Alter Ego #167 by TwoMorrows Publishing

Roy Thomas' Ship-To-Shores Comics Fanzine

BRACE YOURSELF YOURSELF BRACE FOR A A STAR-SPANGLED STAR-SPANGLED FOR

SYD SHORES SALUTE! SALUTE!

$9.95 In the USA

No. 167 January 2021

82658 00421

TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

82658 00421

AND FRIENDS!

RETROFAN #7

Featuring a JACLYN SMITH interview, as we reopen the Charlie’s Angels Casebook, and visit the Guinness World Records’ largest Charlie’s Angels collection. Plus: an exclusive interview with funnyman LARRY STORCH, The Dick Van Dyke Show, Captain Action, a vintage interview with Jonny Quest creator DOUG WILDEY, a visit to the Land of Oz, the ultra-rare Marvel World superhero playset, & more! (84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.95 • Now shipping!

Vol. 3, No. 167 / January 2021 Editor

Roy Thomas

Associate Editor Jim Amash

Design & Layout

Christopher Day

Consulting Editor John Morrow

FCA Editor

P.C. Hamerlinck J.T. Go (Assoc. Editor)

Comic Crypt Editor

Michael T. Gilbert

Editorial Honor Roll

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

Proofreaders

Rob Smentek William J. Dowlding

Cover Artist Syd Shores

Cover Colorist

C’mon citizen, DO THE RIGHT THING! A Mom & Pop publisher like us needs every sale just to survive! DON’T DOWNLOAD OR READ ILLEGAL COPIES ONLINE! Buy affordable, legal downloads only at

www.twomorrows.com or through our Apple and Google Apps!

& DON’T SHARE THEM WITH FRIENDS OR POST THEM ONLINE. Help us keep producing great publications like this one!

Contents

Writer/Editorial: “Syd The Kid”?? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Richard Arndt interviews Nancy Shores Karlebach about her talented father.

Unidentified

With Special Thanks to: Doug Abramson Heidi Amash Richard J. Arndt Bob Bailey Rod Beck Roz Bellman Ricky Terry Brisacque Bernie Bubnis David Burd Nick Caputo John Cimino Shaun Clancy Comic Book Plus (website) Pierre Comtois Chet Cox Dial B for Blog (website) Shane Foley Joe Frank Janet Gilbert Grand Comics Database (website) Dan Hagen Dennis Haycock

Don’t STEAL our Digital Editions!

Tom Hegeman Eric Jansen Alex Jay Nancy Shores Karlebach James Kealy Douglas R. Kelly Mark Lewis Art Lortie John Lustig Glenn MacKay Doug Martin Mike Mikulovsky MinuteMenDarthScanner (website) Mike Nielsen Barry Pearl Philip (a.k.a. Bluelark) David Saunders Jeff Taylor Dann Thomas Dr. Michael J. Vassallo Geoff Willmetts

This issue is dedicated to the memory of

Syd Shores, Chu Hing, & Allen Bellman

“Syd Is Really Unrecognized For The Contributions He Brought To Comics” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Fellow Golden Age Timely artist Allen Bellman on his friend and colleague, Syd Shores.

“Doc V” On The Life & Legacy Of Syd Shores . . . . . . . . . . . 27 A comics historian’s view of one of the 1940s’ most prominent artists.

The Voice Of The [Green] Turtle Is Heard In The Land . . . . 41 The life and tough times of Chinese-American artist Chu Hing, by Alex Jay.

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! The Superman Behind Superman (Part 2) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 Michael T. Gilbert presents Sam Moskowitz’s account of DC editor Mort Weisinger.

The Family Car(s) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 Part XIV of Golden/Silver Age writer John Broome’s “offbeat autobio.”

A Tribute To Allen Bellman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 re: [correspondence, comments, & corrections] . . . . . . . . . 64 FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America] #226 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

P.C. Hamerlinck showcases Shaun Clancy on Golden Age Fawcett staffer Harvey Janes.

On Our Cover: When World War II ended, Captain America was basically out of a job—at least until the Cold War began. So editor Stan Lee decided Steve Rogers should trade in his shield and Army fatigues for the suit and tie of a high school teacher! While he didn’t draw the related story in Captain America Comics #59 (Nov. 1946), Syd Shores penciled and inked this memorable cover—one of many featuring Cap, The Human Torch, or Sub-Mariner that he produced during the 1940s. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo and Jim Lustig. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.] Above: Maybe you virtually never got much of a look at the masked face of the wartime Asian super-hero “The Green Turtle,” but he sure had a beautifully flowing cape, didn’t he? Art (and perhaps script) by Chu Hing, from Rural Home Publishing’s Blazing Comics #4 (Feb. 1945). Thanks to Comic Book Plus website, your one-stop shopping for public-domain Golden Age comics. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.] Alter Ego TM is published 6 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. Six-issue subscriptions: $67 US, $101 Elsewhere, $27 Digital Only. 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

“Syd The Kid”??

’ve got to admit it: when Smilin’ Stan Lee was writing the Bullpen Bulletins page for the Marvel issues cover-dated January 1968, and he wanted to mention Syd Shores’ return to active comics duty, he didn’t exactly do himself proud in coming up with one of his usual “nutty nicknames” for him.

Sure, it was amusing to call Syd “a new Marvel oldtimer—or an old Marvel newcomer, if you prefer”… or to say he’d drawn top Golden Age strips like “Captain America, The Black Rider, The Blonde Phantom” (95% of Marvel’s readers had no idea who the latter two were). But then Stan decided to refer to him as—“SYD (The Kid) SHORES”! “The Kid”?? Maybe he was being ironic… since, as he well knew, Syd Shores had worked for Timely Comics before the name “Stan Lee” was a gleam in the mental eye of Stanley Martin Lieber. Syd, after all, seems to have contributed to Captain America Comics #1 in late 1940, helping to ink either the cover or an interior story—or both. Stan didn’t arrive till a few weeks later. Still, if Stan’s choice of a nickname for Syd wasn’t his finest hour, I know he respected his talent and was glad to see him back. As Richard Arndt, Nancy Shores Karlebach, Allen Bellman, and Dr. Michael J. Vassallo discuss in this issue, Syd never quite found the place he probably deserved on the Marvel roster. And, though I was around at the time, I’m at a loss as to how that happened. After all, Syd’s 1940s work on the three action features Stan mentioned above was exemplary, as was his 1950s horror and Western work. Many ’40s staffers considered him Timely’s “art director” (even though editor Stan officially held that title)… he’s listed on at least one inside cover as “art associate”… and he’s the guy Stan chose to execute three sheets of drawing guides for the rest of the bullpen (see p. 38).

Yet, when he returned in 1967, he seemed to become pigeonholed almost at once as an inker, and not as the penciler he’d always been. Oh, he was given the “Red Wolf” feature—but, by then, the Western genre was fading. And he was given “mystery” stories to pencil and ink, in such titles as Tower of Shadows—but almost every artist got a shot at doing some of those. No, it really does seem there was some sort of missed cue between Stan and Syd this time around (i.e., from 1967-73). Did Stan at some stage give Syd a shot at penciling one of the all-important super-hero features, then find the results disappointing? Possibly— but I don’t recall ever knowing about such an assignment. Rather, it’s always seemed to me as if Stan instantly assigned him to ink Jack Kirby’s Captain America pencils—then Gene Colan’s on Daredevil—and since Syd comported himself so well on those, Stan turned his mind to other problems. Like Richard, Allen, and Doc V., I like to think that, given a bit more time, Syd would’ve found his rightful place in the Bullpen as a penciler, having served a creditable second “apprenticeship” on Red Wolf. Sadly, however, his unexpected passing in 1973 prevented that from ever happening. Even so, Syd leaves behind a rich legacy of Golden Age work— of 1950s horror and adventure illustration—of Red Wolf and all those fine inking jobs on Captain America and Daredevil. And I’m only sorry it’s taken 167 issues to get around to giving him at least a little bit of his due, thanks to the efforts of the above gents—and particularly those of his daughter, Nancy Shores Karlebach. Let’s just make certain that, from this day forward, no one can ever refer to Syd Shores as “the forgotten Marvel artist”! Because very few guys deserve to be so richly remembered!

Bestest,

COMING IN FEBRUARY

168

Twin Spotlights On

PAUL NORRIS & WILLIE ITO!

es TM & © DC Comics]

[Aquaman & comics pag

• Aquaman cover art by the Sea-King’s co-creator PAUL NORRIS! • Two very different life stories to have come out of World War II! REED NORRIS talks to RICHARD ARNDT about his father, PAUL NORRIS, & the wartime exploits of Aquaman, Sandman and Sandy—and of “The Secret WWII Comic from Military Intelligence” that saved American and Japanese lives— • —while WILLIE ITO tells of life in the early-’40s Japanese-American internment centers, and of his later career doing animation for Warner Bros. and Hanna-Barbera—and comic art featuring Pogo, Winnie the Pooh, Beany and Cecil, etc.! • Plus: FCA showcases Fawcett’s Jackie Robinson Comics—MICHAEL T. GILBERT and “The Raiders of the Lost Art!”—JOHN BROOME on fellow Golden/Silver Age DC writer DAVID V. REED—& whatever else we can squeeze between two glossy covers!

TwoMorrows. The Future of Comics History.

Subscribe! Six 80-page issues: $67 Economy US, $79 Expedited US, $101 International, $27 Digital Only

TwoMorrows Publishing • 10407 Bedfordtown Drive • Raleigh, NC 27614 USA

Phone: 919-449-0344 E-mail: store@twomorrows.com Web: twomorrows.com

A Star-Spangled Salute to SYD SHORES – Part I

SYD SHORES: A Daughter Remembers

An Interview With NANCY SHORES KARLEBACH Conducted & Transcribed by Richard J. Arndt

Nancy Shores Karlebach & Stan Goldberg at a New York comics convention in October 2010. Nancy Shores was born in 1948. Stan G. colored many of Shores’ covers in the ’40s and ’50s; sadly, the beloved colorist and “Millie the Model”/”Archie” artist passed on in 2014. Photo courtesy of Dr. Michael J. Vassallo.

Syd Shores A studio-portrait photo of the artist as a middle-aged man. Courtesy of Nancy Shores Karlebach and Shaun Clancy.

From Golden Age To Red Wolf Syd Shores’ dramatic cover for Captain America Comics #21 (Dec. 1942)—and one of his last covers for Marvel Comics: Red Wolf #6 (March 1973). John Romita reportedly did a touch-up or two on the latter. Thanks to the Grand Comics Database. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

NTERVIEWER’S INTRODUCTION: Syd Shores was born in 1913 and passed away on June 3, 1973. He began his career in comics as an art assistant for Mac Raboy while working in the shop run by Harry “A” Chesler. While there, he was also partnered with fellow artist Phil Sturm. He soon became an inker on Joe Simon & Jack Kirby’s Captain America Comics. When they left Timely Comics for National (DC) Comics, Shores was one of the artists chosen to replace them on “Captain America” stories. He soon also became Timely’s unofficial art director. After an interruption in his career for military service in World War II, he returned to draw Captain America. He also co-created and drew “The Blonde Phantom.” After Martin Goodman directed Stan Lee to fire the Timely bullpen staff in 1949, Shores also did work for comics publishers Avon and Orbit Publications, perhaps also for Lev Gleason’s Crime Does Not Pay. During the late 1940s and early ’50s, Shores moved from super-hero comics to Western, war, and jungle comics. When assignments in the field dried up from the effects of the Comics Code and Atlas’ distributor woes, he moved into illustrating men’s-adventure magazines for about eight years. In 1967 he returned to Goodman’s comics line, now called Marvel Comics, as an inker on Gene Colan’s Daredevil and Jack Kirby’s Captain America, among other titles. He also worked on Marvel’s war and mystery comics, as well as drawing non-Code horror stories for Warren, Skywald, and Major’s black-&-white magazine titles. When Marvel began publishing its own b&w horror magazines in the early 1970s, Shores was clearly poised to become a major part of that line. However, his work there was interrupted by a fatal heart attack at the age of 59. This interview took place on July 12, 2018. RICHARD ARNDT: We’re welcoming Nancy Shores Karlebach, Syd Shores’ daughter, to talk about her dad. Thanks for agreeing to this interview, Nancy. What can you tell us about him? NANCY SHORES KARLEBACH: His full name when he was born was Sidney Lawrence Schwartz. He changed it when he became an artist. RA: Was that change the same reason that so many other Jewish writers and artists changed their names? To have a name that sounded less ethnic? KARLEBACH: That could have been, but I think he just wanted a name with a little more of a ring to it. Schwartz was a common name in the area he grew up in, but an awful lot of people, not just Jewish people but immigrants in general, wanted an Americansounding name and changed their names or the spellings of their name to achieve that. And in comics, a lot of that was happening— Jack Kirby, Stan Lee, Gil Kane—these men and a lot of others changed their names. I can’t say for certain why he changed it, but I know that he wanted it to stand out. RA: Sure, if you’re going to pick a new name for business reasons, you’d want to pick one that stands out. That makes perfect sense. Do you know where he got his education, particularly his art education? KARLEBACH: Dad went to Pratt. RA: That would be the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn? KARLEBACH: That would be correct. The Pratt Institute of Fine & Applied Art. He went to night classes there and graduated. He attended classes there for some time, perhaps as long as seven years before finishing up his coursework and receiving his certificate. He also had an art display at the Brooklyn Museum when he was a teenager. He had won an art contest and that was the prize. He also won an art contest sponsored by a dog food company, that may have been the first publication of any of his art. He drew a poster dealing with the mistreatment of puppies. I should tell you that while we talk I’m looking at a folder I have about him. My children never met him because he passed

away before I was even married. For years I’ve been thinking of writing up a whole book of stories about him and his life. I didn’t really follow his work when I was a kid because he was just my dad. [laughs] I knew what he did and so on, but I never followed the details of comics. In fact, my father discouraged my sister and I from reading comics because he felt books were better for The Shores Of Tripoli? (Or Maybe France?) our education, Although he may have contributed inking and not because comics perhaps even some penciling to previous Captain were bad but America Comics covers, this is the first one that is because we were definitively his: for issue #20 (Sept. 1942). [TM & © girls and I guess Marvel Characters, Inc.] he didn’t think there were many prospects for girls reading comics. So I thought I would write about his life for my children. Then I thought that, if it sounded OK, maybe it could be turned into a book, because a lot of artists have had books written about them in the last few years. So that’s on my to-do list. That why I’ve put material together in a folder. RA: That’s not a bad idea. Now, I know that before he entered comics he worked for his uncle in a whiskey-bottling place. KARLEBACH: Yes, that’s correct. I don’t know the exact name of that business, however. When he entered into comics, he was working for my mother, Selma’s ...well, she was his wife-to-be at the time... cousin, Phil Sturm. It was with Phil that he worked on his own debut story, “Introducing The Terror,” which appeared in Timely’s Mystic Comics #5 [cover-dated Mar. 1941]. I don’t know if “The Terror” became a regular feature or not. I think that Phil wrote the story and my father did the artwork. [INTERVIEWER’S NOTE: George Klein is credited with inking that story.] I always have a little hesitation when talking about this sort of thing, because I feel I should know all this stuff, but this happened, of course, before I was born. My father was the third person hired on staff for Timely. Joe Simon was his editor. This was working for Simon and Kirby, under Martin Goodman. My father was working as an inker on Captain America fairly early on. First over Kirby’s pencils in All Winners Comics #1 [Summer 1941], and then on the cover of the regular Captain America title, starting in #5 [Aug. 1941]. RA: He continued on Captain America for quite some time after that point, as I recall.

Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers

Syd & Selma Shores (at right) have a night out in 1965. Syd’s first comics story, “The Terror” in Timely’s Mystic Comics #5 (March 1941), was written by his future wife’s cousin, Phil Sturm—as was “Mr. Liberty” in U.S.A. Comics #1 (Aug. ’41). Interviewer Richard Arndt tells us that George Klein inked the first effort. Thanks to Nancy Karlebach & Dr. Michael J. Vassallo for the photo, and to Doc V for the art scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Jack Kirby & Joe Simon (left to right in above photo), during their World War II days—Jack was in the infantry, Joe in the Coast Guard. Nancy says her father told her he’d done at least some inking on the Simon & Kirby “Captain America” story in All-Winners Comics #1 (Summer 1941), and on their cover for Captain America Comics #5 (Aug. ’41). Thanks to Jim Kealy and Dr. Michael J. Vassallo for the art scans, and to Mike Mikulovsky for finding the photo on the Internet. [Pages TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

KARLEBACH: Yes, he did. It was only a short time later that both Jack Kirby and Joe Simon left the book and my father, along with an artist named Al Avison, drew or inked Captain America for most of the rest of the 1940s. I know that I met Al Avison when I was in my early twenties, but I didn’t really know him at all. I used to go to the comicbook conventions with my father when they first started—the ones that Phil Seuling ran [in New York City]—and my father would get his sticker and wander the convention. It was basically one big room, not like it is today. I did meet a number of the artists at that time, but I didn’t really know them. RA: Did you know Vince Alascia? KARLEBACH: He inked a lot of the “Captain America” stories of the 1940s, and I did meet him. I have a good recollection of what he looked like, but again, I didn’t really know him. A person you should perhaps talk to about specific artists who may have worked with my father is Michael Vassallo. [NOTE: No sooner said than done. See pp. 27-40 in this issue.] Do you know him? He’s actually a dentist by trade, but he knows a great deal about comicbook artists and is something of the authority on Marvel Comics.

Vince Alascia is seen here in a detail from the famous 1942 “Bambi” photo (see other issues for details on the detail!)—and a Syd Shores-penciled splash page that Alascia inked for Captain America Comics #40 (July 1944). Thanks to Jim Kealy for the art scan. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

I came to know Michael by way of Allen Bellman, who worked alongside my father early on at Timely, including work together on Captain America. Allen is still alive. He was 93 at his last birthday, I think. [NOTE: Sadly, Allen passed away on March 9, 2020, at the age of 95… after writing his memories of Syd Shores for this issue.] He still goes to all the comic cons. Allen introduced me to Michael Vassallo, who lives in New York, and he’s been very nice in getting information about my father. Michael is a collector and seems to know practically everything about everything comics-related. Anyway, you should talk to both of those gentlemen. RA: Your dad was in the army during World War II. Do you know anything about his service?

KARLEBACH: He was in the service for two years. He was wounded December 16, 1944, and received the Purple Heart. He gave an interview once where he mentioned he was in the same division or regiment as Jack Kirby but that they never actually met each other at that time. I knew he was an admirer of Kirby’s work and collected it. I’m looking through my papers and—here it is. He was in the Third Army. RA: That would have been General Patton’s command, which Kirby was also in, so that lines up. By the date of his wounding, I would guess that he was wounded in the initial hours of the Battle of the Bulge.

KARLEBACH: I believe he worked for the rest of the ’40s on that title. At least until it was canceled. He was still the art director as well, although I don’t know if he ever actually had that title. I think his official title was associate editor. He also drew “The Blonde Phantom” in her comic series. That was my Dad’s. He created her. Well, he created her along with Stan Lee or whoever wrote that first story. [NOTE: For the record, the creator of The Blonde Phantom is in dispute. It was either Stan Lee with Syd Shores, or it was Al Sulman, who claims to have created her when he was the script editor at Timely. She debuted in All Select Comics #11 (Fall 1946), a title which transformed into Blonde Phantom Comics with #12 and ran for another ten issues through 1949.

KARLEBACH: I know he was wounded near Mitz, France. [NOTE: There was also a long siege of Mitz, which had ended only a few days before Syd was wounded, so there may be some sort of overlap between the Mitz siege and the Battle of the Bulge.] Then they flew him to England to recover and he was there for several You’re In The Army Now! months. RA: Following his World War II service, he returned to Marvel, or Timely, as it was still known at that point. He worked again on Captain America.

And Syd Shores was, just in time for the Battle of the Bulge a week or two before Christmas of 1944. Thank the heavens he survived his war wound—and even got a Purple Heart! Thanks to Nancy Karlebach.

Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers

Stan Lee, Syd Shores, and inker Charles Nicholas are listed as the creative team on her first story in All Select.] I know that Dad did the costume design for The Blonde Phantom. He also drew a lot of Westerns. That was sort of his specialty. He drew a lot of horses! [laughs] A lot of artists had a hard time with horses, but Dad could draw every little muscle. RA: After Captain America and Blonde Phantom Comics were canceled, Timely gradually started being referred to as Atlas, which was actually Timely’s self-owned distribution company; since all their covers sported an Atlas “bullet” on them with no mention of Timely, the company started to be referred to as Atlas. The name just stuck, and continued even after the distribution wing was shut down. KARLEBACH: Is that how that happened? I never knew that. Didn’t they also use “Marvel” in the 1940s? RA: They used the word “Marvel” as part of various comicbook titles, and even briefly at times as a company logo; but the line didn’t actually become “Marvel Comics” until 1961, when the first issue of Fantastic Four went on sale. Even then, it was actually identified as “MC” on the cover for over two years before they actually featured “Marvel Comics” on their covers. Same basic company all along, though.

Back Home Syd Shores’ first post-WWII cover for Captain America Comics was #59 (Nov. 1946), whose cover art graces this issue of Alter Ego—and certainly Timely/ Marvel and Stan Lee welcomed him back with open arms! The inside front cover of CA #59 listed him as “Art Associate.” He inked the second and third “C.A.” yarns in the issue—but apparently had nothing to do with the cover story’s interiors. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo, Jim Ludwig, & Jim Kealy for the scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Your dad also worked for Avon and Orbit drawing comics. Do you know about those companies? KARLEBACH: No, I don’t know those. I know he drew the Two-Gun Kid. RA: Since he drew the very first stories of that character, he may also have been the co-creator there as well. This would have been the first Two-Gun Kid, the Atlas version. There was a second, masked one, using the same name, who was the Marvel Comics version. Syd was also drawing a lot of war stories, which was a huge part of the Atlas line from 1952-1957. I think, at one point, they had over two dozen war comics running.

Blondes & Buckin’ Broncos Shores’ covers for Blonde Phantom #12 (Winter 1947)— actually the first issue, though Blondie got her start in the previous issue, when the mag was called All-Select Comics #11—and for All-Western Winners #3 (Winter 1948). Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

I know that Jack Kirby influenced your father’s art style quite a lot, because in the few interviews your dad did have, he mentioned that frequently. However, your dad was also one of the better draftsmen in his own right working in comics for that time period. KARLEBACH: Well, from what I’ve heard and read online, my father himself influenced a number of artists that came after him. He was actually considered the art director at Timely Comics, without having that exact title. He worked steadily at Timely from his debut there in 1941 until he entered the That’s One For Each Hand, service in 1944. After he was Right? wounded, he spent four The original Two-Gun Kid was drawn months in the hospital in by Syd on the cover of Wild West #1 Great Britain, then returned (Spring 1948), among other places. to active service until late Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Marvel 1945 or early 1946. After that Characters, Inc.] he worked at Timely again, in his old position until everyone was fired in 1948. RA: Yes, I’ve heard before, from both Stan Goldberg and Russ Heath, that Martin Goodman would periodically have Stan Lee fire practically everyone in the bullpen, except Lee himself, when comics entered a downturn, and then Stan would gradually build the bullpen back up until Goodman would order him to fire everyone again. This apparently went on fairly regularly from 1949 until 1957, after which the regular bullpen was often just Stan Lee and his secretary for a number of years. Everybody else would have been working freelance. KARLEBACH: My Dad was there from nearly the very beginning and, being the unofficial art director, a lot of the artists who came into the bullpen during those years learned a great deal of their craft from my father.

“For A Golden Girl Knows When He’s Kissed Her…” To accompany the above line from the theme song of the 1964 film Goldfinger, here’s a Captain America cover Syd Shores executed not long before Martin Goodman laid off the entire Timely art staff, turning them into freelancers with no guaranteed weekly paychecks. Out front on issue #66 (April 1948), Bucky is badly wounded by a masked “Golden Girl” who will soon, as a heroine, replace the boy sidekick, in an attempt to goose the comic’s slumping sales. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

positive on that. I was born that same year of the firings, in 1948, so I was only a child when that studio was running. Also, working in the city, close to where the publishers were at, meant that they could deliver pages closer to the deadline. Not have to commute, just walk a block or two. Dad also worked, in his later years, in a studio with Wally Wood. There were other people there as well. It wasn’t just the two of them. I don’t know the names of the other artists, though. The studio was in Valley Stream. Part of the reason for the studios was, it was just nice to get out of the house. Be with other people with the same interests and were doing the exact same thing as my Dad was—drawing.

RA: Gene Colan, in particular, had some very nice things to say about Syd in various interviews. In the early 1950s, your dad had a studio setup with two other artists, Mort Lawrence and Norman Steinberg. Both of them also worked for Atlas during this period. Do you know why they joined together to set up a studio? KARLEBACH: In the late 1940s, those artists were all part of the bullpen. Then, in 1948, they were all fired and became freelancers, but were still working for Timely, or Atlas, or whatever name the company was using. I think that the three of them got together to form a studio, so that they could still work together, maybe help each other out when deadlines were tight... that sort of thing. For companionship and a helping hand, as much as a business concern. I’m not

All A-Shore(s) In The Nifty ’50s! Among the many covers Shore drew in the first half or so of the 1950s—all of them reportedly colored by Stan Goldberg—are those of Battle Action #11 (April 1953), Black Rider #19 (Nov. ’53), and Annie Oakley #8 (Dec. ’55). Only the latter of these was not probably also inked by Syd—but its embellisher is unidentified. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo and the Grand Comics Database, respectively. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers

RA: Your dad wouldn’t have been alone in wanting some company while drawing. After the Atlas implosion of 1957, he left comics and did the interior art, as well as painted covers, for men’s-adventure magazines. Those magazines are totally gone now, but they lasted into the early 1970s. They were the type of heavily illustrated magazines that featured women who either wore very little or where the little that they wore was quite tattered, from battling Nazi and Japanese soldiers, often in gory detail. KARLEBACH: Yes, I actually have some of those magazines. You see, I was growing up in the late 1950s-early 1960s, which is when I became more aware of what Dad did. During that time, he wasn’t actually drawing comics. After things fell apart in comics, after Fredric Wertham and the coming of the Comics Code, he left comics because he wasn’t getting enough work. That’s when he began doing the art for those men’sadventure magazines. RA: Martin Goodman, the publisher of Marvel Comics from the 1940s until 1969 or so, actually published

a number of those magazines. Perhaps that connection was where Syd got his start doing those magazines. He certainly did do work for the Goodman-published men’s magazines, including All-Man, Escape to Adventure, and Man’s Prime. The Goodman magazines apparently reused covers quite a lot. KARLEBACH: I don’t think I knew that Martin Goodman had anything to do with those types of magazines, But, reusing the covers, [laughs] that sounds right! There were quite a number of those magazines at one time, published by a lot of different companies. I do have a portfolio of some of the originals, not a lot, mind you, of some of those covers and inside splashes. It’s not work that I would frame and hang up around the house, though! [laughs] Just for the subject matter. Dad would have models come sometimes when he’d work on those magazines. At times, though, he would use my next door neighbor or my sister. Sometimes I can see the resemblance! [chuckles] Sometimes he used himself as well. Dad would set up the whole studio downstairs with the lights and props so that he could photograph the poses and the folds of fabric and things like that. He used to go to the public library and look for photos of uniforms and the like. He wanted to do them correctly. RA: One of the things I think should be noted about your dad is that, along with Bill Everett and Russ Heath, he was one of the most accomplished artists working on the Timely/Atlas books. In addition, both Bill Everett and your dad were also very good inkers of other artists’ pencils.

The Many Artistic Worlds Of Syd Shores Likewise part of Syd’s pre-Implosion 1950s Timely output were the cover of Adventures into Terror #30 (April 1954)—a “Battle Brady” story (probably a reprint) that was turned by other hands into a 3-D story and plopped into that same year’s 3-D Action #1—and the final issue of Black Knight (#5, April 1956), as inked by Christopher Rule. Scripters unknown. Thanks to the GCD, Rod Beck, and Dr. Michael J. Vassallo, respectively. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

KARLEBACH: I know that Dad thought a lot of Bill Everett. I think that they died the same year. At the comic-con that year—you know they give out a convention book every year, and the book, as I remember, had tributes for both of them. When comics got big again in the mid-1960s, Dad didn’t come back right away. I think that he preferred comics, but was a little distrustful that he could get all the work he needed to make a living. Finally, however, he came back. He inked Gene Colan on Daredevil and Jack Kirby on Captain America. He was also inking, and maybe penciling, a war book—Captain Savage? RA: Yes, Captain Savage and His Leatherneck Raiders. He inked both Dick Ayers and Don Heck on that title. KARLEBACH: It’s ironic, in a way. Gene Colan was one of the artists that my Dad trained when he was the art director at Timely in the 1940s. Gene wrote a beautiful tribute about my Dad that’s appeared online. My father died in 1973 and my mother died

Adventures—The Kind Real Men Like! The Shores illustrations on this page were probably done in the late 1950s or early ’60s, when he was drawing interior art for various “men’s-adventure” magazines; the one with the marooned man and woman appeared in World of Men for Nov. ’66, a non-Martin Goodman title. The sources of the other two are unknown. Courtesy of Nancy K. [© the respective copyright holders.]

Martin Goodman in 1941. Thanks to Drew Friedman. He published a number of “men’s-adventure” magazines, but apparently none of them contained Shores artwork.

Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers

Splashing Ink Kirby & Shores, together again in the pages of Captain America #101 (May 1968)—and Colan & Shores, united in this splash from Daredevil #74 (March ’71). Scripts by Stan Lee and Gerry Conway, respectively. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

about 3½ years after that. My connection to all the people I’d met through my father was really gone by that time. Mother probably kept up with some of the people, but when you’re young, if you don’t see them every day, you just lose track. I wish that hadn’t happened. Even when Google—the Internet— came out, it didn’t really occur to me to search his name.

