one of my first days working for Marvel, in 1965, he told me he’d seen the movie Gunga Din fifty times— and I soon realized the majority of those times had probably been when he was supposed to be inking comic books.) The above page from Avengers #73 demonstrates Frank’s ability, even if it’s probably composed mostly of swipes, to put together a page that worked well without dialogue. Roy says: “Oddly, one of the few things I remember about the issue is that at some point I angrily told Stan I wanted my name removed from the credits. Nothing to do with Giacoia—surprisingly, it was related to some decree or other of publisher Martin Goodman’s. I don’t recall at this late date what my beef was—only that Stan took such offense at the idea of my taking my name off the splash that I dropped that intention as not worth the tsuris it would cause me. Had Goodman deigned to notice, he might have retaliated, as well. I have this vague notion that it might have been that Goodman insisted a caption be added at the top of this very page, which I didn’t want to do… but I can’t be certain about that. I’d prefer to think his complaint had something to do with the delicate nature of this second Sons of the Serpent storyline.” Inks by Sam Grainger; thanks to Barry Pearl for the scan. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

cheek” comment on a recent editorial decision to de-emphasize continued stories. It is now early 1970. “Relevance,” the interjection of contemporary issues into the super-hero genre, is about to become the hot trend in comics. Much of it will be oversimplified, heavy-handed,

The new line-up of The Black Panther, The Scarlet Witch, Goliath, The Vision, and Quicksilver are forced to work as a superpowered demolition crew for Cornelius Van Lunt, pawns in that ruthless financier’s maneuverings against business rival Tony Stark, while stopping the crime spree of the lackluster Split-Second Squad (#77). The Grim Reaper returns as leader of The Lethal Legion, joining The Man-Ape, Swordsman, Power Man, and Living Laser in a futile stab at revenge (#78-79). Clint, Wanda, and The Vision aid Red Wolf, Marvel’s first Native American super-hero, on his quest to avenge his parents, murdered on Van Lunt’s orders (#80-81). Zodiac’s private army, underwritten by Van Lunt, captures Manhattan Island, holding its millions hostage behind an impenetrable force field. It takes guest hero Daredevil freeing the captive assemblers to end the threat (#82).

Avengers #83 spotlights the annual Halloween parade in Rutland, Vermont, the first of many 1970s comics to do so. Organizer Tom Fagan and Roy Thomas himself (along with his then-wife Jean) guest-star in a story that pits The Avengers against both The Masters of Evil and The Lady Liberators, a “womens’ lib”-themed teaming of The Wasp, The Scarlet Witch, The Black Widow, and Medusa. Its misanthropic leader, The Valkyrie, is unmasked as The Enchantress (disguised, we would learn years later, as the goddess Brunnhilde). Escaping, Enchantress seduces Arkon into menacing Earth anew, a plan thwarted by the Black Knight’s willing sacrifice of his enchanted Ebony Blade in the Well at the Center of Time (#84). On the journey home from Polemachus, four Avengers materialize instead on the parallel world of The Squadron Supreme, the super-heroes Grand-Master used as templates for The Squadron Sinister (#85-86). Not so coincidentally, the same month’s issue of Justice League of America over at DC Comics features a team of alien super-heroes who bear an odd resemblance to Thor, The Wasp, Quicksilver, and The Scarlet Witch. Thomas and JLA scribe Mike Friedrich intend their in-joke as a one-time-only affair, but The Squadron Supreme will become increasingly popular, eventually starring in its own 12issue series.

Assembling The Avengers

After ten issues together (#74-77, 79-84), John Buscema and Tom Palmer move on to other assignments. Frank Giacoia inks #85, John’s last issue, and provides layouts for #87’s retelling and expanding of The Black Panther’s origin. After guest-penciling #78 and 86, Sal Buscema returns as regular Avengers artist just in time to pencil #88’s story, plotted by noted science-fiction author Harlan Ellison, in which a Captain America-led squadron of Avengers faces Psyklop, an insectoid alien intent on sacrificing the Hulk to his dark gods (#88). This issue is, however, merely a lead-in to the likewise Ellison-plotted, Thomas-scripted The Incredible Hulk #140 (June 1971), in which Marvel’s jolly green giant becomes a warlord—and finds love, even if only temporarily—in a subatomic world. And all that is merely a warm-up for the launching of Roy Thomas’ most ambitious storyline to date.

“This Beachhead Earth!” It becomes known among fans as “the Kree-Skrull War” long before the term appears in the comics themselves. The galaxy-spanning space opera is the apogee of Roy Thomas’ run of The Avengers. He and his artistic collaborators, Neal Adams and the Buscema brothers, create a nine-issue epic that builds in scope and intensity, adding characters and plot threads as it goes, until The Avengers are standing alone against the amassed armadas of warring intergalactic empires.

A “Lethal” Injection For some reason, when John Buscema inked the cover of The Avengers #79 (Aug. 1970), he changed several of the elements—even if the basic look and overall effect is the same. The facial expressions, even the positioning of some of the Lethal Legionnaires have been altered—as have the figures of The Avengers themselves inside the hourglass. You don’t believe us? Then look more carefully at Quicksilver’s right leg—Cap’s outstretched arm. For that matter—if John was inking his own pencils, how come this penciled version still exists? Maybe he traced it off on a lightbox—but that brings up the question: Why? Alas, Big John is no longer here to answer our queries—so we’ll probably never know. We can only rejoice that we possess two slightly different versions of a classic image. Thanks to Nick Caputo. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

In issue #89, Pietro, Wanda, and The Vision free Captain Marvel and Rick Jones from the symbiotic interdependence forced on them by The Supreme Intelligence, the computer mind that rules the extragalactic Kree Empire. The Avengers trio, Mar-Vell, Rick, and latecomer Goliath end up in the Arctic, preventing Ronan the Accuser from devolving life on Earth to prevent further human interference in Kree affairs. Before any actual avenging gets done, Ronan is summoned home: Kree space has been invaded by their ancient enemies, the shapeshifting Skrulls (#90-91). Demagogue H. Warren Craddock whips a frightened public into a frenzy, calling for The Avengers’ arrest for refusing to turn Captain Marvel, now known to be a Kree, over for trial. On the final page of #92, Cap, Iron Man, and Thor declare the team disbanded. “Better no Avengers,” says Iron Man, “than those who have disgraced the name!”

Sal Buscema delivers his usual workmanlike job on Avengers #89-92, aided by inkers Sam Grainger (#89) and George Roussos (#92). With #93, Roy Thomas, Neal Adams, and Tom Palmer,

whose X-Men run two years earlier was the talk of fandom, reunite to turn the knob on their space opera up to 11. Adams’ challenging layouts, dramatic figure-drawing, and outré design sense, combined with Palmer’s moody inks, make these issues a treat for the eyes. Unable to finish the storyline he co-plotted due to scheduling conflicts, Adams leaves the finale (#97) in the capable hands of John Buscema, who also contributes the middle third of #94.

The Vision and the others are ambushed by the Skrulls who, posing as the trio of vintage Avengers at the end of #91, disbanded the team. Their commander, the Super-Skrull, captures Captain Marvel, Quicksilver, and The Scarlet Witch, whisking them away to the Skrull Throneworld (#93-94). Craddock uses his political muscle to order the Mandroids, a trio of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents wearing Tony Stark-designed battle armor, to take down The

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

Another Covert Inter-Company “Crossover” In issues published in late 1970, Roy Thomas and DC writer Mike Friedrich—the same friend, actually, who had suggested that Thomas and O’Neil do an undercover “crossover” in Avengers and Justice League of America— decided to do another one, since Mike was now scripting JLA.

Len Wein

(Left:) In Avengers #85 (Feb. 1971), Roy had Sal Buscema introduce a “good-guy” version of the Squadron Sinister—the far more noteworthy Squadron Supreme—and tossed in a few additional JLA-influenced heroes. Relative newcomer Len Wein—seen in photo at left—did some “ghost-plotting” on this issue under Roy’s direction; the latter is pretty sure that Lady Lark (the Black Canary wannabe), Tom Thumb (a slightly larger Atom type), and maybe the Cockney called, of all things, Hawkeye were Len’s idea, though RT suspects American Eagle was his own concept. Inks by Frank Giacoia; thanks to Barry Pearl. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Right:) The Avenger takeoffs scripted by Mike Friedrich and drawn by Dick Dillin & Joe Giella—with costumes designed by Neal Adams—appeared in JLA #87 (Feb. 1971), and seemed almost too close for comfort to their Marvel counterparts, even in terms of color. Luckily, no one complained too much, so Mike got only minimal grief, if Roy remembers a-right, from editor Julius Schwartz. Repro’d from the Justice League of America Archives, Vol. 10. [©2013 DC Comics.]

Avengers. Fat chance (#94-95). On Throneworld, Emperor Dorrek forces Mar-Vell to create an “omni-wave,” a Kree communications device that in Skrull hands will become a doomsday weapon (#94). Thomas and Adams wrap up the dangling plot threads from their run of the “Inhumans” strip in Amazing Adventures, as The Avengers help Black Bolt reclaim the throne of Attilan from his mad brother, Maximus. The Kree agents who sponsored his coup make a hasty getaway, inexplicably kidnapping Rick Jones and delivering him to Ronan on Hala, capital of the Kree Empire (#95); perhaps they believe him still symbiotically connected to the Kreeborn Mar-Vell? The Avengers stand alone against an Earth-bound Skrull armada while Rick, imprisoned in the chamber of the entity that Thomas has renamed the Intelligence Supreme, watches Ronan preparing the Kree fleet for its own invasion of Earth (#96). The Intelligence Supreme awakens in Rick the vast

Ellison Wonderland Noted science-fiction writer Harlan Ellison (seen with toothsome friend) permitted two comics synopses of his to be used as the bases of a trio of Marvel comics scripted by Roy Thomas: The Avengers #88 (May 1971) & #101 (Oct. 1972) and The Incredible Hulk #140 (June 1971). Harlan’s original plots were printed in A/E #31.

Mike Friedrich

cosmic powers latent in all human beings, immobilizing every Kree and Skrull warrior in the universe, including the Skrull posing as H. Warren Craddock on Earth. The SI has been manipulating events from the start to prevent a useless war between races that, unlike the vital natives of our planet, have reached evolutionary dead ends. He returns a de-powered Rick and The Avengers to Earth, all but a missing-in-action Goliath (#97). The summary above omits many of the saga’s best moments, like #93’s surreal and graphically gorgeous interlude in which AntMan repairs The Vision from the inside, or the simulacra of forgotten Golden Age Marvel heroes created by “Super-Rick” in #97. The star-crossed romance of Wanda and The Vision takes its first baby steps in #92, while Ant-Man finds a clue to the Vision’s true origins an issue later, subplots that will shape The Avengers’ near-future.

“A Traitor Stalks Among Us!”

Barry Smith, his style much changed since his last Avengers art job, returns to pencil #98-100. Goliath, surviving his close encounter with a Skrull kamikaze, turns up in his former identity of Hawkeye, an amnesiac Hercules in tow. Ares and The Enchantress, hot from using the magic of the Ebony Blade to conquer Olympus, turn their sights on Earth. It takes the entire Avengers roster, including the Hulk and Swordsman, to turn aside Ares’ army of demi-gods and put things right. Sal Buscema (#98), Tom Sutton (#99), along with Syd Shores and Joe Sinnott (#100 for both), provide the inks for this myth-laden capstone to a year of

Assembling The Avengers

unforgettable “Avengers” adventures.

Avengers #101 adapts a Harlan Ellison short story originally done as an (unused) “Hawkman” synopsis for DC editor Julius Schwartz, with art provided by inker Dan Adkins and new penciler Rich Buckler. Teamed with longtime Fantastic Four inker Joe Sinnott, Buckler illustrates the three-part return of the Sentinels. During the mission to foil the mutant-hunting robots’ plan to sterilize mankind with a solar flare, a Sentinel’s analysis declares The Vision to be of “three decades vintage,” and a critically injured Quicksilver vanishes into thin air (#102-104). The Avengers’ search for Pietro will drive the next few storylines, but it will be conducted without Roy Thomas: #104 is his last issue as the title’s scripter. In the summer of 1972, Marvel’s new corporate owners promote Stan Lee to publisher. Named to succeed Stan as editor-in-chief, Roy reluctantly turns The Avengers over to Steve Englehart. One of a new generation of fans-turned-pros entering the industry in the early ‘70s, Englehart has already proven himself on titles like Hero for Hire, The Defenders, and Captain America. Steve’s stint on Avengers will be remembered for its exploration and expansion of the Marvel Universe, for its intricate multi-title plotlines, and for the first company-wide crossover... sort of. After a John Buscema-drawn battle with The Beast-Brood (#105), Englehart resolves a thorny problem with Captain America’s backstory. In Tales of Suspense #95 back in 1967, Cap was publicly unmasked. Two years later, in Captain America #111, he staged his own death in a manner that led the public to believe “Steve Rogers” had been a cover identity. Somehow in the interim, the old status quo has been restored: Cap’s secret identity is once again known only to his fellow Avengers and his friends at S.H.I.E.L.D. Avengers #106-108 expose this paradox as the work of The Grim Reaper and his current partner, the long-forgotten Space Phantom, who used his extraterrestrial technology to erase all memory of Cap’s revelation. Englehart’s penchant for exploring the emotional lives of his cast comes to the fore as Hawkeye, his ego bruised by The Scarlet Witch’s rejection of his romantic overtures, quits the team in a snit (#109). Wanda’s relief at learning Quicksilver is alive and well in Attilan is shattered when Pietro has a tizzy over her romance with The Vision. Already in hypnotic control of The X-Men, Magneto lures The Avengers into his snare, adding Cap, Wanda, and Iron Man to his mini-army of mesmerized slaves (#110). Thor, Vision, and the Panther fly to San Francisco where, after a dust-up with an embittered Hawkeye (Daredevil #99), they recruit DD and The Black Widow to help with the rescue. With Magneto beaten and his

