Alter Ego #174 by TwoMorrows Publishing

Roy Thomas' Nightmarish Comics Fanzine

PRESENTING:

FEATURING:

C.C. BECK

In the USA

No. 174 March 2022

82658 00452 1

Characters TM & © DC Comics; other art © estate of C.C. Beck

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Vol. 3, No. 174 March 2022 Editor

Roy Thomas

Associate Editor Jim Amash

Design & Layout

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Contents

Writer/Editorial: High Cost Of [Historical/Nostalgic] Living . . . . . . . 2 FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America] #233 [interior cover] . . . . . . . 3

William J. Dowlding David Baldy

A special double-size edition presented by P.C. Hamerlinck

Cover Artist

The late artist C.C. Beck rendered his opinions on comics without fear or favor.

C.C. Beck

With Special Thanks to: Heidi Amash Bob Bailey John Benson Jon Bolerjack Ricky Terry Brisacque Gary Brown Bernie Bubnis R. Dewey Cassell John Cimino Shaun & Erika Clancy Comic Book Resources (website) Chet Cox Brian Cronin Mark Evanier Shane Foley William Foster III Stephan Friedt Janet Gilbert Don Glut Javier Gonzalez Alex Grand Grand Comics Database (website)

Heritage Art Auctions Sean Howe Jim Kealy Lambiek Comiclopedia (website) Art Lortie Jim Ludwig Glenn MacKay Mike Mikulovsky Brian K. Morris Peter Normanton Vince Olivia Barry Pearl Matthew Peets Ken Pierce Bud Plant Ken Quattro Charlo Ramon Randy Sargent Scott Shaw! Dann Thomas Jim Thompson Robert Tuska

This issue is dedicated to the memory of

Román Arámbula, & Richard Corben

Captain Marvel—As Remembered By His Co-Creator . . . . . . . . . . . 4 When Captain Marvel Built Card-Castles In Spain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 Javier Gonzales gives a guided tour of the 1949 FHER Marvel Family trading cards.

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 The conclusion of Alex Grand & Jim Thompson’s interview with William Foster III.

The Haunting Of John Broome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 The classic writer of “Flash” & “Green Lantern” & “The Legend of Deuel Hollow”

The Original Wolverine Sketches—Revisited . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 John Cimino & Roy Thomas ogle John Romita’s 1974 concept art—and Roy signs it.

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! Don’t Get Mad—Get Angry! . . . . . . . 63 Michael T. Gilbert continues his examination of the early Mad and its imitators.

From The Tomb Presents: “Executions: Pre-Code Style!” . . . . . . 69 Peter Normanton says hanging (or the chair) was too good for ’50s comics bad-guys!

Tributes to Richard Corben & Román Arámbula . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 re: [correspondence, comments, & corrections] . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 On Our Cover: For some years before he passed away in 1989, original “Captain Marvel” (and later Shazam!) artist Charles Clarence Beck drew or even painted commissions featuring the World’s Mightiest Mortal and many another subject—either re-creating vintage artwork or creating new compositions. One of the best of the latter was “Billy Batson’s Bad Dream.” Our thanks to Shaun & Erika Clancy for making it available as this issue’s cover. [Shazam hero, Billy Batson, and the Sivana Family TM & © DC Comics; other art © Estate of C.C. Beck.] Above: Not all black super-heroes instantly integrated as smoothly with their white counterparts as did The Black Panther and The Falcon… as witness these final panels of a story from Superboy #216 (April 1976), as will be seen on p. 48. But racial (and professional) harmony conquered all by the final page, and Tyroc became a Legionnaire. Script by Cary Bates; art by Mike Grell. Thanks to Bob Bailey. [TM & © DC Comics.] Alter Ego TM issue 174, March 2022 (ISSN 1932-6890) is published bi-monthly by TwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614, USA. Phone: (919) 449-0344. Periodicals postage pending at Raleigh, NC. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Alter Ego, c/o TwoMorrows, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614. 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: $68 US, $103 Elsewhere, $29 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. FIRST PRINTING.