Stan Lee

Then one day I typed in his name, and I couldn’t believe all the references to him. [giggles] All kinds of information! It was at that time that I found the online tribute from Gene Colan. That was interesting, reading about their early history, which I knew nothing about, and then about his later work, inking Gene. was, of course, the guy who assigned Syd to ink Kirby, Colan, and others during the Marvel Age of Comics. This photo probably dates from the late 1960s, around the time Shores came back to work for Marvel.

Gerry Conway & Gene Colan (left to right) from various sources.

You know, when I was young, I didn’t read comics all that much. I remember Archie—those kinds of comics, but most of the work that Dad did was for boys. Dad didn’t encourage us girls to read comics. He much preferred that we read books. That’s why I know so little about the comicbooks and have to do the research on them. When I was a child, at a certain age, children were really discouraged from reading comics but, nowadays, educators realize that they’re really a great way to learn how to read.

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

RA: I found a note here, sitting underneath other research material, that says it took four years for, I guess Stan Lee, to convince Syd Shores to come back to comics. That Stan Lee had asked him the first time to come back in 1963. KARLEBACH: Well, that makes sense, since he came back in 1967. RA: Your dad also did a number of Marvel’s mystery tales, including an adaptation of a Harlan Ellison story [“Delusion for a Dragon Slayer”’ in Chamber of Chills #1 (Nov. 1972)]. He was also drawing stories for the Warren black-&-white books, as well as stories for Major’s Web of Horror and the Skywald black-&-white and color titles. In fact, the very first interview that I ever did was with Al Hewetson, the second editor of the Skywald books, just a few weeks before Hewetson himself died, and one of the things he was anxious to get into the interview was the story of his friendship with your dad. Al had worked a little while at Marvel, and his first published story was illustrated by your dad. He told me that before he became editor of the Skywald magazines, but while he was working as a writer for them, Syd had agreed to do horror stories for the company. The story he penciled actually appeared in one of Al’s first edited magazines, but Syd was very angry about the inking (by Dan Adkins) on the story, describing it to Al as a “vindictive ink job,” and refused to work for Skywald any longer. Al told me that he worked for two years to get Syd to agree to doing more work for Skywald and that Syd finally agreed to do more stories. However, before he could do any stories for them, he passed away. Al mentioned his sorrow in not having his friend work for him, and then Syd’s death, just when it looked like

Satan’s Inkwell? (Above:) As Richard Arndt relates on this page, Syd evidently hated Dan Adkins’ inking of the story “Satan’s Graveyard” from Skywald’s Nightmare #8 (Aug. 1972) so much that he not only insisted his credit be changed to the pseudonymous “Jim Elder” but also refused to do any further work for Skywald. Not to quarrel with Syd’s judgment, but does it really look all that terrible? Script by Al Hewetson. Thanks to Jim Ludwig. (Center of page:) Still, that didn’t stop Nightmare #13 (June ’73) from running this enhanced photo of Syd, long before he passed away. Courtesy of Jim Kealy. [Both images TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

that was going to turn around, was going to work out, was a great blow to Al.

The Magical Mystery Tour (Above left:) The first page of the Shores-drawn adaptation of science-fiction author Harlan Ellison’s short story “Delusion for a Dragon Slayer” from Chamber of Chills #1 (Nov. 1972), one of Marvel’s late four-color entries into the “mystery/horror” sweepstakes. On the following page, the nebbish hero wakes up in a Conanesque body and situation. Script by Gerry Conway. [Art © Marvel Characters, Inc.; original story © Estate of Harlan Ellison.] (Above right:) Terry Bisson scripted this Shores-illustrated tale for Major Magazines’ Web of Horror #1 (Dec. 1969) during the brief time it was going head to head with James Warren’s Creepy, Eerie, and Vampirella. [© the respective copyright holders.]

KARLEBACH: I think that I knew Al Hewetson. I believe he was from Canada but he came to New York. I remember he once stayed at our house while he and Dad were working together on something. Maybe it was that story for Marvel that you mentioned. I even tried my hand at writing. Worked up some scripts

Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers

Al Hewetson Conceptualizer of Skywald’s later “HorrorMood”—and, earlier, collaborator with Syd Shores on a projected magazine or comic strip to be called The Satirists, for which Syd created a display drawing depicting himself (at bottom) and Hewetson. [Art © Estate of Syd Shores.]

he made a sculpture of a black panther that he really liked. I always wondered if Marvel’s Black Panther might have been nudged into being by that sculpture. I’ve always wondered why, of all the creatures in the animal kingdom, my father sculpted a black panther? I’ve wondered if, in the bullpen, talking back and forth, swapping ideas, whether the notion of a character called the Black Panther was something my dad and Jack Kirby may have tossed around years before. Dad made the statue and, years later, Jack made the character. I asked my Dad’s friend Allen Bellman about it, but he didn’t really know, either, but said it was entirely possible because that’s what they did all the time in a bullpen situation. [NOTE: Syd also drew a story for Warren, apparently using that sculpture as both a model and a key plot point in a story called “It’s Grim,”written by (surprise!) Al Hewetson, appearing in Creepy #35 (Sept. 1970).] The statue doesn’t exist anymore. It was old, made of clay, and began to crumble when we closed up our house. My sister had taken it but it just hasn’t survived. RA: Right now I’m looking at a number of his covers during that time period of the early 1970s and the art is pretty dynamic. Very nicely drawn. KARLEBACH: Thank you for saying so.

and took them around to various companies but that really never took off. I think my writing comics was something that my father would have really wanted. RA: I have a list of unpublished projects that he and Al were working on. One was a newspaper strip called Dirty Socks, which I would assume was a comedy, and the other was a strip called Tales of the Macabre. KARLEBACH: I remember Tales of the Macabre! At least the name. I might even have one strip that might be from that. It was never used, you understand. It was never published. They sent them out to one or two newspapers or syndicates, but they were rejected. I don’t remember the exact years they were doing this, but I know it wasn’t too much later that my father passed away. RA: Al’s note on the subject says that neither strip appeared because they were both too busy with other work to devote enough time to them. However, if you could find those strip samples, that would be a nice addition to the interview. Al mentions the year 1970, but he also mentions that it was done at the time your father had that studio with Wally Wood. The names that Al mentions here also being at the studio were from that time period—Jack Abel, Ralph Reese. Al also mentions that National—DC—had solicited Syd for work but the offer came only two weeks before he passed away. KARLEBACH: Interesting. That’s not something that I was aware of. You know my father dabbled in sculpture, and in the late 1950s

“Grim” And Bear It! This photo depicts the only known sculpture by Syd Shores. As per page at right, he sculpted it to a reference for a story he was drawing for the story “It’s Grim” in Warren’s Creepy #35 (Sept. 1970), as scripted by Al Hewetson. At story’s end (SPOILER ALERT!), turns out the life-size “sculpture” was actually just a real and very deadly panther that awoke from suspended animation and made mincemeat of its new owner. Syd’s sculpture, alas, was accidentally broken during one of the family’s moves. Thanks to Nancy K. for the photo. [Page TM & © The New Comics Company.]

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

RA: He kept that ability throughout his career because his artwork in the late 1960s and early 1970s, which I’m most familiar with, is just as good, whether doing full pencils and inks or just inking, as his 1940s and 1950s work. KARLEBACH: I think so as well. He was an accomplished artist all though those years and continued to be so when comics fell out of favor and he moved into magazine illustration, and then again when he returned to comics in the 1960s. But... many of those 1930s-1970s artists weren’t and haven’t been recognized for their contributions because they weren’t in the business when comics really began to get positive recognition from other media. I think my Dad might well be regarded as a legend, just as some of the other Golden Age artists were recognized and received acclaim at San Diego and elsewhere for their early work, if he’d have lived longer. RA: I think you’re correct. Unfortunately, he passed away just on the cusp of comics being recognized for the good they had within them, as well as the very beginning of the time that the original creators were receiving long overdue credit for their work.

Go West, Marvel Man! Two of Shores’ late covers for Marvel were Westerns—Red Wolf #3 (Sept. 1972) and The Gunhawks #1 (Oct. 1972). Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

KARLEBACH: Yes, Dad passed away at a fairly young age, as well. Just 59 when he died in 1973.

The Last Monsters Syd Shores was working away right up to the end! (Left:) He inked a Jim Mooney-penciled story for Ghost Rider #2 (Oct. 1973), with a script by Gary Friedrich—which led into the brand new “Son of Satan” series. (Right:) Splash of the “Frankenstein Monster” story from Monsters Unleashed #4 (Feb. 1974). Script by Gary Friedrich. Thanks to Barry Pearl for both scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers

Bravado! Bravado! Bravo! Syd penciled the Skywald series “The Bravados” first in several issues of Wild Western Action, beginning with #1 (cover-dated March 1971), then in The Bravados #1-and-only (Aug. ’71)—with inking by Mike Esposito and scripts by Len Wein. Thanks to Nick Caputo and Douglas R. Kelly, respectively. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.] Around the same time, he drew the Black Rider sketch at right for a Street Enterprises Benefit Portfolio, printed by Flying Dutchman. Courtesy of Tom Hegeman. [Black Rider TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

RA: I can remember the announcement of his death, both in the Marvel magazines and in some of the fan press, and it was a bit of a shock, because he’d been doing an enormous amount of work at the time, not only at Marvel but, as we mentioned, for Warren and Skywald as well. I remember that one of his last jobs, a “Frankenstein” story for Marvel’s Monsters Unleashed, was clearly finished by another artist, Win Mortimer. In fact, I think that Win redrew the Frankenstein Monster’s head on every page so the monster would look consistent throughout the story, even though some of the pages were clearly inked by your father and others were completely inked by Mortimer. Was your father aware that he had a heart problem? Because I’m looking at his last credits, and it appears that he was busy right up until his dying day. He was doing that “Monster of Frankenstein” story, but he was also inking Ghost Rider #2. KARLEBACH: Yeah, he was busy. I don’t know if he knew that he was sick. It was really hard to get him to a doctor. He just didn’t go. And you have to remember that people in those days in general just didn’t know how important a regular check-up can be. He smoked a lot. Everybody did in those days, though. He was never really sick. Not sickly in any way. I don’t remember him ever really being sick. The day that he died, he’d gone with my mother shopping. Then he came home and had a heart attack. It was very sudden. RA: Do you remember—and I know this is probably stretching back to your early childhood—any of the artist friends who may have visited your father?

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

The Boy Who Cried “Red Wolf” Both incarnations of the Native American hero Red Wolf were penciled—and sometimes inked—by Syd Shores over the series’ 9-issue life: in issue #1 (May 1972), which postulated one or more heroic ancestors of the character who’d been introduced in The Avengers #80 (Sept. ’70)—and in #7 (May ’73), wherein the modern-day Red Wolf commandeered the title for the rest of the run. Respective scripts by Gary Friedrich and Gardner Fox (in both cases, with contributions from co-creator Roy Thomas); respective inks by Wally Wood and Jack Abel. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

KARLEBACH: I know that one of the creators of Superman was a friend of my fathers, but I’m not sure which one. It was the one who lived in Queens and was losing his eyesight. My dad often visited him in his later years. I just have a recollection of being there with my Dad. RA: That would have been Joe Shuster. KARLEBACH: Artists who came to our home? Well, Allen Bellman came quite often. Al Hewetson, when my Dad and he were working on their projects. When I started going to some of the comic-cons, I met Gene Colan and Dick Ayers, along with their wives. I found out then that Dick Ayers had been to our house, although I didn’t remember it. Those would be the main ones that I’m aware of. RA: One of the things we try to do when we’re dealing with people remembering writers and artists who’ve passed away is to get a sense of what that person was like. What would you like to say about your Dad in that regard? KARLEBACH: He was a wonderful father. I was very close to him. I think, in the industry itself, he was quite respected. In the end I don’t think he was always given the work he wanted to do. Yet, I think that everyone he worked with and for respected his talent and his work. When the men’s-adventure magazines work started to dry up,

he went back to comics. This would have been 1967 or so. He was given more inking assignments and not the full illustrations that he liked to do. Except for Red Wolf. Red Wolf he actually penciled and inked. That was what he liked. He liked to do the art his way, do the complete job. However, he was mostly inking. He was kept very busy doing that, though. He worked for a long time at home and, because of that, he was always there to help out with a home or family crisis. His family enjoyed him. He was very well-loved. He was a worrier, in a way. He always had to make those deadlines! He had a large collection, at one time, of the comics that he’d

Stamp Your Feet! The Kirby cover of Captain America #100 (April 1968), inked by Shores, became one of the Marvel U.S. commemorative stamps a few years back—when the price of a first-class letter was a mere 41¢. Hey, it wasn’t that long ago! [Art TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Syd Shores: A Daughter Remembers

Back To The Drawing Board! Sitting at his board in later years, Syd Shores might well have been musing either on some of his most recent work—like his story “Ando!” for Warren’s Creepy #34 (Aug. 1970), scripted by Robert Rosen— or of his glory days as artist of the lead story in Captain America Comics #24 (April ’43), written by science-fiction pulpster Ray Cummings. Either way, Syd has left a legacy of comicbook greatness behind him—and ahead of us—for all time! Photo courtesy of Nancy Shores Karleback & Shaun Clancy. [Creepy page TM & © The New Comics Company; C.A. page TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

drawn, but he threw them all away when we moved from Brooklyn to Long Island. Comics weren’t really valued in those days. He did live long enough to regret throwing them, though! [laughs] What has mostly survived is the work he did in the years just before his death. One of the nice things that has happened fairly recently was that the Post Office put out a series of commemorative stamps featuring Marvel Comics covers, and one of them was a Jack Kirby/Syd Shores cover from Captain America. The Post Office didn’t used to provide information on artists who had their work used for stamps, but now they apparently do. On the back of the

sheet they put the names of Jack Kirby and my Dad. That was very exciting. I didn’t know about that in advance. I just happened upon it. [laughs] RA: Thank you for agreeing to do this interview. It’s been a real pleasure to speak with you. KARLEBACH: Oh, you’re so welcome! Richard Arndt is a librarian from the wilds of Nevada. He reads a lot of comics.

Richard J. Arndt

An Interview With Nancy Shores Karlebach

SYD SHORES Checklist [This checklist is adapted primarily from information provided in the online Who’s Who of American Comic Book 1928-1999, established by Dr. Jerry G. Bails and viewable at www.bailsprojects.com. Names of features that appeared both in magazines with that title and also in other publications are generally not italicized below. Key: (w) = writer; (p) = penciler; (i) = inker.] Name: Sydney Lawrence Shores (1918-1973) – artist. Primarily known as “Syd,” his first name was occasionally spelled “Sid.” Pen Name: Jim Elder Art Education: Pratt Institute Influences: Hal Foster, Alex Raymond Print Media (Non-Comics): artist – magazines, pulps, Westerns, various men’s-adventure magazines. Co-owner: Commercial Art Studio. Partners: Mort Lawrence and Norman Steinberg 1952-55 Syndication: The Satirists (p)(i) 1971, for Canada (publication uncomfirmed); Tales of the Macabre (daily & Sunday) c. 1972, unsold Promotional Comics: advertising comics (p)(i) for Schneider/Allen and Wash, Inc. Comics Studio/Shop: Harry “A” Chesler Shop (assistant) c. 1940 COMICBOOKS (U.S. Mainstream Publications): Avon Comics: Police Lineup (p)(i) 1952; science-fantasy (p)(i) 1952; war (p)(i) 1952 DC Comics: Casebook Mystery (p)(i) 1952; Gang Busters (p)(i) 1950, 1955 Major Magazines: Cracked (p)(i) 1958-59; horror (p)(i) 1969-70; Web of Horror (w)(p)(i) 1969-70 Marvel/Timely Comics: All Winners Squad (p) 1946; The Avengers (i) 1969, 1972; backup feature (p)(i) 1954 in Combat Kelly; backup feature (p)(i) 1956 in Jann of the Jungle; backup feature (p) (i) in Kid Colt Outlaw 1956; backup feature (p)(i) in Sailor Sweeney; backup feature (p)(i) in Two-Gun Kid; Battle Action; Battle Brady (p)(i) 1952-54; Battle (p)(i) 1953, 1956-58; Battlefront (p)(i) 1954-55; Battleship Burke (p)(i) 1956; The Beast (p)(i) 1972; Black Fury (p)(i) 1950; Black Knight (p) 1955; Black Panther (i) 1976; Black Rider (p)(i) 1948-50, 1953-56; Blonde Phantom (p)(i) 1946-49; Captain America (credited as “art associate”) 1946; Captain America (p)(i) 1941-47, 1968-69; Captain Marvel (i) 1969; Captain Savage (i) 1968-69;

Captain Wonder (p)(i) 1943; Chamber of Chills (i) 1972-73; Chamber of Darkness (i) 1970; Combat Kelly (p)(i) 1954; Commando Adventures (p) (i) 1957; Complete Mystery (p)(i) 1948; covers (p)(i) 1946-49, 1953-56, 1968-69, 1972-73; Creatures on the Loose (i) 1971; The Crusader (p)(i) 1955-56; Daredevil (p)(i) 1969-73; Dracula (i) 1973; Dracula Lives (p) (i) 1973; fillers (i) 1953, 1956; Frankenstein (p)(i) 1974; Ghost Rider (i) 1971-73; Hulk (i) 1968, 1976; Human Torch (p)(i) 1942, 1946-48; illustration (p)(i) 1947; Journey into Unknown Worlds (p)(i) 1956; Jungle Adventures of Greg Knight (p)(i) 1955; Kid Colt (p)(i) 1948, 1950; Kid Colt Outlaw (p)(i) 1956; Lo-Zar (p)(i) 1955; Major Liberty (p)(i) 1941; Man Comics (p)(i) 1949-51; Man-oo the Mighty (p)(i) 1955; Marines at War (p)(i) 1957; Marvel Tales (p)(i) 1957; Masked Raider (p)(i) 1940; Miss America (i) 1946-47; Mr. Wu (p) 1946; My Own Romance (p)(i) 1949; Mystery Tales (p)(i) 1956; Navy Action (p) (i) 1956-57; Navy Combat (p)(i) 1958; Nick Fury (i) 1969; Rawhide Kid (i) 1971; Rawhide Kid (p)(i) 1956; Red Hawkins (p)(i) 1950; Red Wolf (p) 1971-73; Rex Hart (p) 1950; Sailor Sweeney (p)(i) 1956-57; Sgt. Fury (i) 1971-72; Strange Tales (p)(i) 1952; Sun Girl (i) 1949; Suspense (p)(i) 1956; Tales of Fort Rango (p)(i) 1970; The Terror (p) (i) 1941; Two-Gun Kid (p)(i) 1948-49, 1955; Uncanny Tales (p)(i) 1957; Unknown Jungle (p)(i) 1955-57; The Vision (p)(i) 1942; War Comics (p)(i) 1952, 1954; Tales of the Watcher (i) 1968; Tales of the Watcher (p) 1969; Western Outlaws (p)(i) 1957; The Whizzer (p)(i) 1941; World of Suspense (p)(i) 1956; Young Allies (p)(i) 1940s Orbit Publications: covers (p)(i) 1951-52; crime (p)(i) 1950; romance (p) 1950-53; Wanted Comics (p)(i) 1951-52; Wild Bill Pecos (p)(i) 1950-51 Skywald Publishing Company: The Bravados (p) 1971; covers (p) 1971; mystery/occult (p)(i) 1970; Nightmare (p) 1970; Western (p) 1971; The Wild Bunch (p) 1971 Warren Publications: Creepy (p)(i) 1970-71; Eerie (p)(i) 1971; horror (p)(i) 1969 Ziff-Davis Comics: horror (p)(i) 1952; Nightmare (p) (i) 1952

the savage sword of CONAN

IS UNSHEATHED—FOR THE 4TH TIME! Nearly 1000 Pulsating Pages!

SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN: THE ORIGINAL MARVEL YEARS – VOL. 4! Re-presenting SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN #45-60 (1979-1981)

by THOMAS • BUSCEMA • COLÓN • KANE • VOSBURG! Regular Edition (new Adi Granov cover): ISBN #978-1-302-92244-3

Variant Edition (Earl Norem cover) ISBN #978-1-302-92245-0

$125 U.S. ($158 Canadian)

Unleashed on Nov. 11, 2020

A Star-Spangled Salute to SYD SHORES – Part II

“Syd Is Really ALLEN BELLMAN Unrecognized For On His Friend The Contributions He &SydColleague, Shores Brought To Comics” I

Conducted & Transcribed by Richard J. Arndt

NTERVIEWER’S INTRODUCTION: Allen Bellman began his comics career in October 1942 when he answered an ad that led to a job at Timely Comics. He worked in the Timely bullpen as both inker and penciler-inker until 1949, when he became a freelancer. He continued working as such with Timely/Atlas and also began taking assignments from Lev Gleason Publications in 1950. He left the comics industry in 1953. Most comics historians believed him to be the last of the Timely (non-humor) artists from the early 1940s alive. He was also the author of Timely Confidential: When the Golden Age of Comics Was Young (2017). Allen Bellman passed away on March 9, 2020. This interview was conducted July 16, 2018.

RICHARD ARNDT: We’re welcoming Allen Bellman, one of the last surviving 1940s artists to have worked on the original Captain America comic, to reminisce about his old friend, Syd Shores. Welcome, Allen! What can you tell us about Syd?

Allen Bellman Sadly, we don’t have a photo of the late artist Allen Bellman with his Golden Age colleague, Syd Shores— but here’s one of Allen with Syd’s daughter, Nancy Karlebach—flanked by images drawn by both men. (Left:) Shores’ cover for Captain America Comics #32 (Nov. 1943) depicts the hero rescuing his young ally Bucky, who’s strapped to a plummeting bomb. Courtesy of the Grand Comics Database. (Right:) Besides later working unheralded on various “Captain America” stories, Allen drew the Cap-derived “Patriot” for Marvel Mystery Comics #62 (March 1945). Scripter unknown. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

ALLEN BELLMAN: When I came there, to Marvel, he was already working on Captain America, penciling the lead story and other work as time permitted. He was inked by a gentleman named Vince Alascia. RA: Alascia used to do a lot of work for Charlton in the 1950s, ’60s, and ’70s, usually inking Charles Nicholas. He also worked on Jack Kirby’s pencils in the 1940s and 1950s. But we should probably start with when you first met Syd.

Allen Bellman On His Friend & Colleague, Syd Shores

BELLMAN: OK. I was hired in 1942 at Timely. The reason was because Jack Kirby and Joe Simon had left Timely and absconded over to National, DC Comics. Timely put out an ad for artists and I went over there and got the job. I was hired by Don Rico. I was to report in the following Monday, so I came in and Rico introduced me to the people on the staff, including Syd Shores. I had the sense of something not right going on in that office. Syd really had [artist & writer] Don Rico on his back. You could really feel it in the air. A jealousy thing. Now that I look back, I think that Don Rico was jealous that Syd Shores had got the lead assignment on penciling Captain America. That’s my own opinion. There were other freelance artists penciling him too, but Syd was the lead one. I was just hired to be in the bullpen. RA: You mentioned that Don Rico hired you. Would that mean he was the art director of Timely at that time? BELLMAN: No! I never actually knew who the art director was at the time. Years later I found that Vince Fago was considered the art director in 1942, but I never saw him when I was hired. I met him later but had no idea that he was the art director. [NOTE: Apparently Fago served as the interim art director (as well as the comics line’s editor) from Dec. 1942 until 1945 for Timely when Stan Lee was in the service. After 1945, Lee again held that title through the early 1970s when he became publisher and president—and even then, he didn’t officially relinquish it to anyone else for several years.]

Don Rico & Vince Fago (Left:) Writer/artist Don Rico, circa 1942. Both he and Bellman were highlighted back in Alter Ego #114, which see! A detail from the famed “Bambi” photo. (Right:) Vince Fago was also a writer and artist, primarily of humorous comics—and in late 1942 became Timely’s editor when Stan Lee joined the Army. This photo was taken in 1948.

After I started at Timely I became very good friends with Syd. I was doing the backgrounds on his pages for Captain America. Syd and his wife were a huge help to me when I got divorced from my first wife. That was a dark period in my life. They were great people and treated me great. RA: Al Avison preceded Syd on Captain America, is that correct? BELLMAN: Avison was a freelancer. Syd was in the bullpen, but, yeah, I think Al did the lead stories for Captain America before Syd took over. I never saw him. Never saw Jack Kirby or Joe Simon, either. They were both gone before I got there. Syd was the main Captain America artist all the time I was there, right up to the end of the comic in 1949. RA: How many people were in the bullpen at that time? BELLMAN: We had an animators’ department, which I never had too much to do with, and then the guys working on the super-hero and adventure books. That’s where Syd and I were. Maybe 20, 25 people. It’s hard going back to 1942 and figuring how many people might have been working in the bullpen then. I’m 94 and I’m lucky some days to remember what I had for breakfast. RA: You and me both. [laughs] What else, if anything, was Syd also working on at Timely during this period? BELLMAN: Captain America probably kept him pretty busy, but I’m sure they gave him other assignments when they could. If they didn’t have a Cap story available, they’d give “We’ll Always Have Paris!” him something else. He In drawing many of the World War was a good artist. They II-era covers of Captain America Comics, weren’t going to waste such as this one for #29 (Aug. 1943), Shores was following the lead of Alex him! Schomburg, who delineated most of the Human Torch, Sub-Mariner, and Marvel Mystery Comics covers of that era—with a horde of people and paraphernalia crowding the canvas, many of them labeled for clarity. The signs and strewnabout papers in this one reveal that Cap and Bucky are coming to the rescue of members of the anti-Nazi French underground. The GCD suggests that perhaps Syd had an inking assist—by an unidentified artist—on it. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

RA: I probably should remind modern-day readers of this interview that, in those days, comics were 64 pages long, not 32 pages as they generally are today, and there weren’t that many advertisements included. There were probably more than 50 pages of content at the time. [NOTE: In fact,

“Syd Is Really Unrecognized For The Contributions That He Brought To Comics”

on body parts was good. His flow from page to page was good. He also knew how to take a script and make it look good when it went to print. RA: Stan Lee was an editor at Timely early on, but was he the only editor at Timely? BELLMAN: At that time? When I started, he was not even there. I think he was already in the service or maybe just getting ready to go into it. After I’d been there two or three weeks, I saw a little guy walk in whose name was Robby Sullivan. He was a brother-in-law to Martin Goodman. Stan Lee, whose real name was Stanley Lieber, was related to Robby Sullivan. There was some sort of family relationship there between Goodman, Sullivan, and Stan Lee. RA: I’ve got a note here where Syd said in an interview he gave in the early 1970s that he worked on Captain America from 1942-1944, and then was drafted. He ended up in the same regiment as Jack Kirby, although I don’t think they ever met during the war years. Syd certainly never mentions meeting him then. BELLMAN: Thank God he came back alive from the war! RA: I also have a note quoting Gene Colan, where he says he started at Timely in the summer of 1946.

“I Was There!” On the comics convention circuit at age 92, Bellman drew (and reproduced limited editions of) such drawings as this one for fans of Golden Age comics. Thanks to Allen for sending it to us, a few years back. [Captain America & Bucky TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.; other art © Estate of Allen Bellman.]

much more—Captain America Comics #11 had 63 pages of editorial content out of 64 pages! The pages for a monthly like Captain America may well have taken all of his time and more.] BELLMAN: Syd was a fast penciler, but his work was also very accurate. Very true-to-life. The clothes were right. The buildings were right. He was a very good artist. Later on, he was not treated right. There was a point in time when Syd was pushed back when they brought in a lot of editors. Stan Lee did not protect Syd then, and I found that troubling. But I’ll wait for you to ask the questions about that. RA: Sure. How old was Syd when you first met him? I believe he was a bit older than most of the staff, but nobody was really too old in those days. BELLMAN: He was pretty old to me! I was 18 and he was 30. He’d been at Timely at least a couple of years before I got there. But to an 18-year-old, anybody 30 years old is an old guy. There were a lot of pretty good artists there, but most of us were young! There were also a lot of crude artists, because they were young and not fully developed. Carl Burgos, the creator of The Human Torch, sat behind me in the bullpen, and his art was somewhat crude. The Human Torch was a really good idea, though.

Cap’s In The Air

Syd himself was not young. He was mature. His artwork reflected that. It was strong, mature work. He was a truly good artist. His penciling may not have stood out on its own, but when inked it was just good art. His composition was strong. His work

Gene Colan drew a “Captain America” yarn or two in the late Golden Age— such as this splash from Captain America Comics #71 (March 1949)—and would draw a whole lot more in the late 1960s, when he teamed up with Smilin’ Stan Lee. 1940s scripter unknown. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Allen Bellman On His Friend & Colleague, Syd Shores

BELLMAN: Yes, I knew him then, but we didn’t become the really good friends we were to become until fifty years later. Gene was a nice, curly-haired kid with a lot of talent. RA: My notes say that he considered Syd the top man in the art department, which, I guess, means that Syd by this time was acting as the de facto art director for Timely. BELLMAN: He was never officially the art director. He was the head artist. Stan was both the Editor and Art Director. Stan was pretty green back then, though. He was only a year-and-a-half older than I was. Nineteen, 20, 21, no more than that. Now, I say that Stan was green, but he caught on really quick. He really made Timely, then Atlas, then Marvel Comics really work! RA: OK! Gene describes Syd as a really quiet kind of guy.