Golden Age Forever! Gil Kane’s cover for Avengers #97, as inked by Bill Everett—juxtaposed with a “One Minute Later” commission piece penciled by Michael Netzer and inked by Joe Rubinstein for collector Michael Finn. What a fun way to end the Kree-Skrull War, huh? The Golden-Agers got their shot! [Published cover ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.; heroes in above art TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

captives free, the duo are offered Avengers membership. Daredevil declines; Natasha accepts (#111). After a single adventure against the Lion God, a psychopathic African deity, the Widow resigns from active duty and returns to Frisco (#112). When the Vision/Scarlet Witch affair becomes publicly known, a band of suicidal bigots called The Living Bombs do their best to assassinate the amorous android (#113). A pair of shadowy figures lurking in the background of the previous two issues are revealed in #114 as The Swordsman, weary of crime and seeking a second chance as an Avenger, and his gal pal Mantis, an empathic Vietnamese martial artist. Following Rich Buckler’s final issue as penciler (#106) and a fillin by Jim Starlin (#107), Don Heck returns to The Avengers with #108. Heck’s style has changed in the intervening years, becoming broader and more “cartoony,” but his storytelling has lost none of its assurance. After three issues of lush Dave Cockrum inking (#106-108, including flashback sequences in all three drawn by George Tuska), the assignment rotates through Frank McLaughlin (#109), Frank Giacoia (#110), Mike Esposito (#110-111), and Frank Bolle (#112-13). [Continued on p. 35]

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

This Means War! By now, virtually everybody who wants to has seen one of the various quality paperback or even hardcover reprintings of The Avengers #89-97 of 1971-72, which were retroactively christened “The KreeSkrull War.” Roy Thomas launched the conflict with penciler Sal Buscema (#89-92)… then bombshell Neal Adams (seen in 1960s photo) came aboard for #93-96 and really helped kick it into high gear… finally, John Buscema, who’d penciled one chapter in #94, helped RT end the hostilities in #97… with inking along the way by Sam Grainger, Sal Buscema, George Roussos, and Tom Palmer. Seen above and at right are the covers of four of the nine Marvel UK issues of The Avengers which feature the “Kree/Skrull War” story arc, including two that were drawn in the USA especially for the black-&-white British weekly, which split full-issue comics stories between two editions and thus needed two covers per tale. Unfortunately, if we can judge from Neal’s cover for our #72, reprinted on #148, which was the final Marvel UK issue, the Brits didn’t learn how the war came out till they got hold of American issues! Thanks to the Grand Comics Database for the scans. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

The Avengers Get A New Recruit—Direct From Cimmeria! (Left:) While we’re spotlighting British UK covers: Weirdly, the cover of the UK Avengers weekly #95, from 1975, which came out before the “KreeSkrull War” issues, showcases Barry Smith’s cover art for the USA Avengers #100 (June 1972)— which of course came out after our #89-97. Go figure! This was also the edition that debuted Conan, spotlighting a cover figure by John Buscema. Thanks to the GCD. [Avengers art ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.; Conan art ©2013 Conan Properties International LLD.]

Neal Adams

Assembling The Avengers

Rich Buckler (seated) and Roy Thomas, reunited at a Big Apple con in New York City a few years back. Thanks to Jerry K. Boyd.

Switchblades And Sentinels Recently recruited penciler Rich Buckler opened Avengers #102 (Aug. 1972) with a moody flourish (see at left)—quite appropriate for The Vision—but on pp. 10-11 (see below) a new factor entered the equation: the mutant-hunting Sentinels, back from their suicidal flight into the sun at the end of The X-Men #59 (Aug. 1969) for only their third appearance. This time they were seeking Quicksilver and The Scarlet Witch, among others. Roy and Rich wove a three-issue tapestry in #102-104 that included elements from a plot submitted on spec by (and duly credited to) young Marvel intern Chris Claremont. Chris would have lots more to say about both mutants and Sentinels, starting just a few years later. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Chris Claremont

A Look Back At The Formative Years Of “Some Of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”

Enter Englehart! The third regular Avengers scribe, Steve Englehart—and the Rich Buckler/Joe Sinnott cover of issue #108 (Feb. 1973), repro’d from a scan of the original art, courtesy of collector/dealer Mike (“romitaman”) Burkey. Steve was already making a name for himself as the writer of a very successful run on Captain America—so he must’ve figured, what the hey, he might as well take over the rest of The Avengers, too! He did them up proud, as well. A/E co-publisher John Morrow provided the photo of Steve, from a vintage issue of Marvel’s FOOM Magazine. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Steve Englehart

A Heck Of A Comeback (Above:) With the splash page of Avengers #111 (May 1973), Don Heck proved that he could still draw some of the best-looking women in Marveldom as he returned to what had been, along with the early “Iron Man” feature in Tales of Suspense, his signature comic. Inks by Mike Esposito; script by Steve Englehart. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scan. (Left:) Comics readers weren’t the only people taking note of Heck’s talents. This 1976 puzzle made use of Captain America artwork by Don. It’s probably from a Marvel Comics page somewhere-or-other, but we’re not sure quite where. Thanks to R. Gary Land. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

[Continued from p. 31]

Assembling The Avengers

A Coda On The Avengers/Defenders Clash— And Beyond

As chance would have it, our survey of the first decade of The Avengers—from the Sept. 1963-dated issue #1 through at latest the Sept. 1973-dated #115—ends just as the creative team are beginning what is, up to this point at least, the ultimate Marvel crossover. The company’s readers, of course, are hardly strangers to crossovers, even at this juncture—but what Steve Englehart concocts for the summer of 1973 will set a new benchmark. The Avengers #115-118 and The Defenders #8-11, with pencils by Bob Brown and Sal Buscema, will be revolutionary for more reasons than simply having two titles share the same story arc for four consecutive months. For the first time, what will happen in a single title will be shown to affect every corner of the Marvel Universe, an early outlier of the kind of company-wide event that will dominate the line from the mid-’80s on. In issue #115, Dormammu, arch-foe of Dr. Strange, promises to restore Loki’s vision (which was lost in Thor #207) in exchange for the Asgardian’s helping dupe Strange’s “non-team,” The

Avengers Forever! Came the summer of 2012, at last the whole world knew what only comics readers and TV cartoon addicts had known: that The Avengers was one of the coolest super-hero franchises ever, and that the whole can be more than the sum of its parts. And it all happened just one year shy of the mag’s halfcentury anniversary! [Still ©2013 Marvel Studios & Paramount Studios.]

Defenders—the Hulk, Sub-Mariner, Silver Surfer, Hawkeye, and the new Valkyrie—into retrieving the scattered pieces of the Evil Eye. This will bring them into conflict with The Avengers, who must prevent the Eye from being reassembled. The result will be what has come to be known as “The Avengers/Defenders War”— although Englehart prefers to use the term “Avengers/Defenders Clash.” What will ultimately make The Avengers/Defenders Clash stand out is a single page of Avengers #118. Eleven panels show Dormammu’s demon plague being resisted by everyone from Spider-Man to Ghost Rider, Luke Cage to Ka-Zar, even such unlikely heroes as Dr. Doom and Dracula. This single crowded page of Bob Brown art expresses as never before the scope and cohesiveness of the Marvel Universe. And Englehart is just getting warmed up. He will go on, beginning in issue #120 an epic that will span three galaxies and millions of years, touch the lives of dozens of characters, witness three super-hero weddings and, for the first time, the death of an Avenger. It will be the most ambitious, farreaching story yet seen in the title.

All this, however, lies just beyond the horizon as the Avengers title completes its tenth year of creative life. It must be left to others—or at least to another magazine—to continue this history. There is, of course, no substitute for reading the originals. All the comics cited here are available in a wide variety of formats and prices, from the ultra-affordable black-&-white Essentials to the deluxe Omnibuses, so you have no excuse! I’m confident you’ll find, as I did, that (to paraphrase The Swordsman), there’s something about being an Avengers fan that gets into your blood and never lets go.

What’s Brown And Read All Over? Bob Brown surveys his very first splash page for The Avengers: Issue #113 (July 1973), as inked by veteran Frank Bolle—and scripted, of course, by Steve Englehart. Soon Steve, Bob, and their pal Sal (Buscema, that is) would be up to their epaulets in “The Avengers/Defenders Clash” that would segue between the mags starring those two Marvel super-groups. Thanks to Sal Amendola for the photo of Bob Brown. [Page ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Kurt Mitchell

[KURT MITCHELL is a former business process analyst and database designer who has found his true calling as a comics historian. A graduate of the University of Washington, he resides in Tacoma, where he is currently saving up to buy his own quinjet.]

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E.C. STONER – The Forgotten Trailblazer A Rare Look At An Early African-American Comic Book Artist by Ken Quattro

UTHOR’S INTRODUCTION: This is a piece long in development and long overdue. I couldn’t have completed it without the help of many fine people. I’d like to express my thanks to: Dr. Michael Vassallo, Will Murray, Allan Holtz, Samuel Joyner, Hames Ware, and the late Jerry Bails.

I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe; nor am I one of your Hollywood movie ectoplasms. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids—and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me. —Ralph Ellison, prologue to his novel Invisible Man.

Pens & Peanuts

f you think Matt Baker was the first African-American to work in comic books, you are wrong. Elmer Cecil Stoner had him beat by the better part of a decade.

He was the son of a church sexton from the Pennsylvania coalmining town of Wilkes-Barre. Born October 20, 1897, Elmer was the eldest of three children and part of the small portion of the town’s mainly immigrant population that was black. Or, as the census-takers would describe them, “mulatto“—the vague term used for light-skinned blacks. Beyond those scraps of information there is little known about Elmer’s early years except for a story long associated with him that bears some scrutiny. According to several respected sources, Stoner was the creator of the “Mr. Peanut” character for the Planter Peanuts Company. (Hames Ware has confirmed that Stoner’s widow, Henriette, had that among his accomplishments when she filled out the questionnaire for the Who’s Who of American Comic Books database.)

Founded in 1906, the Planters company was indeed from Wilkes-Barre, where Stoner was living at the time. In 1916, it sponsored a contest to find a company logo. As the story is recounted

Art On The Walls—Art In The Halls E.C. Stoner at home—and his cover for Fox’s Blue Beetle #31 (June 1944). All art and photos accompanying this article, unless otherwise noted, were provided by author Ken Quattro. The photo was sent to him by Samuel Joyner, from an unidentified 1940s magazine piece. Blue Beetle is now a trademark of DC Comics. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

E.C. Stoner—The Forgotten Trailblazer

in the official history on the company’s website: Introduced in 1916, the debonair marketing image of Mr. Peanut derived from a crude drawing by a Virginia schoolboy. Prompted by a nation-wide logo contest sponsored by the Planters Company, (14-yearold) schoolboy Antonio Gentile won $5 for his design submission of Mr. Peanut. Then, a professional illustrator enhanced the youngster’s drawing, adding the top hat, monocle, and cane. While it’s entirely possible that Stoner was employed as a professional illustrator in 1916 (he would have been 18 or 19 years old), there are facts that cast some doubt. I’ve located his draft registration card, which is dated September 12, 1918. In the section of the card that notes his occupation, Stoner has written “porter” and his employer as “F. W. They Call Me Mister Peanut! Woolworth Co.” A July 24, 1917, advertisement introducing Although this is some Mr. Peanut. Whether or not Elmer Stoner was involved as a youngster in the character’s two years after the creation is a matter of controversy and creation of the Planters conjecture. [©2013 the respective copyright logo, it seems unlikely holders.] that Stoner would have gone from being an illustrator to a porter. Perhaps he was employed by the Planters company as an in-house artist at the time, maybe as a temporary worker. However, since it is still a possibility—and a great story— let it stand with a question mark in parentheses.

scholarship. When he did attend, exactly, is harder to determine.

Harlem Days The 1920 census reveals that Elmer was still living at home with his parents in that year. He would have been 22 at the time the census was taken. By 1922, though, Stoner was living in New York. It appears, then, that Elmer attended college sometime between the January 1920 census-taking and his showing at an art exhibit in August 1922. This exhibition of “Negro” artists was held at the Harlem branch of the New York Public Library. Among the high points hailed by head librarian Ernestine Rose were “the charcoal illustrations of Elmer C. Stoner,” which, she noted, “were splendidly planned and executed.” [The Southern Workman, pp. 542-543.] Note that Stoner’s immersion into the New York art world corresponds with the advent of the Harlem Renaissance. The Harlem Renaissance was the period of African-American intellectual and artistic flowering straddling the 1920s that centered around that New York community. This re-discovery and awakening of black culture nurtured such talents as Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Duke Ellington. It’s no wonder that Stoner was drawn there: [I]t was a pretty nifty place to live. Crime, dope, and poverty were scarcely visible, protest and militancy were polite, the streets were clean, and, above all, bourgeois aspiration prevailed. [New York Times, “Harlem’s History through a Camera,” Oct. 16, 1971.] Elmer Stoner was newly married when he and his wife Vivienne befriended another couple, Nella Larsen and her husband, Dr. Elmer Imes. Larsen was a writer—with time, one of the most important to emerge from the era. It’s probable that Larsen met Stoner when she was an assistant librarian in the same 135th Street branch where Elmer had exhibited his artwork.