writer/editorial

The High Cost Of [Historical/Nostalgic] Living

sually, I employ these “writer/editorials” to wax eloquent, or at least as eloquent as I can, about something in the wonderful world of vintage comicbooks from the dawn of history (i.e., the Depression 1930s) through the mid-1970s. Just this once, however, forgive me if I feel like talking about the great unmentionable subject for a magazine like Alter Ego. In other words… money. No fool you, you probably noticed that the price of this magazine, and of others in the TwoMorrows lineup—not unlike that of your groceries and trips to the gas station—has risen. Or, if the price of this, that, or the other thing hasn’t actually gone up—well, it’s quite possible that the amount you receive of said thing in exchange for the usual amount of cash or credit card is a bit less than it used to be. Same difference. Now, I’m not gonna go into why that’s happened—partly because that would involve a political discussion, and we’ve all had quite enough of those already, thank you very much; and partly because, despite acing two college-freshman Economics classes in the late ’50s, I’m ill-equipped to explain such matters. That’s my lovely and brainy wife Dann’s department… at least it was, till she ceased teaching Economics at a local tech college a few months back. Suffice it to say: TwoMorrows and I dropped the number of pages in each issue of A/E from 100 (counting covers) to 84 two years or so ago, and we didn’t want to downsize further. I still miss

those 16 glorious pages, each and every issue, because they allowed me to sneak in an extra feature or two that wasn’t quite flashy enough to deserve a mention on the cover. So the alternative was to raise the mag’s price, keeping the page count the same. You’ll be getting the same amount of material, you’ll just be paying slightly more for it—unless you’re a regular US subscriber; that price is staying the same, at least through 2022. Dann tells me that things like Alter Ego are an example of “inelastic demand.” I.e., presumably (and TwoMorrows and I are the ones doing the presuming), this periodical’s audience has already decided the contents of an issue are worth the price being charged for it, even if that moves upward from time to time due to inflation, etc. So only a small percentage of readers are likely to be so put off by a price hike—at least a reasonably smallish one—that they stop buying the magazine. Hopefully, for each benighted soul who goes away because of that extra buck, there’s at least a chance that someone else will stumble upon a copy of A/E for the first time, or else decide to come back to the fold after an absence, either because he discovered he really missed it or because he recently struck oil in in his backyard. Either way, we—all of us here at Alter Ego, from publisher John Morrow down to our ever-squinting proofreaders—hope you’re one of those who decided the combined historical/nostalgic approach of this magazine is worth an extra hundred pennies. And we’ll keep striving to make you feel that way.

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Captain Marvel— As Remembered By His Co-Creator Mini-Essays By C.C. Beck

FCA

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION: For this special edition of FCA, I decided to dust off and excerpt from my files various noteworthy commentaries from hundreds of hand-written, previously-unpublished pages of postulations, reminiscences, viewpoints, and essay “warm-ups” that Captain Marvel’s co-creator and chief artist Charles Clarence Beck (1910-1989) put to paper during the early 1980s as editor of FCA/ SOB—and later for his debate-by-mail group “The Critical Circle,” whose members included Richard Lupoff, Trina Robbins, Jim Amash, and myself. —P.C. Hamerlinck.

C.C. Beck & “Billy’s Bad Dream” Charles Clarence Beck as a special guest at Phil Seuling’s Comic Art Convention on July 14, 1979, held at the Sheraton Hotel in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania—plus three of his initial “thumbnail sketches” of the Captain-Marvel-vs.-Sivana-Family situation, one of which wound up constituting this issue’s cover—from the original art collection of Shaun Clancy. Shaun’s wife Erika provided us with the photo-scan of the final painting. “Billy’s Bad Dream” was originally commissioned years ago by then-comics dealer/book publisher Ken Pierce, who remembers Beck as being a professional who “put a lot of care into his work” and was “very dedicated to being a good artist.” Beck had painted “Billy’s Bad Dream” a second time for a different collector; it was published in 2011 by The New Yorker. [Art & characters TM & © DC Comics.]

Captain Marvel—As Remembered By His Co-Creator

No Credit, Thank You World War II started at about the time Captain Marvel did, and its finish in 1945 also marked the end of the Golden Age of the super-hero comicbooks. I’ll not deny that Captain Marvel had become a super-hero—in both appearance and action—quite early on in his career when Fawcett farmed out some of the work to other artists and writers, who proceeded to present the World’s Mightiest Mortal as the World’s Mightiest Imitation Superman— bouncing bullets off his chest and looking like a ham actor in a shoot-’em-up movie. In addition, Fawcett created a whole line of Captain Marvel spinoff characters which were drawn by other artists in styles quite unlike mine. Finally, Art Director Al Allard and I persuaded Fawcett to let me supervise the production of at least the Captain Marvel books. I was given the title of Chief Artist in charge of a studio filled with assistants and given some name recognition in the comics, but the writers were never given any credit at all, and to this day few people are aware that comic illustrators work from scripts instead of making everything up as they go along. That is why today I refuse to accept any credit for creating Captain Marvel, pointing out that I was merely the first— and the last—artist to draw him in his original form. I want no credit whatsoever for drawings made by artists over whom I had no control and whom, as a matter of fact, I never met in some cases.

Al Allard Art director of Fawcett Publications’ comics in the early 1940s.

Not At His Beck And Call

George Tuska in a photo taken c. 1938-41. Courtesy of George’s son Robert, via Dewey Cassell.