Another Marvel Mystery! We don’t know how many stories about Timely’s original “Big Two” Syd Shores drew in the 1940s—but he definitely penciled a number of covers of both heroes’ mags. Juxtaposed here are those of Human Torch #29 (Winter 1947) and Sub-Mariner #23 (Summer ’47), both possibly inked by Vince Alascia. Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

BELLMAN: Really quiet. He did his work and didn’t talk much. When his daughter Linda was born, there was a popular song about a gal named Linda and he’d sing that. [NOTE: Almost

“A Lot Of Westerns… [And] A Lot Of War Comics” Three dynamic illustrations from Shores-“covered” genres mentioned by Allen Bellman: the covers of Kid Colt Outlaw #6 (July 1948), Black Rider #20 (Jan. 1954), and Battle Brady #11 (Feb. 1953). Stan Goldberg colored at least the latter two of these. The Kid Colt cover inker is unidentified. Courtesy of Dr. Michael J. Vassallo and the GCD.[TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“Syd Is Really Unrecognized For The Contributions That He Brought To Comics”

“Wild” In The Studio Allen Bellman may not recall his fellow Golden Age artist Mort Lawrence, but ML and Syd Shores even teamed up at one time to try to sell the above-depicted Stella Fortune daily comic strip, with the penciled panels probably being the latter’s work. The probably Shores-written text taped onto it tells its story… but alas, as with 99% of all attempted comic strips, it failed to sell. [© Estates of Syd Shores & Mort Lawrence.] Both men drew at times for Patches Publications’ The Westerner Comics. Shores did the “Wild Bill Pecos” lead story in #32 (Jan. 1951), while Lawrence illustrated a “Wild Bill” exploit in #27 (June 1950). Both stories are attributed to William Woolfolk as scripter. [© the respective copyright holders.]

Allen Bellman On His Friend & Colleague, Syd Shores

certainly the 1946 Buddy Clark tune.] Just occasionally. Then, when Nancy was born, he’d sing “Nancy (with the Laughing Face).” [NOTE: A 1945 Frank Sinatra recording.] I remember when they both were born. In fact, I’m very friendly with Nancy and her husband and family right now. RA: That’s nice. I think it’s kind of sweet that he would sing songs about his daughters as well. There are records that indicate that, after the war when the comics began shrinking in size, he worked on both “Human Torch” and “Sub-Mariner” stories. BELLMAN: That I don’t know about. He did beautiful work on Westerns. Kid Colt, Black Rider… He did a lot of Westerns but I don’t remember all of them. He also did a lot of war comics. Actually, we all did a lot of war comics. I enjoyed drawing those and I think Syd did as well. RA: Syd founded a comics art studio in the 1950s. Were you involved in that? BELLMAN: Yeah, there was Syd, me, another guy, a background guy, whose name I don’t recall. It was in Hampstead, Long Island. We both lived in that neighborhood. I was in the art studio. We each paid a fee for that. RA: I have two other gentlemen whose names are listed—Mort Lawrence and Norman Steinberg. BELLMAN: The first name doesn’t ring a bell, and the second one… I’m just not sure. RA: I’d also like to discuss the layoffs or firings of the bullpen that took

place from time to time, starting in 1949 and going through to the big one in 1957. BELLMAN: Yeah. Every department at Timely or Timely-Atlas had a benchmark. When those benchmarks came around, every day somebody was called in and fired. After I was fired, I personally ran over to Lev Gleason and got a new job right away. Syd got fired and then re-hired as a freelancer by Timely within a day or two of each other. Maybe even quicker than that. When there were no comics to be worked on, they gave Syd illustrations for this or that to do. In 1957 it was different. A lot of companies were gone. Atlas, I guess it was called at that time, canceled a lot of books, which gave them enough inventory for the few books that were remaining to keep going for a while. Maybe even as long as a year or a year and a half. We both had to leave comics around then. I remember going to his house and seeing illustrations and covers that he was doing for various magazines. They were absolutely wonderful! The interiors were done in washes—light grays and dark grays. He couldn’t make enough money on that, though. He told me that. He had a lot of offers. The editors of those magazines tried to keep him busy, but the volume of work wasn’t enough to take up all the comicbook pages that he couldn’t do anymore. I remember being in his house when he was laboring over an illustration for one of those magazines. It was like a house of mourning. RA: I think he was doing advertising at that time as well.

Casting A Wide Net (Left:) Once he was no longer on staff at Timely after 1949, Shores sometimes accepted freelance assignments from other companies—such as Orbit-Wanted, for whom he penciled this yarn for Love Diary #32 (Dec. 1952). Whether or not he inked it as well is as unknown as the name of the lovestruck scripter. Thanks to Jim Kealy. [© the respective copyright holders.] (Center:) Of course, Syd’s Timely work was also reprinted abroad, whether he was working for the company at the time or not—as witness the Canadian cover (from the Bell group) displaying his art for Goodman’s All True Crime Cases Comics #26 (circa Spring 48). Thanks to the GCD for this and the following cover. (Right:) Up till near the end, a few Korean War comics held on—even though a truce had been declared more than two years before Shores drew this cover for Battlefront #38 (Jan. 1956). [This & preceding cover TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“Syd Is Really Unrecognized For The Contributions That He Brought To Comics”

Sailor, Beware! One real gem, at least in terms of showing how well Syd Shores could draw, was the short-lived Timely war/adventure comic Sailor Sweeney, as per these two pages from issue #12 (July 1956). Syd drew Chinese people who looked as Chinese people might have when coming to America in those days—with not a racial caricature in sight (unless you count the tone-yellow coloring, which was simply an unenlightened convention of the day, with no ill will meant). Scripter unknown. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

BELLMAN: That I can’t speak to. I know nothing about that. Syd, I think, is really unrecognized for the contributions he brought to comics. What really angered me about Syd was that in the 1960s he was pushed back into being only an inker, and at Marvel, of all places. Here was one of the best guys ever to construct a comics page, and all he was allowed to do was ink. One of the worst things you could do to an all-around artist. I’m not saying that Marvel didn’t already have good pencilers. They had Jack Kirby and Gene Colan. Very good pencilers. But Syd was not that far in quality from them. Quieter, maybe. Kirby was flashy. It’s just a shame that Syd was pushed back because they didn’t like his current style. It wasn’t fair. It was just sad. RA: One of the things that should probably be mentioned here was that in 1967, when Syd came back to what was now Marvel Comics, they didn’t actually have that many books they could put him on. Kirby, Colan, John Romita, John Buscema, and Don Heck accounted for most of the penciled artwork for the titles at that time. The other pencilers of that time period— Can A Wolf Beat Marie Severin, Werner Roth, Larry Lieber, and A Bear? Dick Ayers—had been working for Marvel for This dynamic cover for Red Wolf years by then. That situation did change in 1968, #4 (Nov. 1972) surely proves Allen though, when they nearly doubled their output. Bellman’s point: that Syd Shores could BELLMAN: Maybe. I don’t want to put down those fellas you mentioned. In fact, God bless Jack Kirby for creating Captain

probably have been better utilized by Marvel penciling as well as inking super-hero stories. Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Allen Bellman On His Friend & Colleague, Syd Shores

America. Best character he ever created. It still seems to me that Stan or somebody should have found a place for Syd to pencil and ink his own work. Having him just ink was pushing him back, because his 1940s “Captain America” work was just so good. Maybe Kirby was a better artist, but that’s no excuse for pushing a man as good as Syd was back. He was Marvel’s top artist at one time. To me, pushing Syd into only an inker’s role was cold and cruel. RA: I’m sorry to hear you think that. BELLMAN: Maybe I’m wrong to put it like that. A lot of good artists, who just weren’t around during the 1960s and 1970s, are forgotten today. Just because they didn’t do their art on today’s popular characters or because they died before they could be recognized. Sam Burlockoff, an old friend of mine, should be written up, too. He did a lot of work for Timely—freelance. Also for Quality and Archie Comics. His daughter got in touch with me and sent me a picture of me and him. RA: Syd did do some pencil and ink jobs for Marvel, mostly in 1972 or 1973, just before his death. He was doing anthology stories for the mystery titles and the black-&white magazines, as well as working on Red Wolf. BELLMAN: That may be, but I had to speak my heart here. Marvel pushed him back as though he were a second-rate artist. He was not. I don’t think that Stan defended his artists like he should have. I remember Gene Colan telling me that he was getting a lot of grief from an art director at one time. He went in to Stan to see if Stan would sort out the problem and Stan did not defend Gene, either. In other words, he’d defend editorial before he’d defend the artists. Another time, a rat went to Robby Solomon to say one of the artists in the bullpen took one piece of Bristol Board home and got that artist fired. Some of the artists just were not very nice, either. RA: When Syd passed away, was that from a heart attack? BELLMAN: The story was that he was having chest pains. He was asked by his family, who told this to me, to go to the hospital, but he told them that the pain would go away. Instead, Syd went away. He was only about sixty. So young. To me, anyways. Syd and I were best friends. Roz and I were often over to his house for dinner. We’d talk to each other about any problems we were having. It was a great relationship. He was a quiet gentleman, and he was a gentleman. He was also a great artist. I hope people recognize that. He just didn’t live long enough to be recognized by his peers and his fans. I’d like to see Syd Shores adopted into the Hall of Fame at the San Diego ComicCon. It’s about time.

Putting A Cap On It Future Mad artist Dave Berg drew the above caricature of Syd Shores for Stan Lee’s 1947 “how-to” book Secrets behind the Comics. Syd himself, of course, drew the slam-bang action page from Captain America #40 (July 1944 – scripter unknown) at top right—and the humorous illustration for a 1973 artists’ portfolio published by the industry’s own Academy of Comic Book Arts. [CA #40 page & Captain America TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.; caricature © Estate of Stan Lee.]

A Star-Spangled Salute to SYD SHORES – Part III

“DOC V” On The Life & Legacy Of SYD SHORES

A Comics Historian’s View Conducted & Transcribed By Richard J. Arndt

NTERVIEWER’S INTRODUCTION: Dr. Michael J. Vassallo, better known to comic fans as “Doc V,” is one of the primary authorities on the company that started out as Timely, became Atlas, and ended up as Marvel Entertainment. His website timely-atlascomics.blogspot.com is an excellent place to gain more information on all things related to that company. At Nancy Shores Karlebach’s suggestion, we contacted Doc V for his take on Nancy’s father—Syd Shores. This interview took place July 27, 2018.

RICHARD ARNDT: Michael, it’s nice to finally talk to you. I’ve admired your work for quite some time. It’s been invaluable to comic historians. MICHAEL J. VASSALLO: Thank you. RA: I guess we should start out on how you got acquainted with Syd Shores. VASSALLO: I remember seeing his work, back in the early 1970s,

Syd Shores In The Marvel Age Of Comics Doc V reports he first encountered Syd Shores’ work as inker of Jack Kirby’s Captain America (as per above splash from #107, Nov. 1968), with script by Stan Lee—but his first glimpse of what Syd himself looked like was most likely his self-portrait that accompanied his full-art job in Tower of Shadows #5 (May 1970), scripted by Gerry Conway. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

A Comics Historian’s View

on sort of secondary features at Marvel, and elsewhere as a penciler. I also remember his inking Jack Kirby on Captain America. This would have been the 1960s revival, which started off with #100, taking up the numbering from Tales of Suspense, which Syd also inked for a bit. I also remember the little blurb stating he’d passed away. Those two events bookended roughly five or six years’ time. However, when I started getting involved with the history of Atlas and Timely, I realized that this guy was all over the place, and, man, was he good! That pretty much opened my eyes to Syd Shores. RA: One of the things I’ve noticed about his early work was that a lot of 1940s artwork can appear to be rather static to modern eyes. Syd’s 1940s work is anything but! It’s quite dynamic. It may not be quite as kinetic as Jack Kirby’s was at the time, but it wasn’t far behind. VASSALLO: No, it is not. His work is extremely dynamic. I know from talking to Nancy that Syd was somewhat upset that he wasn’t really able to break in at Marvel as a penciler when he came back to comics in the latter part of the 1960s. Stan Lee was seemingly hesitant to put him on any top features. RA: That’s always seemed a little odd to me. If nothing else, his 1960s art style would have seemed perfect for Iron Man. VASSALLO: I agree totally. I don’t think he was given the chance. Years ago, Mark Evanier mentioned, I think it was on the old, old, old Kirby list from the mid-1990s, that folks were complaining to Marvel, and so pretty much directly, to Stan Lee, that Shores’ inking looked very old-fashioned. It was being called muddy, which may have referred to the way it looked when printed. The original artwork is actually quite crisp. Mark suspected that may have happened due to the way Syd inked. He didn’t use a bottle of ink. Mind you, I’m completely ignorant of the tools used in inking, but from my remembrance of what Mark said, Syd used a solid ink block, which had to be repeatedly dipped with or in water. That sounds crazy to me. I don’t really know anything about it, but that type of inking apparently made the reproduction extremely muddy and that was the main reason that he was soon taken off inking Kirby. RA: You’re right in saying that really makes no sense, as I’ve seen original pages of Kirby/Shores work for that time period and the inking looks just fine. He was also inking Gene Colan’s work on Daredevil at the time, and the type of production problems you’ve mentioned should also have been appearing there, but I recall those pages as being quite nice. [NOTE: For the record, I’ve looked at both the Epic (color) and Essential (black & white) Captain America reprint volumes for those issues, and Syd’s pages are indeed much darker (muddier, if you will) than the preceding issues inked by either Frank Giacoia or Joe Sinnott, or the issues directly after inked by Dan Adkins and George Tuska. The reproduction, even in black-&-white, is not as clear. Syd also appears to have routinely reworked Cap’s head on the interior pages on a regular basis, causing it to appear to be a Syd Shores head and not a Jack Kirby one, and also completely redrew The Red Skull’s head whenever he appeared on covers—this, at least, apparently in an effort to appease the Comic Code requirements.] VASSALLO: True enough. Well, it was a Mark Evanier story that described Stan’s complaining about Syd Shores’ inking around 1968-1969 or so. RA: It’s hard to believe there would have been that many complaints from readers about any artist at Marvel at that time, when they were still running strong with fans. Still, who knows? VASSALLO: Exactly. Who knows? Mark might have some inside information on that situation, since later he was Jack’s assistant, but who knows?

Syd Was A Real Sport! But this wasn’t a sports-oriented comic mag in which he depicted a flawlessly drawn boxing match—it was the crime comic Tales of Justice #57 (Dec. 1955)—so you can bet there was some skullduggery involved before too many more panels. Scripter unknown. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

RA: That kind of complaint didn’t make it into the letters pages in any great detail, since that would have been memorable. VASSALLO: You’re right. It didn’t. RA: I actually admired his work inking Gene Colan on Daredevil quite a bit. VASSALLO: I do, too, and Gene was a huge admirer of Syd Shores. Every time I talked to Gene, he would rave about how much Syd helped him on that title, how great an artist he was—on and on. In fact, with most of the Timely/Atlas/Marvel artists that I’ve talked to over the years, Syd’s name always comes up. I believe that he, in an unofficial position, was acting as the art director at the Timely and Atlas bullpen. He was a mentor to every new artist who was trying to break in on staff. They all went to him with their problems. How to flesh out a scene, how to do pacing, how to do this or that. Syd apparently always took the time to help everybody who needed it. He was also usually older than everybody else, too. RA: Not that much older than everybody, was he? VASSALLO: Yeah, he was in his late twenties when he got into comics and would have been in his thirties or older during the postwar Timely years. Only Christopher Rule, I suppose, would have been older than Syd. Syd died young, at age 58 or 59, but

“Doc V” On The Life & Legacy Of Syd Shores

Think While You Ink! You can judge for yourself re Kirby as inked by Syd Shores and other embellishers. Here, from the black-&white Essential Captain America, Vol. 1, are Frank Giacoia’s inks from Tales of Suspense #79 (July 1966) and Syd’s from Captain America #100 (April ’68). [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

he was considerably older than the teen-agers also breaking into the business in the 1940s or the 20-somethings in the early 1950s. Anybody who was breaking into comics in those days would have considered anyone five years or older than them to be a father-figure. He was acting as the art director, although, as I’ve mentioned, it was an unofficial title. I think Stan Lee laid claim as the official art director. In fact, I’ve seen that mentioned in print in some of the Timely credits—“Editor and Art Editorial: Stan Lee.” So Stan grabbed the official art director title, but he was not the actual art director. Syd Shores was the acting one for those Timely years. Timely, and then later Atlas, was putting out dozens of titles a month, and no one person could have done both jobs for that many books. RA: Syd started off inking Captain America covers, and then moved to the interiors when Jack Kirby was still the lead artist of the 1940s book. VASSALLO: Syd came to Timely by way of the Harry Chesler shop. Some of the early work that appeared from him at Timely, like “The Terror” in Mystic Comics #1, I’m convinced he didn’t actually do for Timely but instead did for Chesler, and Martin Goodman bought them for Timely. If you saw the first works of Syd’s that appeared in Timely books, they were written by Phil Sturm, who was also working at Chesler. Phil was Syd’s wife Selma’s cousin, if I’m remembering right. [NOTE: Please note that Wikipedia lists Harry Chesler as Syd’s cousin. However, both

Singing For His Supper As Marvel writer and associate editor at the time, A/E’s editor certainly had no qualms about Syd’s inking during their long run with Gene Colan on Daredevil. Seen here is the splash page of their second teaming on the title, Daredevil #56 (Sept. 1969). Thanks to Barry Pearl. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

A Comics Historian’s View

For a considerable time, Syd was credited with inking the cover to Captain America #1, the one where Kirby has Cap punching Hitler. I think that credit came from a short interview that Syd gave to Al Hewetson in the early 1970s. However, I don’t believe he is the inker. It’s possible that he did work on the cover, though. Like I said, this book was a Simon & Kirby shop effort. Syd may have drawn a line here or inked a small part there. RA: He’s not credited with cover inks for #1 anymore, although he is for #5 and #7. VASSALLO: I’m not certain Syd inked those, either. It’s possible, however. When I collated the credits for Marvel’s Golden Age Captain America Omnibus, after the deepest analysis of the first ten issues ever done, we left the credit for #1 blank because there’s just no credible evidence as to who did what vis-à-vis the inking on the first issue’s cover. If only there was a “pay copy” of Cap #1, like there is for Marvel Comics #1! Al Avison was the first artist to take on Captain America when Simon & Kirby were forced out of Timely. Al had been the primary non-Kirby Captain America penciler on those first ten issues and was well versed with the character. Syd began to ink Avison. When Avison left the book several issues later, Syd took it over. For the rest of the 1940s, he was the de facto artist on the character, for the most part. There were a lot of “Captain America” stories appearing in other titles, so they had need of other artists to draw those stories—Don Rico, Fred Bell, Allen Bellman. In the main book, in the lead story, however, Syd was the Captain America artist. RA: Captain America was eventually phased into a horror title… VASSALLO: It was. Its last couple of issues introduced horrorthemed stories, culminating with a complete switch over to all-horror content coinciding with the boom in the horror genre and

A Vision Of Loveliness Besides working on “Captain America” and serving as a sort of unofficial art director (or “art associate”), Shores racked up some super-hero solo credits even in his early days, as per this “Vision” story from Marvel Mystery Comics #30 (April 1942). Scripter unknown. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Nancy and Doc V stated to me that the cousin was actually Phil Sturm.] Selma and Syd were already married by this time. Obviously, being relatives, both Phil and Syd were working in the same shop. However, Joe Simon, then an editor at Timely, picked up Syd from somewhere and had him join that loose set of artists who produced the first ten issues of Captain America, all credited to Simon & Kirby. Everyone thinks that Simon & Kirby did those issues on their own, but it’s not solely Simon & Kirby. They were the creators and prime movers who did the first couple of stories. Kirby penciled a lot and did all of the splash pages. Simon did some penciling and inking. There were all kinds of ancillary artists helping out, including Syd, plus Al Liederman, Al Avison, Al Gabriele, Bernie Klein, George Klein, George Roussos, Reed Crandall, Charles Wottkoski, Ernie Hart, Mort Meskin, and Mike Sekowsky. Simon & Kirby were operating their own shop, producing Captain America for Timely. Some names, like George Klein and Mike Sekowsky, were some of the earliest Timely staffers, and their contributions could have come via a staff position rather than through that loose Simon & Kirby shop. At some point in the run of the first ten issues, Simon & Kirby were only doing the splash pages and the rest of the story pages were seemingly done by the others.

Terror Firma We showed you the splash page of “The Terror” by writer Phil Sturm and artist Syd Shores (his first solo job) back on p. 5—here’s the final page from that odd early mash-up of super-hero and horror from Mystic Comics #5 (March 1941). Thanks to Doc V. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“Doc V” On The Life & Legacy Of Syd Shores

RA: Timely/Atlas had a tendency to fire everyone in the bullpen, probably when they had a lot of inventory…. VASSALLO: The first time was at the end of 1949. The staff was in the Empire State Building at the time and, for whatever reason you want to pick, although the usual story is that Martin Goodman opened up a closet and found it full of unpublished inventory. He blew a gasket and then realized that he could save a lot of money firing everybody and replacing them with freelancers. The fact that the freelancers were often the same artists who’d been fired from the bullpen didn’t seem to make any difference. I’ve also heard there were tax reasons that came into consideration. Still, at the end of 1949, the Timely staff in the Empire State Building was let go. All that was kept on was a small production staff. Everyone else became a freelancer. RA: Stan Goldberg told me about a mass firing, and the 1949 one must have been the one he was referring to. FYI, Russ Heath told me that the mass firing was his fault. He had come up with some innovation involving reproduction that was much cheaper than the old way. VASSALLO: Oh, I’ve heard that story! He came up with a way to reprint stories using only pencils, without them having been inked.

Were Thine That Special Face? A/E’s editor says: “I don’t know about anybody else, but every time I look at this splash page from the second story in Captain America Comics #2 (April 1941), I’m convinced that someone besides Jack Kirby drew at least Cap’s face on it—if not the Cap figure itself.” None of this detracts from the supreme accomplishment of Simon & Kirby’s first ten issues of that title, but it took a lot more than two guys to turn all of them out. From the hardcover Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age Captain America, Vol. 1. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

its introduction at Timely-Atlas in 1949. Syd also drew some issues of the Blonde Phantom. RA: Yes, Nancy tells me that he was the co-creator of that character. VASSALLO: Towards the end of the original Captain America run, 1948-1949, there were a lot of artists drawing the stories. I’ve even uncovered two Gene Colan stories at Timely, which just blew my mind when I found them. Then the title became Captain America’s Weird Tales at the end of the run, just for the last two issues. The final all-horror cover, #75, was also drawn by Gene Colan. All the Timely super-hero books ended by the close of 1949 or earlier. RA: At least Cap didn’t lose his title to a dog, like Green Lantern did. VASSALLO: That’s true. [laughs] In 1947, when Timely decided to branch out—at the time they were only publishing two types of comics—super-hero and humor—they started doing crime comics. Syd was right on top of that. He drew the covers for both of the first two issues of the crime books, which appeared simultaneously [NOTE: Justice #7 and Official True Crime Case Comics #24—both Fall 1947]. They’re beautiful covers.

The Joke’s On—The Jester! Yet another Shores/Alascia action page from “The Jester of Death” in Captain America #40 (July 1944). Thanks to Jim Kealy. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

A Comics Historian’s View

He even said he produced a few stories that way. I’ve never been able to identity of those stories, though. I don’t believe that’s the reason, Rich. RA: I’m not necessarily saying he’s right, either. He might have thought so, however, because the mass firing came very shortly after he went to Timely with his reproduction innovation. It might be a part of the reason, though. VASSALLO: It could be a part of it, I guess. Yet whatever technique it was, it was never instituted, so I’m doubtful. But Goodman fires the staff and everyone becomes a freelancer, scrambling for work. Syd immediately was back at work for Timely, freelancing. I think he also went over to Orbit, I think, to work on Westerns. Whoever published Wanted [NOTE: Wanted Comics—and yes, the publisher was Orbit], I’ve found him doing crime comics for another publisher but most of his work was freelance for either Timely or Orbit. RA: I know that, in the 1950s, with super-heroes largely out of the picture, especially at Timely/Atlas, that most of the stories would have been short stand-alone tales for various genres—Westerns, crime, war, horror, romance, etc. VASSALLO: Yes, in the 1950s those would have been the genres and it would have been mostly anthology titles. However, he worked on a lot of recurring characters in the 1950s as well. In the war books, he had a character called Battle Brady, who ran in Battle Action, as well as in his own title and even once in a while in Battle. He was wonderful doing Westerns. He introduced the “Two-Gun Kid.” He drew “Kid Colt,” “Rex Hart,” and on “Black

“Horror-ay For Hollywood!” (Top left:) The GCD credits this Shores-penciled cover for Blonde Phantom #13 (Spring 1947) as being inked either by Syd himself or by Vince Alascia. Thanks to the GCD. (Above:) An action page from Blonde Phantom #14 (Summer 1947) by Shores, scripted by Otto Binder. Thanks to Jim Ludwig. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

We’ve Got These Covered, Too! Doc says the Shores covers of Timely’s Justice #7 and Official True Crime Cases Comics #24—both dated Fall 1947 and both actually the first issues of their series—are “beautiful covers”… and who are we to argue with an expert? Thanks to MJV for the scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“Doc V” On The Life & Legacy Of Syd Shores

Rider” he had a long run penciling the character, both in his own book and on excess stories for other Western titles. For Atlas Western fans, Black Rider is well loved! Syd’s artwork there is really beautiful, and he picked up Christopher Rule as his inker, making for a lush combo. RA: Syd also did a lot of Westerns in the 1960s and 1970s as well. VASSALLO: True, but at that point Westerns were nearly dead. To me, anyone doing Westerns in the late 1960s, the editors were just giving them the assignments because the artists needed work desperately, not because the title was expected to sell well. RA: Then Atlas had their implosion. DC had theirs in 1978, but Atlas had theirs in 1957. Nearly every Atlas issue of the time had Sept. 1957 as their final issue. VASSALLO: Yes, Atlas imploded in the spring of 1957, when those last books would have gone on sale. They canceled dozens of titles when their distributor, the American News Company [ANC], went under. Up until that point, though, Syd was drawing everything you could ask of him at Atlas. Besides the genres already mentioned, he was even drawing Bible stories and jungle stories. His jungle work was “Man-oo the Mighty,” “Lo-Zar,” covers for Lorna the Jungle Girl, and a feature called “The Unknown Jungle.” I think those were actually reprinted in three volumes by Marvel in the Marvel Masterworks Atlas series. He worked on Sailor Sweeney—he did twelve or thirteen stories for that series. He drew “The Black Knight” and “The Crusader“ for the last issue of Black

Who Is That Masked Man? A mid-1950s British reprinting of a great Shores/Western cover: Black Rider #4, from L. Miller & Sons. Courtesy of the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Knight [#5, Apr. 1956]. Christopher Rule inked the issue. RA: After the Atlas implosion, he quit comics for roughly a decade, correct? VASSALLO: He did advertising for much of that time and, mind you, I’m not an expert on this, but he also did a lot of illustrations and covers for the men’s-adventure magazines. They were often known as “sweat” magazines. Not for Martin Goodman, though, because I would know about those. He worked for other companies, although Goodman published the “sweat” magazines as well. I’m pretty sure that Syd didn’t do any illustrations for Goodman’s titles in that genre. He did, however, do interior illustrations in the 1940s for Goodman’s true crime magazines. We reproduced a lot of those for my and Blake Bell’s book The Secret History of Marvel Comics. His work for those is actually pretty nice and was done for Amazing Detective Cases, Complete Detective Cases, and National Detective Cases. He also did illustrations for pulp magazines— Western pulps for Martin Goodman that has Syd Shores art inside, replacing Western art traditionally drawn in Goodman’s pulps by L. F. Bjorklund. The years probably span 1946 to about 1952. RA: He probably wasn’t the only comicbook artist to do work in Goodman’s pulp and crime magazines, since Goodman would have gone to the same artists he used for everything else.

The “’48” State Two Shores efforts for Timely in 1948 were the Human Torch cover of Marvel Mystery Comics #85 (Feb.), possibly inked by Alascia—and a full-issue team-up with editor and writer Stan Lee in Complete Mystery #2 (Oct.). Thanks to Michael T. Gilbert & the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

VASSALLO: Right. If you get my book, we reproduced a lot of those artists in the interior. There wasn’t as much new art as you might think. In the 1930s there was new art, but by the 1940s Goodman just reused artwork that had been done for stories in

A Comics Historian’s View

Horror Ya Doin’? (Above left:) Syd was a Timely horror mainstay from the very beginning of the company’s foray into the field, as per this cover for Marvel Tales #96 (June 1950), only a few issues after the title had changed from Marvel Mystery Comics. The vignettes along the side are by Joe Maneely. Thanks to Doc V. (Above right:) This page alone from Astonishing #14 (June 1953) should prove that Shores would’ve been a great artist to draw Marvel’s Werewolf by Night comic in the early 1970s. Thanks to Michael T. Gilbert. [Both pages TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

the 1930s. The original Goodman pulp interior artist, as I mentioned, was L.F. Bjorklund, a dynamite Western artist who illustrated 90% of Goodman’s 1930s Western pulps. Goodman used the art over and over and over. In the ’40s and ’50s, though, Goodman raided his comicbook artists, with Syd moonlighting a few new illustrations. Bill Everett did a few. George Klein, Allen Bellman, Carl Burgos, and others did as well. I scanned all the new art from that period to use in our book. RA: I saw just the tail end of the “men’s sweat” magazines in the late 1960s and maybe the early 1970s. I mostly remember a lot of women in bondage and Nazi covers. They had really good art, though.