According to Larsen’s biography, In Search of Nella Larsen by George Hutchinson, the Stoners had moved from their home in Harlem in 1924 to Greenwich Village, where “Vi” opened a gift shop on Christopher Street. The two couples often played bridge and were part of a tight-knit circle of African-Americans who lived in The Village.

There is also significance in Stoner’s employment by the F.W. Woolworth Company. At one time, the seemingly ubiquitous fiveand-dime store was in nearly every town. One of the partners in Woolworth’s was a man named Fred Morgan Kirby. Kirby was originally a competitor of Woolworth; in 1911 their two companies were combined into one. Kirby’s original store in Wilkes-Barre location became a regional headquarters. Reading between the lines, it is a fair assumption that Kirby was aware of Stoner and his talent. Fred Kirby was a philanthropist, particularly dedicated to the early 20th-century version of civil rights. Among his charitable gifts was the establishment of the Chair of Civil Rights at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania. As Stoner was known to have attended the Wilkes-Barre Academy, it is possible he did so with the help of Kirby, through a gift or a

You’re Standing In A Draft Stoner’s draft registration, dated Sept. 12, 1918. He would have been approximately 20 years old at this time.

A Rare Look At An Early African-American Comic Book Artist

The Stoners hosted parties and hobnobbed with the intellectual elite of the community. While it’s not entirely clear how Stoner was earning a living, he was successful enough (in 1925) to be partowner of an apartment building at 203 W. 122nd Street in Harlem. The Stoners’ marriage, however, wasn’t nearly as successful. The Larsen biography mentions that, a few days after the Jack Dempsey-Jack Sharkey heavyweight championship bout (July 22, 1927), Vi Stoner showed up at Larsen’s home with a new boyfriend.

Entry Into Comics From that point, I’ve found no trace of Elmer until the publication in 1930 of the children’s book Mic Mac on the Track, written by Zillah K. Macdonald and illustrated by Stoner. His trail picks up again in the early 1930s when, according to his Who’s Who entry, he was employed as the art director at Tower Magazines. The 1929 debut of the Tower Magazines introduced a (then) unique concept in marketing. The line of magazines, mainly oriented toward women and children, was to have exclusive distribution through the F.W. Woolworth store chain. Initially, the sales of such titles as Illustrated Love, Home, Tiny Tower, and Serenade

Which Witch Came First? Stoner’s cover for the pulp-style magazine The Witch’s Tales, Vol. 1, #1 (Nov. 1936). Its progenitor, The Witch’s Tale, was a popular thriller radio show of that era, a forerunner of the spooky host Raymond on Suspense and of the E.C. Ghoulunatics who later introduced Tales from the Crypt and the like. It had debuted in 1931. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

were brisk. But by 1935, printing costs drove the company to bankruptcy. A series of nasty court battles ensued, with several Tower executives indicted for mail fraud and a lawsuit by the disgraced company president, Catherine McNellis, against its secret financial backer, Fred M. Kirby. The connection of Kirby to Tower Magazines lends credence to the possibility that Stoner was indeed employed at that publisher. If he was, however, it is likely he wasn’t the art director. The names of several different Tower Publishing art directors have been verified, such as Vern Noll and Hugh Ryan, but nothing other than the Who’s Who entry has mentioned Stoner. Once again, the fading memories of his widow likely exaggerated his position. With the collapse of Tower, Stoner probably freelanced as a pulp illustrator. Among his pulp efforts were the covers to Carwood Publishing’s The Witch’s Tales #1 and #2 (Nov. & Dec. 1936), as well as several interior illustrations.

Detecting The Credits The “Speed Saunders” feature was penciled in Detective Comics #1 (March 1937) by E.C. Stoner, which of course was published by the brand new entity Detective Comics, Inc. Craig Flessel was the inker, but the Grand Comics Database also credits Stoner with writing the story. Was this perhaps based on information supplied by Stoner’s widow? Repro’d from DC’s Millennium Edition reprint. [©2013 DC Comics.]

Around the same time, Elmer Stoner did his initial comic book work. A reader opening to the first story in Detective Comics #1 (March 1937) would find “Speed Saunders,” with pencils by Stoner and inks by Creig Flessel. This seems to be just a one-time effort by Stoner, though, as “Saunders’” next appearance, in issue #3, is credited solely to Flessel.

During the interim, according to Who’s Who, Elmer worked on the railroads exhibit “panorama” at the 1939 New York World’s Fair. Some clarification of that statement is in order. Under the

E.C. Stoner—The Forgotten Trailblazer

In A Timely Fashion (Above left:) This black-&-white image of the “Breeze Barton” splash from Daring Mystery Comics #3 (April 1940) was provided to Ken Q. by Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. Pencils by Jack Binder; inks by E.C. Stoner. To view this page in color, pick up a copy of Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age Daring Mystery, Vol. 1. (Somehow, Marvel left the word “Comics” out of the hardcover’s title.) Stoner is also credited by that book’s art-identifiers as inking Binder’s “Breeze” tale in DMC #5, but not in #4; those are the only three issues in which that hero appeared. Chances are that, when this story was produced, Great Britain and France had only recently declared war on Nazi Germany; note that, presciently, the unknown scripter has the war still going on in 1945. (Above right:) Stoner is credited with inking Binder’s pencils on “Flexo the Rubber Man” in the first two issues of Timely’s Mystic Comics; and with #3 (June 1940), seen here, he seems to have penciled that feature and left the inking to other Binder shop hands. Repro’d from Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age Mystic Comics, Vol. 1, not from the original mag. [©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

direction of designer Paul Perhune, Stoner was probably one of the artists involved with the creation of the huge (160' x 40') diorama in the “Railroads at Work” exhibit. During this time, he also illustrated a children’s book for young Fair-goers entitled Seeing the World’s Fair.

The time required for these projects likely accounts for the gap between Stoner’s first comic work and his starting his comic career in earnest when he emerges as a member of the Harry “A” Chesler

Here Comes The Sun, Man! (Left:) “Ajax the Sun Man,” drawn by Stoner, appeared in issues of Street & Smith’s Doc Savage Comics between 1940 and 1943. Jack Binder is credited with art on some “Ajax” stories; his brother Otto, just then becoming a top “Captain Marvel” scribe at Fawcett after years of writing pulp sciencefiction, reportedly scripted “Ajax” in 1941-42. This splash page is from Doc Savage Comics #3 (Feb. 1941).. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

A Rare Look At An Early African-American Comic Book Artist

Marvels & Phantoms & Devils Among the numerous things Stoner drew for Dell is this splash page of “The Marvel Man” for Popular Comics #66 (Aug. 1941)—the cover (and lead story) of The Funnies #46 (August 1940)—and this page of “The Night Devils” from War Comics #5 (1942). [©2013 the respective copyright holders.] The former strip, often titled “Martan the Marvel Man,” ran in Popular from #46-71, between the end of 1939 and the beginning of 1942. Stoner doesn’t appear to have been its original artist. “Phantasmo, the Master of the World” did his thing in The Funnies #45-64, from 1940-42, with Stoner as the original artist; the hero soon got a sidekick named Whizzer McGee. Guess it’s lonely mastering the world all by yourself. “The Night Devils” was an odd strip to be appearing in a mag called War Comics—but if Timely’s and Fawcett’s heroes could fight the Axis, why not the mysterious heroes of this series? Stoner apparently drew both their appearances.

shop circa 1939. The burgeoning comic book industry was a welcome situation for any artist looking for work during the Depression, and particularly to an African-American one. There was little discrimination when it came to acquiring art to fill the pages of a comic, as comic shop owners took whoever would work for the fees that they were paying. Working through a shop offered a secondary bonus for Stoner, as it provided a buffer between him and an editor should the latter be reluctant to employ a black man. Much of Stoner’s Chesler output has been found at rival Timely Comics, in particular, as Jack Binder’s inker on “Breeze Barton” in early issues of Daring Mystery Comics. Shortly thereafter, in 1940, Binder, Chesler’s art director, broke off to form his own studio. One of the artists to come along with him was Stoner: By March of 1941, the shop’s output had grown to 95 pages a month, a total of $1,150.00 worth of work. Newcomers included Dave Beens, Arnold Hicks, Ben Nee,

E.C. Stoner—The Forgotten Trailblazer

You Know The Drill! Another giant figure by Stoner— on the cover of Hawley’s Hi-Spot Comics #1 (Nov. 1940), in this case a symbolic representati on of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ hero David Innes of Pellucidar. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

Victor Fox’s re-entry into the comic book industry meant the reintroduction of some old super-heroes and the creation of new ones. Blue Beetle and The Green Mask both picked up in their own titles again, and both were initially depicted by Stoner. In a series of e-mails over the last months of his life, Jerry Bails confirmed for me that the Stoner stint on Blue Beetle comics ran from #31 (June 1944) to #45 (June 1947), during which Stoner supplied either a cover, interior artwork, or both. An odd recurring theme of Stoner’s work of this period were his “pin-up” covers. Blue Beetle #38, The Bouncer #10, and Green Mask, Vol. 2, #2, all had the lead character singularly posed, with a handwritten “pin-up” notation nearby. Were these intended to be removed from the comic and treated as a poster? Who knows? Interestingly, Elmer had at least one fan on staff at the Communist Party USA’s newspaper, The Daily Worker. Wrote Eugene Gordon in a 1944 profile of Stoner: “Stoner is working right now on a 30-page volume of the Blue Beetle continuity. This renowned counter-spy is known to our troops on all battlefronts, and, being the practical anti-fascist that he is, Stoner sees to it that the Blue Beetle carries a practical lesson. [Daily Worker, May 21, 1944.]

and Elmer Stoner, one of the few black artists to work in the comics. [Jim Steranko’s History of Comics 2, pp. 32-37.] While at Binder’s, Stoner has been credited with work for Fawcett (“Spy Smasher”) and Street & Smith. Along with the titular feature in early issues of the latter’s Doc Savage Comics, Stoner also drew “Ajax the Sun Man.” It was the comics published by Dell/Western, though, that featured Stoner most prominently. Beginning in 1940, Elmer drew a variety of covers for Popular Comics and The Funnies. The covers, depicting the interior strips “Gang Busters,” “Martan the Marvel Man,” and especially “Phantasmo,” clearly reveal Stoner’s cleanlined, if somewhat awkward, style. Frequently, he drew the interior art as well, such as the “Night Devils” feature that ran in Dell’s War Stories. His Phantasmo covers often showed the awesomely powered hero as a giant, perhaps owing something to Bernard Baily’s contemporary Spectre covers at DC. The over-sized hero motif appeared on many of his covers throughout his career, including the one-shot Hi-Spot Comics #2 (Nov. 1940) for Hawley.

As is readily apparent, Stoner’s work was not in the league of Eisner or Kirby or Fine. He was, after all, a middle-aged fine artist who had only worked in advertising and magazine illustration, now trying to make the jarring transition to comic books. The techniques and requirements of sequential storytelling were new to him, and it was apparent. But he was competent and, perhaps more importantly, available. With the U.S. entry into World War II, most of the able-bodied young artists were service-bound, and those who remained found steady work, including Elmer Stoner.

Features For Fox By 1944, Stoner appears to have left Binder’s employ. His presence in Feature’s Prize Comics #39-41 seems to indicate he did some work through artist Bernard Baily’s studio. His main source of income during this period, though, was the S.M. “Jerry” Iger shop… which, among other things, produced whole comic book issues for Fox Publications.

The Challenger Of The Unknown This cover by E.C. Stoner must belong to the first of the four circa 1945-46 issues of Interfaith’s The Challenger—since it’s the only one of the series’ covers that will fill a blank space in the monumental Gerber Picto-Journal Guide to Comic Books. Another mystery solved! [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

A Rare Look At An Early African-American Comic Book Artist

Competition For Betty Grable? Stoner’s covers for Fox’s The Bouncer #10 (1944)… Blue Beetle #38 (Summer 1945)… and The Green Mask #13 (Summer ’45). The Bouncer issue was actually the first (of five) featuring a Greek statue that came to life— courtesy, if we recall aright, of young scripter Bob Kanigher. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

Even though Gordon evidently never read a Blue Beetle comic book, he still provides some interesting background: Right now, in between doing his Blue Beetle continuities and painting portraits, he shows up regularly at USO centers to draw for servicemen and servicewomen. One of the USO centers is Harlem’s, where, also, he teaches the soldiers to sketch. He occasionally gives art lectures as a means of improving Negro-white relations.

Proving his commitment to this end, Stoner provided artwork for Interfaith Publications’ 1945 comic series The Challenger. The comic’s high-minded purpose was to be “a magazine pledged to fight race prejudice, discrimination, and all other forms of fascism in North America.” In an interview I once conducted with Al Feldstein, that artist, writer, and editor made the following comments in relation to working with Matt Baker, but they are a commentary on the contemporary comic industry as a whole: “[W]hen I returned from Service in 1945 and took my old job back at the S.M. Iger Studio, Matt Baker was there… and I was assigned a drawing board right next to his. As I recall, he was treated as an equal by all of us, which his

E.C. Stoner—The Forgotten Trailblazer

Have A Jolly, Jolly Christmas! Stoner drew the cover and interior art (such as the two-page spread above) for the Gould-Stoner Company’s one and only Christmas Play Book, 1946. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

known, but the fact that no other publication was forthcoming from Gould-Stoner seems to indicate that it effectively killed the company.

unique, special, and outstanding talent demanded. He was well respected for his talent. But this was 1945-6… and the Racial Divide in America was still pretty much with us. Matt, I am sure, was acutely aware of this unwritten abomination… as were the rest of us… so it kept all of us apart.”