I never had any control over the stories, either, although many have said that I had. The stories were simply handed to me to be illustrated as they had been in the beginning. Most of them were well-written and, as people have often told me, the plots and characters were better developed and more imaginative than in most other comics.

How To Talk Without Saying Anything

C.C. Beck made it clear he wanted absolutely no credit (or blame) for “Captain Marvel” artwork he’d had nothing to do with—such as this scene from Captain Marvel Adventures #2 (Summer 1941), with art by George Tuska and script by Rod Reed, in a tale featuring the Arson Fiend. Art director Al Allard had hired Tuska to draw the entire second and third issues of CMA, probably fearful of overloading Beck with art assignments. Tuska would make his super-hero mark years later, with Iron Man. [Shazam hero TM & © DC Comics.]

This way of regarding the illustrations in comicbooks was due to our having grown up reading the syndicated comic strips in the newspapers. I had myself once worked as a lettering man for a syndicated comic artist; Marc Swayze and some others had been assistants to syndicated cartoonists. I had spent the better part of six years at Fawcett as a “spot cartoonist” drawing single-panel cartoons before I was assigned to Captain Marvel. Pete Costanza had been an illustrator of Western pulp stories, in which one or two drawings were added to the typeset copy simply to break up the monotony. Most syndicated comics of today have retained the off-hand, simplified (“cartoony”) way of illustrating the copy; the over-drawn comic strips can go on and on for years without accomplishing anything.

Rod Reed Early Fawcett editor and sometime scripter, seen in 1942.

Back in the Golden Age some artists, such as Mac Raboy, spent many hours lovingly feathering their lines, adding shadows and texture everywhere, and showing in minute detail all the muscles, tendons, bones, veins, arteries, eyelashes, and teeth of their figures. Others, such as myself, Pete Costanza, Marc Swayze, Ed Robbins, and many more who worked on Captain Marvel used a simpler drawing style now called “cartoony.” We cartoonists could turn out three pages of camera-ready artwork while the fine artists were still drawing one panel. Captain Marvel, we believed, was designed to be read, not to be admired as art. To us, the pictures were mere adjuncts, that is, things added to but not necessary parts of the essential story.

There seems to be a law governing the production of illustrated copy that says, “The more pictures you add, the less story you will tell.” Today’s comicbooks, in my opinion, are almost all picture, with only a minute, feeble, meaningless amount of story… or perhaps none at all.

Otto And Wendell One time, back in the Golden Age, when I was producing comics for publishers other than Fawcett (with their permission), Otto Binder came into my office with about a dozen plot outlines for stories. “Why so many?” I asked. “Can’t you tell the difference between good ideas and bad ones?” “What do you mean?” Otto answered. “These are all good ideas!” And he was right; they were. Only in later years did Otto turn out bad stories to order for another publisher who shall remain nameless.

Fawcett Collectors Of America

Golden Age Pile-On While it was usually Captain Marvel against Dr. Sivana, or the three Marvels facing off against the Doctor, son Sivana Jr., and daughter Georgia, occasionally—as in the “Billy’s Bad Dream” painting—Cap alone would be up against all three wicked scientists at once. Splash panel from Whiz Comics #86 (June 1947). Script: Otto Binder; art: C.C. Beck. [Shazam hero, Billy Batson, Shazam, & Sivana Family TM & © DC Comics.]

Superman, nor a change in reading habits and attitudes, but the mishandling by his own publisher. The old “Captain Marvel” stories were comic, not sober-sided police-type accounts. They had funny characters in them—Doctor Sivana, the World’s Maddest Scientist; Mr. Mind, the World’s Wickedest Worm; pompous but likable Mr. Morris; Professor Edgewise, the mad inventor; and many others. Captain Marvel himself was humbly vulnerable; Superman, by contrast, was aloof and godlike.

Captain Marvel editor Wendell Crowley once told me at the Fawcett offices that nobody was indispensable. “If you and I disappeared overnight, Beck, we’d be replaced by tomorrow morning and nobody would know the difference,” he declared. Well, I think Wendell was wrong. Both he and I, and many others during the Golden Age, always tried to do our best in our prescribed narrow field of operation—unlike some who are turning out today’s comicbooks and other forms of entertainment. Had Wendell said “very few” instead of “nobody would know the difference,” he would have been right.

Whose Fault Was It? What really killed Captain Marvel, one of the greatest heroes of the Golden Age of Comics, was not the lawsuit brought against him by the publisher of

The Hits Just Keep On Comin’! Beck believed that the Golden Age of superheroes ended in 1945—the same year World War II came to a close—but at that point Captain Marvel was really just beginning to hit his full stride, with several years of some of the character’s best, most-memorable tales by Beck himself, Wendell Crowley, Otto Binder, Pete Costanza, et al., still ahead—such as “The Plot against the Universe” from Captain Marvel Adventures #100 (Sept. 1949). [Shazam hero, Billy Batson, & Dr. Sivana TM & © DC Comics.]