Let There Be… Battle! This archetypal cover for Battle Brady #14 (June 1953) was signed by artist Shores. But, with the Korean War having ended in a truce around the time this issue went on sale, war comics would soon no longer be a growth industry. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

VASSALLO: Very good art. I’m pretty sure, Rich, that Syd didn’t do any “men’s sweat” work for Martin Goodman. He did a lot of it, but not for Goodman. At least up through the early 1960s. After that my interest and expertise wanes. RA: So, from the Marvel implosion of 1957 until 1967 when he started inking Daredevil, he wasn’t doing comics at

“Doc V” On The Life & Legacy Of Syd Shores

names are not well-known or who were only in the comics industry for a short time who may still be alive, but how would you find them? RA: You’re right about that. I recently tracked down and interviewed Joye Hummel Murchison Kelly, who wrote “Wonder Woman” stories for three or four years in the 1940s. Very few people knew who she was at the time, because she wrote those stories under William Marston’s pen-name. She hasn’t had anything to do with comics since 1947. While interviewing her, I persuaded her to consider and accept an offer from the San Diego Comic-Con to attend the 2018 convention, where she received the Bill Finger Award. That was pretty cool. She had good memories of her days writing “Wonder Woman”… but not so much about the stories themselves. That was work she’d done seventy or more years ago. Still, she was a joy to talk to.

“To Live Outside The Law You Must Be Honest” Kid Colt started out as “Hero of the West” with issue #1 (Aug. 1948)—but by #3 (Dec.) had quickly metamorphosed into Kid Colt Outlaw, clearly a more glamorous calling. Shores drew both covers, though it’s not certain if he inked that of issue #1. Kid Colt Outlaw became Timely/Marvel’s longest-running Western title. Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

all. He was doing the men’s-adventure magazines but, according to his daughter Nancy, he couldn’t make enough to live on doing that, so he was also working in advertising of some sort or the other. VASSALLO: Someone at some point also said that he was driving a cab during those years, but that’s incorrect. He was not driving a cab. That comment made it into the Wikipedia page for Syd, but Nancy was quite vehement that Syd never drove a cab. That comment made her quite angry. For a while, every time we changed it, it would be changed back. I think what happened was that Roy [Thomas] contacted the person making that claim and he eventually stated in print that Syd was never a cab driver. Once it was printed, that printed version was shown to Wikipedia and they finally took out that piece of misinformation from the article. RA: You know, some of those stories refuse to die, and carry on by moving from one artist or writer to another. I’ve heard the “dangling Mort Weisinger out the DC office window” anecdote a half dozen times or more, and it’s nearly always a different writer or artist who’s doing the dangling. The person being dangled changes sometimes, too, but it’s usually Mort Weisinger. I assume that something close to that story may have actually happened, but whether it was actually dangling or simply the threat to dangle him or maybe just wishful thinking on the part of those who had to deal with Weisinger, it’s really hard to say at this point in time. VASSALLO: I know. It’s a funny story but you’re right—it’s never the same guy twice. Anybody who could verify it has either passed away or is in their 90s now. All the Golden-Agers are gone, except for a handful, and they’ve all gone rather quickly, in the last It’s A Jungle In There! ten to fifteen years. Of course, In the pages of Timely/Atlas’ Jungle that makes sense—they’re Action #3 (Feb. 1955), that is—for which quite old! RA: And, of course, those who are left, their memories of those days are seventy years or more old! VASSALLO: There may be some writers, artists whose

Syd drew that issue’s “Man-oo the Mighty” feature, whose star was—a silverback gorilla. Truly beautiful work. Repro’d from the hardcover Marvel Masterworks: Jungle Adventures, Vol. 2 (of three—collect ’em all!). [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

I also interviewed a gentleman who used to draw comics for the Iger Shop in the mid to late 1940s. He also was a very nice man, but because he drew for the Iger Shop, he really had no idea where his stories ended up, since the Iger Shop supplied art to numerous publishers. In addition, he often did partial work on many stories and pages that he really retained no memory of. And again, he hadn’t had anything to do with comics since he left that shop in the late 1940s. He was 93 when I interviewed him. Anyways, back to Syd. He was inking Gene Colan and Jack Kirby, but was drawing/inking only back-up stories and Westerns

A Comics Historian’s View

Beating The Bad Guys To A Pulp Two so-called “double-truck” illustrations done by Syd Shores for pulp magazines—actually, at a time when he was very much in demand at Timely Comics (and before the pulps all but went out of existence over the coming decade). They’re from Complete Detective Cases for July 1944, and Western Novels and Stories, Vol. 11, #9 (April 1949)… you guess which is which! Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [© the respective copyright holders.]

at that point, I think. He did do lead work for Westerns when Sol Brodsky started Skywald. VASSALLO: He was also doing Red Wolf for Marvel. That feature had two different Red Wolfs— one in the 19th Century and one whose adventures were set in the 1970s. RA: The 1970s version debuted in The Avengers, if I remember right. John Buscema and Tom Palmer drew the debut, though. VASSALLO: Yes, but Syd drew

“Doc V” On The Life & Legacy Of Syd Shores

Blonde On Blonde Syd Shores drew both the cover and an early “Blonde Phantom” story for All Select Comics #11 (Fall 1946). The writer of the story is unidentified. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

The Devil, You Say! As Doc V says, this illustration by Syd Shores appeared in one of Martin Goodman’s non-comics magazines: Complete Detective Cases, Vol. 6, #3 (July 1944), to be precise, accompanying a story titled “Devil’s Weed.” Wonder what it was about? The illo appeared in Blake Bell & Dr. Michael J. Vassallo’s excellent 2013 study The Secret History of Marvel Comics. [© the respective copyright holders.]

most of the rest of the stories, especially in the Red Wolf title. [NOTE: Syd penciled the 19th-century Red Wolf’s first solo adventure in Marvel Spotlight #1 (Nov. 1971) and then drew the first eight issues (1972-1973) of the Red Wolf title, where the 19th-century character headlined for the first six issues and the 20th-century character carried on for another three issues. Dick Ayers penciled the last issue, probably due to Syd’s death.] VASSALLO: To tell you the truth, I’m so used to his 1940s-1950s work that when I saw his 1970s work— drawing modern fashion and such—it always looked a little funny to me. I’m not sure even how to express what I mean there. It just seemed like he missed the 1960s and came back to the 1970s and drawing modern stuff. There were no fedoras on men’s heads, no older cars, and that always seemed strange. Maybe if I’d seen his work progress through 1957 to 1970, it would have

Hail, Hail, The Gang’s All Here! Syd may not have been drawing super-heroes—or much of anything else in comicbooks—during the decade from 1957 to 1967; but he’d certainly done his share of them prior to that. Case in point: the cover of All Winners Comics #21 (Winter 1946-47), in which he at least penciled all seven members of the short-lived All Winners Squad, which included Timely’s “Big Three,” two kid sidekicks, Miss America, and The Whizzer. He penciled much of the interior book-length story as well. It’s not known if he inked the cover. Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

A Comics Historian’s View

What A Bunch Of Characters! As Doc V mentions re the character sketches on this page and the next, the late Timely artist Marion Sitton told him several years ago: “Stan [Lee] had Syd Shores draw up these sketches and he passed them out to the artists in the bullpen so we could see the type and style of work we should try to emulate…. I believe [this was] sometime in 1949.” Thus proving that, approximately seven decades ago, Syd was the gold standard of artistry at Timely Comics. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

been easier to handle. RA: I always looked at Syd Shores’ 1970s work, which I’m most familiar with, whether it appeared at Marvel or Warren or Skywald, as being the Marvel equivalent of Curt Swan’s work at DC. VASSALLO: What do you mean by that? RA: Swan had a reputation for solid drawing. Dynamic, but not overly so. Syd’s style, to me, was just like that. Solid, well-drawn work, but not overly so. Kirby, Colan, in fact the entire Marvel line of artists largely featured exaggerated action work, which was one of the innovations that Marvel brought to comics in the 1960s, but where the Marvel artwork was quieter—like the pre-Neal Adams X-Men—the stories didn’t seem all that much different from DC’s run-of-the-mill titles. VASSALLO: Yeah, in that respect I agree with you. Syd drew real people with real clothing, who moved like real people do. Back in the Timely days, Sid did character studies of how men would look like in a suit and then how that man would look in different poses. There was a separate page dealing

“Doc V” On The Life & Legacy Of Syd Shores

Syd Shores in a heavily shadowed photo (above) from the defunct Now and Then Times tabloid—plus a sampling of his “quite prolific” output in the last year or so of his life, as per interviewer Richard Arndt. You can mostly read for yourself the other (clockwise) credits for Red Wolf #2 (July 1972)… Daredevil #99 (May ’73)… Dracula Lives #2 (’73)… Tales of the Zombie #1 (’73)… and the “Frankenstein” yarn from Monsters Unleashed #2 (Sept. ’73)… while the final chapter of Tales of the Zombie #1 (’73) was by Steve Gerber (script), John Buscema (layouts), and Syd Shores (finished art). Richard also mentions Skywald’s Bravados, but that title had been dormant since ’71. Thanks to Barry Pearl for the scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

with women. Head shots from every angle. Really, really nice stuff. It’s an example of how he was the Timely bullpen head and the things that he would do to help out artists. I have copies of those character studies that I acquired from Timely artist Marion Sitton, another artist mentored by Syd in 1948. RA: Again, that reminds me of Curt Swan, as a friend of mine has a page of various head shots of Superman, seen from different angles that Swan drew, which was probably done to help other artists stay on model when drawing him.

A Comics Historian’s View

VASSALLO: Yes, right! The two of them were probably the go-to guys on how to do-it-right. If Syd hadn’t gotten ill and then passed away, I think he would have been a major 1970s artist for Marvel. He certainly was a tier below John Buscema but perhaps a tier up from Don Heck, and that’s no insult to Don, whose work I adore. Plus, he was fast! He probably could have done anything given to him. The last things he worked on, to my knowledge, were Ghost Rider and the black-&white version of [The Monster of] Frankenstein. Horror stuff. RA: Or horror-adventure stuff, since Marvel only rarely did straight-out horror in the 1970s. VASSALLO: His illness and death just took away the chance. I don’t know if he got enough practice doing that sort of modern Stan Lee-Jack Kirby style of doing a book. The synopsis/then plot/pencils/then dialogue/then inking that they developed for super-hero comics. However, if he’d had the chance to do more of that, I think he would have been just fine. RA: Syd was actually quite prolific in the last year of his life. In addition to Red Wolf, he completed penciling and inks for a “Daredevil” story

Spotlight On A Spirit The mystical origin of Red Wolf, as depicted by writer Gardner Fox, penciler Syd Shores, and inker Wally Wood in Marvel Spotlight #1 (Nov. 1971). Thanks to Barry Pearl. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

[#99], completed pencils and inked a “Dracula” story for Dracula Lives #2, drew or inked various mystery stories, was drawing The Bravados for Skywald, and was inking Ghost Rider. VASSALLO: I’m glad that people are getting around to looking at Syd Shores’ work again. It’s long overdue.

The Bible Tales Me So No disrespect intended by the above pun, but Timely’s Bible Tales for Young Folk had a somewhat puzzling history, though we do know that Shores drew the “Samson” story in issue #2 (Oct. 1953). Jerry Robinson, Fred Kida, and other fine artists likewise contributed to this five-issue series. Scripters unidentified. Thanks to Michael T. Gilbert. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Dr. Michael J. Vassallo is a noted comics historian, frequent Alter Ego contributor, and a chief authority of the Timely/Atlas period of Marvel’s history. A Manhattan dentist by day, Doc V is the co-author of The Secret History of Marvel Comics, has written twenty introductions to Marvel Masterworks volumes, as well as providing writing and editorial support to Taschen Publishing (75 Years of Marvel, The Stan Lee Story), and is editor of Allen Bellman’s biography Timely Confidential and the upcoming Atlas at War anthology, to be published by Dead Reckoning, the graphic novel division of the Naval Institute Press. He is working on an art biography of Atlas titan Joe Maneely, maintains his busy blog www. timely-atlas-comics.blogspot.com, and resides in Westchester County with his wife Maggie (and their sheltie Holly), where they raised their two children, Michelle and Jason.

Dr. Michael J. Vassallo

and Nancy Shores Karlebach.

The Voice Of The [Green] Turtle Is Heard In The Land The Life & Tough Times of Chinese-American Artist CHU HING

A/E

by Alex Jay

EDITOR’S NOTE: Alter Ego #162 featured Mark Carlson-Ghost’s illuminating article on several fly-by-night, often quasi-legal (at best) comicbook publishers of the late World War II years, 1944-45. One of the most memorable super-heroes to emerge from those days was “The Green Turtle,” drawn and quite possibly written by Chu Hing, for Rural Home Publications’ Blazing Comics #1-4. At that time, Alex Jay provided us with scans of interior art from those issues, and— even more welcome—with a photo of Chu Hing as a young man. Alex had also scribed a biographical article about the artist for his online blog http:// chimericaneyes.blogspot.com/2014/01/aboutartist-chu-f-hing.html. Although it is written in a somewhat more formal and bare-bones style than the usual A/E entry, we found the piece fascinating, as it illustrates yet again how much thorough research is being done concerning comics and their creators, and we’re delighted that Alex permitted us to reprint it here, only slightly edited—mainly by omitting lengthy “http” and other references, which interested readers can obtain by logging onto the original online article….

hu Fook Hing was born on January 17, 1897, in the city of Kapaa on the Kauai island of Hawaii.1 His father was Chu Kin, and his mother was Chong Shee (Miss Chong).2 Chu was the family name; it is customary in Chinese culture to state the family name first. From China, Chu Kin arrived in Hawaii in 1882.3 Chong Shee arrived ten years later and they married that year.4 Chu Kin was a dry goods merchant.5 Hing was the second of 15 children.6 Around 1909 the Chu family moved from Kapaa to Hilo, Hawaii.7 Nothing is known of Hing’s Hawaiian art education, but there was evidence of his enthusiasm. A Minnesota newspaper, the Duluth News Tribune, published an article on October 13, 1912, about how its fifth- and sixth-grade students studied geography. The fifth-graders mailed picture postcards and letters about Duluth to fifth-graders in Arizona, Hawaii and other states. Soon, hundreds of cards arrived. The most prolific correspondents of the Duluth schoolchildren seem to be the fifth-graders of Hilo. In addition to dozens of cards from Chu Fook Hing, Chu Fook Tang, and Dora Conradt, there are

Chu Hing in 1919, the only known photo of him—plus two of his later comicbook covers: (Left:) His masked-aviator hero “The Green Turtle” starred inside and on the covers of the first four issues of Rural Home Publications’ Blazing Comics. Seen here is that of #2 (July 1944), co-featuring his sidekick Burma Boy. The other three “Green Turtle” covers of Blazing were depicted in A/E #162. Surprisingly, this is virtually the only time the hero’s face, even though masked, was seen straight on in the entire series; usually, it was turned away from the reader, for reasons speculated on three issues back. (Below:) Other features’ heroes had taken over the cover spot from the former superhero Blue Bolt some time before Vol. 4, #5 (Dec. 1943) of that Novelty comic. Thanks to the Grand Comics Database & Alex Jay for the cover scans. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

many letters careful and conventional in both English and punctuation, and containing such quaint bits of information as “Hilo is a rainy place and is called in sport the ‘Rainy City,’” “The chief industries of Hawaii are sugar-cane and coffee,” and “Each gulch has ever-running streams.”8 Hing’s brother, Tang, was a year older than he.9 Hing continued making art in junior high and high school. He was 21 years old when he filled out his military registration card on July 31, 1918.10 Apparently he did not serve in the military. World

The Life & Tough Times Of Chinese-American Artist Chu Hing

War I ended 3½ months later. The coming year would be one of new opportunities for some of the Chu children. In 1919, with financial support from his father, Hing decided to go to Chicago for professional training at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. Some of his siblings decided to leave, too. His younger brother, Ngu, was the first to depart for Chicago; he boarded a freighter on July 14. Steaming through the Panama Canal, Ngu landed in Philadelphia on September 1. From there he went to New York, where he stayed for 2½ days and then continued on to Chicago.11 Next to leave was Hing, who boarded the S.S. Niagara at Honolulu on September 23; he landed at Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, on September 29.12 After a week in Vancouver, he departed aboard the S.S. Princess Victoria on October 7 and arrived in Seattle the next day.13 His younger brother, Fong, followed in December.14 His sister, Mew Kee, arrived in Chicago in September 1920.15

A. January 17, 1896. [His World War I draft card said 1897.]

Complying with Chinese Exclusion Act regulations, Hing went to the Seattle immigration office and applied for admission; a case file was opened. He answered, in English, questions by the Examining Inspector of the Immigration Service. Below is his October 8, 1919, testimony:

Q. Where was she born?

Q. You were born where? A. Kaapa, Hawaii. Q. Your father’s name? A. Chu Kin. Q. What does he do? A. Tailor Q. Is he Chinese born or Hawaiian? A. Chinese. Q. Your mother’s name? A. Chong Shee. A. China. Q. Are you a full blooded Chinese? A. Yes.

Q. What is your name?

Q. Ever been in China?

A. Chu Fook Hing.

A. No, I have never been there.

Q. Give me the date of your birth.

Q. What is your father’s financial standing? A. I don’t know. Q. You have how many brothers and sisters? A. 14. Q. Has your father had more than one wife? A. Only one. Q. How many of your brothers and sisters are in the United States? A. One. Q. What is his name? A. Chu Fook Ng You [sic]. Q. How old is he? A. Between 17 and 18. Q. When did he come to the mainland? A. Reached Chicago September 8th this year. Q. How does it come you didn’t come together? A. Couldn’t get a boat; traffic all tied up at San Francisco; he went by way of the Panama Canal and worked his way up through Philadelphia. Q. What is your brother doing here? A. He is studying automobile business. Q. And you are going to do what? A. Study art; I am going to study at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. Q. Who will support you? A. My father (presents Certificate of Identity 2012 issued at Honolulu January 12, 1909 to Chu Fook Hing, aged 13, height 4’ 4”; scar on first finger of left hand).

So Where’s His Brother Hopalong? The 1951 Butch Cassidy [and the Wild Bunch] #1-and-only from Avon Comics contained a backup feature on the Pony Express, drawn by Chu Hing. Scripter unknown. With thanks to Alex Jay. [© the respective copyright holders.]

Q. It will be necessary for you to bring to this office a photograph for identification purpose. A. Yes.16

The Voice Of The [Green] Turtle Is Heard In The Land

Hing signed the transcript of his testimony and his entry was approved. A black-&-white photograph of him was in his file.17 Additional information about him was found on the S.S. Princess Victoria passenger list: he had $200 and was going to meet his younger brother, Ngu, at “1519 Wabash Avenue” in Chicago; “Chicago Academy of Fine Arts” was written after the address, his height was recorded as “5 feet, 6 inches,” and he had a “scar on first finger of left hand”.18 He probably traveled by train to Chicago. Hing and his brothers have not been found in the 1920 U.S. Federal Census that was conducted in early January. Ngu “took a course in a mechanical school at 1519 South Wabash Avenue,” and his residential address was listed as “1219 S. Wabash.”19 (He was at the immigration office on May 18, 1920, applying for a new certificate of identity, a document with a photograph of the applicant and a serial number; this identification document was a another requirement of the Chinese Exclusion Act. Unfortunately, Ngu was not asked for the addresses of his brothers.) The census listed 16 people at 1219 South Wabash including two Chinese restaurant workers but not Ngu, who may have moved there after the census.20 That location was about a mile north of Chinatown and about a mile south of the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts.

Eleven months later, on December 21, 1928, Hing and Helga departed on the S.S. Sierra from Honolulu; they arrived in San Francisco on December 27 and continued on to Chicago.37 According to the 1930 U.S. Federal Census, the couple resided at the Lincoln Park Arms Hotel, located at 2738 Pine Grove Avenue. Hing’s occupation was listed as commercial artist in the printing industry; Helga’s occupation was listed as “none.”38 They took in all that Chicago had to offer. In the same 1966 letter, Helga wrote: “Hing has one hundred and 20 beautiful watercolors from Chicago early mornings and evenings. They are from our young days when we walked the shores of the lake.... O how we long to see Michigan Ave, the Art Institute and walk the shores as in the old days”.39 As the nation staggered through the Great Depression, Hing and Helga looked eastward. In the 1930s, the artistic couple gradually made their way to New York City. A watercolor by Hing titled “Twilight, Central Park, N.Y., At the Moll” [sic] was dated April 26, 1935.40 The New

The Chicago Academy of Fine Arts was founded by Carl N. Werntz in 1903, and in 1916 was located at 81 East Madison Street.21 Art Education in the Public Schools of the United States published a description of the academy: “The school is a private unendowed school supported by tuition fees. The normal course includes charcoal and color work from life, still life, flowers, etc.; principles of design, composition and color, applied design, perspective, construction work, pedagogy, physiology, psychology and history of art.”22 A Handbook of American Private Schools said the academy “gives instruction in fine, decorative, and normal art and dress design, with emphasis on the vocational and commercial aspects”.23 The academy was notable for having a number of students who became cartoonists, including Walt Disney (1917),24 Roy Crane (1920),25 Hal Foster (1921),26 and C.C. Beck (1928).27 (This school should not be confused with the Chicago Academy of Fine Art, of 1879, that had changed its name to the Art Institute of Chicago in 1892.28) Both the Academy of Fine Arts and the Art Institute had male and female students. Perhaps at one of those institutions, Hing met another aspiring artist, Helga Marie Jensen, who had immigrated from Copenhagen, Denmark, in 1922.29 Exactly how and where they met is not known, but the mutual attraction was genuine; they married in 1923.30 Coincidentally, they shared the same birth date.31 She probably met Hing’s brother, Ngu, and sister, Mew Kee. Hing also attended the Art Institute of Chicago. The Chicago Tribune for June 17, 1922, reported that Hing was one of four recipients of the Frederick Magnus Brand Memorial prize for composition.32 In a 1966 letter to Mrs. Paepcke, asking for her help to exhibit Hing’s paintings at the Art Institute, Helga wrote: “[H]e has excellent grades from there.”33 At some point Hing and Helga completed their schooling and sought work. Eventually they decided to look elsewhere to start a new life. In June 1925 they made their way from Chicago to San Francisco, where they boarded the S.S. President Taft on June 27 and sailed for Hawaii. On July 3 they arrived at Honolulu.34 Helga was introduced to the rest of the Chu family. Presumably Hing and Helga found work and pursued their artistic endeavors. For some reason, Helga returned to the mainland, through Los Angeles, on May 14, 1926.35 She stayed until January 6, 1928, when she sailed back to Honolulu aboard the S.S. President Madison, arriving six days later.36

The Rising Sun Vs. The Middle Kingdom As Chu Hing informed the Immigration official, he had never been to China—yet when he drew (and possibly wrote) the first “Green Turtle” story for Blazing Comics #1 (June 1944), he depicted a pulpish version of the Japanese Empire’s attempt to conquer his parents’ homeland. We hardly support the use of the ethnic epithet on this page, but no good purpose would be served by falsifying history and pretending that phrase isn’t something that some in America and elsewhere—even perhaps people born in Hawaii of Chinese descent—might have uttered two years after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Few stories in 1940s U.S. comicbooks were set in China, so this “The Green Turtle” was a rather bold experiment for the lead feature in such a magazine. For the story’s splash page, see A/E #164. Art (and perhaps script) by Chu Hing. Thanks to Comic Book Plus website. [© the respective copyright holders.]

The Life & Tough Times Of Chinese-American Artist Chu Hing

York Times, on July 13, 1936, reported the results of a contest for art school students, for the best painting of the Tudor City tulip gardens. Hing, a Wood-Ridge, New Jersey, resident, was one of four artists who received honorable mention.41 In November 1936, Hing had two watercolors, “Sunset over Belmont Harbor” and “Early Morning in November,” exhibited in the Thirty-Fourth Annual Water Color Exhibition at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia. The catalogue listed his address as 136-05 Sanford Avenue, Flushing, New York.42 The following year, Hing was in the Thirty-Fifth Annual Philadelphia Water Color Exhibition with a tempera painting titled, “Devil Dancers; Tibet.”43 Helga may have referred to it or a similar painting in her 1966 letter: “Hing has beautiful compositions from Shakespears [sic] Tempest and from the Devil Dancers of Tibet”.44 Helga departed New York on December 13, 1938, bound for Copenhagen to visit her sister Ester. On May 22, 1939, Helga returned home aboard the S.S. Queen Mary that had sailed from Cherbourg, France, and then from Southampton, England.45 The year 1939 marked a high point in Hing’s artistic career; in Helga’s 1966 letter she wrote: “Hing had 2 watercolors exhibited at Le Salon Paris in the spring of 1939.”46 Helga returned home to a major event in her neighborhood, the New York World’s Fair that had opened April 30. While the Fair celebrated the World of Tomorrow, the world was only months away from Germany’s invasion of Poland. The 1940 U.S. Federal Census recorded Hing and Helga in Queens, New York, at 136-05 Sanford Avenue. Hing’s occupation was “commercial artist in the printing industry.”47 On December 7, 1941, the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor brought the United States into the Second World War. A massive military draft was underway; but a draft registration card for Hing has not been found. As the draft enlisted more comics artists, replacements were needed. In 1943, Hing found work at Lloyd Jacquet’s comics shop Funnies, Inc.48 In an interview conducted by

Art In More Than Four Colors (Right:) If we read a-right, this is a painting by Chu Hing of his wife Helga. No doubt painted some years after they met, this piece of art was recently offered for sale on eBay. Unfortunately, a photographic flash somewhat mars the center of the image. (Far right:) As per artist Chu Hing’s faint notation at bottom right, this painting depicts a late summer scene (reportedly in 1934) in Forest Preserve, in the north of Chicago. Thanks to Alex Jay. [© Estate of Chu Hing.]

He’s Baaaack! When Blazing Comics returned after a several-month hiatus with issue #4 (a.k.a. Vol. 2, #1, cover-dated Feb. 1945), “The Green Turtle” was again its cover feature, as seen in A/E #164. Above is the splash page, with the hero’s head averted, as per usual. Art and quite possibly script by Chu Hing. [© the respective copyright holders.]

Jim Amash for Alter Ego, Leonard Starr, who was also at Funnies, Inc., referred to “Chu Hing, who did nice work and boasted he had studied with Harvey Dunn—but his characters’ eyes always looked Oriental when he drew them, no matter who they were…. He was very, very proud of himself…”49 Later, Hing was on staff at Timely Publications, which would later evolve into Marvel Comics. Artist Pierce Rice joined Timely in 1948 and recalled how the bullpen operated:

The Voice Of The [Green] Turtle Is Heard In The Land

As early as 1944, Hing and Helga were living in Larchmont, New York, a suburb of New York City.55 As they had done in Chicago, they walked along the shoreline, in this case, of Long Island Sound. Hing commuted to the Funnies, Inc., office at 45 West 45th Street,56 and later to the Empire State Building where Timely was located.57 In addition to art and comics, Hing explored other business opportunities. On August 10, 1942, Hing obtained a copyright on his “convertible loose wing & fixed tip vacuum wing, tailless kite, with sound effect.”58 Apparently, this kite was the first of several projects that Hing and Helga

Three Timeless Timely Tales (Clockwise from top left:) The “true-crime” story from Lawbreakers Always Lose #10 (Oct. 1949) was both penciled and inked by Chu Hing… the “Two-Gun Kid” yarn from Wild Western #9 (Oct. ’49) was penciled by Pierce Rice and inked by Chu Hing… while the heartbreaker from the generically titled Love Romances #2 (Jan. 1950) was penciled by John Severin and inked by Chu Hing. As per Alex Jay’s article: Whether rightly or wrongly, Pierce Rice used to dread being inked by either Chu Hing or Fred Eng. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo for the both the scans and the artist IDs. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“One of the mistakes Stan [Lee] made is, whenever a penciler finished a job, he’d have him hand it to an inker,” Rice said. “Whichever inker was free. No partnerships developed, and no continuity.” Rice said he lived in fear of two inkers on the staff: Chu Hing and Fred Eng: “I used to dread the thought of something [of mine] falling into Fred’s hands, but we had no choice in the matter.”50 Hing was part of a small group of Asian-Americans working on comicbooks. Ben Oda was lettering for the studio of Joe Simon and Jack Kirby. Early in his career, Bob Fujitani worked at Eisner & Iger, Hillman, and MLJ.51 Min Matsuda, Irving Watanabe, and John Yakata were on the staff at the Charles Biro-Bob Wood shop.52 Helen Chou, Fred Eng, Morrie Kuramoto, Tsung Li, and Kaem Wong were contributors at various publishers.53 Syndicated comic strip artist Paul Fung produced art for National Comics’ All Funny Comics, among others.54 Hing’s comicbook work can be viewed here: “The Art of Chu F. Hing, Part 1”: http://chimericaneyes.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-art-of-chu-fhing-part-1.html (one-page features); “The Art of Chu F. Hing, Part 2”: http://chimericaneyes.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-art-of-chu-f-hing-par-2. html (covers and stories for various publishers); “The Art of Chu F. Hing, Part 3”: http://chimericaneyes.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-artof-chu-f-hing-part -3.html (Marvel Comics); “The Art of Chu F. Hing, Part 4”: http://chimericaneyes.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-art-of-chu-fhing-part-4.html (“The Green Turtle” and “The Judge and the Jury”).