Blackstone & Beyond Despite the steady income, Stoner had aspirations beyond drawing comics. “With all the commercial stuff I am doing,” Gordon quotes him, “I still like to paint. I still hope, some day, to work in fine arts.” It would be several years before Stoner’s hope became a reality.

But Stoner wasn’t without work. The first issue of Blackstone, Master Magician (March-April 1946) featured both a Stoner cover and interior artwork illustrating Walter Gibson’s text. As for Blackstone #3 (July-Aug. 1946): “That was done by William C. Popper,” Gibson told historian Will Murray, “who also published under the name of Vital Publications.” [Will Murray, “Gibson’s Secret Comics Career.”] Walter Gibson is mostly remembered as the writer of Street & Smith’s pulp and comic book versions of The Shadow. Gibson was

Elmer obviously wanted to be a publisher, as well. In 1946, he and a partner with the last name of Gould (the first name yet to be determined) established Gould-Stoner Company, and on October 8th of that year, they copyrighted their one and only publication, Christmas Play Book.

The concept was straightforward—a child’s activity pamphlet, 16 pages in length, containing puzzles, games, and Stoner drawings throughout. It was distributed through department stores and, apparently, also by 20th Century-Fox. It seemed innocent enough: Fox bought the pamphlet from Gould-Stoner and was selling it to exhibitors, who would in turn distribute it to movie-goers. Except that, in 1945, Fox had bought another publication with the name of Christmas Play Book and the publishers of that were now suing both Fox and GouldStoner for copyright infringement and damages of $100,000. The outcome of the suit isn’t

A Real-Life Hero (Left:) Blackstone the Master Magician #1 (March-April 1946), from Vital Publications—evidently in association with Street & Smith—sported a signed E.C. Stoner cover. (Right:) It probably led to the 1948 Blackstone tour poster seen at right. Noted Shadow author Walter Gibson wrote the “Blackstone” story in the comic. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

A Rare Look At An Early African-American Comic Book Artist

also a good friend of the real-life Harry Blackstone and scripted his manifestation as a comic character at each of his various publishers. Vital’s version of Blackstone ran only three issues, all with Stoner art. When that series ended, the title was picked up and briefly published by M.C. Gaines’ Educational Comics (EC). That single issue, again containing Stoner art, was cover-dated “Fall 1947” and was titled Blackstone the Magician Fights Crime. With Gaines’ death that year, the title was picked up once again, this time by Timely, but without Stoner as its artist. Elmer wasn’t quite done with the Master Magician, though. He also provided the cover art to several programs that were Stoner Was Worth His Salt distributed at the real Harry Blackstone’s magic shows in The cover and an interior page from The Story of Salt (1949), one of the commercial giveaway comics drawn by Stoner. Scripter unknown. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.] the late 1940s. It should be noted that Stoner’s artwork African-American cartoonists from Philadelphia—Samuel Joyner is noticeably more polished, and he even uses a different signature and Cal Massey—made their way to New York and to Stoner’s than in his comic book work. studio. As his work in newsstand comics diminished, Stoner’s work on “Elmer Stoner and Ted Shearer were the highest-paid cartoonists giveaways increased. The 1949 giveaway comic The Story of Salt I met starting out in the business around 1949 and the early 1950s,” was a 16-page Stoner creation depicting the history of that allJoyner wrote to me. “I understand Stoner owned the apartment important mineral for the Leslie Salt Company of San Francisco. building where his studio was located. He had a baby grand piano By this time, Alvin Hollingsworth, Ezra Jackson, and Matt in his living room (as a beginner, I was really impressed). He was Baker—African-Americans all—had each followed a similar path painting full-color calendars for Pennsylvania Railroad Company.” through the comic shop system. In fact, Stoner’s employment at the The apartment at 228 W. 13th Street in Greenwich Village was Binder, Iger, and Baily shops coincided at times with each of them. the residence of Elmer and his wife Henriette for many years. It Was he a conduit for the younger black artists into the comic also was the subject of an anecdote told by Walter Gibson: industry? At this point it is only speculation, but Elmer’s success in comics was readily apparent to some. In the late ’40s, two aspiring He lived in an apartment house. He had the top apartment. He was the only colored man in the apartment, and very friendly with the tenants. Well, one day they came in and there was a big hullabaloo. The guy that owned the apartment said he was going to sell the place. They were afraid rents were going to change. They were protesting. And Stoner comes in. He stopped at the apartments going up. “I want to talk to you about the house. Don’t worry about it. There’s not going to be any raise in the rent, because I bought the place!” [Murray, op. cit.]

Stoner’s work on another series of comics for Vital led directly to the next step in his career. These were the small, oblong-shaped 1948 giveaways distributed through Wisco “99” service stations. Among them were Johnny Starboard and the Underseas Pirates, Blaze Carson, and Jim Solar, Space Sheriff, the last a creation of Stoner’s old Blackstone collaborator, Walter Gibson. Jim Solar was part of the Gibson space-

E.C. Stoner—The Forgotten Trailblazer

Marshal Law The Rick Kane, Space Marshal daily newspaper strip for Aug. 27, 1951; art by Stoner. Script by Walter Gibson. You’d have thought that the staffers at the Enterprising Feature Syndicate would’ve known how to spell “marshal”! Special thanks to Will Murray. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

lawman lineage that included Spurs Jackson in Charlton’s Space Western comic book and Rick Kane, Space Marshal, the short-lived comic strip authored by Gibson and drawn by Stoner. As Gibson recounted to Murray:

followed. Stoner’s body of work both in and outside of the comic book medium was significant. He was a man of substance; he should not remain invisible.

There was a guy named Higgins who was in the syndicate business. I met him through the Ledger Syndicate. We decided to do a comic called Rick Kane, Space Marshal. Stoner did the first for me, and it was like Star Wars, taking off from the world on a trip to Mars. I treated Mars just as you would treat an airplane flight across the ocean. We had it in the New York Post. It ran as a daily. Then there were some problems. Stoner quit. Higgins was handling it. He was one of these promoters, and he wanted to get more money out of it. So he was bleeding him [it?] and trying to grab more money from the people. And he wasn’t paying Stoner. And we were having trouble meeting our deadlines. [Murray, op. cit.] The strip, distributed by the Enterprising Feature Syndicate, only ran from the summer of 1951 until early in 1952, with Stoner’s work on it ending sometime sooner. Stoner sued the syndicate to restrain it from continuation of Rick Kane with another artist (Walter Johnson), as it violated the terms of his contract. A judge disagreed and on December 17, 1951, he denied Stoner’s request. Elmer C. Stoner apparently left comics around this time. Except for an educational comic entitled Deadline, The Story behind the Headline, produced in 1957, I’ve found no other publication in that medium carrying his name. His reputation outside the comic industry, however, apparently continued to grow. By the mid-’50s, Stoner realized his dream of being recognized as a fine artist, aided perhaps by selling his work through his wife’s art gallery, Talents Unlimited. Although Elmer was accorded many honors during the waning years of his life, one unique and likely lucrative honor was his role as a spokesman for Gordon’s Gin in a series of print ads that ran in various AfricanAmerican publications of the mid-to-late 1960s. On December 16, 1969, Elmer Stoner passed away. Since then, he has been largely forgotten by the comic book industry and overlooked as a trailblazer. He was no Jackie Robinson; his presence in the comic industry didn’t alter its course. He did, however, pave the way for Alvin Hollingsworth, Matt Baker, Ezra Jackson, Cal Massey, and for every African-American artist who

Here’s To Success! In this print ad from the June 1966 issue of Ebony magazine, “noted artist, author, and editor” Elmer C. Stoner equated artistic striving with purchasing just the right brand of gin… while his wife Henriette hovered in the background. Such ads were prestigious (and probably paid fairly well, too), and showed the reputation as a fine artist that Stoner had come to enjoy in his later years. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

A Rare Look At An Early African-American Comic Book Artist

E.C. STONER Checklist

[The following Checklist is adapted primarily from information found in the online edition of Who’s Who of American Comic Books 1928-1999, established by Jerry G. Bails (see display ad on p. 53). Names of features which appeared both in comics of that title and in other magazines are generally not italicized. Key: (a) = full art; (p) = pencils only; (i) = inks only.]

Name: Elmer Cecil (E.C.) Stoner (1897-1969) – artist

Education: Wilkes-Barre Academy, Pennsylvania; protégé of F.M. Kirby, philanthropist

Print Media: Art director: Tower Magazines (publishing co.) 193237; artist: (possible) creator of Mr. Peanut for Planters (at age 15); artist: posters during World War I. Commercial Art & Design: 1939 New York World’s Fair – The RR Train Panorama Exhibit Fine Arts: Artist: commissioned to do portraits of first black colonels in the U.S. Army – painter: exhibits, water colors & oils – painter: murals for hotels & restaurants Honors: Artist Laureate of Pennsylvania; Cresson traveling scholarship to Europe; G.V. Congress Brotherhood Award (posthumously) 1970; Outstanding Son of Pennsylvania 1950; Packward Prize – no date; Priz de Rome – no date

Syndication: Rick Kane, Space Marshal (a) 1951

Promotional Comics: Educational features (a) premiums for Christmas Book (20th Century-Fox); educational features (a) premiums for Eveready Flashlights, Jeep, C&O Railroad; educational features

The United Nations—Comic Book Style

Marshaling Their Forces

This page winds up an episode of “Ted O’Neil of the Commandos” in Feature/Prize’s flagship title Prize Comics #39 (Fall 1944). Never in real life, alas, on or off the battlefield, would the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union achieve the kind of jovial harmony depicted on this World War II-era page. Art by Stoner; writer unknown. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

(Above:) This 1951 newspaper ad—perhaps in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat in Missouri—trumpets the arrival of the Stonerdrawn, Gibson-written strip Rick Kane, Space Marshal. Alas, it didn’t last long. With special thanks to Allan Holtz. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

E.C. Stoner—The Forgotten Trailblazer

Harvey Comics: Revenge of the Zombies (a) 1940 Interfaith Publications: The Challenger (a) c. 1945

Marvel/Timely Comics: Breeze Barton (a) 1940; Flexo (a) 1940 Parents’ Magazine Press: True Comics (a) 1941-42

Rural Home Publishing: Mr. Ree (a) c. 1944-45

Street & Smith Comics: Ajax the Sun Man (a) 1941; Blackstone (a) 1946 (Imprint: Vital Publications); Doc Savage (a) 1940-41; Iron Munro (a) c. 1940-41

What’s Blue And Green And Read All Over? (Above:) By the time of this action page from Fox’s Blue Beetle #33 (Aug. 1944), the hero had come a long way, baby, from the early days when artist Lou Fine drew him with a handgun, shooting the weapons out of the hands of gangsters. (Top right:) The cover of The Green Mask #10 (also Aug. ’44). Art in both cases by E.C. Stoner; scripters unknown. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

(a) premiums on history of salt, Jeep, C&O Railroads, measurement Comics Studios/Shops: Jack Binder Studio (p)(i) 1940-41; Harry “A” Chesler Studio (p)(i) 1939-40; S.M. Iger Studio (p)(i) c. 1942-48 COMIC BOOK CREDITS (Mainstream U.S. Publications): DC Comics: Speed Saunders (p) 1937

Dell/Western: Convoy (a) 1940-43; covers (a) 1940-43; Gang Busters (a) 1940-43; Martan the Marvel Man (a) 1939-41; Mr. District Attorney (a) c. 1941; Night Devils (a) 1940-43; Phantasmo (a) 194042; war (a) 1942-44; War Heroes (a) 1942-44

EC Comics: Blackstone (a) 1947

Fawcett Publications: Bulletman (a) 1943; Captain Marvel (a) c. 1943-44; Lance O’Casey (a) c. 1943-44; Spy Smasher (a) 1943

Feature/Prize Comics: Ted O’Neil of the Commandos (a) 1943

Fox Comics: Blue Beetle (a) 1943-45; The Bouncer (a) c. 1943-45; Captain Kid (a) 1940; covers (a) 1946; Martin Kane (a) 1950

The WHO’S WHO of American Comic Books 1928-1999 Online Edition Created by Jerry G. Bails FREE – online searchable database – FREE www.bailsprojects.com – No password required

A quarter of a million records, covering the careers of people who have contributed to original comic books in the US.

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A Trio of Twins! Gabby Hayes Western #10 (Sept. 1949) with its photo cover… Gunmaster #2 (Nov 1964—art by Bill Fraccio and Dick Giordano)… and Red Mask #45 (Dec. 1954—art by Frank Bolle). [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

Evil Twins Two! by Michael T. Gilbert

ast issue we spotlighted super-heroes and their deadly doppelgängers. Turns out the Wild West was crawlin’ with ‘em, too! Cowboy heroes like Red Mask and Gunmaster both faced their own Evil Twins. And over at Fawcett, even crabby Gabby Hayes came face to face with himself. Ugh! The Lone Ranger battled his own mirror image in a super-special, er, “Disguise Issue.” Disguise or not, the phony didn’t stand a chance against the real McCoy! But the most famous cowboy twins weren’t even evil. “The Trigger Twins” began in the premier issue of DC’s All-Star Western (#58, continuing the numbering from the cancelled All-Star Comics). Writer Bob Kanigher and artist Carmine Infantino came up with a clever origin story starring identical twins Walt and Wayne Trigger. Walt became a rootin’ tootin’ gun-totin’ sheriff, but was lousy at his job. His more-skilled twin Wayne was a lowly storekeeper, who sometimes pretended to be Walt in a pinch to help out his numbskull brother. And that’s how the West was won. Or should I say—two? The series lasted from May 1951 until December 1960. All-Star Western #116 was the Twins’ last appearance in the original run. A new feature, “Super-Chief,” replaced the dynamic duo for the title’s remaining three issues. The Twins reappeared in Showcase #72 in 1968 (the “Top Gun” issue) and rated their own one-shot reprint in 1973. They occasionally appeared in DC mags thereafter.