Article Title

Although readers loved Captain Marvel and his funny, impossible friends, his publisher insisted that he be made more convincingly real, as if an actual person rather than a comic character. He was made to go on a tour around the country, visiting various cities and shaking hands with numerous mayors, magazine distributors, and local celebrities. While real-life characters can appear in comic strips with more or less success, comic strip characters can’t appear in real life and be convincing. The contrast between a real person and a cartoon character is too great; one or the other will always look phony. Captain Marvel looked phony. Captain Marvel’s publisher insisted that he join in the war effort and be shown visiting the front lines and leading bayonet charges, which made him look silly, as readers knew perfectly well that neither he nor any of the other comic heroes of the time ever made any difference in the progress of the war. Captain Marvel was shown talking to J. Edgar Hoover, to Franklin D. Roosevelt

The Captain Marvel A-Team (Left:) Otto Binder and his mother, Marie, in the mid-1940s. Photo sent to the FCA editor by our late colleague Bill Schelly. (Right:) Wendell Crowley—Fawcett’s finest editor, in 1947.

and other real life characters, and tweaking Hitler’s nose and punching the Emperor of Japan in his teeth. Some artists distorted Captain Marvel all out of shape. Eventually he became just what Superman’s publisher had claimed at the start—a poor imitation of the Man from Krypton, who now looked just like the overweight, sadly altered Big Red Cheese. Fawcett discontinued all their comics in 1953. Less than twenty years later, DC revived Captain Marvel. I was talked into illustrating stories scripted by their own writers, who had been children during the Golden Age. These writers seized upon the surface features of Captain Marvel’s worst stories—the ones featuring aimless flying around, the comic acts of secondary characters, and the use of sound effects and cartoon ways of showing action. The stories were structure-less, meaningless, and totally worthless. Other artists took over the drawing and turned Captain Marvel into a huge blob of muscles who wore a painted-on costume, Billy Batson into a high school dropout, and made all the other characters into grotesque parodies of themselves. The revived Captain Marvel was awful. The valiant hero went down the drain once more, to everyone’s relief. But, every so often, DC fishes him out of the garbage disposal, gives him a new costume and a facelift, and puts him on display once more—a tenth-rate, poorly-selling imitation

The World’s Mightiest Comicbook Serial The first page of chapter 18 of Otto Binder’s “The Monster Society of Evil” serial, from Captain Marvel Adventures #39 (Sept. 1944). Beck and the CM staff artists kept the illustrations uncluttered and straightforward. [Shazam hero, Billy Batson, & Mr. Mind TM & © DC Comics.]

Fawcett Collectors Of America

C.C.’s Last Stand The splash panel for Beck’s final Shazam! story drawn for DC Comics—which also, sadly, marked his last-ever illustrated comicbook story—from issue #10 (Feb. 1974). Beck never had anything good to say about DC or its revival of Captain Marvel, but some buyers of Shazam! still enjoyed what they read. [TM & © DC Comics.]

is considered by many to have written the best stories in the 1970s run of DC’s Shazam! comic.

Available for the

first time in 50 YEARS This This collectible collectible portfolio portfolio features features 12 12 ready-to-frame ready-to-frame reproductions reproductions of of the the iconic iconic Marvel Marvel Comics Comics black black light light posters posters

INTRO BY

Roy Thomas

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THE OFFICIAL ROY THOMAS CHARACTERS, CONCEPTS, AND CREATIONS DATABASE

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Art by Joe St. Pierre. TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.

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super-hero instead of what he was originally, a creature of magic and fantasy. His stories now are filled with bad English, puns, and inside jokes, and are presented in pictures gathered together at random as if they were pages from a scrapbook pasted together by an amateur. For heaven’s sake, why can’t they leave the old fellow alone to live in the memory as he was when he was young and in his prime?

When Captain Marvel Built Card-Castles In Spain The 1949 FHER Hazanas De Capitán Marvel Trading Cards by Javier Gonzalez

hen one crosses paths with esoteric collectibles from distant lands, one may wonder how many hands have held these fascinating finds… or how they endured their long journey across an ocean divide… and what miraculously preserved them over decades before they finally found their way to new homes. In essence, we become the curators of these collectibles and ultimately navigate their next earthly destination. My passion for card collecting, with a wish to bring greater awareness of

vintage international finds to other like-minded collectors, eventually led me to create the online Tomorrowsgems.com. And it was this same enthusiasm and zeal that led me to discover—and eventually acquire—a complete set of the 1949 FHER Hazanas de Capitán Marvel [Adventures of Captain Marvel] cards from Spain. The concept of Captain Marvel, originally created in 1939 by William Parker and C.C. Beck for Fawcett Publications’ Whiz

How Do You Say “Shazam!” In Spanish? (Left:) The cover for the FHER card album in which to affix all 144 cards from the set Hazanas de Capitán Marvel, illustrated by Spanish artist Nogueras. (Right:) Title page art from the interior of the card album; artist unknown. [Shazam heroes TM & © DC Comics.]