The Life & Tough Times Of Chinese-American Artist Chu Hing

The Elephant In The Room Alex Jay has obtained copies of virtually all of the patent applications of “Hing F. Chu and Helga M. Chu” (as the names were written in the English/American style, with family name last). This application for what was apparently a paper elephant toy has the appellation “1946_12-10 One piece, third dimension, cutout toy Application 1945_03_08 US Patent 2412321.” More of the couple’s patent applications can be viewed at Alex Jay’s online version of this biographical article. [© estates of Hing F. Chu and Helga M. Chu.]

copyrighted. Here are their works and company names from the Catalogue of Copyright Entries: 1. Viking tailless kite; Viking Tailless Kite Company59; 2. Viking reversible cloth dolls; Viking Tailless Kite & Toy Company60; 3. Zoo; Viking Toy Company61; 4. Circus; Viking Toy Company62; 5. Adventures of Marco Polo63; 6. Chinese New Year festival64; 7. Designs for kites 65; 8. Facts not fiction 66; 9. Atomic man; Viking Tailless Kite Company 67. Some of the copyrighted items were also patented. From 1944 to 1947, they filed five patent applications, and all were granted. The inventors’ names on the documents read: “Hing F. Chu and Helga M. Chu, Larchmont, N.Y.: 1. Kite 68; 2. Alternating Cloth Doll and Method of Constructing Same69; 3. Tailless Kite70; 4. One Piece, Third Dimension, Cutout Toy71; 5. Frame Construction for Kites and Like Toys72.

On October 9, 1951, Helga returned from trip to Denmark; the air passenger manifest has her address as “Larchmont Acres, Larchmont, N.Y.”73 (A black-&-white photo of a Larchmont Acres apartment complex can be viewed at the Larchmont Historical

The Voice Of The [Green] Turtle Is Heard In The Land

Society website. In the early 1950s, Hing’s comicbook work ended.74 Apparently the couple had not been able to get their kites, doll, and toys produced. With limited finances, they eventually moved out of New York. By 1966, but probably earlier, Hing and Helga were in Honolulu, Hawaii, living on their Social Security checks.75 On May 6 of that year, Helga wrote a letter to Mrs. Elizabeth Paepcke, who was married to Walter Paul Paepcke, the founder of the Container Corporation of America. (“With Walter, Elizabeth became an important figure in the cultural and social life of Chicago. She was involved in the Art Institute, Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Lyric Opera and numerous other organizations.”76) Dear Mrs. Paepcke, Please listen to my prayer. I am Helga Chu. I would ask you because I know how generous and sympathetic you are. Hing is going blind. The doctors here, Dr. Fouljner and others, have given him 3 more months and the last light will be going out forever.77 In her letter Helga laments that the local art academy was not

l Love Desi This biographical feature from Eastern Color’s Juke Box Comics #1 (1949) told the story of musician Desi Arnaz up to that time—including the rise of his popular dance band and his 1940 marriage to then-minor movie star Lucille Ball. Little could the anonymous scripter, let alone artist Chu Hing, have guessed what lay in store for the talented Cuban and his comic genius wife in the next few years, as their TV series I Love Lucy became one of the most popular and influential shows ever. And Arnaz’s technical innovations (three-camera comedy, filming TV shows, the concept of syndicated re-runs, etc.) were if anything even more important. Thanks to Alex Jay. [© the respective copyright holders.]

interested in exhibiting Hing’s art. She also revealed the tension between them and Hing’s family: We are both very depressed. Hing’s family does not care if we live or die. To them I have never been more than a Polack [sic] as his sisters call me or an old hag.78 Helga still had hope of returning to Chicago and she shared her idea with Mrs. Paepcke: Hing and I were 69 years of age on January 17. We are receiving Social Security of 180 dollars a month and from July doctors and hospitals are free. We have a life insurance of 2 tousand [sic] dollars... We can borrow 1000 dollars and come to Chicago... I am sure I can find a nice little studio in Chicago and we will live there.79 How Mrs. Paepcke responded is not known. Helga and Hing remained in Honolulu. Fourteen months later Hing passed away August 1967.80 Fourteen years later Helga passed away in July 1981.81

“It’s All Greek To Me!” The title of the Avon comic was Police Lineup (#1, Aug. 1951)… but that issue’s “Truth Not Fancy” filler, drawn by Chu Hing, illustrated the timeline of military-technological development from the famous “Greek fire” of ancient times to its modern descendant, the flamethrower, introduced during World War I and coming into its own in WWII. Scripter unknown. Thanks to Alex Jay. By the way, our heading is a not-100%-accurate Shakespearean quotation from Julius Caesar, but hopefully close enough for a comics fanzine. [© the respective copyright holders.]

Special thanks to the Special Collections Research Center of the University of Chicago Library for permission to use Helga Chu’s letter from the Elizabeth H. Paepcke Papers. For further reading on Chu Hing, see Comic Book Marketplace #109 (Dec. 2003); AC Comics’ Men of Mystery #25 (2000); Superhero Comics of the Golden Age: The Illustrated History by Mike Benton (Taylor Publishing, 1992); Chinese Historic Sites and Pioneer Families of Kauai; A Local History Project of the Hawaii Chinese History Center

The Life & Tough Times Of Chinese-American Artist Chu Hing

(1980, revised); Rocket’s Blast-ComiCollector #93 (1972).

FOOTNOTES: 1. World War I Military Registration Card, 31 July 1918. 2-5. Thirteenth U.S. Federal Census, Hilo Town, Hawaii, 15 May 1910. 6-7. Chu Fook Ngu, Chinese Exclusion Act Case File 2029/43, National Archives and Records Administration-Great Lakes Region (Chicago, Illinois), 18 May 1920. 8. Emily Petzold, “Geography Has Changed Considerably Since Mother Was a Girl – Something of the New Kind,” Duluth New Tribune (Minnesota), 13 Oct. 1912: 4. 9. Chu Fook Ngu. 10. World War I Military Registration Card. 11. Chu Fook Ngu. 12. Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at Seattle, Washington, 1890-1957. Micropublication M1383. RG085. 357 rolls. National Archives, Washington, D.C., Microfilm Roll Number M1383_42. 13. Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at Seattle, Washington, 1890-1957. Microfilm Roll Number M1383_43. 14. Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving at San Francisco, 1893-1953. Microfilm Publication M1410, 429 rolls. Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, RG 85; National Archives, Washington, D.C.; Microfilm Roll Number M1410_128.

“I Never Met A Turtle I Didn’t Like” Chu Hing illustrated the life story of celebrated humorist Will Rogers in Avon’s Cow Puncher #6 (1949). Scripter unknown. Thanks to Alex Jay. With apologies to Will for warping his famous catch-phrase. [© the respective copyright holders.]

Carolina: TwoMorrows Publishing, 2001) 135. 28. School of the Art Institute of Chicago, “SAIC History.” 29-30. Fifteenth U.S. Federal Census, Chicago City, Cook County, Illinois; 26 April 1930.

15. Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at Seattle, Washington, 1890-1957. Micropublication M1383. RG085. 357 rolls. National Archives, Washington, D.C., Microfilm Roll Number M1383_52.

31. Social Security Death Index. Roots Web.

16-17. Chu Fook Hing, Chinese Exclusion Act Case File 36863/1-1, National Archives and Records Administration-Pacific Alaska Region (Seattle, Washington), 8 Oct. 1919.

33. Elizabeth H. Paepcke. Papers, Box #26, Folder #5, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library, Helga Chu, 6 May 1966 letter.

18. Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at Seattle, Washington, 1890-1957. Micropublication M1383. RG085. 357 rolls. National Archives, Washington, D.C., Microfilm Roll Number M1383_43.

34. Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving at Honolulu, Hawaii, 1900-1953. Microfilm Publication A3422, 269 rolls. Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Record Group 85; National Archives, Washington, D.C.; Microfilm Roll Number A3422, Roll 82.

19. Chu Fook Ngu. 20. Fourteenth U.S. Federal Census, Chicago City, Cook County, Illinois; 8 Jan. 1920. 21. Porter Sargent, A Handbook of American Private Schools (Boston: Sargent’s Handbooks, 1916) 228. 22. James Parton Haney, Art Education in the Public Schools of the United States (New York: American Art Annual, 1908) 334. 23. Porter Sargent. 24. Walt Disney Timeline, The Walt Disney Family Museum. 25. Roy Crane, Wikipedia. 26. Brian Kane, Hal Foster: Prince of Illustrators, Father of the Adventure Strip (New Jersey: Vanguard, 2002) 53. 27. P. C. Hamerlinck, Fawcett Companion: The Best of FCA (North

32. Eleanor Jewett, “Graduation Marks Close of Splendid Year for Art School,” Chicago Tribune (Illinois), 17 June 1922: 11.

35. Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving at San Pedro/Wilmington/ Los Angeles, California, June 29, 1907-June 30, 1948. Microfilm Publication M1764, 118 rolls. Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Record Group 85; National Archives, Washington, D.C.; Microfilm Roll Number M1764:11. 36. Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving at Honolulu, Hawaii, 1900-1953; Microfilm Roll Number A3422, Roll 95. 37. Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving at San Francisco, 1893–1953; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M1410, 429 rolls); Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, RG 85; National Archives, Washington, D.C.; Microfilm Roll Number M1410_242. 38. Fifteenth U.S. Federal Census. 39. Elizabeth H. Paepcke.

The Voice Of The [Green] Turtle Is Heard In The Land

53. David Hajdu, The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008) 339, 341, 345, 350. 54. Ron Goulart, Comic Book Culture: An Illustrated History (Portland, OR: Collectors Press, 2000) 150. 55. United States Patent Office, 2,394,366, 5 Feb. 1946; Application 27 Jun 1944, Serial No. 542,384; city and state on first page. 56. Wikipedia, “Funnies Inc.” 57. Wikipedia, “Timely Comics.” 58. Catalogue of Copyright Entries, Part 1, Group 2, Pamphlets, etc.; New Series, Vol. 39, No. 8, (1942) 573. 59. Catalogue of Copyright Entries, Part 4, Works of Art, etc., New Series, Vol. 40, No. 1 (1945) 26. 60. Catalogue of Copyright Entries, Part 4, Works of Art, etc., New Series, Vol. 40, No. 2 (1945) 29.

Putting The Horse Before The “Cortez” Yet another “Truth Not Fancy” filler delineated by Chu Hing deals with the Spanish conquistador Cortez. From Avon’s Jesse James #15 (Oct. 1958). Note the artist’s distinctive signature. Scripter unknown. Thanks to Alex Jay. [© the respective copyright holders.]

40. Bruun Rasmussen Auctioneers, Copenhagen, Denmark, 8–14 Oct. 2012. (Helga visited her sister, Ester, and gave Hing’s watercolors to her.) 41. “Artist Wins Contest,” The New York Times, 13 July 1936. 42. Catalogue of the Thirty-Fourth Annual Water Color Exhibition and Thirty-Fifth Annual Exhibition of Miniatures (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, 1936) 37, 42, and 57. 43. Catalogue of the Thirty-Fifth Annual Philadelphia Water Color Exhibition and the Thirty-Sixth Annual Exhibition of Miniatures (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, 1937) 32. 44. Elizabeth H. Paepcke. 45. Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at New York, New York, 1897-1957; (National Archives Microfilm Publication T715, 8892 rolls); Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service; National Archives, Washington, D.C.; Microfilm serial: T715; Microfilm roll: T715_6333; Line: 3. 46. Elizabeth H. Paepcke. 47. Sixteenth U.S. Federal Census 48. Who’s Who in American Comic Books 1928-1999 (online). 49. Leonard Starr interview, “I Think I Worked for Every [Comics] House in the City,” Alter Ego #110, June 2012: 6, 11–12. 50. Steve Duin, Mike Richardson, Comics between the Panels (Dark Horse, 1998) 370. 51. Tom Orzechowski, “Spotlight on Bob Fujitani at SDCC,” 20 July, 2005. 52. Joe Simon, The Comic Book Makers, (New Jersey: Vanguard, 2003) 57.

61. Catalogue of Copyright Entries, Part 4, Works of Art, etc., New Series, Vol. 40, No. 7 (1945) 136. 62. Catalogue of Copyright Entries, Part 4, Works of Art, etc., New Series, Vol. 40, No. 8 (1945) 187. 63. Catalogue of Copyright Entries, Part 4, Works of Art, etc., New Series, Vol. 41 (1946) 21. 64. Catalog of Copyright Entries, Part 1, Group 2, Pamphlets, etc., New Series, Vol. 43 (1946) 170. 65. Catalog of Copyright Entries, Third Series, Vol. 1, Parts 7-11A, No. 2; Works of Art, etc. (July–Dec. 1947) 135. 66. Catalog of Copyright Entries, Third Series, Vol. 1, Parts 7–11A, No. 1, Works of Art, etc. (Jan.-June 1949) 15. 67. Catalog of Copyright Entries, Third Series, Vol. 1, Parts 7–11A, No. 1, Works of Art, etc. (Jan.-Jun. 1949) 146. 68. United States Patent Office, 2,394,366, 5 Feb. 1946; Application 27 Jun 1944, Serial No. 542,384. 69. United States Patent Office, 2,406,994, 3 Sept. 1946; Application 9 Oct 1944, Serial No. 557, 816. 70. United States Patent Office, 2,412,322, 10 Dec. 1946; Application 17 May 1945, Serial No. 594,316. 71. United States Patent Office, 2,412,321, 10 Dec. 1946; Application 8 Mar 1945, Serial No. 581,588. 72. United States Patent Office, 2,461,465, 8 Feb. 1949; Application 14 Nov. 1947, Serial No. 785,992. 73. Scandinavian Airlines Air Passenger Manifest, 8 Oct. 1951. Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at New York, New York, 1897-1957; (National Archives Microfilm Publication T715, 8892 rolls); Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service; National Archives, Washington, D.C.; Microfilm serial: T715; Microfilm roll: T715_8050; Line: 2. 74. Who’s Who of American Comic Books, 1928-1999 (online edition). 75–79. Elizabeth H. Paepcke. 80–81. Social Security Death Index.

The Life & Tough Times Of Chinese-American Artist Chu Hing

CHU HING Checklist [This checklist is adapted primarily from information provided by the online Who’s Who of American Comic Books 1928-1999, established by Dr. Jerry G. Bails and viewable at www.bailsprojects.com. Names of features that appeared both in comics of that title and in other magazines as well are generally not italicized below. Key: (w) = writer; (p) = penciler; (i) = inker; (unc) = uncomfirmed.] Name: Chu Fook Hing (artist, probably writer) Comics Studio/Shop: Funnies, Inc. (p)(i) c. 1943-46 COMICBOOKS (U.S. Mainstream Publication): Avon Comics: various features (i) early 1950s Better/Nedor Publications: Captain Future (i) 1946; Don Davis (i) 1946; Fighting Yank (i) 1946; Pyroman (i) 1946 Consolidated Book: Gale Leary, the Will o’ the Wisp (p) 1944 D.S. Publishing: Public Enemies (p)(i) 1949 Eastern Color Printing: Heroic Comics (p)(i) 1947 Fiction House Comics: Chip Collins (i) 1944 (unc); Dusty Rhodes (p)(i) 1943-44; Kayo Kirby (i) 1943-45 (unc); Señorita Rio (p) 1944 (unc) Holyoke Publications: covers (p) c. 1945]; Power Comics (p) c. 1945 [both for imprint Narrative] Lev Gleason Publications: romance (p)(i) 1951; Marvel (Timely) Comics: All-True Crime Cases (p)(i) 1949-50; backup feature (i) in Casey Crime Photographer; Human Torch (p)(i) 1944; Rex Hart (p) 1950; romance (p)(i) c. 1948-50; Tex Morgan (p)(i) 1948-50; Tex Taylor (p)(i) 1948-50; Tommy Tyme (p)(i) 1948; Two-Gun Kid (i)(some p) 1948-50 Novelty Comics: covers (p)(i) 1943; Dan’l Flannel (i) mid-1940s (unc); Sergeant Spook (p)(i) c. 1945 Rural Home Publishing: crime (p)(i) 1945; The Green Turtle (p)(i) (probably w) 1944-45; Judge and Jury (p)(i) 1945; The Prankster (p) (i) 1945 (unc); Red Hawk (i) 1945 (unc) Superior Publishers: Calling All Cars (i) 1944 (unc)

www.comics.org

U.S. Camera: Kid Click (i) 1944 (unc)

The “Evil Twin” Episode—More Or Less The Green Turtle goes into action against a Japanese imposter in Blazing Comics #3 (Sept. 1944). Art (and maybe script) by Chu Hing. Thanks to Comic Book Plus. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

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

Syd Shores’ splash for Captain America #65 (Jan. 1948). Inks by Ken Bald; scripter unknown. Thanks to Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

(Above:) A reworked version of the 1985 booklet, Fifty Who Made DC Great. Art by Curt Swan & Murphy Anderson. [© DC Comics.]

Mr. Monster’s Comics Crypt!

Mort Weisinger: The Superman Behind Superman (Part 2)

Sci-Fi Profile: Is It A Bird? Is It A Plane?

No, It’s The Superman Behind Superman—Mort Weisinger (Part 2)

by Michael T. Gilbert

ast issue we reprinted part one of science-fiction fan/historian Sam Moskowitz’s fascinating profile of SF fan, agent, writer, and editor Mort Weisinger, which originally appeared in Ziff-Davis’ Amazing Stories, Vol. 38, #8 (Aug. 1964). This time Sam explores Mort’s comicbook career. Though Moskowitz didn’t know it at the time, Weisinger (who began editing for DC in March 1941) was nearing the end of his run at DC. By 1970, as sales for the Superman-starring comics fell, he admitted he was no longer in touch with his readers and retired to write articles for various non-comic publications. For many fans, it signaled the end of the Silver Age. Reading Moskowitz’s article, we see short shrift given to the later years of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, creators of DC’s most lucrative character. That’s not too surprising, as the duo had tried to wrest control of their character from DC with a lawsuit in 1947, and failed. They received a one-time payment of $94,013.16—almost a million bucks in today’s money—which (after lawyer fees) they quickly ran through. Not surprisingly, DC refused them any further work. Joe continued in comics for a few more years, before fading eyesight forced him from the field. Jerry fell on hard times, too, and he left comics for a steady job as a mailroom typist for the post office. In 1959 he returned to DC, hat in hand. After years of near poverty, Siegel once again found himself a work-for-hire cog laboring for Mort on a multi-million-dollar character he and Shuster had created. True to form, Weisinger treated Jerry poorly. Siegel’s work for Weisinger ended in 1966 when DC learned he was once again planning to sue the company. This occurred a year later, when the 28 years of Superman’s initial copyright was ending. The lawsuit failed and Jerry Siegel was once more persona non grata at DC. It’s possible that Moskowitz’s article, unintentionally diminishing Siegel’s contributions to DC (by crediting Mort rather than Jerry and the other writers with innovations such as the Phantom Zone, time travel, “imaginary” stories, and such), fueled the fire of Siegel’s resentment.

by Sam Moskowitz

eisinger was not primarily interested in becoming a fiction writer, though he qualified for the American Fiction Guild, where eligibility required the sale of 100,000 words of fiction, and became its secretary. One evening, at a meeting, he heard that one of the editors at Standard Magazines had quit. The editorial director at Standard was a remarkable man named Leo Margulies, who guided the destiny of between 40 and 50 pulp magazines. Weisinger had previously entered a contest sponsored by Popular Detective, one of Margulies’s brood, which paid five cents a word for each word short of 1000 in which a good “whodunit” could be written. He made a good impression on Margulies by compressing a salesworthy plot into 500 words for a story called “Rope Enough.” When he approached Margulies at a meeting and asked for the job, he got it, at $15 a week. At the age of 20, Mort Weisinger was on his way! Now fate played a hand. Hugo Gernsback’s Wonder Stories, which had survived six years of the worst depression in the nation’s history, could no longer pay its way. Standard Magazines purchased it early in 1936. Weisinger was the logical man to edit the publication, except that Standard Magazines had a policy that every story had to be approved by three editors. A limited pool of harried and overworked men were cumulatively editing over 40 magazines and none of them knew anything of science-fiction except Weisinger. They tended to “OK” anything he wanted without even giving it a reading. Thereby he “beat the system” and became editor of the magazine in fact as well as theory. Because of tough competition in adult sciencefiction from Astounding Stories, Margulies and publisher Ned Pines decided to aim for the teenage market. They changed the title to Thrilling Wonder Stories (Standard Magazines were trademarked as the “Thrilling” group) and established a policy of action covers, preferably with a monster involved. So frequent and varied were the monsters on Thrilling Wonder Stories covers, and so bulging their eyes, that the term Bug Eyed Monster (BEM) originated and was fostered in that publication.

Jerry, a long-time sci-fi fan, almost certainly read this article. Once the star of the show, he’d become a poorly paid bit player while Weisinger reaped fame and fortune. Though we’ll never know for sure, “The Superman behind Superman“ may have been a contributing factor in Siegel’s decision to sue DC a second time. And now… Play it again, Sam!

Sam Moskowitz Portrait of the fan and author, drawn in 1957 by legendary sci-fi artist Frank R. Paul for the cover of Sam Moskowitz: A Bibliography and Guide. [© the respective holders.]

Despite the raucousness of the covers and the juvenile slant, Weisinger, through his knowledge of the field, managed to retain the magazine’s readers by securing authors of considerable appeal. From the pages of [his fanzine] Science Fiction Digest he reprinted two A. Merritt stories that had never previously appeared in a professional magazine. He secured original stories from Otis Adelbert Kline, who had achieved a substantial following

Mort Weisinger: The Man Behind Superman (Part 2)

Weisinger found that discovering a good cover situation in a story was not always possible; so his policy was to give a provocative idea to an artist and then have an author write a story around the artwork. This was to become a common practice. Anticipating school reservations about their students reading anything as garish as Thrilling Wonder Stories, Mort Weisinger bluffed the educators into a state of open-mouthed bafflement by featuring, on the same cover as “Dream Dust of Mars” by Manly Wade Wellman, an article by Sir James Jeans on “Giant and Dwarf Stories” (Feb., 1938). Along with “Hollywood on the Moon” by Henry Kuttner, young readers were initiated into the mysteries of “Eclipses of the Sun” by no less an authority than Sir Arthur Eddington (April 1938). By mid-1938 Thrilling Wonder Stories’ sales were encouraging enough to warrant either more frequent publication or a companion magazine. The publishers decided on a companion to be titled Startling Stories, a title created by Weisinger. Remembering the popularity of the complete novels in the old Amazing Stories Quarterly, Weisinger instituted the same policy for the new magazine, leading off its first, Jan., 1939, issue with “The Black Flame,” a previously unpublished work by Stanley G. Weinbaum. The new magazine was an instant success, frequently outselling Thrilling Wonder Stories. When Weisinger took his editorial post with Standard, he sold his interest in the Solar Sales Service [a sci-fi literary agency] to Julius Schwartz, who was still editing [the fanzine] Fantasy Magazine. Business forced Conrad H. Ruppert to cease gratuitous printing of the publication, and after a switch to another printer for a few issues, the magazine quit publication with the Jan. 1937 number. The science-fiction fan world collapsed into juvenile pockets of interest with the removal of this central point of focus.

A Twice-Told Tall Tale Mort Weisinger edited the July 1940 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories (Vol. 17, #1), which sported a nifty Howard V. Brown cover. In June 1961 Weisinger recycled the idea for the cover of Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen #53. ZiffDavis didn’t get into the comic biz until 1950, so Mort missed out. Instead, they hired Jerry Siegel as art director—presumably based on his success with Superman. However, lightning definitely didn’t strike twice, and the line folded a couple of years later. [© the respective copyright holders.]

for his imitations of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Posthumously, works of the late Stanley G. Weinbaum were run, and John W. Campbell became a regular contributor. Up to then, editing a science-fiction magazine consisted of reading the manuscripts that came in and picking the best. Weisinger switched to feeding authors ideas and ordering the story of a pre-determined length around an agreed-upon theme. As a bi-monthly, serials were out of the question for Thrilling Wonder Stories, so authors were encouraged to write series using proven popular characters. Henry Kuttner, who had written only “weirds,” was induced to try science-fiction and given the idea for a group of stories concerning Hollywood on the Moon; Eando Binder enthralled readers with the adventures of Anton York, an immortal man, while building a reputation for the nom de plume of Gordon A. Giles for a series of interplanetary adventures, the “via” stories; John W. Campbell used a light touch in popularizing Penton and Blake, who cavorted around the solar system because they were wanted by Earth authorities; a wild animal hunter for Earth zoos, Gerry Carlyle, provided an excellent base for an interplanetary series by Arthur K. Barnes; and Ray Cummings revived “Tubby,” a paunchy character initially popularized 15 years earlier, who dreams wild scientific adventures.

But Weisinger played a major role in reviving science-fiction fandom in late 1938 when he made appearances at local and regional meetings, and most particularly when he decided to review science-fiction magazines, giving prices and addresses, as a regular column in Startling Stories. He also gave major support to the first World Science-Fiction Convention, held in New York in 1939, by contributing publicity, money, auction material, and program talent, and by bringing Leo Margulies and a dozen big-name authors to the affair with him. It paid off when Time and the New Yorker gave major write-ups

Holding Up Standards An undated photo of Standard Magazines editorial director Leo Margulies (on left), and a 1934 photo of publisher Ned L. Pines (right). [© the respective copyright holders.]

Mr. Monster’s Comics Crypt!

to the event. At the convention, Leo Margulies watched the proceedings and then let go his widely quoted phrase: “I didn’t think you boys could be so damn sincere.” He immediately went into a huddle with Mort Weisinger in the back of the hall and the result was Captain Future, a quarterly based on the adventures of that heroic character. Weisinger also developed new writers by conducting an Amateur Story Contest. His most notable find was Alfred Bester, who was to become internationally known for his pyrotechnic masterpiece, “The Demolished Man.” Bester’s first story, “The Broken Axiom,” a tale of the possibility of two objects simultaneously occupying the same space, appeared in the April, 1939 Thrilling Wonder Stories. Another accomplishment was convincing the sons of Edgar Rice Burroughs, John and Hulbert, to write “The Man without A World.” He was also responsible for introducing Alex Schomburg, master of the airbrush, to science-fiction illustrating. From 1939 to 1941, while Weisinger was performing a yeoman editorial job for Standard, comic books had mushroomed into a publishing phenomenon. From the first of the “modern” comic books, Funnies On Parade, published in 1933 by M.C. Gaines of Dell, until 1939, growth of this field had been only of modest proportions. Most comic magazines were reprints of nationally syndicated strips until the issuance of Detective Comics, dated Jan. 1937 by the National Company, which had entered the comic magazine business in 1934. Historians tend to lose perspective of why original comic features came into existence in the comic magazines. It was not out of any desire to be creative but because most of the obtainable worthwhile syndicated daily and Sunday strips were contracted for. As the field broadened it became increasingly difficult to obtain suitable reprints But the comic field found a life-giving new formula with the introduction of the character Superman in Action Comics in 1939 [MTG: Actually, the issue was cover-dated June 1938], which resulted in a sellout of that magazine, and in the appearance of Superman Quarterly Magazine in May 1939. Original scripts based on heroic figures, preferably with a dash of super-science and fantasy, became the rage, and nothing could hold the lid on. The two men responsible for the creation of the “Superman” strip, Jerome Siegel, the

Amateur Hour Moskowitz states that Weisinger “discovered” Alfred Bester when the latter won Mort’s Amateur Story Contest in 1939. This is page one of that story, printed in the April 1939 issue of Thrilling Wonder Stories. Bester went on to write stories for DC, including the first Solomon Grundy tale in the “Green Lantern” series. [© the respective copyright holders.]

Taking An Oath Alfred Bester became one of the premier Golden Age “Green Lantern” writers, and is generally credited with perfecting the famous oath—a credit he himself denied. Art by Mart Nodell from Green Lantern #14 (Winter 1944). [TM & © DC Comics.]

writer, and Joseph Shuster, the artist, were old science-fiction fans and long-time friends of Mortimer Weisinger. Jerome Siegel produced in October 1932 a crudely mimeographed magazine called simply Science-Fiction. To obtain readers he exchanged advertisements with The Time Traveler. This magazine contained stories under various pen names by the editor, plus some cast-offs contributed by kindly authors. From its second issue on, it featured some professional quality cartooned illustrations by Joseph Shuster. Siegel, writing under the name of Bernard J. Kenton, had placed a story with Amazing Stories, “Miracles on Antares.” Informing his readers of this fact, Siegel wrote that Kenton “was at present working upon a scientific fiction cartoon strip with an artist of great renown.” The artist was Joseph Shuster, the year was 1933, and the strip was Superman! For five years Siegel and Shuster peddled the “Superman” strip, meeting rejections at every turn. Among the editors who turned it back was M.C. Gaines. He left Dell to work for National in

Mort Weisinger: The Man Behind Superman (Part 2)

1938, and when Action Comics was rejected thought it might prove suitable. [MTG: The foregoing is not 100% accurate, but we’ll leave it to others to furnish details on that.] Siegel and Shuster had been doing a variety of well-received originals for Detective Comics and Adventure Comics, and they were available and cooperative. Superman was given a chance and literally created the comic book industry as an important publishing business.

We Have Seen The Future… According to Moskowitz, Weisinger was instrumental in the creation of SF pulp-mag Captain Future. Here’s George Rozen’s cover for the first issue, cover-dated Winter 1940. [© the respective copyright holders.]

By 1941 the various Superman comic books were selling so well that the editorial director of National Comics, Whitney Ellsworth, decided they could use another editor. Since the entire success of Superman was based on a background of science-fiction, Ellsworth felt Weisinger was ideally qualified. Negotiations were conducted through Leo Margulies, who wisely counseled Weisinger that comic magazines had a greater future than pulps. But almost simultaneously, Mort Weisinger received a letter from Ziff-Davis offering him the editorship of a new slick paper magazine they were planning to issue, titled Popular Photography. Weisinger was on the horns of a dilemma. The Ziff-Davis offer carried with it full editorship, a challenge and prestige, but the field was unknown to him. Superman, which required a strong facility at plotting and a comprehensive background in science-fiction, was right down his alley. He took it in March 1941. Then World War II abruptly terminated his stint at National Comics. Happily, his old friend, Julius Schwartz, turned down by the army because of poor vision, was taken on as interim editor. In the armed forces, it was Sergeant Mort Weisinger who was assigned to Special Services, working at New Haven as associate editor of Yale’s lively paper called The Beaver. It was on the train to New York, where he scripted an Army radio show, that he met

a tall attractive registered nurse, Thelma Rudnick. He proposed on the train, and they married on Sept. 27, 1943. They have two children, a boy and a girl.