Banking On Twins!

Pulling The Trigger!

Evil Twins Two!

The Blue Beetles! Fox’s Blue Beetle also had a thing for deadly doubles. Last issue we featured a weird 1944 story from BB #33, “The Adventure of the Double Cell,” in which an evil genius actually cloned the Blue Beetle.

Very hard to top that one, but how about a Nazi Blue Beetle? Yup! Old Dan Garrett fought Fritz Von Straff, a German version of himself, in issue #27’s “Double Trouble.” But the real Beetle fought another cheap knockoff in Blue Beetle #17, when he set out to discover “Who Is the Mimic?” But wait! There’s more! The same issue had a two-page humor feature called “Benny Bumps.” Half-pint Benny dressed up as the Beetle, only to stumble onto the real thing. Man, that comic was positively infested!!

Had enough? If not, check out the Twice Told Blue Beetle #1 cover below (credited to Lou Fine by the Grand Comics Database), and its Evil Twin Roly-Poly version. Blue Beetle, who starred in the original 1939 cover, was transformed into the Black Hood for the cover of Roly-Poly Comics #15 (June 1946). Adding to the weirdness, the Black Hood never even appeared in the issue. Talk about Evil!

Beetle-Mania! (Clockwise from near right:) “Benny Bumps” from Blue Beetle #17 (Dec. 1942)… “Double Trouble” from BB#27 (Jan. 1944)… “Who Is the Mimic?” from BB #17… . and the double image of Roly-Poly Comics #15 (June 1946) and the original version of that pose, Blue Beetle #1 (Winter 1939). [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

Mr. Monsters! Mr. Monster and his Golden Age counterpart are another pair of non-evil twins. In 1983 I decided to re-invent and re-design an obscure 1940s super-hero from an old coverless comic found at a 1971 comic convention. Mr. Monster’s sole Golden Age adventure was an eight-pager signed by Fred Kelly and buried in the back of Super Duper Comics #3, a 1947 one-shot Canadian comic. For decades, I tried to find out more about this mysterious artist, and asked my readers to do the same. I dreamed of someday thanking him in person, but few facts about Fred Kelly ever surfaced. For all I knew, he might have died decades earlier. In 1986, my old friend Brian Buniak (currently teaching at the Joe Kubert School) drew a one-page spoof imagining what might happen if we ever did meet. (See facing page.) Brian, a Mad magazine alumni, is perhaps best known for his work on Martin Greim’s Thunder-Bunny series in the ’80s, and his recent “Angel and the Ape” stories for DC’s Joe Kubert Presents series. He did an amazing job with the cast from the old Night Court TV series. Eighteen years later, I finally got the chance to compare Brian’s Kelly/Gilbert fantasy encounter with the real thing. Sometime in 2004, Canadian comic scholar Robert Pincombe finally tracked down Fred Kelly. Soon Fred and I were invited as guests of the 2004 Paradie Comics Toronto Con. The whole story can be found in Alter Ego #56 (Feb. 2006).

I was thrilled to finally meet him. He cut an impressive figure, despite having suffered a stroke a year earlier. We sat on a panel together, and at breakfast the next morning, Janet and I had a lovely time chatting with Fred and his wife Rita. I also presented Fred with a signed check, as thanks for having inspired my own character. And Fred signed something as well—the coverless Super Duper comic that had started it all!

Two Mr. Monster Monsters (Above:) Michael T. Gilbert’s cover to Eclipse’s Mr. Monster #1 (Jan. 1985)—and Fred Kelly’s Mr. Monster splash from Bell’s Super Duper Comics #3 (May 1947). Both Kelly and Gilbert signed the comics. [Mr. Monster cover ©2013 Michael T. Gilbert; Canadian art ©2013 the respective copyright holders.] (Below:) Michael T. Gilbert (left) and Fred Kelly (right) at the 2004 Paradise Toronto Comic Convention. [©2013 Michael T. Gilbert.]

When Fred passed on a year later, his sister thanked me for helping revive interest in his comic book career. The recognition received at the end of his life meant a lot to him.

I’ll let you decide how Brian’s imaginary depiction of Fred stacks up to the real thing. As for me, finding out in person was a dream-come-true!

Two Pictures! A 2013 photo of Gilbert standing before a 1940s Fred Kelly “Doc Stearne” page he got from the artist, Fred Kelly—which is framed side by side with Brian Buniak’s Fred Kelly spoof which is printed on the facing page. “Doc Stearne” was the Canadian series that morphed into “Mr. Monster,” and this is possibly the only page from that series still in existence. [©2013 Michael T. Gilbert.]

Too Many Lawsuits! A scene from the Night Court TV show, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1992. [© NBC or successors in interest.]

Evil Twins Two

Fred Kelly Court! Brian Buniak’s imaginary meeting between Gilbert and Kelly was originally printed in Dark Horse’s Mr. Monster #2 (April 1988). [Mr. Monster ©2013 Michael T. Gilbert; other art & script ©2013 Brian Buniak.]

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

Et Tu, Harvey? Not even kiddie comics are immune to the ravages of Evil Twins! Harvey Comics’ devilish Hot Stuff met his in the form of Freezy, the Blue Devil—a troublemaker who blasted ice instead of flames from his trident! Freezy almost created a new Ice Age before Hot Stuff sent him packing. So maybe our devilish hero’s Evil Twin is actually a Good Twin? Hmmm! And, while not evil, that goody-two-shoes Casper the Friendly Ghost certainly has his share of weird duplicates! Is it just me, or is that dead-babies-in-the-window cover a little... unsettling? Brrrrr!

That’s all for now. My thanks to Brian Buniak, Ronn Sutton, and Janet Gilbert. ‘Till next time…

Variations On A Theme! (Counterclockwise from left center:) The covers of Casper the Friendly Ghost #29 (Feb. 1955)… The Friendly Ghost, Casper #52 (Dec. 1962)… #112 (Dec. 1967)… and #41 (Jan. 1962). [©2013 Harvey Comics.]

Comic Fandom Archive

“I Started To Remember...” Memories Of The 1964 New York Comicon— A Very Brief Visit With Steve Ditko, & More, From

BERNIE BUBNIS

Introduction To Special Guest Edition

ne of the great pleasures of writing The Golden Age of Comic Fandom and other books about the history of fandom has been getting to know many of the people I was writing about, but had only known “in the old days” as names on a dittoed or mimeographed page. One such fan is Bernie Bubnis.

In our profile/interview with Bernie back in A/E #100, we talked about the 1964 New York Comicon he had organized with the help of a handful of friends—and which may be considered the first comic book convention—and about his exit from fandom not too long afterward. In the weeks and months after our interview, Bernie turned out to be a voluble raconteur in e-mails to yours truly, Roy Thomas, and doubtless others. Roy and I quickly realized that Bernie had just a bit (!) more to say about that 1964 con, and we invited him to write a guest column for A/E. And so, voila! —Bill Schelly.

Bernie Times Three—Plus One

A clockwise Bubnis triptych: Bernie around the time of the ’64 con—a bit later, in leather with motorcycle helmet—and Bernie today, with his granddaughter Lauren. Photos courtesy of BB, of course.

Long days and nightly commutes to the Long Island suburbs put me home after dark. Nothing disturbs the home fires like a telephone ringing. Before caller ID, I just stared at that ringing piece of plastic. Who calls at this time? This has got to be a problem. What happened next scared me. This was an unexpected call.

won’t throw things. This was surely the night I would go to Dogpatch, maybe the Fortress of Solitude; maybe I can stop crying.

t was 1995. The ever-changing economy was looking upward. After some tough times in the early ’90s, my business was booming. My business model was simple. Three New York City area showrooms that displayed windows and doors. Hell, everyone wanted to ride the upscale trolley and improve homes. The beginning of the bubble.

The guy on the other end is asking me questions about things that happened over 30 years ago! Things I hardly ever thought about anymore. In those days, you couldn’t punch into Google and pull up a man’s life. He knew what I was doing (and thinking) in 1961. I was 13 years old. I didn’t know what I was doing in 1961. This was going to be a very uneasy conversation. This guy had to be a detective of some kind, and I was dead-on in his gun sights. I read too many Mickey Spillane novels. The guy on the other end of the phone line was (Detective) Bill Schelly, comic fandom historian. Huh? Who has this much time on his hands? He was writing a book about the very early days of comic book fandom and had tracked me down, like a trapped rat. To me, those days were long gone, and I never really wanted to relive a few of those memories. Like a scene in a horror movie, I started to remember.... If I read a story out loud, maybe that would drown out the yelling and screaming. I hid in my room. With my comic books and science-fiction magazines. If I concentrated enough, I could transport myself out of this house. Maybe tonight my parents

I hid with my books. Comics led to magazines like Amazing and Fantastic. Science-fiction fandom was alive and well. Letter columns and fanzines were the blogs of the ’60s. My father passed away, and a part of me started to breathe again. It was time to stop hiding. I boarded a Long Island Railroad train to New York City. From there, a subway ride to the Greyhound Bus Terminal, and a short time later—Newark, New Jersey. That is where the Eastern Science Fiction Society met every month and I started to realize I was not alone. Newark almost played a role in Bill Schelly’s history book, but more on that a little later. It was time I started to choose my own family.

One of my favorite fanzines was Yandro, edited and published by Buck Coulson and his wife Juanita. Most times it just rambled about this and that, but always centered on science-fiction fandom. It was a very popular fanzine at the time and (in spite of its popularity) chose to actually publish my earliest cartoons and fiction. That spotlight felt warm and comfy. I just had to start my own fanzine.

“I Started To Remember...”

Buck’s fanzine reviews introduced me to Comic Art (Don and Maggie Thompson) and Xero ( Dick and Pat Lupoff). Something fishy, here. Both these pubs talked about comic books and comic strips and super-heroes and they took it all seriously. I wasn’t dancing by myself anymore. Of course it did not hurt that my three favorite fanzines were all family affairs. Fate was tapping my shoulder. Then I discovered Alter-Ego. Holy crap! The whole thing was about comic books! I had found my family. My love affair with comic book fandom was about to begin. I bought everything at the newsstand. Mostly comic books, but also some magazines like Mad, and of course the sf pubs like Astounding and If and even Famous Monsters of Filmland. FM was kid/hog heaven. Loads of monster photos and articles about production and special effects. All put together by the WORLD’S LEADING AUTHORITY ON JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING. I knew that because Forrest J. Ackerman told me so every month. My 13-year-old eyes saw Ackerman standing about 70 feet tall. Maybe 80. I was fascinated by him. If I was FJA, what would I do? Put together a fanzine ABOUT FJA, of course! I sketched out a cover idea and named it The Acker-Zine (he even had us talking like him). No idea what the contents would look like, but I knew it would be great. Sent the sketch and a letter to Forry, with my plan that I had no plan but anything about Ackerman would be sensational. I hope 13-year-old kids today are still as innocent and ignorant as I was in 1961. A few weeks later, two large cardboard boxes arrive and they are filled with fanzines dating from the 1940s and FJA was involved in every one. A short note: “Start here and thanks for your letter. Forry.” Forry in uniform, Forry feuding with other fans, Forry, Forry, Forry. Good God, I’m not a speed reader but I plunged into the piles of paper and tried to sift enough fanoriented topics into 30-something ditto pages. Not my proudest moment, but I was able to print about 100 copies. Sent a few to FM and received a plug in the

letter column. Only about 40 were sold, and Ackerman was kind enough to purchase the remaining copies. Never got another mention, but he did send me another large cardboard box, this time filled with horror and science-fiction movie posters. He encouraged me to contact the poster services stamped on each and start collecting on my own. I did collect but I used these services to purchase and re-sell movie material and became an early dealer in movie memorabilia. Ackerman saved my life, which was crumbling beneath a pile of debt left behind by my father. He also helped finance the first comicon in 1964, but more on that later. Among the fanzines that Forry had sent me originally was a booklet titled Official Souvenir Journal of the First World Science Fiction Convention held July 2nd-4th, 1939, in New York City. It measured only 6"x9" with twenty pages, but its shiny gold cover made it look much larger. Of course, Ackerman’s name was listed inside along with those of Julius Schwartz, Otto Binder, Robert Heinlein, and Ray Bradbury. The interior schedule of panels listed for instance “Science Fiction and the New Fandom” and “Men of Science Fiction” by Mort Weisinger. The last event for July 4th weekend was to be “Independence Day Fireworks at New York World’s Fair.” I just had to be at the first Comic Convention!

In 1961, I responded to a letter-writer in the DC comic Mystery in Space by the name of G.B. Love. In those early days, I signed my stuff as B.G. Bubnis. You just knew the two of us were separated at birth. Joined the Science Fiction and Comic Association (the S.F.C.A.) along with two other kids named Buddy Saunders and Rick Weingroff, soon to become fandom’s most prolific artist and writer. The first few issues were just carbon copies and severely lacked content. Hence my short story was printed in the first issue, and somehow Gordon’s baby survived for many more editions. Gordon suffered from cerebral palsy but not from the lack of stamina or guts. The Rocket’s Blast fanzine was his passion and an early pillar of fandom. He was/is an inspiration. Proud to have been on board. Thanks to fanzine collector and archivist Aaron Caplan, I recently got a chance to see the first ten issues of Rocket’s Blast for the first time in fifty years. Great fun to read early work by Saunders and Weingroff; their styles got better with each issue. RB #2 printed a letter from me with an interesting couple of lines: “Now this may sound far-fetched, but why don’t the few members we have now meet in a chosen spot once a year. Now I know it sounds impossible but who knows it might work.” I guess the convention planning was starting even earlier than I remembered.