Comics, introduced us to a pure-hearted boy left all alone to find his own way in the world and who became something extraordinary. Billy Batson was one of the most appealing aspects of Captain Marvel. While sales of Captain Marvel comics in the U.S. often surpassed DC’s Superman during the 1940s, Fawcett initially didn’t attempt to capitalize on Cap’s popularity with a series of trading cards as their competitor had done. In 1940, Gum Inc. released a set of 72 Superman gum cards. So, while Fawcett never domestically released a gum card set of their own at the time, there was still a wide assortment of memorabilia offered to fans of the World’s Mightiest Mortal during the Golden Age. When Fawcett did eventually authorize production of 144 fully-illustrated Captain Marvel cards in 1949, the set had double the number of cards of the previous Superman gum card series. What’s even more compelling is that Fawcett chose to produce their incredible card set overseas in Spain. The 1940s saw other companies, such as Disney, licensing products with their properties successfully abroad. Fawcett had observed this strategy as a potential way of increasing worldwide readership exponentially, as numerous Captain Marvel items had already been distributed in Spain prior to the release of the 1949 card set. In conjunction with theatre showings of the 1941 American movie serial from Republic Pictures titled The Adventures of Captain Marvel, the first Captain Marvel items released in Spain were a movie poster and an earlier card set by FHER featuring scenes from that movie serial. (In Spain it was called Aventuras del Capitán Marvel.) The set’s 180 thin-paper cards measuring 2x2 7/8” featured colortinted, air-brushed photos from the film that could be affixed in a special album.

Maybe They Got Cap Confused With Blue Bolt? In Spain, before Fawcett licensed the 1949 fully-illustrated Captain Marvel card set, the FHER company released set (and accompanying album), El Capitan Maravillas, featuring colorairbrushed still shots from Republic Pictures’ 1941 movie serial The Adventures of Captain Marvel, starring Tom Tyler as the World’s Mightiest Mortal. For some reason, the lightning bolt on his chest got colored blue instead of gold, but hey—you know what? It doesn’t look half bad! [Shazam hero TM & © DC Comics.]

Fawcett Collectors Of America

When Captain Marvel Built Card-Castles In Spain

Marvel battle the evil Dr. Thaddeus Sivana and his family: son Thaddeus, Jr. (curiously named “Celso” in the card set) and daughter Georgia. As in the original Fawcett story, the Sivanas scheme to separate the Marvels from their magic lightning. On a side note: Although expunged by Fawcett executive editor Will Lieberson in 1945, the controversial Captain Marvel black supporting character Steamboat appears briefly in the card set— at least, presumably it’s Steamboat—but he’s been re-named “Snowball” in the set. And now, published in its entirety for the first time in 73 years—complete with a lightly-edited English translation—we re-present the Fawcett-licensed, original 1949 FHER card set illustrated by the artist Nogueras …

Two Of Fawcett’s Finest Original cover art for El Capitán Marvel #2 comicbook published in 1947 by Editorial Hispano-Americana, Spain. Special thanks to Charlo Ramon. [Shazam hero TM & © DC Comics; Nyoka the Jungle Girl TM & © Bill Black.]

The movie-serial merchandise was followed up with the distribution of a Captain Marvel comicbook series containing select Fawcett stories translated into Spanish, and packaged in a horizontal format with different cover art layouts. The comics from Spain also solicited individual fan clubs to join for Captain Marvel, Captain Marvel Jr., and Mary Marvel. The club for Mary was touted exclusively for girls and was called the “Amigitas de Mary Marvel” [“Female Friends of Mary Marvel”]. The Marvel Family fan base continued to broaden overseas. There was a great presence in Spain—a company named FHER, a Spanish publishing house located in Bilbao that produced comics, sticker albums, books, cut-out dolls, and die-cuts marketed to Spanish children. The company was founded by the brothers Germán and José Fuentes Lizaur in Bilbao in 1937—hence the acronym, FHER, which means “Fuentes Hermanos” (Brothers Fuentes). Unlike most publishing companies at the time, the Fuentes brothers were astute businessmen who understood the importance of obtaining publishing rights and permissions from companies abroad who owned some of the world’s most successful and popular characters. FHER and Fawcett Publications came to an agreement in 1949 that gave the Spanish company the right to publish a complete trading card series that would reacquaint fans in Spain with Captain Marvel. Other illustrated cards of that era simply showcased the star character in random, unimaginative scenes, with no real story or plot. What made the FHER Captain Marvel illustrated card series from ’49 so unique was that it began with the (altered) origins of the World’s Mightiest Family, and then was followed with a (somewhat loose) adaptation of Otto Binder’s epic 5-part story from The Marvel Family #10 (1947) in which Captain Marvel, Captain Marvel Jr. (referred to as “Little Marvel” in the card set, edited for A/E readers with his true name), and Mary