Following his discharge shortly before the end of the war, Weisinger took a whirl at non-fiction. His talent for the offbeat and his skill at finding the unusual angle made him a winner from the start. He sold four major articles in one week, including one to as outstanding a market as Coronet. All the research, experience, and familiarity with interviewing techniques gained on The Time Traveler and The Science Fiction Digest paid off as Weisinger eventually became one of the nation’s banner article writers, scoring with Reader’s Digest, Collier’s, Saturday Evening Post, Ladies Home Journal, Esquire, Cosmopolitan, This Week, Holiday, Redbook, and a galaxy of great American magazines. Eventually a paperback he wrote, 1001 Valuable Things You Can Get Free, would go into endless editions and be used as the basis of a weekly feature in This Week [a Sunday newspaper supplement magazine]. Weisinger had settled down to a career of freelancing when Superman The Supermen Comics called up and asked (Left:) The 1933 version of “Superman.” (Right:) Joe Shuster when he was coming back to (seated) and Jerry Siegel in 1942—looking at a Superman work. Reluctant to part with propaganda poster drawn by Fred Ray. [Art © the Estates his newfound prosperity, of Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster.]

Mr. Monster’s Comics Crypt!

The prosperity of Superman had encouraged numberless imitators, the most popular of which was Captain Marvel, published by Fawcett with continuities written by Eando Binder. National Comics, before World War II, sued Fawcett to “cease and desist” in the use of that type of character. For nearly a decade the case dragged through the courts. As the years rolled past, many of the Superman imitators disappeared, unable to sustain an element of novelty and originality in their storylines. Finally, Fawcett settled out of court. It was suggested that Fawcett felt the vogue had passed and there was little money to be made from Captain Marvel, and that Superman had won a pyrrhic victory. National’s answer to that was Mort Weisinger. Rallying his vast background of science-fiction plotting, he literally began to reshape the history of Superman to make it possible for new, more fascinating adventures to occur. There was precedent. Originally, Superman covered ground by tremendous leaps. When the first movie was made, it became obvious that to portray this would make him appear like a kangaroo, so he was given the power of flight. A new generation of readers were indoctrinated with a background that lent itself to greater thrills. Ancient evildoers of Krypton, men with powers approaching that of Superman, readers now learned, had been banished to “The Phantom Zone,” from which they could be released as needed to add zest to the continuities. The “worlds of if” device was introduced. This featured things that Superman might have done and what would have happened had he followed that course. Most sensationally popular of Weisinger’s innovations was the device of time travel. This astounding new Superman talent opened a new dimension of adventure, making it possible for our hero to go into the past and introduce Hercules, Samson, and Atlas into the adventures, or to reach into the future to foil a menace that would not arrive for 1000 years. Frequently, associational characters build a following. This resulted in a proliferation for the Superman Group. The big gun, Superman, was published eight times a year and averaged one million circulation. Added to this was Action Comics, featuring Supergirl; World Finest Comics, where Superman appears with Batman, another famed adventure strip hero, whose destinies are guided by Weisinger’s friend, Julius Schwartz; Jimmy Olsen, teen-age pal of Superman, has his own magazine, as has Lois Lane, his girlfriend; Superboy features the adventures of Superman as a boy; Adventure Comics stresses Superboy and the Legion of SuperHeroes. Special adventures have featured Krypto, the Super Dog. This variation on a theme has prevented youngsters from becoming jaded with a single character.

Up, Up, And Away! Shortly after World War II, Weisinger helped plot a “Superman movie.” Most likely it was the first Columbia Pictures Superman serial, starring Kirk Alyn and Noel Neill, which debuted on Jan. 5, 1948. [TM & © DC Comics.]

he finally succumbed to the lure of an all-expense sojourn for himself and family to work on the plotting of a Superman movie in Hollywood as a prelude to his resuming editorial work. The story has often been told of the FBI’s unsuccessful attempt to stop John W. Campbell from printing atomic energy stories in Astounding Science Fiction. The story has also been told of the successful mothballing of a Philip Wylie atomic energy story “Paradise Crater,” sent to Blue Book during the war. To those stories may be added two about “Superman” strips with atomic energy plots which the government stopped Mort Weisinger from printing in 1945. So he was off to a lively start.

Presiding over the entire retinue is Mort Weisinger, who directs the continuity writers (including such science-fiction veterans as Edmond Hamilton, Eando Binder, and the originator, Jerry Siegel, who is still active) into channels he considers most appealing to his audience. Thus, in the most direct fashion, from the point of origin to present-day plot sustenance, the Superman strips are the spawn of the science-fiction magazines: created by a science-fiction fan, from ideas obtained from science-fiction stories, run by a former science-fiction editor and to a great degree written by science-fiction authors. Theoretically, popular Superman should repay its debt to science-fiction by a feedback system as its readers outgrow the comics. The reason this has not happened to any great degree since 1952, when science-fiction went sophisticated, is because no “bridge” magazines exist to wean the jaded away from the comic and into slick science-fiction. Weisinger’s Thrilling Wonder Stories, Startling Stories and Captain Future performed that role earlier,

Mort Weisinger: The Man Behind Superman (Part 2)

buttressed by Amazing, Fantastic Adventures, and Planet Stories. Should such magazines come back on the scene, they will find Mort Weisinger with his Superman Group conscientiously continuing to do the spade work for them

Julius Schwartz promoted lively letter columns, often including names and addresses of the letter writers, enabling readers to communicate directly with each other—another throwback to the pulps of their youth. Beyond that, Sam’s article also reminded me how much the sci-fi elements Weisinger borrowed from the pulps captivated me as kid. Super villains from Krypton! Time travel into the future! Titanic apes with Kryptonite vision! Green Kryptonite! Red Kryptonite! Rainbow Kryptonite! The eerie Phantom Zone! And how about the poor souls trapped in the tiny Bottle City of Kandor? Concepts like these fueled my early interest in science-fiction.

The End We hope you enjoyed Sam Moskowitz’s informative biographical profile. Sam passed away on April 15, 1997, at age 76. We’d like to thank his nephew, Dennis Haycock, for permitting us to reprint it.

Naturally, some of these ideas had appeared long before Mort reshaped the Superman mythos in the late ’50s. But under Weisinger’s watch all the elements coalesced into a unified universe, with rules that kids could understand and which fired their imaginations. In doing so, Weisinger and his writers and artists produced comics that I, and fans like me, will always treasure.

Moscowitz’s article reminded me just how great a debt the classic “Superman” stories owed to Weisinger’s early pulp training. At Standard Publications, he learned to design a gripping cover and then assign a story to match it. During his pulp years, Weisinger also learned to feed plots to his writers, something that later became his trademark at DC. Additionally, both Mort and

Till next time…

Mort Weisinger as seen on Robby Reed’s Dial B For Blog website.

NEW SEQUENCES CONSTANTLY BEING ADDED! Official Website: http://edgarriceburroughs.com/comics/ Website now also features weekly comic strips of John Carter of Mars, Carson of Venus, Pellucidar, Land That Time Forgot, and many others— only $1.99 per month!

ALL-NEW FULL-COLOR ADVENTURES —NOW PLAYING ON AN INTERNET NEAR YOU!

by ROY THOMAS & New Artist COREY FURMAN

THE HERO INITIATIVE CREATES A FINANCIAL SAFETY NET FOR COMIC CREATORS WHO MAY NEED EMERGENCY MEDICAL AID, FINANCIAL SUPPORT FOR ESSENTIALS OF LIFE, AND AN AVENUE BACK INTO PAYING WORK. SINCE INCEPTION, THE HERO INITIATIVE HAS BEEN FORTUNATE ENOUGH TO BENEFIT OVER 50 CREATORS AND THEIR FAMILIES WITH OVER $500,000 WORTH OF MUCH-NEEDED AID, FUELED BY YOUR CONTRIBUTIONS! IT’S A CHANCE FOR ALL OF US TO GIVE BACK SOMETHING TO THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE GIVEN US SO MUCH ENJOYMENT.

The Comic and Fantasy Art Amateur Press Association celebrates 35 Years! Back Issues now available @ $75.00. DApp993@aol.com

Art by Syd Shores from cover of Captain America Comics #22 (Jan. 1943)

Captain America TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

The Family Car(s)

Part XIV Of JOHN BROOME’s My Life In Little Pieces

A/E

EDITOR’S NOTE: Last issue’s installment of the esteemed Golden/Silver Age comicbook writer’s 1998 “Offbeat Autobio” detailed several anecdotes relating to his wife Peggy, who had a way with a phrase herself. We continue that accounting this time around, with a sideways look at the family unit’s colorful automobiles over the years, courtesy of their daughter Ricky Terry Brisacque. The text is, as always, © the Estate of Irving Bernard “John” Broome….

eggy’s penchant for giving fanciful names to our household articles extended to the automobiles we owned at various times, starting with a Model A Ford, a two-seater coupe that had served as a chicken coop in the previous owner’s backyard for some years. We had to clean out the feathers and the chicken doo-doo to use it. Obviously, it didn’t look like much, but it was cheap—this was in the depths of the Great Depression of the 1930s and $15 was what we paid for it. However, would it work? We got hold of a battery, attached it, and cranked. After a few tries, the old flivver exploded with a roar, shaking off chicken feathers and doo-doo to all sides like a dog coming out of a lake. In spite of this spectacular demonstration of the vitality of American industry, Peggy named the Ford “Dying Capitalism”—in those days, all the young people we knew were communists. But in time, we learned better, I’m glad to say. Our next car was a yellow Cadillac convertible with a golf club compartment, if you please, in the rear—no one had money to buy gasoline for such a huge car which did gallons to the mile almost, so we got it for a song, for $50, and Peggy, still loyal to her ideals, named it “Comrade Cadillac.” After that came a boxy but economical Chevrolet that brought us home safe and sound, and dry, more than once through thunderstorms in upstate New York where after the War we had begun to live. Water seemed the natural element of that old Chevy—it became the “Santa Maria.” It was followed by a big gray Nash Ambassador, a car with a “powerful warhorse of an engine” that we kept for years, but which finally succumbed when a possibly overworked grease monkey left off the screw-on cap after checking the transmission oil level. It was with much regret, some months later, that we conducted the Old Gray Mare, emitting an increasingly loud wheeze of protest, to her final resting place, a Mad Max-type junkyard in nearby Poughkeepsie. Our last car didn’t need a nickname: a four-seater blue convertible, it came equipped with its own: the Minx, dainty and spunky as an English lass: imported, yes, because Detroit had

John, Peggy, & Ricky Broome in 1956. (We ran this photo three years ago, but it’s one of the few we have of Mrs. Broome, so thanks again to Ricky Terry Brisacque for the picture.) (Right:) Although John speaks this issue of some of the clunkers the Broome family owned at one time or another, at least he got to write about one of the supreme automobiles of popular fiction—the Batmobile, as per this page from Detective Comics #331 (Sept. 1964), as penciled by Carmine Infantino and inked by Joe Giella for editor Julius Schwartz’s “New Look Batman.” Thanks to Bob Bailey. [TM & © DC Comics.]

Part XIV Of JOHN BROOME’s My Life In Little Pieces

stopped making convertibles, presumably on the grounds of their being unsafe, and didn’t make them again till decades later. An incredible fact. Hard to understand. Although, come to think of it, it was a fact that might easily have made present-day cherishers of seatbelts and airbags happy since quite clearly it paved the way for the spread of those articles and for an increasing emphasis on motoring safety—if not at all on motoring joy or exhilaration or that bounding sense of freedom that comes from riding in a wind-whipped open convertible on a ﬁne and sunshiny day.

“A Hank Of Hair And A Piece Of Bone…” Peggy Broome was once briefly concerned about losing a few strands of hair—while, behind the somewhat garish cover painting by Rudolph Belarski, her hubby had earlier written a tale about a man who got a whole new face, in the Better Publications science-fiction pulp Startling Stories, Vol. 6, #3 (Nov. 1941). The title illo is by Leo Morey. Thanks for the cover scan and artists’ IDs to David Saunders and his invaluable www.pulpartists.com website—and to Glenn MacKay and Art Lortie for the Broome title page. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

A P.S. Of Peggy Stories She pressed me to tell her just what had gotten me angry the evening before at a friend’s house where we’d had dinner, but I was stubborn, it wasn’t anything important, and I was reluctant to explain. “You’re only asking out of curiosity,” I charged. She looked at me in astonishment. “Of course!” she said. Peggy was morose over her hair falling out during a shampoo. We played music on our recorders to distract her and cheer her up. After we ﬁnished, I remarked not very originally, “Music restoreth the soul.” “Yeah,” she responded with a plaintive pout, “but not the hair.”

Uncle Heinie Peggy’s Uncle Heinie was already a bowed and stooped old graybeard with failing eyesight when I met him. However, he hardly seemed to change over the following decades when he easily outlasted every one of his fellow male family members, all, by the way, ﬁrst-generation U.S. immigrants, and like him from the same corner of eastern Europe. The wing of the clan that I got to know settled in quite toney Shore Road, Brooklyn (rumor had it that several Maﬁa bosses had their mansions there), in a solid brick two-family house. Peggy and folks downstairs and Uncle Heinie and family upstairs. When you chanced to encounter him during those years, Uncle Heinie was likely to trouble himself to explain how he happened to be still around when all the other family men of his generation had disappeared. “I forgot to die,” he would say, a bit jauntily, giving way to what one suspicioned might have been a lifelong weakness for turning a phrase. Once Peggy and her sister Mindelle (sixteen months between them) made so bold as to take their patriarchal uncle to task for what they considered some unfair treatment of his wife, their sainted Aunt Esther (and their mother’s sister), and Uncle Heinie on being so confronted, raised a hand before them as if he were Charlton Heston playing Moses on the heights of Mount Ararat. (Actually, a bloodline relation of his with the same last name was one of the most revered and honored rabbi-scholars in Judaism, and Uncle Heinie was not likely even for a moment to lose sight of his close connection with that illustrious personage.) “Girls,” he addressed them now with Old Testament gravity, “do

you know what is the most important one of the Ten Commandments?” The two young defenders of the rights of elderly wives were momentarily taken aback by this unexpected defensive maneuver. “Honor thy father and mother,” piped Mindelle, mostly because some answer seemed required. “No,” their interlocutor assured them with a faintly curled upper lip and some strong professorial blinks behind the thick telescopic lenses through which he was peering down at them. “The most important of the Ten Commandments is—Mind Your Own Business!” And so saying, he turned and started up the narrow staircase to his abode above which at ninety, he could still negotiate without any assistance. And that was Uncle Heinie. Next issue, John Broome relates several anecdotes concerning his fellow DC Comics (and “Batman”) writer, David V. Reed.

In Memoriam

ALLEN BELLMAN

(1924-2020) “Our Last Tenuous Connection To Timely’s Super-Heroes Has Been Irrevocably Severed”

A Remembrance by Dr. Michael J. Vassallo

t is with much sadness that I report the passing on March 9th of my dear friend, artist Allen Bellman, the last man alive who could claim to have drawn the exploits of Timely’s Golden Age Captain America in the 1940s. He passed peacefully at the age of 95 after a short, unexpected illness, with his beloved wife Roz by his side and surrounded by his loving family. Allen was well known to the Alter Ego family. I formally interviewed him for this magazine twice—the first being published in 2003, the last roughly two years ago. In between, he wrote letters to the editor and contributed several essays and commentary pieces, thus keeping his hand in a medium that had made his last two decades a roller-coaster ride of recognition and fun. Though Allen’s story is well-known now, a brief re-telling follows. Born in Manhattan and raised in Brownsville, Brooklyn, the son of Russian-Jewish immigrants, his family owned a bakery store where young Allen would draw on the brown paper wrapping. Creating his own comic strips and organizing a comic club with childhood friend (and later comics artist) Sam Burlockoff, Allen got his cartoons published in the “Aunt Jean” column in the Brooklyn Eagle and New York Mirror newspapers. His hero Milton Caniff (Terry and the Pirates) was an honorary member. After attending the High School of Industrial Arts and Pratt Institute, he answered an October 1942 Timely Comics newspaper ad (the company was at the time in the McGraw-Hill Building) for a background artist on the “Captain America” feature, then being drawn by Syd Shores. This was a month before Timely editor Stan Lee entered the armed services. Writer/artist Don Rico came out, looked over his samples, and hired him on the spot. He was 18 years old. After a bit of background-artist apprenticeship, Allen was given his own feature, “The Patriot,” and proceeded to become a vital cog in the Timely staff’s assembly-line manner of churning out comicbook stories. For the rest of the decade, except for a stint in the Navy during the war, he drew whatever was needed: “The Patriot,” “Captain America,” “The Human Torch,” “Sub-Mariner,” “The Destroyer,” one-page crime features, even pulp illustrations. Most of this work was drawn anonymously, often only as one hand in a diverse-hands manner of production. For this reason, Allen had long been unknown to all but the most knowledgeable Timely historians. The work was hidden, unrecognized, and diluted. When Timely’s art staff was let

Allen Bellman at a Detroit con a few years back—and (below) one of the many Captain America-related drawings that he would reproduce as handouts he would sign for fans. The photo from the Daily Detroit or the Detroit Free Press is by M. Lapham. [Captain America TM & ©Marvel Characters, Inc.; other art & photo © Roz Bellman.]

go at the end of 1949, Allen took a staff position at Lev Gleason Publications, churning out crime and romance stories. Then, in late 1951, he was back freelancing for Timely/Atlas in every genre they produced, from pre-Code horror, science-fiction, and space opera to crime, Westerns, and war stories. This was prototypical Allen Bellman comicbook art. A bit quirky, very stylized—but, when he was in love with the subject manner, to me, just beautiful. My favorite work of this time was several pre-Code horror, crime, and war stories, as well as a run as the final artist on the “Jet Dixon of the Space Squadron” feature. Allen then left the industry just as Dr. Fredric Wertham’s book Seduction of the Innocent was released in 1954. It had been a 12-year run, from age 18 to 30. Allen would go on to commercial art, working in retail, and becoming an award-winning photographer, joining the staff of the Florida Sun Sentinel. In 1962 he married his adorable wife Roslyn, who knew virtually nothing of his work in the comicbook industry. When I tracked him down in 1998, he was happy in his retirement and had long put his earlier comics career behind him. But, as I soon discovered, it had never really been forgotten. More than any creator of the past that I located, Allen was thrilled I’d found him. I sent his family photocopies of all the work he did I had in my possession, which was a sizable chunk. Shortly afterward, I interviewed him for Alter Ego, giving his story a wider range. When the interview went online, Allen went viral and began to get calls to attend comicbook conventions, first in Florida, then all over the country. He and Roz became feted stars of the comics convention circuit, with Allen earning an Inkpot Award in 2007, walking the red carpet at the Captain America: The First Avenger film premiere, and throwing out the first ball at a Florida Marlins baseball game. Developing a sizable social media presence, his convention panel discussions and sketch drawings were beloved by fans around the world.

2017 also saw the publication of his autobiography, Timely Confidential, an unfiltered look back at his life and colleagues during his Timely years, a book I was proud to have edited for him.

In Memoriam

him. A few days later he was in the hospital and then, like a light turning off, he was gone. I want to offer my deepest condolences to the family of Allen Bellman. He was a special man, someone who only wanted to give back. He has left an impact on untold thousands of fans and admirers who loved him. His legacy was not just artistic, but one of humanity. To Roz and his daughters Kathy, Judith, Alice, and Ellen, granddaughters Doreen and Jeaneen, Mandy, Laura, Shawn and Rachael, as well as all extended family and close friends… take comfort in knowing it was a life fully lived.

As 2020 dawned, I informed Allen that one of his war stories would be included in a new anthology collection, Atlas at War, which I was preparing and editing for the graphic novel division of the Naval Institute Press, Dead Reckoning. I interviewed Allen once again (along with Joe Sinnott), this time to get his recollections on his work on war stories. It was just after this interview that I received word from him that he was ill, With Allen’s passing, our last and I immediately realized that tenuous connection to Timely’s superit was serious. I spoke to him two heroes has been irrevocably severed. more times after that. They are His earlier work in our industry has conversations I will always cherish. finally been recognized. No one, I With declining strength, Allen Spaced Out! repeat, no one, had a better last act was unafraid of dying, knowing This is the splash panel of one of several “Jet Dixon” stories that than Allen Bellman. his run had been a long one, and Allen Bellman drew for Space Squadron #5 (Feb. 1952). Scripter a good one. He talked to me about unknown. Courtesy of Dr. Michael J. Vassallo. [TM & © Marvel Allen, I will miss you and am our mortality and his family, and Characters, Inc.] proud to have been thanked me for making his last 20 your friend and able years a whirlwind of happiness and to re-introduce you to the world. I bid you a heartfelt validation. I knew he was saying good-bye to me, and I told him goodnight. the thanks were not necessary, that I should be instead thanking

All characters TM & © their respective owners.

BOOKS FROM TWOMORROWS PUBLISHING

ER EISN RD AWAINEE ! M NO

HOLLY JOLLY

MONSTER MASH

MARK VOGER’s sleigh ride thru Christmas pop culture, spotlighting classic holiday movies, music, TV, books, decor, comics, and more!

MARK VOGER’s time-trip back to 1957-1972, to explore the CREEPY, KOOKY MONSTER CRAZE, when monsters stomped into America’s mainstream!

(192-page FULL-COLOR hardcover) $43.95 (Digital Edition) $15.99 • Now shipping! ISBN: 978-1-60549-097-7

(192-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $39.95 (Digital Edition) $11.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-064-9

MIKE GRELL

LIFE IS DRAWING WITHOUT AN ERASER Career-spanning tribute to a comics art legend! (160-page FULL-COLOR TPB) $27.95 ISBN: 978-1-60549-088-5 (176-page LTD. ED. HARDCOVER) $37.95 ISBN: 978-1-60549-087-8 (Digital Edition) $12.99

KIRBY & LEE: STUF’ SAID

ED AN D EX P CO N D SE ION ! T I ED

ISBN: 978-1-60549-094-6

THE MLJ COMPANION

Documents the complete history of ARCHIE COMICS’ super-heroes known as the “Mighty Crusaders”, with in-depth examinations of each era of the characters’ history: The GOLDEN AGE (beginning with the Shield, the first patriotic super-hero), the SILVER AGE (spotlighting the campy Mighty Comics issues, and The Fly and Jaguar), the BRONZE AGE (the Red Circle line, and the !mpact imprint published by DC Comics), up to the MODERN AGE, with its Dark Circle imprint! (288-page FULL-COLOR trade paperback) $34.95 (Digital Edition) $14.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-067-0

COMIC BOOK IMPLOSION

In 1978, DC Comics implemented its “DC Explosion” with many creative new titles, but just weeks after its launch, they pulled the plug, leaving stacks of completed comic book stories unpublished. This book marks the 40th Anniversary of “The DC Implosion”, one of the most notorious events in comics, with an exhaustive oral history from the creators involved (JENETTE KAHN, PAUL LEVITZ, LEN WEIN, MIKE GOLD, and others), plus detailed analysis of how it changed the landscape of comics forever!

ER EISN RD AWAINEE ! N OM

(136-page trade paperback with COLOR) $21.95 (Digital Edition) $10.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-085-4

(272-page FULL-COLOR trade paperback) $36.95 (Digital Edition) $13.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-073-1

IT CREPT FROM THE TOMB Digs up the best of FROM THE TOMB (the UK’s preeminent horror comics history magazine): Atomic comics lost to the Cold War, censored British horror comics, the early art of RICHARD CORBEN, Good Girls of a bygone age, TOM SUTTON, DON HECK, LOU MORALES, AL EADEH, BRUCE JONES’ ALIEN WORLDS, HP LOVECRAFT in HEAVY METAL, and more!

EXPANDED SECOND EDITION—16 EXTRA PAGES! Looks back at the creators of the Marvel Universe’s own words, in chronological order, from fanzine, magazine, radio, and television interviews, to paint a picture of JACK KIRBY and STAN LEE’s complicated relationship! Includes recollections from STEVE DITKO, ROY THOMAS, WALLACE WOOD, JOHN ROMITA SR., and other Marvel Bullpenners! (176-page FULL-COLOR trade paperback) $26.95 (Digital Edition) $12.99

HERO-A-GO-GO!

MICHAEL EURY looks at comics’ CAMP AGE, when spies liked their wars cold and their women warm, and TV’s Batman shook a mean cape!

(192-page trade paperback) $29.95 (Digital Edition) $10.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-081-6

ER EISN RD AWAINEE ! N OM

JACK KIRBY’S DINGBAT LOVE

The final complete, unpublished Jack Kirby stories in existence, presented here for the first time, in cooperation with DC Comics! Two unused 1970s DINGBATS OF DANGER STREET tales, plus TRUE-LIFE DIVORCE and SOUL LOVE magazines! (176-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $43.95 (Digital Edition) $14.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-091-5

AMERICAN COMIC BOOK CHRONICLES:

THE WORLD OF TWOMORROWS

Celebrate our 25th anniversary with this retrospective by publisher JOHN MORROW and Comic Book Creator magazine’s JON B. COOKE! Go behind-the-scenes with MICHAEL EURY, ROY THOMAS, GEORGE KHOURY, and a host of other TwoMorrows contributors! Introduction by MARK EVANIER, Foreword by ALEX ROSS, Afterword by PAUL LEVITZ, and a new cover by TOM McWEENEY! (224-page FULL-COLOR TPB) $37.95 (240-page ULTRA-LIMITED HARDCOVER) $75 (Digital Edition) $15.99

8 Volumes Covering The 1940s-1990s

MAC RABOY

Master of the Comics

OR -COL FULLDCOVER HAR RIES SE nting me f docu ecade o d y! c a e h s histor ic com

MAC RABOY perfected his art style on such 1940s comic book creations as DR. VOODOO, BULLETMAN, SPY SMASHER, GREEN LAMA, and his crowning achievement, CAPTAIN MARVEL JR., before moving on to illustrate the FLASH GORDON Sunday newspaper strip. Author ROGER HILL documents the life and career of the master artist in a full-color hardcover with never-before-seen photos, a wealth of rare and unpublished artwork, and the first definitive biography of a true Master of the Comics!