Famous Monsters—And Famous Forry (Left:) Famous Monsters of Filmland #6 (Feb. 1960)—an early issue of the groundbreaking Warren magazine that inspired Bubnis to publish his own, amateur publication, called Acker-Zine. King Kong cover artist unknown. (Right:) FMF’s Forrest J. Ackerman in 1962 with another acolyte, one Don Glut (future comics writer and filmmaker). [©2013 the respective copyright holders.]

I printed a few early ditto pages for the RB on my own machine and sent them off for inclusion. I remember doing sketches of John McGeehan, Buddy, Rick, and G.B. so that we would all get some visuals

Comics Fandom Archive

Love That Rocket’s Blast! Gordon (“G.B.”) Love, editor of The Rocket’s Blast, published some of Bernie’s earliest fan letters and articles. Seen here are his masthead (and a few lead-off lines) from RB #2 (Jan. 1962)—as well as Bernie’s letter (and the publisher/editor’s response) from that same issue. Rocket’s Blast was in its infancy when Bernie joined the S.F.C.A. and began appearing in its pages. [©2013 the respective copyright holders.] Shown below right is a page done for RB #8 as a tribute to two co-creations of Joe Simon & Jack Kirby, as Bernie printed them on the spirit duplicator he’d purchased from Jerry Bails after it had been used to run off the first two issues of Alter-Ego (Vol. 1). The Cap figure, though, is based on a 1954 John Romita splash. Thanks to Bernie for the photocopy. [Captain America TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, inc.; Fighting American TM & ©2013 Estates of Joe Simon & Jack Kirby.]

on our membership. We never even considered being able to feature actual photos. I believe the first sketch page appeared in RB #14. Welcome, my friends, to a simple time. The only folks missing from the membership were Spanky and Alfalfa.

Around this time—1962—I started my own fanzine, Comic Heroes Revisited. I met some fellow Long Island fans, Len Wein and Ron Fradkin. We traveled to each other’s houses to talk/trade/live comic books. I remember we once went to New York City and found a back-issue magazine shop on 42nd St. and 6th Ave. Some out-of-touch dealers still considered comics as junk, so we found a pile of junk priced at a quarter each. I think Len got Shadow #1 and I got Zip #1 (which featured Steel Sterling, and I used the cover as my page for the Super Hero Calendar in 1963). Len edited and published a fanzine called Aurora and I was happy to contribute some artwork. Even illustrated a full story based on one of his creations. Happy, happy campers. Good friends, Len and Ron. Two strong egos would soon clash and destroy a friendship. I’m a jerk. It is time to stop depending on my memory for this story. Let us now get some historical reference points. Following are excerpts from two issues of a fan newsletter named Dateline: Comicdom from editor Ronn Foss: December 1963, issue #5, letter from Ron Fradkin: “Personally, we’re not making much progress. Most of the committee members just sit around and trade comics, original art, etc., and not much is done about a Con.”

January 1964, issue #6, letter from Andrew Fraknoi: “Ron Fradkin is right. The Committee is not getting anywhere. The trouble is that the members live too far apart to permit the frequent meetings necessary for organizing a complex event like a convention. However, at the last meet George [Pacinda] was quite optimistic and we’re far from giving up.”

“I Started To Remember...”

Little did I know at the time that I was planning my own “going-away” party. Step one was to contact fans and alert them to some committee changes. My co-chairs were Ron and Len, we were the new sheriffs in town, we would pull this convention up from its committee-plagued grave and it would be held in a YMCA in Newark, New Jersey. Yeah, you read correctly. Newark. Newark?? Holy cow, why was I in charge of anything?

Weined Away From

Remember, the Eastern Science Fandom Fiction guys met there every month. Len Wein at the 1967 Kalercon, The New York football Giants play in just as he was working his way New Jersey (years later); and, of into the comics field as a pro. Photo by Pat Yanchus. course, the original convention committee lives there. No doubt, I almost got this part wrong. Time to start praying.

This part of the story still confuses me, but Alter Ego [Vol. 3] #7 ran a very good article by Ethan Roberts, explaining how he contacted me and offered to help obtaining the Workman’s Circle location in New York City. He phoned me from a candy store and kept running out of money during the call. Our conversation suddenly ended, and the guy organizing this convention still was not sure where it would be held. I suddenly wanted to borrow George Pacinda’s white shirt and tie, because even l wasn’t sure who was in charge.

A Sterling Accomplishment The 1964 Super Hero Calendar was Bernie’s first claim to fame in fandom, and included his tracing of Steel Sterling for the month of March. [Steel Sterling TM & ©2013 Archie Comic Publications, Inc.]

Ron and Len were involved with this arm of Jerry Bails’ Academy of Comic Book Fans and Collectors’ attempt to stage a comic convention on the East Coast. I was asked to attend these early meetings but resisted because I felt those long Midwestern arms around our New York throats. I planned to sit this one out. Early in 1964, Len was adamant that I start lending a hand to this floundering convention committee. Well, I will be there if this time the meeting is held in New York. Past meetings were in New Jersey. The closest spot was, of all places, the gigantic waiting area of Grand Central Station. I don’t know if you could do such a thing today, but 48 years ago no one paid us any attention. At least eight or nine kids (George wore a white shirt and tie so we would know he was in charge) with comic books spread all over the floor and benches. It was a great little fan meet, but the convention plans were drifting further and further away. They were headed back to New Jersey on the next train. Damn it, I didn’t want to wait. I’ve been waiting. Ever since I opened that Journal from 1939. There is gonna be a party in July 1964 and it may be 25 years later but this is going to be our party. At least I was determined, if not completely dense, about what I would do next.

Man Of The Hour Ethan Roberts’ high school graduation picture. He arranged the venue for the ’64 con, thus making it possible.

Fradkin Forever Ron Fradkin (wearing tie) in 1967, excerpted from a photo of the NYC-area fan-group The Illegitimate Sons Of Superman. Thanks to Rich Rubenfeld.

Another letter from convention committee member Andrew Fraknoi: Dateline: Comicdom (March 1964) #8: “[T]he Con committee under Pacinda was getting nowhere months after our first meeting except perhaps our grandiose and impractical suggestions. It seems Bubnis, Wein, and Fradkin have succeeded in accomplishing what the committee could not do.”

Thank you, Andrew. Well said. I wonder what contortion Andrew’s face became when he read another letter in the very same issue. This piece of evidence will be known as the Bernie Bubnis “MAN OVERBOARD” letter: “...But what good is a hall without sufficient number of fans to make it look like a convention? As it stands now, I am the only guy working... though Len Wein and Ron Fradkin hold down the titles of co-chairman. At this writing, we have 4 paid members....” That letter caused a stir between Len, Ron, and myself. Len was convinced that this whole convention plan was about to fizzle away. We were going to look like idiots. This thing might become our Titanic, but I was not about to give up. Just like any idiot would do. Ron was a good soldier and promised to get more involved, but Len and I were on two different pages. More trouble coming. Another fan accused Len of stealing one of his comics. Who knows who did what to whom, and I chose to believe the fan and not Len. I let it be known that Len was no longer representing any convention business. I handled this like a mindless dictator, but I

Comics Fandom Archive

was happy to have a “reason” to reduce my co-chairs. My steamroller personality just rumbled forward. Too late now. I’m glad he has had a good career. Just one more piano left to fall on my head, and here it comes. Here is the first sentence of a letter printed in Dateline: Comicdom (June l964), issue #11 : “Comcon 64 has been aborted....” The letter was written by Jerry Bails. The rest of it made no other mention of the convention. The guy who had helped start it all was commenting on the Academy’s aborted convention, but his timing could not have been worse. Those feared hands not ours, at my throat were very real at that moment. This would definitely confuse some people, and I was one of them.

Just one problem, Jerry—no one told me, and my new best friend Ethan has the hall for July 27th, NEXT MONTH!

Next month? Wow, we better get to work! Art Tripp had just been discharged from the Army, and he had a vision. My house was becoming “crash central,” and every comic fan had free entry. Art just appeared one day and volunteered his help. Welcome aboard. Art’s vision was a pin—a button commemorating the convention which could be given to everyone attending. I really did not like the idea. It seemed a little childish and it would cost me more money. I was starting to run up a bill. Ads for the convention in fanzines. Mailing out notices about the convention location and such. No one was sending any money, so I was picking up the tab for most of the attendees. The convention booklet had to be printed and postage applied. Was the hall free? Thank goodness, F.J. Ackerman’s picture still hung on my wall, to remind me that he had put me in the movie memorabilia business. A steady stream of capital continued to come in from that enterprise. But the “button” thing made me cringe. Art was correct, even though it took me fifty years to agree. Years later, I looked at one of those buttons which read “Comicon I964” and felt like I was holding history. We originally planned to put “New York Comic Tri-Con 1964” on it, but the wording took

up too much room. The buttonmaker, Art, and I decided the year was a definite and that “Comic Convention” should headline. Art shrunk it down to Comicon and was smart enough to give me a piece of history to hold fifty years later. Time to get the pros involved. Ron had good relations with Marvel, so he was off to see the Bullpen. I would handle DC and Gold Key. How could they say no? Actually, pretty damn easy.

Button, Button... Who’s Got The Button? Art Tripp-designed 1964 Comicon button which Bernie donated to Bill Schelly’s Comic Fandom Archive a few years ago.

Bill Harris was the Gold Key editor and had treated me very well when I had profiled him for RBCC. Attending the convention was not going to be possible, but he helped me interest Lone Ranger artist Tom Gill in making an appearance. Tom was so excited about being with fans that he offered to present an art demonstration. He also brought along original artwork to distribute at the convention. His attendance and cooperation were always overlooked by pundits’ later essays about the convention. At least someone was taking us seriously. The DC offices were easier to navigate than the Marvel offices. It always seemed we could just show up at DC and find a pro to annoy. Marvel kept a tighter guard on their front door, but Ron knew whom to bother first. Flo Steinberg was Stan Lee’s secretary, and he begged her to take our story to Stan and ask him to make an appearance at the con. No go, but he would send over an intern, Dave Twedt, who at least knew the difference between the Hulk and the Thing. At least he “worked” at Marvel and ranked higher than a janitor. I think they sort of took us seriously.

I profiled Steve Ditko for another issue of RBCC and he was very friendly. I would make my plea directly to him. Please, Please, Please, come to our convention. No, No, No, I will not come to your convention. All looked bleak until the door opened and Steve walked into Workman’s Circle. Time stopped. No one could believe their eyes. He appeared during Dave Twedt’s question-andanswer session. At that very moment, it officially became the First Comic Convention. Thank you, Mr. Ditko. This next story is tough to relate, because it involves one of my heroes, Julius Schwartz. Along with those early fanzine editors and writers, no one deserves more credit for the birth of comic fandom. Those early Schwartz-edited letter columns unified the masses and started to glue us together. I wanted him at this first convention. I was sure he wanted to be there, also. I remember being in his office a week before the convention date. Ron and I had already floated the convention idea in front of just about everybody at DC. I don’t think they took us seriously, but this time would be different. I wanted the King to attend and I wasn’t leaving till he agreed. I should have sent Fradkin here, also.

Punchin’ Julie Julius Schwartz, legendary DC editor of the Silver Age The Flash, Green Lantern, Justice League of America, The Atom, Hawkman, Batman, et al. In this photo, courtesy of Jean Bails, Julie is seen proofing penciled art featuring Zatanna—probably a Mike Sekowsky page for an issue of Justice League of America.

He was ready for me. He knew what he wanted to do and I walked right into his trap. I’m begging him and he suddenly opens his desk drawer, produces a small booklet and throws it at me. It was the same 1939 SciFi Con Journal that Ackerman had given me, and if Julie thought I would be surprised, he was wrong. He says, “This was a real convention!” Hey, what does that have to do with you attending? I do remember saying, “I don’t care what you did a hundred years ago.”

“I Started To Remember...”

found the place: Phil Seuling brought soda, Claude Held and Howard Rogofsky and Bill Thailing from OHIO (he found the place!) and all the way from California was Malcolm Willits with a copy of Action #1!

Wow, even the eternal fan, Larry Ivie, found his way to Workman’s Circle. He was an early inspiration for me, and when he did not like the Tom Gill original art he was given, I made sure he got another page of “Atomic Knights” by Murphy Anderson. Maybe I should have given him a different page, because his article in Comic Art #5 was a pretty blistering description of this convention. Good thing that just about everyone in fandom read CA in those days. He even spelled my name correctly.

The Fandom Menace (Clockwise from above left:) Bernie on left, with friends Jack Douglas and Kenny Eye. BB says this particular photo is the true dividing line between my fan life and my street life. “No photo of [me as] a 15-year-old fan with any other fan exists, but the one with these characters does exist. On the other side of the room are cabinets filled with comic books. These guys would never have understood my fanboy life. It is the way I looked at that first convention.”

How many people was I going to run over for this stupid convention? I did Prolific fan writer Rick Weingroff attended that first not really mean to New York con at Workman’s Circle; this photo was say that, but it taken one year later, at the first NYC con organized was too late for by Dave Kaler. apologies. He was (Right:) Rare photo of Margaret Gemignani, one of livid. Told me to the very few female members of early fandom, here get out and never garbed as Timely’s Miss America at a 1970s comics convention masquerade. come back. I think he actually pushed me out of his office. I left the building and walked to Penn Station for my trip back to Long Island. I was alone and I needed time to think.