The American Original The FHER 1949 card set from Spain is based on Otto Binder’s 5-chapter epic tale from Marvel Family #10 (April 1947). Art by C.C. Beck. [Shazam heroes TM & © DC Comics.]

Fawcett Collectors Of America

Hazanas De Capitán Marvel [Shazam heroes, Batsons, Freddy Freeman, Shazam, & Sivanas TM & © DC Comics]

1 - On the Rock of Eternity, a place equidistant from the Present, the Past, and the Future, the spirit of Shazam, a very wise Egyptian magician, has his dwelling place, devoted to meditation and contemplating human frailties, seeking relief from mortals’ sorrows.

2 - He is rarely seen by humans. Only three kids, siblings Billy and Mary Batson and Freddy Freeman, can invoke him by lighting a brazier deep in a cave known only to them.

3 - These three kids were granted by Shazam the ability to become three wonderful beings. When Mary and Billy say “SHAZAM!” and Freddy says “CAPTAIN MARVEL!” magical rays of ardent lightning split the space.

4 - Billy Batson, the young radio host, instantly becomes Captain Marvel, gifted with superhuman strength, extremely powerful intelligence, and extraordinary courage. He runs with the speed of an express train [and] flies like a bird, and his body rejects bullets.

5 - The gentle Mary Batson—cultured, sporty, determined, prototype of the modern girl— becomes Mary Marvel, a wonderful young woman, endowed with the same powers as Captain Marvel, supporting him to protect the weak and the oppressed.

6 - Freddy Freeman, a humble newsboy, poor and crippled from birth, when he says “Captain Marvel!” becomes Captain Marvel Jr., possessing the same powers as Captain Marvel and Mary Marvel, and an extremely efficient helper! How did they …

7 - … receive such wonderful powers? Let’s go back, a few years... Mary and Billy were then living at the home of Susana Bromfield, the adoptive mother of the former. They were both orphans and their best friend was Freddy Freeman.

8 - Billy was going to school one day. Extremely nice, honest, and noble, he was unaware that his great qualities were being observed by someone who trusted him. And, as he passed an entrance to the Metro, a strange figure approached him...

9 - ...motioning for him to follow. Billy innocently obeyed, and the mysterious character entered through the mouth of the underground railway and through a secret door that went unnoticed by the many people who passed through that place.

When Captain Marvel Built Card-Castles In Spain

10 - Billy, following the strange character, found himself in a cave that presented a surprising appearance. What place was this, located in the heart of the populous city, that seemed to take him back to a remote and legendary time?

11 - The mysterious guide left Billy Batson before a venerable old man with a long white beard, seated on a marble throne at the back of the cave. And the old man spoke thus: “Billy Batson! I am Shazam, the ancient Egyptian sorcerer...

12 - “ …I have spent my life fighting Evil... but my days are ending... you will be my successor! You are pure of heart, honest, noble... you have been chosen! Call my name!” And Billy, surprised and amazed, spoke the magic word: “SHAZAM!”

13 - And, for the first time, the magical lightning fell on Billy... that fantastic bright flash that falls unseen by mortals; they do not perceive the noise or the momentous transformation that our hero undergoes...

14 - …and, for the first time in history, Captain Marvel appeared, the extraordinary figure who would undertake so many interesting adventures, and who would be the idol of modern youth. Billy was very surprised by the change...

15 - …then watched as a great block of stone that hung over the throne where the magician was sitting fell with a great crash with the same lightning that gave life to Captain Marvel. Shazam could still hear Billy from the lips of the spell, but it was written that he must die!

16 - Then, a moment later, the spirit of Shazam appeared and spoke: “I name you Captain Marvel. With my name you are granted the powers of these six great men of history and mythology. You will be able to fight effectively against evil.”

17 - And a new magical bolt struck, returning Billy Batson to his true self. Seconds later, our young friend was at the entrance to the Metro, feeling that everything that had happened in such a short time was a dream.

18 - Afraid that they would not believe him, Billy said nothing to his sister or his friend. He hardly believed it himself! To distract himself, he read the newspaper. A strange piece of news soon caught his attention: “The Phantom Scientist threatens to paralyze all radio broadcasts...