TwoMorrows. The Future of Pop History. (160-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $39.95 • (Digital Edition) $14.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-090-8

Phone: 919-449-0344 E-mail: store@twomorrows.com Web: www.twomorrows.com

TwoMorrows Publishing • 10407 Bedfordtown Drive • Raleigh, NC 27614 USA

it and throw it like a Frisbee to knock out fleeing crooka, à la the Batarang. Sigh… Jeff Taylor And here I thought you were going to complain because he didn’t act “mad” enough, Jeff. Yeah, as a kid reading those two issues when they were fresh and new, I couldn’t figure out why the hero took that name—but I liked the stories and visuals just the same. I try hard, each and every issue, to find a reason—if only because of space limitations—not to print some or all of the e-mail that longtime fan Bernie Bubnis sends about nearly every edition. However, it’s difficult—because, in addition to his letters being generally clever and often insightful, he almost always comes up with at the very least a tidbit of information that I think should be passed on to A/Eficionados. Case in point: Hi Roy,

oy here, eschewing third person for the length of this letters section, as per usual. (Interesting that I still think of it as a “letters section,” when in truth at least 90% of the comments that come in re a given issue arrive via e-mail. Anyway, beneath Shane Foley’s fine retro-vintage image of a very young Alter Ego (from our Heroic Publishing comics of the same name—TM & © Roy & Dann Thomas; costume designed by Ron Harris), let’s get to comments on A/E #157, whose FCA spotlight focused on Golden Age (and often Fawcett) writer William Woolfolk but also drew considerable attention for its Star Wars comics 40-year reunion panel, “Comic Crypt’s” continued coverage of artist/writer Pete Morisi, and a brief history of Zorro. We’ll start with frequent A/E letter-hack (with no disrespect intended) Jeff Taylor:

This issue was a perfect blend of all the things that make A/E so unique. Fair coverage of a writer’s career seen through the eyes of a relative. Always entertaining, and the graphic sidebars were well-executed. A little more history from P.C. and due homage paid to Mr. Woolfolk. The first of two panels in the issue was just what the doctor ordered. Those Golden Age guys

Hi Roy— The interviews and panel coverage in Alter Ego #158 were great (especially the Star Wars one), and as an old Zorro fan from way back, I enjoyed the article on the dashing, dark-clad hero. No mention, though, of The Three Swords of Zorro, an obscure 1963 European flick starring Guy Stockwell (Dean’s brother), which I managed to catch on the late, late show way back in the day when they still had late, late shows. But the thing that caught my eye the most amongst the William Woolfolk stuff (other than learning there were actually two “Winston Lyon” Batman novels) was his short-lived super-hero The Mad Hatter. I don’t know why, but I’ve always thought this obscure wisecracking Batman clone was really cool. I just seem to like his larger-than-life, devil-may-care attitude, I guess. Still, there is something that has always bothered me about his eye-catching purple and white costume. No, it isn’t the fuzzy white cape that reminds me of one of those really soft bath towels. Nor is it the baggy belt-less trunks that resemble nothing so much as those adult pull-up diapers…. No, the thing that bothers me about The Mad Hatter is the simple fact that he doesn’t wear a gosh-darn hat. And the sad thing about that (other than the fact that I’m obsessing on it) is that he would look so debonair in a top hat (purple, to match his costume, of course). I mean, I can just see him taking it off and bowing with a flourish. Not only that, but it could be a tricked-out magician’s hat, too, full of gadgets and gimmicks like the Caped Crusader’s famed utility belt. He could even flatten

Mad As A Hatter? This action sequence from Mad Hatter #2 (Oct.-Nov. 1946) shows the fur-caped (but hatless and undeniably sane) hero battling a murderous criminal who’s had his brain transplanted into the body of a gorilla, then disguised himself as a human just to confuse folks. Script by editor/publisher Bill Woolfolk; art by John Giunta. Thanks to Comic Book Plus. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

re:

were having fun up there, and it showed on every page. Panels can ramble sometimes, but are always interesting reading. The Al Capp tangent at this one was fun for me…. The Star Wars comics panel is great fun to read, but for a completely different reason. From the first photo with Howard [Chaykin] sans any Star Wars shirt, hat, tie, belt buckle, or (I have to believe) underwear, we just knew how he felt about the Star Wars comics. BLAST, BANG, BOOM, we were off to the races. You couldn’t write this stuff. It just has to happen! That is why more panel coverage in A/E is on my wish list. Mr. Monster and Bill Schelly… I expect them to be readable and interesting. Anything less will not be acceptable. As soon as either of these guys decides not to be interesting, I will be the first to let you know. I can’t wait for one of them to trip up. I will pounce on them like a 1000-pound rock. …Crap, looks like I’ve got a long wait. By the way, that 2002 Golden Age panel referred to a strip joint on 52nd Street in NYC. I know there was one at 7th and 48th called the Metropole Café. My gangster father would meet his pals there and he would bring me along with him. I think he felt it made him look more human. It did not, but I developed an early attachment to jazz and semi-dressed women. And I never wear Star Wars clothing. Not sure the two things are connected, but it’s possible. Bernie Bubnis I remember going briefly into the Metropole once or twice during my early days in Manhattan, Bernie—but I don’t recall seeing you or your “gangster father” there. Probably just as well. Next up is reader Joe Frank: Dear Roy, To my surprise, I was really taken with aspects of the Star Wars panel. By way of understatement, I’m not a big fan of the franchise. I liked the first two films, and then my interest plummeted. But I was one of those who read your three issues prior to the movie and, consequently, was motivated to see it before it became a phenomenon, with lines around the theatre. In the discussion, there was the guilty-conscience sentiment that if there hadn’t been the preview panel for Star Wars [at the San Diego Comic-Con] in 1976, that sort of media presence wouldn’t have become a convention staple. I disagree. Because someone previews a film, that’s no guarantee that anyone will be hooked and attend. Also, if fans weren’t interested, there would be no massive attendance in the halls. In my view, fans willingly sold out comics interest and appreciation to go with a more high-profile hero worship. To be accepted, seen as cool and in on the latest high-profile Hollywood project, fans ever-so-willingly lessened their attention on the comics personnel and, stars in their eyes, welcomed big-name studios, producers, and stars to blank-check adoration. Their choice. But it is a shame in one way: people, like me, who had enjoyed listening to panel discussions on and by comics pros are so crowded out that it becomes too much hassle for the payoff. I see that you and Denny O’Neil will be here in Phoenix in a couple weeks. But, claustrophobic as I am, I’m not going to maneuver through a sea of bodies, wend my way through, and hope for a seat. Called it a day in 2009 when, at CC:I [con], I was more focused on finding an exit than back issues or engaging in discussions. I thought your remembrance section, with thoughts on Russ Heath, Marie Severin, and Gary Friedrich was touching, as was your editorial. How sad to think of most of the ’60s Bullpen in the past tense. It’s a reminder to appreciate people while they’re here. Enjoyed your Zorro coverage, even though, in one blurb, you

got your Guys confused. As in the article, the Zorro pictured was Guy Williams, not Guy Madison. Joe Frank Yeah, that was my [Roy’s] error, Joe—and sad to say, no one else seems to have noticed until you cracked open a copy. Guy Madison, of course, played Wild Bill Hickock on radio and TV. If you’re feeling nostalgic about the 1960s Marvel Bullpen (as I am, these days, after the recent passing of the folks you mention, plus Stan Lee and Steve Ditko), you won’t want to miss A/E #169, which will be almost totally devoted to my fellow Bullpenner (and good friend since high school) Gary Friedrich. And don’t worry about the Star Wars panelists’ proffered guilt about helping to establish the big-forthcoming-movie as a way-too-major focus of many so-called “comics conventions.” We were only half serious, being fully aware that, if it hadn’t been Chaykin, Charlie Lippincott, and me in ’76, it would almost certainly have been someone else a year or two later who started pushing forthcoming films at San Diego or some other con. It was, apparently, time. David Burd sent the following missive to “Comic Crypt” editor Michael T. Gilbert, and we’ve included both e-mail and e-response below: Dear Michael T.: Thanks for the wonderful job you did with your series of articles about Pete Morisi. I have just read part 4. I have to admit, I was never a fan of PAM’s artwork, but I do enjoy the insight into his thoughts and his life as a working comics artist. There’s one thing that bugs me, though. As I look at the “Arizona Kid” splash on page 58 and the “Two-Gun Lil” on the facing page, both are fully rendered and very competent work. But Pete’s later art for Charlton has a peculiar quality about it. I realize Charlton paid very low page rates and artists would cut corners any way they could to save time. This isn’t just about a rush job, though. Pete Morisi’s art looks like it has been traced. I remember that certain “look” of art that has been traced. I saw it in school, when kids would trace pictures from comic books. The same look is found on early fanzines that were printed on mimeograph or spirit duplicators. (Such as your example of The Comic Reader #40.) You can always tell that the drawing has been traced onto the master with a ballpoint pen, rather than drawn in panel and then inked with a dip pen and/or brush. It’s almost as if PAM had a stencil, or some kind of drawing guide.

The Zorro And The Pity Or did we use that everpunishing pun already? Anyway, this cover for the English Zorro #52 (May 1952) from L. Miller & Son— drawn by Andre Oulie— shows how chronologically flexible a “Fox” can be! Sorry, not sure who sent us this scan, let alone who drew it. [TM & © Zorro Productions, Inc.]

[correspondence, comments, & corrections]

Pete’s artwork is to George Tuska’s what Leroy lettering is to Artie Simek (or Abe Kanegson!). It comes down to a “dead line” as opposed to the thick-and-thins you get from a crow quill pen or a nice brush. I wonder if you have any information about this. Did Pete ink his pencils with a Flair pen to save time? Or use a single-width Rapidograph pen, perhaps? I’d love to see one of Pete’s drawings inked with a lively line by a really great inker. Maybe you would like to take a crack at it. David Burd Michael T. Gilbert, co-proprietor of “Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!,” replies: “Having read Pete’s letters, it becomes clear that he was consciously copying photos… a pretty common thing among cartoonists trying to meet deadlines. We should have more of Pete’s thoughts on that in our PAM cover story next issue [#159]. I think I mentioned in one of my articles that Pete used the same reference photos for two different characters in two different stories. And, if memory serves, Pete was miffed when Charlton printed both

stories in the same Western comic! D’oh! “Pete began tracing more and more in his later years, though he was always conflicted about whether it was the right approach. It may have been a time-saving thing on his part, but I also think there was a ‘lack of confidence’ element as well. PAM was always second-guessing himself, and (like his friend Al Williamson) grew far too reliant on photo reference as the years went on. I prefer his earlier, more organic work (even when he was swiping Kirby and others). “I don’t really know what materials he used, but probably not Flair or Rapidograph. I myself draw with a brush and fine-line Fountain Pentel magic marker, so the resulting art doesn’t have to be cold or stiff. “But I’ll have to take your comments into consideration whenever I look at PAM’s work from now on!” Roy here again: Pete Morisi never felt he had to apologize for deciding consciously, at a crucial point in his career, to begin imitating the art style of popular Crime Does Not Pay artist George Tuska—mainly because an editor suggested he do so. In fact, as has been noted, he even asked George if it was okay with him, and George seems to have raised no real objection. Most likely, George couldn’t figure out quite how to reply! However, Morisi created his own stories and compositions, even with utilizing Tuska figures. Now, a Star Wars comicbook query from Doug Abramson: Hi Roy, I have a question about the Star Wars interview. On page 85, did you mean to print Jabba the Hut’s appearance from issue #1 to illustrate things from the screenplay that wound up in the comic but not the movie? Because I’m almost positive that the confrontation between Luke and Owen is in the movie with almost verbatim dialogue. P.S.: I am rather fond of Jaxxon. Doug Abramson Funny you should say that, Doug… so am I. And so, I was glad to learn at that TerrifiCon, is Howard Chaykin—not to mention a few other people. Sadly, George Lucas is/was not one of them… but what does he know? I believe someone besides yourself (though I managed to misplace his e-mail) also wrote that one of the two Star Wars #1 pages I listed as not being in the movie actually did make the final cut—so I’ll assume it was the one on p. 85, which was p. 23 of the comic. See the art spot on the next page for what I now believe are other comics-included scenes that were, if ever filmed, left on the cutting-room floor. Audrey Parente & Rich Harvey’s “Zorro” history attracted its share of attention, too, as per comments above and Dan Hagen’s below. Dear Roy, Alter Ego #158 was stuffed with goodies, particularly (for me) the Jim Warren, Pete Morisi, and Zorro pieces. I always appreciated Morisi’s Thunderbolt (like your own Iron Fist) as one of the characters who were the “brain-grandchildren” of Bill Everett and his highly original “Amazing-Man.” Both were worthy successors.

Tough Is As Tough Does! This page from Peter Cannon… Thunderbolt #1 (Jan. 1966) demonstrates writer/ illustrator Pete Morisi’s conscious artistic borrowing from his fellow artist George Tuska. Five’ll get you ten that that tough-guy at top right plugged either a cop or a stoolie in Charlie Biro’s Crime Does Not Pay a decade or so earlier! But George never seemed to mind—hey, he’d already got paid for doing it! Thanks to Doug Martin. [Peter Cannon TM & © the Pete Morisi Estate.]

I ran across a funny anecdote about Zorro, whose influence on super-hero comics can hardly be overstated. Mary Pickford recommended the first “Zorro” story to her husband, Douglas Fairbanks, and thereby changed the course of American popular culture. She even named her terrier “Zorro,” and that dog also left his mark on the world. When Zorro ran across wet cement at their home, she started to scold him but stopped, seized by an idea.

re:

Putting Out The Light On Darklighter Besides the events covered on p. 7 of Marvel’s Star Wars #1 (July 1977), which was reproduced on p. 95 of A/E #157, there were a number of other panels in the issue that depicted sequences either never filmed or else cut out of the final movie. Seen here are the final three panels from Star Wars #1, p. 2, and all of p. 14, a scene featuring Luke Skywalker and Biggs Darklighter that was intended to be echoed before and during the climactic battle against the Deathstar. Without the earlier scene, Biggs’ death carried little impact in the film. Thanks to Philip, a.k.a. “Bluelark,” for pointing out these particulars. As Mike Nielson added online: “Anything in [issue] #1 featuring Biggs probably isn’t in the movie.” Images from MinuteMen-DarthScanner website. Script by Roy Thomas; art by Howard Chaykin. [TM & © Lucasfilm/Disney.]

Realizing those footprints would be there forever, she called Sid Grauman and proposed that she and Douglas leave their prints at his Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, and thus began a tradition. Dan Hagen Lessee, Dan… “Mary Pickford”… “Mary Pickford.” Seems like I’ve heard that name before. Did she ever do anything else noteworthy besides promote Zorro, come up with the handprints-in-cement idea, and marry swashbuckling screen actor Douglas Fairbanks? On an even lighter note, this from Pierre Comtois: Roy, Alter Ego #158 was another interesting issue chock-filled with diverse content, but what I really wanted to bring up was an element that is rarely if ever mentioned by the mag’s correspondents, namely your punning titles to the captions accompanying many of the illos you use. I’m constantly amazed that you can continue to think up different jokey headings or puns to head up those captions. What got me to finally tip my hat to you on this mostly thankless effort on your part was the one you wrote for the caption on page 28 this issue. Now, usually these little witticisms I find merely entertaining. Now and then they bring a smile to my face. But not very often (if ever, so far as I can recollect) do they make me laugh aloud. But doggone it, you finally did it with this one: “A reptile dysfunction!,” used to describe Action Comics #576 with its weird-looking dinosaur. I can see how such a sense of humor could carry you through all those Not Brand Echh stories you used to write. Keep it up! (No pun intended.) Pierre Comtois A few years back, Pierre, I began adding headings to A/E’s captions to attract a bit more attention to them. Some I made puns, while others are either some other kind of allegedly humorous comment or even a dead-serious reference. Perhaps thinking them up takes more time than it’s worth, because, as you say, they’re rarely noticed, or at least rarely commented on… nor should they be, necessarily. Still, once I started doing it (probably under the influence of Forry Ackerman’s work in Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine), I couldn’t quit. My two personal faves

are the one you mention (which I don’t recall seeing anywhere else, though of course many of my puns hardly claim to be original) and, as it happens, a blurb on the cover of issue #28, which featured an interview with Golden Age artist Lee Ames. The cover blurb read: “LEE AMES To Please.” Interviewer Jim Amash called me up to mentioned he’d laughed at that one—which made my day. One more correction, briefly noted: Geoff Willmetts, editor of the website SFCrowsnest.info, informs us that “the first unidentified cover of Northwest Smith from Ace Books [on p. 93] was done by Jim Burns.” Thanks, Geoff! Got other kudos or cumquats? Send them to: Roy Thomas e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com 32 Bluebird Trail St. Matthews, SC 29135 Meanwhile, hope you’re a member of the e-mail discussion group Alter-Ego-Fans on the Yahoo Groups. Subscribers can exchange views, learn about future issues of A/E—and occasionally be bombarded by requests from Ye Editor for help finding rare (or even not-so-rare) items for inclusion in this magazine. Just visit http:/groups.yahoo.com/group/ alter-ego-fans. Moderator Chet Cox advises us that Yahoo Groups has deleted its “Add Member” tool, so if it won’t let you in, please contact him at mormonyoyoman@gmail.com and he’ll usher you right in. And, over on Facebook, my friend and manager John Cimino runs what he’s christened The Roy Thomas Appreciation Boards, which discuss anything and everything dealing with Ye Ed, including this mag, upcoming con appearances, comics and super-hero movies, etc. The site is fully interactive— whatever that’s supposed to mean!

Edited by ROY THOMAS The first and greatest “hero-zine”—ALL-NEW, focusing on GOLDEN AND SILVER AGE comics and creators with ARTICLES, INTERVIEWS, UNSEEN ART, P.C. Hamerlinck’s FCA [Fawcett Collectors of America], MICHAEL T. GILBERT in Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, BILL SCHELLY’S Comic Fandom Archive, and more!

EISNER AWARD Winner Best Comics-Related Periodical Go to www.twomorrows.com for an ULTIMATE BUNDLE, with all the issues at HALF-PRICE!

ALTER EGO #158

ALTER EGO #159

DIEDGITIIOTANSL BLE

AVAILA

ALTER EGO #155

ALTER EGO #156

ALTER EGO #157

Golden Age artist/writer/editor NORMAN MAURER remembered by his wife JOAN, recalling BIRO’s Crime Does Not Pay, Boy Comics, Daredevil, St. John’s 3-D & THREE STOOGES comics with KUBERT, his THREE STOOGES movies (MOE was his father-inlaw!), and work for Marvel, DC, and others! Plus LARRY IVIE’s 1959 plans for a JUSTICE SOCIETY revival, JOHN BROOME, FCA, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY and more!

All Time Classic Con continued from #148! Panels on Golden Age (CUIDERA, HASEN, SCHWARTZ [LEW & ALVIN], BOLTINOFF, LAMPERT, GILL, FLESSEL) & Silver Age Marvel, DC, & Gold Key (SEVERIN, SINNOTT, AYERS, DRAKE, ANDERSON, FRADON, SIMONSON, GREEN, BOLLE, THOMAS), plus JOHN BROOME, FCA, MR. MONSTER, & BILL SCHELLY! Unused RON WILSON/CHRIS IVY cover!

Interview with JOYE MURCHISON, assistant to Wonder Woman co-creator DR. WILLIAM MARSTON, and WW’s female scriptwriter from 1945-1948! Rare art by H.G. PETER, 1960s DC love comics writer BARBARA FRIEDLANDER, art & anecdotes by ROMITA, COLAN, JAY SCOTT PIKE, INFANTINO, WEISINGER, JULIUS SCHWARTZ, and others! Extra: FCA, JOHN BROOME, MR. MONSTER, & more!

(100-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $5.99

ALTER EGO #160

ALTER EGO #161

ALTER EGO #162

FCA SPECIAL! Golden Age writer WILLIAM WOOLFOLK interview, and his scripting records! Art by BECK, SCHAFFENBERGER, BORING, BOB KANE, CRANDALL, KRIGSTEIN, ANDRU, JACK COLE, FINE, PETER, HEATH, PLASTINO, MOLDOFF, GRANDENETTI, and more! Plus JOHN BROOME, MR. MONSTER, BILL SCHELLY, and the 2017 STAR WARS PANEL with CHAYKIN, LIPPINCOTT, and THOMAS!

Peter Cannon–Thunderbolt writer/artist PETE MORISI talks about the creative process! Plus, read his correspondence with comics greats JACK KIRBY, JOE SIMON, AL WILLIAMSON, CHARLES BIRO, JOE GILL, GEORGE TUSKA, ROCKY MASTROSERIO, PAT MASULLI, SAL GENTILE, DICK GIORDANO, and others! Also: JOHN BROOME’s bio, FCA, MR. MONSTER, and BILL SCHELLY!

REMEMBERING STEVE DITKO! Sturdy Steve at Marvel, DC, Warren, Charlton, and elsewhere! A rare late-1960s Ditko interview by RICHARD HOWELL— biographical notes by NICK CAPUTO— tributes by MICHAEL T. GILBERT, PAUL LEVITZ, BERNIE BUBNIS, BARRY PEARL, ROY THOMAS, et al. Plus FCA, JOHN BROOME, BILL SCHELLY, and more! Spider-Man cover by DITKO!

Full-issue STAN LEE TRIBUTE! ROY THOMAS writes on his more than 50-year relationship with Stan—and shares 21stcentury e-mails from Stan (with his permission, of course)! Art by KIRBY, DITKO, MANEELY, EVERETT, SEVERIN, ROMITA, plus tributes from pros and fans alike, and special sections on Stan by MICHAEL T. GILBERT, BILL SCHELLY, and even the FCA! Vintage cover by KIRBY and COLLETTA!

WILL MURRAY presents an amazing array of possible prototypes of Batman (by artist FRANK FOSTER—in 1932!)—Wonder Woman (by Star-Spangled Kid artist HAL SHERMAN)—Tarantula (by Air Wave artist LEE HARRIS), and others! Plus a rare Hal Sherman interview—MICHAEL T. GILBERT with more on artist PETE MORISI—FCA— BILL SCHELLY—JOHN BROOME—and more! Cover homage by SHANE FOLEY!

(100-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $5.99

(100-page magazine) SOLD OUT! (Digital Edition) $5.99

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99

TwoMorrows. The Future of Comics History.

ALTER EGO #163

ALTER EGO #164

ALTER EGO #165

ALTER EGO #166

The early days of DAVE COCKRUM— Legion of Super-Heroes artist and co-developer of the revived mid-1970s X-Men—as revealed in art-filled letters to PAUL ALLEN and rare, previously unseen illustrations provided by wife PATY COCKRUM (including 1960s-70s drawings of Edgar Rice Burroughs heroes)! Plus FCA—MICHAEL T. GILBERT on PETE MORISI—JOHN BROOME—BILL SCHELLY, and more!

Spotlight on MIKE FRIEDRICH, DC/Marvel writer who jumpstarted the independent comics movement with Star*Reach! Art by NEAL ADAMS, GIL KANE, DICK DILLIN, IRV NOVICK, JOHN BUSCEMA, JIM STARLIN, HOWARD CHAYKIN, FRANK BRUNNER, et al.! Plus: MARK CARLSONGHOST on Rural Home Comics, FCA, and Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! Justice League of America cover by NEAL ADAMS!

WILL MURRAY showcases original Marvel publisher (from 1939-1971) MARTIN GOODMAN, with artifacts by LEE, KIRBY, DITKO, ROMITA, MANEELY, BUSCEMA, EVERETT, BURGOS, GUSTAVSON, SCHOMBURG, COLAN, ADAMS, STERANKO, and many others! Plus FCA, Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt with more on PETE MORISI, JOHN BROOME, and a cover by DREW FRIEDMAN!

FAWCETT COLLECTORS OF AMERICA (FCA) Special, with spotlights on KURT SCHAFFENBERGER (Captain Marvel, Ibis the Invincible, Marvel Family, Lois Lane), and ALEX ROSS on his awesome painting of the super-heroes influenced by the original Captain Marvel! Plus MICHAEL T. GILBERT’s “Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt” on Superman editor MORT WEISINGER, JOHN BROOME, and more! Cover by SCHAFFENBERGER!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99

TwoMorrows Publishing 10407 Bedfordtown Drive Raleigh, NC 27614 USA 919-449-0344 E-mail:

store@twomorrows.com

Order at twomorrows.com

“There Was Always A Party In The Comics Department On Payday!” The Thrilling True Story of HARVEY JANES & Fawcett Publications Interview Conducted by Shaun Clancy Edited by P.C. Hamerlinck

Harvey B. Janes in the backyard of his Salt Point, NY, residence in March 2012, with one of his rescued racetrack dogs. Photo courtesy of Shaun Clancy. (Above left:) Harvey Janes wrote the cover story “Science Creates a Monster”—a behind-the-scenes article on the Universal horror film Creature from the Black Lagoon—for the May 1954 issue of Fawcett’s Mechanix Illustrated. Janes later became the magazine’s Science & Auto Editor. (Above right:) The masthead of Fawcett’s Jackie Robinson #6 (1952) listed Janes as editor. The 32-page story centered around the baseball star’s most famous plays and was scripted by Charles Dexter, with art by Clem Weisbecker. Fawcett Publications led the way, among mainstream comics companies, in comics featuring African-Americans… in this case, the first “Negro” player in Major League Baseball. [TM & © the respective copyright holders.]

“There Was Always A Party In The Comics Department On Payday!”

FCA

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION: You may be asking yourself, “Who’s Harvey Janes?” In 2010, Golden Age comics fan-collector-historian Shaun Clancy had managed to locate Chris Lieberson, son of 1950s Fawcett managing editor Will Lieberson. Chris was still living in the same New York City apartment Will had lived in back in the day. During one of their conversations, the name “Harvey Janes” popped up. Harvey was just 19 years old when he began working in the comics department at Fawcett, and became a close friend of Will and his family. Shaun was able to track down Harvey, and a series of phone calls, beginning in January of 2012, revealed a vivid memory filled with fascinating stories from the former Fawcett employee. In March of 2012, during a road trip from Seattle to Boston, Shaun stopped by to visit Harvey at his house in Salt Point, NY. Reminiscing with Shaun of days gone by was at the forefront of Harvey’s mind, as he had just survived a bout with cancer and was quietly taking care of two rescued greyhound race track dogs. Sadly, Harvey B. Janes passed away on June 17th, 2014. —P.C. Hamerlinck SHAUN CLANCY: Let’s begin with some background information. When and where were you born? HARVEY JANES: I was born December 12, 1930, in the Bronx at a place called Webb’s Sanatorium. One of my father’s older brothers was a doctor there, as well as the co-owner of it. SC: Any siblings? JANES: No.

JANES: Yes, I was an editor for the newspaper at DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx, along with Edward S. Feldman, who became a famous movie producer [Witness], and Bruce Jay Friedman, who became a famous novelist and screenwriter [Stir Crazy]. When I later got a job at Magazine Management editing a car magazine, there sat Bruce [laughs] editing one of their men’s magazines! What a small world. SC: Did you go to college? JANES: I attended the New School of Development and Research in New York City. SC: Was Fawcett Publications your first full-time employment out of school? JANES: No, my first full-time job was with a clipping bureau. One of the duties I had there was carrying large sacks of envelopes full of mailings from the post office a few blocks away. One day, I’m carrying these huge bags down the sidewalk when I was accosted by some guys. One of them pushed me and I fell over. At the time I happened to be a welter-weight boxer about to turn pro, and so I got up and beat the s*** out of him. I thought that the other guys would jump me, but they didn’t. I called up the next day and quit the job. I didn’t like the people there anyway and, for all I knew, those guys would’ve tried to gang up on me again. After that, I went looking for another job, and that’s how I wound up at Fawcett! [both laugh]

SC: Your father, J. George Janes, was a pulp artist. Did he want you to become an artist?

SC: How did you get the job at Fawcett? JANES: I got it through an employment agency. I was hired to be a clerk in the comics production department under Annette Packer.

JANES: My dad thought I was going to be an artist. My mom even kept some drawings I had done when I was 4 or 5 years old. My dad would’ve loved to have helped me, and I did study art, but I became more interested in writing. Because of my dad’s contacts, I was already selling articles to publishers when I was 16 and 17 years old, so I went in that direction instead of art.

SC: Was she the one who actually hired you at Fawcett? What year was this? JANES: Annette hired me in late 1949. After a week there I got my first paycheck and Annette called me and said, “You got a raise!” The reason I got a raise was because the minimum wage law had just changed. [both laugh]

SC: Were you on the high school newspaper?

Pulps & Pinups (Left to right:) Harvey B. Janes’ father, pulp artist J. George Janes, in 1927. For further information on the elder Janes’ career, compiled by David Saunders, visit https://www.pulpartists.com/Janes.html. J. George Janes’ cover for Secret Agent X (April 1934), published by A.A. Wyn’s Ace Magazines. Scan courtesy of Heritage Auctions. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.] In this March 2012 photo, Harvey proudly displays one of his father’s pinup paintings.

Fawcett Collectors Of America

SC: It seemed like there was such a fun atmosphere at Fawcett. We’ve previously published photos of some of the get-togethers and parties, including editor Ginny Provisiero’s Fawcett 10-year anniversary party… JANES: Ginny and Edna Hagen were always man-crazy! Did Ginny ever marry? SC: No, she didn’t. In a big group photo from Will Lieberson’s 10-year anniversary party, those two ladies are the only ones sitting on men’s laps! JANES: They were always looking for men! [both laugh] SC: Do you remember the lawsuit between National (DC) and Fawcett? JANES: Oh boy, do I remember that! We were locked away for days trying to come up with stuff to prove that Captain Marvel did things before Superman did them. We spent many hours looking through comics and materials. SC: Did Fawcett supply you with Superman and other comics so that you could compare them with the “Captain Marvel” stories? JANES: Oh, yes. We were given piles of comicbooks to find things that preceded “Superman.” SC: Were you successful in finding anything? JANES: Sure, we found a lot of examples. We found some things that came before a lot of the stuff that Superman was supposed to have originated. We thought we had a strong case and that it wasn’t plagiarism on Fawcett’s part. SC: Who else besides you were assigned to research material for the case? JANES: Edna, Ginny, Dagny [Weste], Wendell Crowley, Al Jetter, Otto Binder, and others. Will Lieberson asked us to do it. SC: Dagny later married Wendell. JANES: I remember the day in 1970 when Will told me Wendell had died. Dagny was Will’s secretary, so that’s how she and Wendell met each other. One time in the comics department we did a circus sideshow skit. Will was the ringleader. Wendell, at 6’8”, was, of course, the giant. Kay Woods was the fat lady; Edna Hagen was the skinny lady; the midget was Bruce Nichols. The strong-man was Roy Ald. Roy Ald used to do handstands during meetings. [both laugh] SC: Did you know that Wendell collected all of Fawcett’s comics while he was working there?

Annette Packer A pic of Fawcett’s comics production supervisor at Will Lieberson’s Fawcett 10-year anniversary party, held on July 11, 1952.

JANES: No, I didn’t, but I once had a collection of comics. I had a wooden chest that my father made for me when I was about 8 years old and, because of my father’s connections in the publishing world, he’d bring home all kinds of comicbooks, including early Superman issues. The chest was full of them! Shortly after I got married, my parents moved from the Bronx to Long Island and they wanted to use that chest, so they threw away all the comicbooks inside of it! [both laugh]

Super-Hero Circus To strengthen their case in the National (DC) vs. Fawcett lawsuit over whether or not Captain Marvel was infringing on Superman’s trademark and copyrights, Janes was among several people at Fawcett assigned to gather material for the defense. When it came to circus covers, at least, C.C. Beck’s for Whiz Comics #6 (July 1940) preceded Paul Cassidy’s for Action Comics #27 (Aug. 1940). [Action cover TM & © DC Comics; Shazam hero TM & © DC Comics.]

“There Was Always A Party In The Comics Department On Payday!”