Bill Schelly’s fandom history books and especially issue #7 (2001) of Alter Ego give the minutes of the meeting much better than I can. I was just enjoying the party. I thought I had a good time until I read the reviews. I went to work on the Souvenir Booklet, asked Weingroff to write a review (he also spelled my name correctly), got some help from pro and fan artists, and printed my last fan project. Dave Kaler also attended, and in 1965 put together the next convention. I ignored a few very kind invitations to be involved. That convention was great. It absolutely was. No one mentioned the 1964 convention for quite some time. More conventions followed and they kept getting better. Phil Seuling took this bull by the horns and made his conventions even betterer (new word invented especially for Phil). Those Seuling conventions were very

A forgotten hero. I’m talking about Ron Fradkin, of course. Feet on the ground, always a great attitude and a good soldier. There were really only four of us at this point. Ethan saved our necks. Art invented that iconic button. Ron helped me with everything else and I trusted him. When I told him the Schwartz story, he said simply, “We did everything we can, see you Monday.” That Monday was like an oven in New York City. It was July 27th and Ron and I decided to stop at the DC offices and at least get some original art to distribute at the convention. Ron did most of the work and Julie and Murray Boltinoff were kind enough to cooperate. Schwartz looked at me with a cold stare but still told Ron to take what was needed. Carrying pages of original art, we headed to the subway. When fellow fans Paul Vizcarrondo and his friends landed on the same subway car, we just knew this day was going to turn out OK. Sort of. We arrived late, the air-conditioning went off, people had trouble finding the place and... and... and I was in FAN HEAVEN. I’m meeting people who were just names on envelopes and letters. Rick Weingroff from Maryland, who had contributed an early article to my fanzine, was flesh and blood. Margaret Gemignani (a girl, a freakin’ girl) who loved comics. Don Foote, Len Berman, Dave Bibby, the gang was all here. The dealers sure

Along Came A Spider... Bernie’s 1964 New York Comicon booklet with its Steve Ditko cover as traced by Bernie onto a spirit-duplicator master. We’ve run this piece before—but how could we leave it out? [Spider-Man TM & ©2013 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Comics Fandom Archive

York in 1964, and if anyone wants to say, ‘Well, my friend came over to see me in 1938 and that was the first convention,’ ... Right. Sure it was. The first convention called a convention, the first one planned as a convention, the first one run in an organized manner was ... in New York, 1964.” Thanks for the memories, Phil. I’m glad we were both there.

EDITOR’S NOTE: That’s the end of Bernie’s reminiscences, but we thought you’d enjoy an excerpt from a subsequent e-mail, as Bernie related a meeting with Steve Ditko:

The mystery surrounding Steve Ditko is about as thick as some of the fog he conjures up in his artwork. (Good thing I never planned on writing professionally. Surely I would have been arrested.) Ditko is the most interesting person I have ever met. I just have to share this memory.

successful, and Phil helped put the exclamation point on that 1964 party in 1972’s Fantastic Fanzine Special #2 (edited by Gary Groth):

“Well, those buttons were beautiful and they’re really from the first comic convention. And there’s the proof of it... nobody can say there was a convention before.... The first convention was in New

I did a series of “meet the pros” articles for RBCC. I made an appointment to meet with Steve Ditko at his NY office and I was scared stiff! He was very cordial but “all business” during our meeting. He was not easy to approach. The meeting was over and I was just about to leave. I turned to him and naively said, “Every other artist I have met with gave me some original art as a token of my visit.” Before I could finish my thought, he said, “I don’t want to give you anything.” BANG!!! SHORT PAUSE, then I laughed so hard my glasses fell off my face. He started laughing and we both laughed some more. It wasn’t meant to be a joke, but the “matter of fact” delivery was priceless. He never gave me any artwork that day, but I called on him again and this time I wasn’t scared at all.

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re:

Now, on to cyber-mail and the occasional snail-mail missive re Alter Ego #107, which spotlighted interviews with late “Batman” artists Dick Sprang and Jim Mooney—not to mention several other subjects that are covered below in our current style, in which all editorial comments are set in italics….

Everson “Bud” Zell had a minor epiphany when he read the Dick Sprang interview, and wrote: “Two things came together for me recently, related indirectly to Alter Ego #107. The first was the new issue of Science Illustrated (April 2012). On page 18 it has a third-of-a-page short article about a small flying sphere developed in Japan. When I saw the article, I immediately said, ‘I’ve seen that before.’ I had, and I knew exactly where—Batman Annual #1. The final story in that issue was one written by Edmond Hamilton and illustrated by Dick Sprang and Charles Paris, and was reprinted from Batman #109.

“In the story, Batman uses some of his ‘Amazing Inventions,’ one of which is a flying sphere which seems to have several things in common with the recent Japanese development besides the spherical shape: an onboard power source, remote control, television camera, and (based on the diagram of the artwork) possibly the use of a helicopter blade to drive the sphere.

hane Foley really went all-out on his maskot illo this time— surprising Ye Editor by featuring me under attack by the giant fanged python from the John Buscema-penciled Avengers issue in which Yellowjacket married The Wasp and the Ringmaster’s Circus of Crime crashed the reception. The toco toucan on my arm in this pic represents Cyrano, whom I still remember fondly nearly twenty years after his passing. (My trumpeter hornbill Barbra, seen near Shane’s signature, would never dream of letting me get so familiar.) Thanks to Randy Sargent for his crafty coloring. [Alter Ego hero TM & ©2013 Roy & Dann Thomas; costume designed by Ron Harris; other art ©2013 Shane Foley.]

I Spy With My Little (Flying) Eye (Above center:) These Sprang/Paris panels (from an Edmond Hamilton script) from Batman #109 (Aug. 1957) depict one of “The Amazing Inventions of Batman.” They are repro’d from the 2009 hardcover The Batman Annuals, Vol. 1, part of the DC Comics Classics Library. [©2013 DC Comics.] (Right:) This short piece from the MarchApril 2012 issue (Vol. 2, #5) of Science Illustrated looked awfully familiar to Bud Zell. Thanks to Leonardo de Sa & “Glenn” for the scan. [©2013 Science Illustrated or its parent company.]

“I have no idea of the sources of this story. Perhaps Hamilton borrowed it from a science fiction story, maybe even one of his own. It may have come from a recent (in the 1950s) issue of Popular Science or Popular Mechanix. One wonders if a diagram was passed along to the artist by the writer or if Sprang’s background as the son of a mechanical engineer provided an assist in developing the schematic drawing included in the story. I’m sure the size of the components which would have been needed would have made the actual building of a sphere at that time more than problematic, but I thought the comparison of the ’50s concept to the early-21stcentury reality was very interesting.” Tony Isabella, comics writer since the early 1970s, sent us this piece of information: “The Funky Winkerbean strip you ran in the latest A/E was one of mine. I didn’t write many Sundays for Tom [Batiuk], but this one came about by accidental inspiration. I had just finished writing the basketball sequence that

[correspondence, comments, & corrections]

Sprang Into Action One Dick Sprang item we had in our files that didn’t make it into A/E #107 was a scan of the artist’s own record of his 1945 work for National/DC. It had come to us from reader David Bachman, who once printed it in a low-circulation apa-zine; the original is owned by Ike Wilson, who was Sprang’s agent in his years of drawing art commissions. David says he, Ike, and Joe Desris first ran across it during their August 1991 visit to the Sprangs’ home in Prescott, Arizona, which was noted in that A/E. He adds: “It puts art credits for those particular stories, published without credits, beyond reasonable dispute. It also defines the point at which Sprang moved from penciling and inking stories to only penciling stories (he did continue after 1945 to ink covers that he penciled.” [© Estate of Richard Sprang.] Below, repro’d from the Grand Comics Database, is Sprang’s cover for Detective Comics #104 (Oct. 1945), one of the items listed on the sheet. Note the tiny sketch in his note concerning that issue’s cover. He penciled and inked the Alvin Schwartz-scripted story, as well. [©2013 DC Comics.]

brother George (ex-Forest Ranger), helped with some of the writing on ‘The Ermine’ in Star Ranger Funnies V2#1 (Jan. 1939). Martin’s younger brother Frank (Washington Redskins halfback and quarterback) suggested the story ‘Mighty Man and the Football Mystery’ in Amazing-Man Comics #8 (Dec. 1939).” Thanks, Jake. John D. Trawick and Francis A. Rodriguez also ID’d the original source of that Batman/Catman/Catwoman recreation by Jim Mooney. It’ll be a little while before we can feature Jeff McLaughlin’s fulllength interview with that artist, but we’re looking forward to it—as, I’m sure, are all three of you and numerous other A/Eficionados.

preceded this strip by a couple of weeks and got an idea for this one, knowing how Tom loved incorporating old comics covers into his Sundays. I also suggested Jim Mooney for the guest artist and put Tom in touch with him. I love working with Tom. He pays well and quickly, and always treated me with respect. I write a plot for him now and then, but I no longer do any of the writing. My job was to get Tom something like a year ahead of schedule, and he kept me on a little longer than that.”

Jake Oster supplied the following corrections to #107: “(1) Page 19: Right and left got mixed up in “Strange and Unexpected” ways. (2) Page 24: The original version of the Batman/Catman illo by Jim Mooney appeared as the cover of Detective Comics #318 (Aug. 1963), although the Grand Central Database credits it to Dick Dillin and Shelly Moldoff. (3) Page 33: Dell’s Frankenstein, Dracula, and Werewolf were written by D.J. Arneson, not D.J. Arenson. (4) Page 37: The newspaper Charlie McGill worked for was the Bergen Evening Record, not the Bergen Evening News. He started in 1954 and worked there for four decades. The Record, no longer an evening newspaper, is still published daily and Sunday. (5) Page 38. ‘Holt Wilson’ was a Western hero appearing in Charlton’s Range Busters #9 (July 1953). (6) Page 39: Nina Tallarico is credited on ‘This Was Annie Oakley’ (1 page) in Geronimo Jones #2 (Nov. 1971). Also, according to the GCD, the splash page of ‘Rich Boy’s Plaything’ (8 pages) in Romantic Secrets #52 (Nov. 1964) is signed ‘Nina Tallarico,’ and it surmises that ‘perhaps she wrote parts or all of the story instead of contributing to the art.’ (7) Martin Filchock’s older

Len Wein, one of the foremost late-Silver and Bronze Age scripters, offered this: “I must be crazy, because I don’t know why I’m ’fessing up to this, but that’s me under the Black Bolt costume in Alter Ego #107. As ever, the magazine just keeps getting better, especially now that it’s in full color.” Confession is good for the soul, Len. And color is good for A/E. Makes me want to go back and publish the previous 106 issues in color, too… but co-publisher John Morrow says that might be just a wee bit hard to justify economically. Still, I can dream, can’t I?

Jim Amash, this mag’s amiable associate editor and erstwhile ace interviewer, feels he should’ve worked in a mention somewhere in the part of his interview with artist Tony Tallarico that appeared in #107 that “the artist ‘Cerrone’ who penciled a few stories for Tony (see A/E #107, page 37, blue caption) was his friend Dominick Cerrone. Cerrone was a fashion designer who was pulled in by Tony to help him. Cerrone never did any other comics work.” Addition duly noted, Jim—and we’re only sad that, following your interviews with Tallarico and Leonard Starr, no more are forthcoming at present. But we’re endeavoring to fill your seven-league boots as best we can. Lou Kanegson sent the following note to the Comic Crypt’s own Michael T. Gilbert, who forwarded it to us: “I greatly appreciate you sending me copies of Alter Ego and the preview of chapter six. Your editorial skills—enhanced by photos and materials I haven’t seen for many years—make the story of the Missing Letterer… a personal event. It sharpened my recall of Abe and of some of the enjoyable times we spent together.”

Michael’s multi-part study of the search for information about the longtime and influential letterer of Will Eisner’s The Spirit also drew this

re:

“Even the Kanegson lettering betrays the origin of those ten installments. Not only does the ‘Dr. Drew” style change drastically between Rangers #56 and #57; so do the lettering, the layouts, and even the panel borders. These make me even more convinced that the pure Grandenetti is in Rangers #57 and beyond, as clearly exhibited on page 40 of A/E #107. Just compare that with the art on page 48, which is from the previous issue, Rangers #56.

“Maybe Eisner was helping Jerry to get started in comic books. Grandenetti was certainly talented, but he had no comic book credits at all prior to ‘Dr. Drew’—other than a four-page strip in Eisner’s ill-fated Baseball Comics #1. His first non-‘Dr. Drew’Eisner/Fiction House work (according to the GCD) was for November of 1950 in an Avon romance comic—nearly six months after the first ‘Dr. Drew.’ By 1950 Eisner certainly saw that he couldn’t keep The Spirit goes forever, and helping his talented but unknown assistant find alternative employment would be the mark of a caring and appreciative boss. “Taking nothing away from Mr. Grandenetti, I think the historic record needs to be altered to give Mr. Eisner the credits he deserves. The two pages reproduced in A/E #107 make my case quite clearly.”