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19 - …through his invention, the Radio Silencer, unless he is awarded twenty-five million dollars.” The next day, Billy had the chance to overhear a conversation between two suspicious individuals, whom he secretly followed.

20 - The two individuals went to a building and entered it. “This must be the lair of the Phantom Scientist and the place where he has installed the Radio Silencer with which he intends to subjugate all the stations!” Billy surmised.

21 - Billy ran resolutely towards the radio broadcast station WHIZ, whose owner, Mr. Sterling Morris, was known to Billy’s sister’s adoptive mother. “Mr. Morris! I just discovered the hiding place of the Phantom Scientist!”

22 - Mr. Morris smiled at Billy: “But, boy! Can you imagine that I can believe that you have discovered it when all the police in the city could not? Come on, come on, go play! These are matters for adults! Don’t get into trouble!”

23 - “But I assure you…” Billy muttered. “Look, boy,” said Mr. Morris jokingly. “If you’re right, I’ll use you on this station as an announcer. Ha, ha, ha!” Billy was quite taken aback, but once on the street he remembered what happened to him earlier that seemed like a dream to him!

24 - “Maybe it wasn’t a dream!” Billy said to himself. Then, with some disbelief, he uttered the magic word: “SHAZAM!” A lightning bolt struck from above, turning him into the marvelous Captain Marvel for the second time in his life.

25 - Meanwhile, in his secret laboratory, the Phantom Scientist was talking with his two henchmen: “They have refused to pay me the twenty-five million dollars? Idiots! My device is ready! I’m going to give the word and all the broadcasting stations will blow up!”

26 - Suddenly a fantastic figure made a devastating appearance through the window. “I am Captain Marvel! Who are you?” he asked, addressing the Phantom Scientist. “It does not matter that you know my name, because you are going to die. I am Doctor Sivana, the genius of science!”

27 - Drawing his pistol, Sivana began to fire hastily at Captain Marvel, watching with surprise that the bullets bounced off the Captain’s body without causing the slightest damage. “Don’t waste your time, Doctor!” Marvel said. “I am invulnerable to bullets …”

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28 - “…but you are vulnerable to my fists!” Captain Marvel gave the scientist a fantastic punch, smashing him against the Radio Silencer and reducing it to fragments. “I’ve lost!” exclaimed Doctor Sivana.

29 - The next day Sterling Morris read the big news: RADIO SILENCER DESTROYED. “Billy Batson was right!” Morris exclaimed. “I promised to employ him as an announcer and I will keep my word!”

30 - That’s how Billy Batson got his job as a radio announcer at station WHIZ. Mr. Morris himself presented the boy to the listening audience: “Attention, friends! I have the honor to introduce you to the new reporter for station WHIZ: Billy Batson!”

31 - Even with his new position at WHIZ, Billy was still a kid, playing with his sister Mary and with Freddy Freeman, the crippled newsboy, to whom he had not yet revealed to either one [sic] the wonderful powers that he had.

32 - Whenever he was needed to fight evil, he transformed himself into Captain Marvel. One night, the sorcerer Shazam appeared to him in a dream: “You alone are not enough to fight against as much evil as there is in the world. Choose two helpers and report with them in the cave!”

33 - Billy decided that Mary and Freddy would be his helpers! The three kids soon appeared before the spirit of the wizard, who spoke to them: “When Mary says ‘SHAZAM!’ and Freddy says ‘CAPTAIN MARVEL!’ they will become Mary Marvel and Captain Marvel Jr., respectively.”

34 - And so it came to be. Since then, there are now three wonderful beings who fight against evil, wherever they find it... and their adventures are innumerable... and the good works they have carried out are countless... and the fame of the Marvel Family is everywhere.

35 - Nevertheless, they have three terrible enemies that stand out above the rest: Doctor Sivana, the terribly perverse scientist, whose powerful brain is only used for evil. His offspring, Georgia and Celso, are as evil and as smart as he!

36 - We now find the three Marvels gathered at station WHIZ in front of the television transmitter, answering questions asked by Miss Joan Jameson: “Who are the greatest enemies of humanity?”

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37 - “Doctor Sivana, the most evil scientist in the world!” Captain Marvel replies. “Georgia Sivana, the most evil woman of science on Earth!” says Mary Marvel. “Celso Sivana is globally the worst!” says Captain Marvel Jr. “Where are they now?” Joan asked Captain Marvel.

38 - Meanwhile, in one of his secret laboratories, Doctor Sivana himself is watching Captain Marvel on the screen of his television set, assuring viewers that “The three Sivanas are in jail! We stopped them a short time ago!”