SC: Did you know artist Bill Brady? JANES: Sure, I knew Bill. He was a little leprechaun. [both laugh] Will and I used to go to the fights all the time. Will loved boxing. Bill was very close to Will and his family and would occasionally come along with us. Once I was at the Liebersons’ house having dinner with them before Will and I went to one of the fights. Will’s son—Dennis—was about 7 or 8 at the time, and Will was trying to convince his son that I was Soupy Sales. [both laugh] The kid didn’t buy it, but he didn’t argue with his dad, either. I was over at Will’s three or four times a week to go somewhere together, and Bill would often come along with us. He was a lovely, sweet man with a wry Irish sense of humor. SC: Will had written a Broadway play called Springtime Follies that lasted only one night. JANES: I believe Will wrote the play with his brother. It starred movie actor Joseph Buloff. SC: Did you go see the play? JANES: No, I didn’t. I told Will I’d see it next week, but there was no next week! [both laugh] SC: After leaving Fawcett, Will developed TV Junior magazine. Were you involved in that? JANES: Yes, I was. I wrote some articles for it as a freelancer. SC: It sounds like you stayed in touch with Will after you were both gone from Fawcett. JANES: The day I started at Fawcett and first met Will, he was 36 and I was 19. We became good friends and we had the same interests in boxing as well as music. He was crazy about the theatre and he got me involved in it. During the ’70s he was the director of the Quaigh Theater, which was an off-Broadway theatre, and we worked together there. I was a stage manager and assistant director and we did all kinds of things. In addition to that, we went to off-Broadway plays all the time together. When I found out that Will had died in 1995, I wondered if he had died on the tennis

Wendell Crowley & Will Lieberson Two Fawcett editors extraordinaire (Wendell’s the tall one on our left) pose with Captain Marvel in the comics department in 1947. Fawcett must’ve loved that drawing of old Shazam’s star pupil about to throw a toy airplane that’s emblazoned on their T-shirts; they also used it on the wristwatch they sold through the mail around that time.

court. It stated in his obituary that Will had a heart condition, but that wouldn’t have stopped him from being out on the courts with his racket. If they told him he had a bad heart, he’d still go play tennis. SC: While you were at Fawcett, did you do any writing there? JANES: I did some writing for a couple of their magazines like True and Mechanix Illustrated. SC: Did you do any writing while you were in the comics department? JANES: Only editing. One of my duties with Will was editing the two-page text stories that appeared in the comics so that they’d qualify for Third Class postage.

Actually, Lieberson Should Have Called It Winter Follies! Actor Joseph Buloff (seen here in the 1957 MGM musical Silk Stockings) starred in Will Lieberson’s very short-lived Broadway play, Springtime Follies, which ran for a single night on February 26, 1951.

SC: What else did you do in the comics department? JANES: Besides editing stories, I checked the manuscripts for grammatical errors. I’d also distribute the art pages that needed lettering. The artist would bring in the artwork with empty word balloons, so I was in charge of sending it out to either Charlotte Jetter or Martin Demuth to letter, then proof the final pages. SC: Did you meet any celebrities that may have stopped by the comics department, like Gabby Hayes? JANES: Rhoda Geller was our main receptionist, and the alternate receptionist was Pat Cushman (who happened to be Buzz Fawcett’s mistress). One time, neither of them was available for the reception area, so I was asked to take over the desk for

Fawcett Collectors Of America

It’s A Bird… It’s A Plane… It’s Soupy-Man! One of Lieberson’s post-comics projects was the development a TV Guide-like publication for children called TV Junior, for which Harvey Janes wrote articles on a freelance basis. Shown above is TVJ, Vol.2, #7 (Nov. 1959). [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

a few minutes. I was sitting there and in walks Gabby Hayes. He looked like an old rag in the movies, but when I met him he was tan, standing up straight, and wearing a $4,000 suit, a big watch, and a big cowboy hat. In a normal-sounding voice he says, “George Hayes for Ralph Daigh.” [both laugh] I also met Tex Ritter. He was there to see Will. He was very pleasant. Rod Cameron visited the offices and I had a long talk with him. He was a huge guy and a big serial/Western movie hero. Smiley Burnette once stopped by the comics department, but I didn’t talk to him. On one of the floors below the Fawcett offices was a Screen Actors Guild office, so Fawcett had a constant flow of famous people stopping in to see them—some because of the comics, some because of the movie magazines.

SC: Do you remember any of the comicbooks you worked on? JANES: Nyoka the Jungle Girl was one of them. SC: Do you remember editor Barbara Heyman? JANES: Yes! I was in love with Barbara Heyman. Besides myself, she was the youngest one on staff in the comics department. She was probably in her early 20s. I had a crush on her. SC: As Executive Editor of the comics, was Will the only editor at Fawcett that had a secretary? Edna Hagen, Kay Woods, Ginny Provisiero, and Dagny Weste had all been his secretary at one time. JANES: Annette Packer had a secretary, a pretty girl named Kitty Carrie, but as far as I knew, Will was the only other editor in the department with a secretary. I remember Will had hired a secretary who had misfiled everything, including freelance writers’ and artists’ paychecks that had been sent over from the Greenwich, Connecticut, office. It took us a week to find them, so no one got paid for awhile. After she was fired, Will was looking for a new secretary and someone decided to pull a prank. They got a model/ actress to go into Will’s office for an interview. She’d cross her legs, open her blouse, and come on to him. Will, being a practical joker himself, immediately smelled a rat, and so he attacked the girl and she ran out of the office! [both laugh] [continued on p. 77]

Play Ball! The splash pages of 1950’s Thrilling True Story of the Baseball Giants and Baseball Heroes, both scripted by Charles Dexter and edited by Harvey Janes. Artists unidentified. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

“There Was Always A Party In The Comics Department On Payday!”

Go West, Young Man! Harvey Janes recalls these cowpoke actors with licensed Fawcett comicbook titles riding into the comics department at varying occasions: George “Gabby” Hayes (#5, April ’49); Smiley Burnette (#1, March ’50); Rod Cameron (#2, April ’50); Tex Ritter (#2, Dec. ’50). The photo below shows Harvey, during his stint as comics production assistant and editor, at Will Lieberson’s 10th-year anniversary party in 1952. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

Fawcett Collectors Of America

Take Me Out To The [Four-Color] Ball Game… While he didn’t mention them in his conversations with Shaun Clancy, Harvey Janes received a byline as the editor of several of Fawcett’s baseball-related comicbooks: Jackie Robinson #6, Baseball Heroes, Thrilling True Story of the Baseball Giants, and Thrilling True Story of the Baseball Yankees, all cover-dated 1952. All these issues were scripted by Charles Dexter. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

“There Was Always A Party In The Comics Department On Payday!”

drinker. I’d pick up comic pages from Martin, who was staying at the Iroquois Hotel next door to Fawcett. I was there one morning when Martin gets a call from Mickey Spillane from Grand Central Station and he asks to see him. Martin asked why and Mickey said he’d tell him when he got there. We go over there and Mickey says, “I need money! I’m embarrassed to tell you that I got my pocket picked on the train!” And I said, “Now, let me get this straight: Mike Hammer got his pocket picked?” [both laugh] Martin and I gave him money. Mickey calls me up the next week and he took me to lunch and gave me the money back. That’s a story I’m sure he would not have wanted told! [both laugh] SC: Earlier, you recalled the circus sideshow skit that the comics department did, and you mentioned the name Bruce Nichols. Can you share anything more about him? JANES: In the late 1960s my wife and I had lived in Manhattan, near Madison Square Park, where I’d walk our dog. One day I was leaving the park and a short homeless man approached me and asked, “Mister, can you …” Once he got a good look at my face he ran away. It was Bruce. I recognized him, he recognized me and, obviously ashamed, ran away from me. I called up Will and told him about the incident and he said, “Oh yeah, he’s been a bum for several years and he calls me occasionally. I made the mistake of giving him money once, and now he keeps calling. I told him it had to stop. I never found out how he ended up like this.” It’s a sad story. All I know is, when the comics department broke up, Bruce got a job at Disney in their art department. Bruce was quite small, and he and Wendell Crowley used to go out to lunch together. Wendell was twice his height. One of the places we’d all go to lunch to was a Chinese restaurant called The Great Wall. Al Jetter was so good with the chopsticks that he could pick up three peas in a row. Wendell loved their egg foo young. He’d always tell the waiter to serve it with “Lots of gravy!” [laughs]

It’s A Jungle Out There, Girl! The photo-cover of Nyoka the Jungle Girl #66 (April 1952). While he couldn’t recount many specific comicbook titles on which he worked at Fawcett, Harvey Janes did remember Nyoka. [TM & © AC Comics/Bill Black.]

[continued from p. 74] Before Fawcett, Will worked at Funnies, Inc. Several of the people from Fawcett originally were at Funnies, Inc., including Ray Gill. He and I shared an office together for a while. He was a heavy drinker. Mickey Spillane had also worked at Funnies, Inc. Mickey used to come up to Fawcett often to see Ray on Fridays (payday) and we’d all go out for drinks over at the Algonquin Hotel’s lounge, so Mickey and I became good friends. SC: Any stories about Mickey? JANES: There were always people who were beating the system at Fawcett so they could make extra money on the side. Al Jetter’s wife Charlotte was supposedly a comicbook letterer, but actually it was Al doing all the lettering jobs, and Al even admitted to me and Will that he was the one doing the work to make a supplementary income. Charlotte would bring in the lettered comic pages to me, and then I would give her more pages to do, and she’d bring them back in the next day because Al was awake half the night working on them! Anyway, we had another person also doing the lettering for the comics, a charming fellow named Martin Demuth, whom I mentioned previously. We became friends. He was another heavy

You know, I had met my wife at Fawcett. We’re divorced now. Her name was Barbara Brotman. She was editor Jim Scardon’s secretary for Fawcett’s Woman’s Day magazine. Anyway, one of my jobs was writing articles for an in-house publication called The Fawcett Flame, and Scardon was its editor. I used to go around to all the different departments and try to get interesting material for The Fawcett Flame, and every time I’d check in with Scardon, I’d get to see Barbara, and eventually we became husband and wife. SC: Did you know Bob Powell? JANES: Sure, I knew Bob. He drove a Porsche. I’d occasionally see him down at the race tracks. SC: How about Rod Reed? JANES: Rod Reed had been the head of the comics department before Will replaced him. Rod had a deal with Will that he would write most of the two-page short stories that were in the comics. At one point, with an increase of comic titles, I was put in charge of all the two-page stories as the editor, so I decided to have my friend Dan Greenberg write a few of them, but I didn’t tell Rod. Rod would’ve written all of them, had I let him! I never met Rod in person, but did speak with him on the phone. Bill Parker was the editor of Mechanix Illustrated and, years before Rod Reed’s tenure, he was Fawcett’s first comics editor. One day I went to lunch with True editor Ken Purdy and he told me that Bill Parker had cancer. (Bill died years later, in 1963.) Ken said during our lunch that if he found out he had cancer he would blow his brains out. Well, that’s exactly what he did, in 1972. I was the associate editor of Sports Cars and Hot Rods magazine for Fawcett, and Sheldon Wax was its editor. Sheldon knew Hugh

Fawcett Collectors Of America

Martin’s brother, Arthur, came into my office and congratulated me and I said, “I didn’t know Martin had a brother!,” to which he replied “There’s four of us, just like the Fawcetts, except we all have the same mother!” [both laugh] That’s when I thought to myself that this wasn’t a friendly competition. I thought later that Martin must have enjoyed hiring someone away from Fawcett, and it might have helped me get the job, even though I was qualified for it. I was there less than a year because, in the interim, shortly after I started working there, Martin had a battle with his distributor and walked away from them. Martin had to go crawling to the other big distributor, who already had two car magazines. They agreed to take his publications, but he had to get rid of the car magazine.

Some (Clockwise) Faces In The Fawcett Crowd

SC: This would have been about 1957?

Harvey Janes became friends with hardboiled crime novelist—and occasional actor—Mickey Spillane (seen above in the 1954 murdermystery film Ring of Fear). His creation, two-fisted private eye Mike Hammer, would become one of the rages of that decade.

JANES: Yes. Fortunately, I had made many connections in the business and landed a job as the New York editor for Road & Track magazine. I did road tests and then wrote about the cars for the magazine and for a newspaper column. It later led to a P.R. manager job with Saab, which eventually got me an advertising job at the J. Walter Thompson Company on the Ford account.

Husband & wife comicbook “lettering team” Charlotte and Al Jetter, at Will Lieberson’s Fawcett 10-year anniversary party on July 11, 1952. But Janes explains why we put “lettering team” in quotation marks. Bruce Nichols, comics production assistant, from a photo taken at the same 1952 party.

Hefner and told him all about me, and I could’ve had a job as auto editor for Playboy if I wanted it. I wasn’t really interested, but told Sheldon I’d get back to him. It turned out two weeks later Sheldon and his wife died in a plane crash outside of Chicago. I never heard from Hefner, and I never bothered to contact him. But another opportunity was waiting for me.

SC: Did you get to know any of the Fawcett brothers? JANES: I knew Roger Fawcett the best out of all four brothers. His secretary was a gorgeous blonde named Nicky Hamilton. While at Fawcett, I became friends with an Englishman named Charles Binger, a portrait painter who talked Roger

A photo agent had stopped by Fawcett one day while I was working on the next issue of Sports Cars and Hot Rods. He asked me, “Do you want to edit a car magazine?” and I replied, “By myself?” and he answered, “Yeah. Martin Goodman over at Magazine Management is looking for an editor.” I went over there and was hired as the editor of Auto Age magazine. Diana Bartley from Fawcett came with me over to Magazine Management. Diana was a beautiful woman. She was disabled and had several different colored crutches to go with her outfits. She became a freelance writer, writing for auto magazines under the name D.M. Bartley, as she thought that the predominantly male readership wasn’t ready to accept a woman writing about cars. SC: Martin Goodman was also publishing Atlas Comics at that time and had three brothers. JANES: Yes, I know. With the first issue of Auto Age I did, I doubled their sales.

Calling All Cars! (Left:) Father-and-son collaboration: The Young Sportsman’s Guide to Sports Car Racing, published by Thomas-Nelson in 1962, written by Harvey B. Janes and illustrated by his dad, J. George Janes. (Right:) Auto Age magazine (Jan. 1956), edited by Janes and published by Martin Goodman’s Magazine Management. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

“There Was Always A Party In The Comics Department On Payday!”

into letting him do his portrait. Binger lived close to me, and I was over there one Saturday morning when in walked Roger Fawcett for one of his portrait sessions—so that’s how I got to know Roger better than his brothers. SC: Was Roger’s office on a different floor than the rest of the staff?

Roger K. “W.H.” Fawcett, Jr. The Fawcett Publications president in a 1951 photo. Harvey Janes knew Roger the best out of the four Fawcett brothers who ran their publishing empire. Roger passed away two years after the $50 million sale of Fawcett to CBS in 1977.

JANES: He was on a floor above us. Interestingly, the entrance into the Fawcett offices was on 67 West FortyFourth Street and, after I had left Fawcett, they removed that entrance and put it on Sixth Avenue, giving them a totally new address. SC: Did you have any interactions with Roscoe, Gordon, or Buzz Fawcett?

JANES: I didn’t know Roscoe or Gordon at all, because they were up in the Greenwich, CT, office; Roger and Buzz were in the New York office. Buzz knew who I was and we had said hello a few times. One time I took a ride up to the Armonk Airport and, while watching the planes coming in, I bumped into Buzz Fawcett. He said, “Hi! You didn’t see me here.” And I asked, “Why?” and he replied, “My wife doesn’t know I have the plane!” [both laugh] And here I’m thinking, “How much money must you have that your wife wouldn’t know you had an airplane?” I was a good boy and didn’t tell anybody. SC: Until now. Did you know Fawcett’s Editorial Director, Ralph Daigh, or Art Director Al Allard? JANES: Ralph Daigh and I got along very well. He was an interesting guy. I remember seeing him drive up to the office in an MG in all weather with the top down and wearing a huge fur coat and big fur hat. We were both car nuts, so that was our connection. Al Allard was very handsome with long hair. He and Ralph were both from the Captain Billy era in Minnesota where Fawcett Publications originated. I remember one day washing my hands in the bathroom at the office and Al comes out of a stall and goes to the sink next to me and says, “Harv, I’m getting old.” And I asked, “How can you tell?” and he replied, “It takes

Turning The Page Wait a minute! That’s not Nyoka the Jungle Girl! Harvey Janes never forgot meeting the legendary model Bettie Page.

me all night to do what it used to do all night!” [both laugh] I also remember Grayson Tewksbury, the head of Fawcett’s photo department. His studio took pictures for all the magazine covers and articles. The studio had a changing room with a doublesided mirror. [both laugh] In fact, one of the models I saw there was Bettie Page. She became a cult figure. Grayson introduced me to her once. She was a gorgeous woman. I can still remember her body. [both laugh] SC: Who were some other people you remember from Fawcett? HARVEY JANES: Rona Jaffe. We had adjoining cubicles. She worked in the Gold Medal Books department, and my side of the cubicle was where the comicbook section had ended. Rona later wrote a novel in 1958 called The Best of Everything, which was based on her experiences in the Fawcett workplace. It was made into a movie the following year. In the film, she suggests that she slept with everyone in the office but me [both laugh], which was true. When I saw the movie, I knew who all the characters were supposed to be in real life, including Rona herself. I got along very well with comics writer Jon Eric Messman. He was a funny guy, liked kidding around, and he and Will Lieberson were good friends. SC: I had heard Jon was a practical joker.

Rona Jaffe was a former Fawcett employee whose best-selling book, based on her experiences (and colleagues) at Fawcett, was turned into a popular 1959 film of the same name: The Best of Everything. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

Fawcett Collectors Of America

would hang around and we’d all socialize for a while. Back then, there was no air conditioning, so we’d have the windows propped open on warmer days. Al Liederman, the freelance comic artist who drew “Captain Kid,” got a little too close to the window once and somehow managed to dislodge the plate glass and it fell down towards the sidewalk. I quickly stuck my head out and yelled, “Look out below!” It happened around 5 p.m. and there were a lot of people down there. By some miracle, the glass didn’t hit anyone. SC: Did you work on any of Fawcett’s Gold Medal books? JANES: After the comics folded, Ralph Daigh was pushing me because he knew I was a good editor and he wanted to place me somewhere, so I was with the Gold Medal line for a short while before moving over to Mechanix Illustrated as Science and Auto editor. SC: Did your dad do any artwork for Fawcett while you were there?

“The Kid” Grows Up! A 1954 magazine illustration by Harvey Janes’ pulp-artist father, J. George Janes, feautring actor Jackie Cooper. [© the respective copyright holders.]

JANES: He and Will were veterans at practical jokes. Sometimes Will would get pretty cruel with his jokes. Anything would go with him. I sometimes played tricks on Annette Packer. SC: Was there anybody you didn’t get along with at Fawcett? JANES: There was a guy named Bob Risotti who later changed his last name to Rickwell. He was a big, blustery braggart. He knew that I had been a boxer and had kept in shape, and one day he asked me, “Harvey, I’m about 20 pounds overweight. What do you think I should do?” and I replied, “Cut off your head!” That was the last time he asked me anything. He was Annette Packer’s assistant in production. One time, he gave me an envelope to give to a woman upstairs and, on the way up, I opened it to see what was inside and the envelope was full of nude photos of the woman who I was delivering it to! Every year we’d have a big Christmas party in the office. There’d be many people there because employees could invite guests. So, I’m in this crowded room and Wendell Crowley was near me and some idiot who I’d never seen before looks up at Wendell and says, “How you doing, chicken-head?” I pulled the guy aside and told him that, if he said another crack like that, I’d throw him out. I never knew how Wendell felt about it, or maybe he was used to those type of wisecracks. There was always a party in the comics department on payday. All vouchers from the freelancers would come in on a Friday morning, and then they’d all come back in the afternoon for their checks. So it became like a party because the Shaun Clancy & Harvey B. Janes freelancers, many of whom (left to right) at the editor/writer’s home we didn’t see that often, in Salt Point, NY, in March 2012.

JANES: Yes, I got him some work with Mechanix Illustrated, and when I started writing for True magazine I got him some work there also. He began doing auto covers for magazines in the ’50s after I became editor of Auto Age. I even did two books with my dad—I wrote them and he illustrated them. One of them was The Young Sportsman’s Guide to Sports Car Racing. We liked working together.

ALTER EGO #168

ALTER EGO #169

COMIC BOOK CREATOR #24 COMIC BOOK CREATOR #25 COMIC BOOK CREATOR #26

Two RICHARD ARNDT interviews revealing the wartime life of Aquaman artist/ co-creator PAUL NORRIS (with a Golden/ Silver Age art gallery)—plus the story of WILLIE ITO, who endured the WWII Japanese-American relocation centers to become a Disney & Warner Bros. animator and comics artist. Plus FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT, JOHN BROOME, and more, behind a NORRIS cover!

Spotlight on Groovy GARY FRIEDRICH— co-creator of Marvel’s Ghost Rider! ROY THOMAS on their six-decade friendship, wife JEAN FRIEDRICH and nephew ROBERT HIGGERSOM on his later years, PETER NORMANTON on GF’s horror/ mystery comics, art by PLOOG, TRIMPE, ROMITA, THE SEVERINS, AYERS, et al.! FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT and Mr. Monster, and more! MIKE PLOOG cover!

TIMOTHY TRUMAN discusses his start at the Kubert School, Grimjack with writer JOHN OSTRANDER, and current collaborations with son Benjamin. SCOTT SHAW! talks about early San Diego Comic-Cons and friendship with JACK KIRBY, Captain Carrot, and Flintstones work! Also PATRICK McDONNELL’s favorite MUTTS comic book pastiches, letterer JANICE CHIANG profiled, HEMBECK, and more! TIM TRUMAN cover.

BARRY WINDSOR-SMITH discusses his new graphic novel MONSTERS, its origin as a 1980s Hulk story, and its evolution into his 300-page magnum opus (includes a gallery of outtakes). Plus part two of our SCOTT SHAW! interview about HannaBarbera licensing material and work with ROY THOMAS on Captain Carrot, KEN MEYER, JR. looks at the great fanzines of 40 years ago, HEMBECK, and more!

Career-spanning interview with TERRY DODSON, and Terry’s wife (and go-to inker) RACHEL DODSON! Plus 1970s/’80s portfolio producer SAL QUARTUCCIO talks about his achievements with Phase and Hot Stuf’, R. CRUMB and DENIS KITCHEN discuss the history of underground comix character Pro Junior, WILL EISNER’s Valentines to his wife, HEMBECK, and more!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships Feb. 2021

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships April 2021

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Now shipping!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships Spring 2021

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Summer 2021

WORLD OF TWOMORROWS

BACK ISSUE #124

BACK ISSUE #125

BACK ISSUE #126

BACK ISSUE #127

HORRIFIC HEROES! With Bronze Age histories of Man-Thing, the Demon, and the Creeper, Atlas/Seaboard’s horrifying heroes, and Ghost Rider (Danny Ketch) rides again! Featuring the work of CHRIS CLAREMONT, GERRY CONWAY, ERNIE COLON, MICHAEL GOLDEN, JACK KIRBY, MIKE PLOOG, JAVIER SALTARES, MARK TEXIERA, and more. Man-Thing cover by RUDY NEBRES.

CREATOR-OWNED COMICS! Featuring in-depth histories of MATT WAGNER’s Mage and Grendel. Plus other indie sensations of the Bronze Age, including COLLEEN DORAN’s A Distant Soil, STAN SAKAI’s Usagi Yojimbo, STEVE PURCELL’s Sam & Max, JAMES DEAN SMITH’s Boris the Bear, and LARRY WELZ’s Cherry Poptart! With a fabulous Grendel cover by MATT WAGNER.

“Legacy” issue! Wally West Flash, BRANDON ROUTH Superman interview, Harry Osborn/Green Goblin, Scott Lang/Ant-Man, Infinity Inc., Reign of the Supermen, JOHN ROMITA SR. and JR. “Rough Stuff,” plus CONWAY, FRACTION, JURGENS, MESSNER-LOEBS, MICHELINIE, ORDWAY, SLOTT, ROY THOMAS, MARK WAID, and more. WIERINGO/MARZAN JR. cover!

“Soldiers” issue! Sgt. Rock revivals, General Thunderbolt Ross, Beetle Bailey in comics, DC’s Blitzkrieg, War is Hell’s John Kowalski, Atlas’ savage soldiers, The ’Nam, Nth the Ultimate Ninja, and CONWAY and GARCIA-LOPEZ’s Cinder and Ashe. Featuring CLAREMONT, DAVID, DIXON, GOLDEN, HAMA, KUBERT, LOEB, DON LOMAX, DOUG MURRAY, TUCCI, and more. BRIAN BOLLAND cover!

(224-page FULL-COLOR TPB) $37.95 (Digital Edition) $15.99 • Now shipping!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Now shipping!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships Jan. 2021

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships March 2021

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships May 2021

KIRBY COLLECTOR #79

KIRBY COLLECTOR #81

BRICKJOURNAL #66

RETROFAN #13

RETROFAN #14

See “THE BIG PICTURE” of how Kirby fits into the grand scheme of things! His creations’ lasting legacy, how his work fights illiteracy, a RARE KIRBY INTERVIEW, inconsistencies in his 1960s MARVEL WORK, editorial changes in his comics, big concepts in OMAC, best DOUBLE-PAGE SPREADS, MARK EVANIER’s 2019 Kirby Tribute Panel, PENCIL ART GALLERY, and a new cover based on OMAC #1!

“Kirby: Beta!” Jack’s experimental ideas, characters, and series (Fighting American, Jimmy Olsen, Kamandi, and others), Kirby interview, inspirations for his many “secret societies” (The Project, Habitat, Wakanda), non-superhero genres he explored, 2019 Heroes Con panel (with MARK EVANIER, MIKE ROYER, JIM AMASH, and RAND HOPPE), a pencil art gallery, UNUSED JIMMY OLSEN #141 COVER, and more!

YUANSHENG HE’s breathtaking LEGO® brick art photography (and how he creates it), the many models of TOM FROST, and the intricate Star Wars builds of Bantha Brick’s STEVEN SMYTH! Plus: “Bricks in the Middle” by KEVIN HINKLE and MATTHEW KAY, step-by-step “You Can Build It” instructions by CHRISTOPHER DECK, Minifigure Customization with JARED K. BURKS, and more!

Exclusive interviews with Lost in Space’s MARK GODDARD and MARTA KRISTEN, Dynomutt and Blue Falcon, Hogan’s Heroes’ BOB CRANE, Wham-O’s Frisbee history, Twilight Zone and other TV sci-fi anthologies, Who Created Archie Andrews?, oddities from the San Diego Zoo, & lava lamps, with ERNEST FARINO, ANDY MANGELS, WILL MURRAY, SCOTT SAAVEDRA, and SCOTT SHAW!

Behind-the-scenes photos of many of your favorite Sixties TV shows! Plus: an unpublished interview with Green Hornet VAN WILLIAMS, Bigfoot on Saturday morning television, WOLFMAN JACK, The Saint, the lean years of Star Trek fandom, the Wrestlemania video game, TV tie-in toys no kid would want, and more fun, fab features from FARINO, MANGELS, MURRAY, SAAVEDRA, SHAW, and MICHAEL EURY.

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Now shipping!

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $10.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships Spring 2021

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships Feb. 2021

(84-page FULL-COLOR magazine) $9.95 (Digital Edition) $4.99 • Ships April 2021

New from TwoMorrows OLD GODS & NEW: A COMPANION TO

JACK KIRBY’S FOURTH WORLD For its 80th issue, the JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR magazine presents a double-sized 50th anniversary examination of Kirby’s magnum opus! Spanning the pages of four different comics starting in 1970 (NEW GODS, FOREVER PEOPLE, MISTER MIRACLE, and JIMMY OLSEN), the sprawling “Epic for our times” was cut short mid-stream, leaving fans wondering how Jack would’ve resolved the confrontation between evil DARKSEID of Apokolips, and his son ORION of New Genesis. This companion to that “FOURTH WORLD” series looks back at JACK KIRBY’s own words, as well as those of assistants MARK EVANIER and STEVE SHERMAN, inker MIKE ROYER, and publisher CARMINE INFANTINO, to determine how it came about, where it was going, and how Kirby would’ve ended it before it was prematurely cancelled by DC Comics! It also examines Kirby’s use of gods in THOR and other strips prior to the Fourth World, how they influenced his DC epic, and affected later series like THE ETERNALS and CAPTAIN VICTORY. With an overview of hundreds of Kirby’s creations like BIG BARDA, BOOM TUBES and GRANNY GOODNESS, and post-Kirby uses of his concepts, no Fourth World fan will want to miss it! Compiled, researched, and edited by JOHN MORROW, with contributions by JON B. COOKE. SHIPS FEBRUARY 2021! (160-page FULL-COLOR trade paperback) $26.95 • (Digital Edition) $12.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-098-4

their respecti

ve owners.

CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS POP CULTURE!

All characte

rs TM & ©

Break out the candy canes! HOLLY JOLLY is a colorful sleigh ride through the history of Christmas, from its religious origins to its emergence as a multimedia phenomenon. This FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER explores movies (Miracle on 34th Street, It’s a Wonderful Life), music (White Christmas, Little St. Nick), TV (How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer), books (Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol), decor (1950s silver aluminum trees), comics (super-heroes meet Santa), and more! Featuring interviews with CHARLES M. SCHULZ (A Charlie Brown Christmas), ANDY WILLIAMS (TV’s “Mr. Christmas”) and others, the story behind DARLENE LOVE’s perennial hit song Christmas (Baby Please Come Home), and even more holiday memories! Written and designed by MARK VOGER (author of the TwoMorrows’ books MONSTER MASH and GROOVY), the profusely illustrated HOLLY JOLLY takes readers on a time-trip to Christmases past that you will cherish all year long! (192-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $43.95 • (Digital Edition) $15.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-097-7

TwoMorrows. The Future of Pop History.

TwoMorrows Publishing • 10407 Bedfordtown Drive • Raleigh, NC 27614 USA

Phone: 919-449-0344 E-mail: store@twomorrows.com Web: www.twomorrows.com Don’t miss exclusive sales, limited editions, and new releases! Sign up for our mailing list: http:// groups.yahoo.com/group/twomorrows

PRINTED IN CHINA

NOW SHIPPING! THE PERFECT HOLIDAY GIFT!