Getting In The Spirit Of Things If you want to visually compare and contrast the “Secret Files of Dr. Drew” stories from Fiction House’s Rangers Comics #56-57, as Jim Vadeboncoeur, Jr., does in his letter on this page, dig out your copy of A/E #107. Meanwhile, here is a panel from The Spirit strip for Nov. 30, 1947, reportedly a collaboration of Will Eisner and Jerry Grandenetti—and lettered, naturally, by Abe Kanegson. Thanks to Michael T. Gilbert. [©2013 Will Eisner Studios, Inc.]

comment from David Burd, which MTG likewise forwarded to us: “Wow! I just read the final chapter of the Abe Kanegson story. You really did an amazing job on this project. I am consistently amazed by your detective work. Abe went from someone whose name I never knew (though I admired his lettering) to a man with a full life, a wife, kids, relatives, hobbies, and accomplishments in several other areas. I now know more about him than [I know about] some of my own relatives! It’s especially impressive because you’re known primarily as the creator and artist behind Mr. Monster and the writer of ‘Donald Duck’ stories, not an investigative journalist. Like Abe’s square dance calling, I think you have a potential second career… as a researcher. If they ever make CSI: Eugene, you’re a natural for one of the detectives!” We’d watch it, David— which is saying something, since we’ve never seen a full episode of any one of the other 14 CSI series.

Jim Vadeboncoeur, Jr., one of the foremost Golden Age art researchers, reacted thus to an item in the Comic Crypt: “I’ve been saying this in private for decades, so the latest issue of A/E is encouraging me to say it publicly: The ‘Dr. Drew’ strips in Rangers Comics #47 through #56, which are signed ‘Grandenetti’ and look extremely Eisnerish, are drawn by Will Eisner and [Jerry] Grandenetti as part of Eisner’s studio. If you examine the sequence of the ‘Dr. Drew’ episodes, there comes a point between #56 and #57 where somebody bows out and leaves Grandenetti to his own devices. That “somebody,” I believe, is Will Eisner.

“It’s pretty obvious from the rest of his career that the Grandenetti of Rangers #57 is the real Grandenetti. He never again approached the verve of those first ten ‘Dr. Drew’ stories. Since he was working in the Eisner Shop during the time he worked on ‘Dr. Drew’ (June 1949 to June 1951) and the Eisnerish episodes lasted for a year and a half, it seems improbable that Eisner didn’t know about them. My belief is that they are Eisner Shop jobs with Eisner himself breaking down the stories and contributing mightily to the final product.

In addition, re Robert Wiener, who has supplied us with silver prints of numerous early Timely stories, I apologize for accidentally writing that he works for Hakes Collectibles, rather than for Grant Books, his actual employer. Send correspondence, both e- and other, to:

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

Be here next issue to celebrate Marc Swayze’s 100th birthday!

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#177 July 2013

Special Edition by P.C. Hamerlinck

[Marcus B. Swayze, Fawcett comics artist and writer during the 1940s and early ’50s and a contributor to FCA since the first issue of Alter Ego, Vol. 3, in 1999, passed away on October 14, 2012, at the age of 99. The next issue of A/E (and its extra-length FCA section) will be a celebration of Marc’s 100th birthday, which was already in preparation when he left us. We felt it fitting that this special number of FCA feature the last comics story Marc ever drew—in a 1956 issue of Gabby Hayes, after that Western title had moved from Fawcett to Charlton Comics. I am honored to introduce it. —P.C. Hamerlinck.]

uring the peak of the late-’40s/early-’50s cowboy genrecomics bang, Fawcett Publications believed that three B-Western-movie side-splittin’ six-shooter cinematic sidekicks were laudable and laughable enough to prosper with their own comic book titles. Smiley Burnette Western, with art generally by Stan Aschmeier (former artist of “Johnny Thunder,” “Dr. MidNite,” et al.), hit the dirt in 1950 before biting the dust after four forgettable issues, featuring the chubby comedy relief of many a Gene Autry and Durgano Kid movie. Andy Devine Western, distinctively drawn by Dick (Frankenstein) Briefer, appeared that same year; but although Devine played deputy Jingles with Guy Madison in radio and TV’s The Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok, that comic vamoosed from the stands after only a couple of issues. Fortunately for Fawcett, while the onscreen clowning of the above pair of sidekicks did not transfer successfully into comic books, such was not the case with its third entry in that arena: Gabby Hayes Western. George “Gabby” Hayes was the popular comedic cowboy crank who at one time or another rode devotedly alongside such rugged screen stars as John Wayne, Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Wild Bill Elliott, Randolph

Scott, Hopalong Cassidy, Bob Steele, et al. Before Gabby’s film career finally rode off into the sunset, he even starred in his own television series, The Gabby Hayes Show (NBC 1950-54, ABC 1956); in addition, Fawcett’s Gabby Hayes Western comic book enjoyed a remarkable 50-issue run.

Furthermore, there were a stack of 61 Gabby Hayes British black-&-white comics (Fawcett reprints) published by L. Miller & Sons from 1951-55… five different Quaker Oats GH giveaway mini-comics in ’51… and a ’53 Toby Press one-shot, before Charlton gave the eccentric sidekick one last flicker of limelight in the Western sky by using up old/unused Fawcett inventory, coupled with their own new material, for nine more issues after Fawcett dismantled their comics line at the end of 1953.

Gabby Hayes Western debuted with a November 1948 cover date and ran until the 50th issue, dated January 1953. Fawcett, who touted Gabby as “The most garrulous galoot ever to straddle a saddle” and “The rage of the purple sage,” utilized movie-style photo covers on all their issues; “Gabby Hayes” also appeared as a back-up feature for 50 issues of Monte Hale Western (even though Hayes had never appeared in a movie with Hale), and got up to numerous shenanigans in Fawcett’s anthology title Real Western Hero (a.k.a. Western Hero, beginning with #70). Gabby’s madcap misadventures at Fawcett were scripted by Otto Binder, Rod Reed, John Eric Messman, and Irwin Schoffman; artwork was by Leonard Frank as well as Jack Binder, Clem Weisbecker, Carl Pfeufer, Bob Laughlin, and Maurice Whitman.

When Charlton continued the series (along with several other former Fawcett titles), the word “Western” was dropped and the publication became simply Gabby Hayes. Charlton’s nine-issue run, from #51 (Dec. ’54) through #59 (Jan. ’57), was sporadically published over a span of 4½ years. The new material added to the Fawcett leftovers consisted of illustrated covers by Dick Giordano, and a story or two drawn by our very own Marc Swayze.

Over the course of 1954-55, Swayze edited, wrote, and illustrated various features for Charlton—at first on staff, later as a freelancer, before leaving the comics industry for good. The following story, from Gabby Hayes #58 (June 1956), which he drew and may have even scripted, is the artist’s last published comic book work.

“We Didn’t Know... It Was The Golden Age!” 75

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78 FCA [Fawcett Collectors of America]

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BACK ISSUE #69

“Bronze Age B-Teams”! Defenders issue-byissue overview, Champions, Guardians of the Galaxy, Inhumans, PETER DAVID’s X-Factor, Teen Titans West, Legion of Substitute Heroes, an all-star chatfest of Doom Patrol interviews, plus art and commentary by ROSS ANDRU, SAL BUSCEMA, KEITH GIFFEN, TONY ISABELLA, PAUL KUPPERBERG, ERIK LARSEN, GEORGE PÉREZ, BOB ROZAKIS, cover by KEVIN NOWLAN.

“Bronze Age Team-Ups”! Marvel Team-Up and Two-in-One, Super-Villain Team-Up, CLAREMONT and SIMONSON’s X-Men/New Teen Titans, DC Comics Presents, SuperTeam Family, HANEY and APARO’s Batman of Earth-B(&B), Superman/Captain Marvel smackdowns, plus art and commentary by BUCKLER, ENGLEHART, GARCÍA-LÓPEZ, GIFFEN, LEVITZ, WEIN, and a classic GIL KANE cover inked anew by TERRY AUSTIN.

“Heroes Out of Time!” Batman: Gotham by Gaslight with MIGNOLA, WAID, and AUGUSTYN, Booster Gold with JURGENS, X-Men: Days of Future Past with CHRIS CLAREMONT, Bill & Ted with EVAN DORKIN, interview with P. CRAIG RUSSELL, “Pro2Pro” with Time Masters’ BOB WAYNE and LEWIS SHINER, Karate Kid, New Mutants: Asgardian Wars, and Kang. Mignola cover.

“1970s and ‘80s Legion of Super-Heroes!” LEVITZ interview, the Legion’s Honored Dead, the Cosmic Boy miniseries, a Time Trapper history, the New Adventures of Superboy, Legion fantasy cover gallery by JOHN WATSON, plus BATES, COCKRUM, CONWAY, COLON, GIFFEN, GRELL, JANES, KUPPERBERG, LaROCQUE, LIGHTLE, SCHAFFENBERGER, SHERMAN, STATON, SWAN, WAID, & more! COCKRUM cover!

TENTH ANNIVERSARY ISSUE! Revisit the 100th, 200th, 300th, 400th, and 500th issues of ‘70s and ‘80s favorites: Adventure, Amazing Spider-Man, Avengers, Batman, Brave & Bold, Casper, Detective, Flash, Green Lantern, Showcase, Superman, Thor, Wonder Woman, and more! With APARO, BARR, ENGLEHART, POLLARD, SEKOWSKY, SIMONSON, STATON, and WOLFMAN. DAN JURGENS and RAY McCARTHY cover.

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95 • Now shipping!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95 • Ships July 2013

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95 • Ships August 2013

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $8.95 (Digital Edition) $3.95 • Ships Sept. 2013

(100-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95 • Ships Nov. 2013

Ambitious new series documenting each decade of comic book history!

AMERICAN COMIC BOOK CHRONICLES: 1960-64 & The 1980s

JOHN WELLS covers comics in the 1960-64 JFK and Beatles era: DC’s new GREEN LANTERN, JUSTICE LEAGUE and multiple earths! LEE and KIRBY at Marvel on FF, SPIDER-MAN, HULK, and X-MEN! BATMAN’s “new look”, Charlton’s BLUE BEETLE, CREEPY #1 & more!

AMERICAN COMIC BOOK CHRONICLES: The 1950s

1960-64: (224-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $39.95 (Digital Edition) $11.95 • ISBN: 978-1-60549-045-8 • Out now! 1980s: (288-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $41.95 (Digital Edition) $13.95 • ISBN: 978-1-60549-046-5 • Out now!

(192-page trade paperback with COLOR) $27.95 ISBN: 978-1-60549-051-9 • (Digital Edition) $9.95 • Ships July 2013

(256-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $40.95 (Digital Edition) $12.95 • ISBN: 9781605490540 • Ships Aug. 2013

THE STAR*REACH COMPANION

Complete history of the influential 1970s independent comic, featuring work by and interviews with DAVE STEVENS, FRANK BRUNNER, HOWARD CHAYKIN, STEVE LEIALOHA, WALTER SIMONSON, BARRY WINDSOR-SMITH, KEN STEACY, JOHN WORKMAN, MIKE VOSBURG, P. CRAIG RUSSELL, DAVE SIM, MICHAEL GILBERT, and many others, plus full stories from STAR*REACH and its sister magazine IMAGINE. Cover by CHAYKIN! MATURE READERS ONLY.

KEITH DALLAS documents comics’ 1980s Reagan years: Rise and fall of JIM SHOOTER, FRANK MILLER as comic book superstar, DC’s CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS, MOORE and GAIMAN’s British invasion, ECLIPSE, PACIFIC, FIRST, COMICO, DARK HORSE and more!

BILL SCHELLY tackles comics of the Atomic Era of Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley: EC’s TALES OF THE CRYPT, MAD, CARL BARKS’ Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge, re-tooling the FLASH in Showcase #4, return of Timely’s CAPTAIN AMERICA, HUMAN TORCH AND SUB-MARINER, FREDRIC WERTHAM’s anti-comics campaign, and more!

DAN SPIEGLE: A LIFE IN COMIC ART

Documents his 60-year career on DELL and GOLD KEY’S licensed TV and Movie adaptions (LOST IN SPACE, KORAK, MAGNUS ROBOT FIGHTER, MIGHTY SAMPSON), at DC COMICS (BATMAN, UNKNOWN SOLDIER, TOMAHAWK, JONAH HEX, TEEN TITANS, BLACKHAWK), his CROSSFIRE series for ECLIPSE, DARK HORSE’S INDIANA JONES series and more, with rare artwork, personal photos, and private commission drawings. Written by JOHN COATES.

(160-page trade paperback) $19.95 • (Digital Edition) $7.95 ISBN: 978-1-60549-048-9 • Now shipping!

(104-page trade paperback) $14.95 • (Digital Edition) $4.95 ISBN: 978-1-60549-049-6 • Now shipping!

SUBSCRIBE! • Digital Editions: 3.95 each, or save with a digital subscription (digital editions are included FREE with a print subscription)! • Back Issue, Draw, Alter Ego & Comic Book Collector are now all full-color! • Lower international shipping rates! $

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MODERN MASTERS: CLIFF CHIANG

Spotlights the career of CLIFF CHIANG (artist of DC’s New 52 breakout hit WONDER WOMAN series) through a career-spanning interview, and loads of both iconic and rarely seen artwork from Cliff’s personal files. There’s also an in-depth look into the artist’s work process, and an extensive gallery of commissioned pieces, many in full-color. By CHRIS ARRANT and ERIC NOLEN-WEATHINGTON. (120-page trade paperback with COLOR) $15.95 (Digital Editions) $5.95 • ISBN: 978-1-60549-050-2 Now shipping!

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THE BEST OF ALTER EGO, VOL. 2

This sequel to ALTER EGO: THE BEST OF THE LEGENDARY COMICS FANZINE presents more vintage features from the first super-hero fanzine, begun by JERRY BAILS & ROY THOMAS. Editors ROY THOMAS and BILL SCHELLY reveal undiscovered gems from all 11 original issues published from 1961-78, including features on Hawkman, the Spectre, Blackhawk, the JLA, All Winners Squad, the Heap, an unsold “Tor” newspaper strip by JOE KUBERT, and more!