39 - Joined with his two wicked children, Doctor Sivana giggles sarcastically: “Those three fools are unaware that we have escaped and are planning their absolute destruction and annihilation!” Sivana’s young monsters chimed in with their shrilling voices: “That’s right, Daddy!”

40 - The three evildoers felt secure, believing the Marvel Family could never find them in their new floating laboratory dish located high above the Earth, thanks to special anti-gravity devices.

41 - “Look, beautiful children,” Doctor Sivana said to his offspring, showing them a complicated device designed to destroy the Marvels. “With this, I only need to measure the voltage of Shazam’s rays. Once that is achieved, we will be the masters of the whole world!”

42 - The next day the three wicked characters get into a rocket that takes them from their floating laboratory to the mainland in order to measure the voltage of Shazam’s lightning. They suddenly appear on the roof of station WHIZ.

43 - Snowball is busy working up on the roof when the evil scientist calls out to him. “Hey, boy!” says Sivana. “Where’s Captain Marvel?” Snowball is terrified. His legs tremble terribly as he can only mutter: “Th-th-th-the Sivanas!”

44 - Snowball runs down the ladder, jumping the steps seven at a time, and appears before Billy, Mary, and Freddy, his face contorted with terror. “Quick! The three Sivanas are on the roof! Run!” The kids immediately shout their magic words.

45 - When the magic lightning strikes, Doctor Sivana’s Voltmeter is completely pulverized. The wicked scientist realizes that his apparatus was incapable of measuring the voltage of such tremendously powerful flashes.

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46 - Seeing what’s coming their way, the three Sivanas rush back into their rocket, which is launched at the same time that a special tube releases clouds of thick smoke to protect their strategic retreat.

47 - It was useless for the Marvel Family to attempt pursuit in the dense smoke, leaving them no choice but to curb their enormous desires to stop the diabolical Sivana family in their shameful escape.

48 - Later, up in his floating laboratory, a disgusted Doctor Sivana roars at his children: “Bah! The apparatus I built to register 600,000,000,000,000,000 mega-volts has been pulverized. There is more force in a single bolt of Shazam lightning than in all the bolts of all the storms on Earth combined!”

49 - Sivana continued: “But I will give this machine a power infinitely greater than that of the atomic bomb! For this I need three elements: Protium, Neutrium, and Electrium!...

50 – “…The Protium, after 10,000 years, will evolve into Neutrium and, in another 10,000 years, will be converted into Electrium. Together, these three elements will give incalculable strength to my apparatus. To achieve this, you, Georgia, will go to the past to look for the Protium. You, Celso, will go to the future...”

51 – “…to look for the Electrium. I’ll get the Neutrium here!” Determined to carry out his project, Sivana adds special tubes powered by super-atomic energy to his rocket that will lead him to the Rock of Eternity, outside of time and space.

52 - Going faster than light, the rocket enters the Fourth Dimension! The wicked scientists instantly find themselves in the place where the Past, the Present, and the Future do not exist: the Rock of Eternity! So far, they have succeeded.

53 - From his unearthly dwelling the sorcerer Shazam contemplates their arrival. “The Sivanas! I must alert the Marvel Family! The appearance of these wicked individuals cannot herald anything good!”

54 - Meanwhile, on Earth, Billy, Mary and Freddy have gone to the deep cave from which they invoke the presence of Shazam. Unable to locate the Sivana family, they decide to call upon the good wizard for help.

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55 - Billy lights the brazier and, little by little, the venerable figure of the old man takes shape and alerts them: “The Sivanas are on the Rock of Eternity. Get there at once!”

56 - Our heroes speak their magic words, and the three flashes of lightning turn them into three invincible beings. They fly faster than light in order to reach the mysterious point outside of time and space.

57 - The three Marvels arrive at the Rock of Eternity, where the Sivana Family’s rocket ship is about to embark on the journey to the regions of the Past, Present, and Future.

58 - The evil Doctor Sivana explains to his children the mysteries of Eternity: “Space-time is a closed circle. The Rock of Eternity is its center. From here the journey is easy into the Past, Present, and Future.”

59 - Each member of the Sivana Family rides a small pocket-rocket. These devices—the fruit of the doctor’s evil brain—are as fast as their big ship. They mount two of the perfidious rockets...

60 - ...when suddenly, the three Marvels make their appearance, quickly entering the great rocket. “We have to prevent what those heartless ones are up to!” exclaims the Captain. “It seems to me that we have arrived in time!”

61 - But they have not arrived in time! With the door open, the two rocket ships piloted by the Doctor’s evil spawn take off as Sivana shouts with joy: “Let’s see if you can catch them, idiots!”

62 - “Mary, chase Georgia!” the Captain said with urgency. “You, Junior, go after Celso. I’ll take care of Doctor Sivana!” But when the Captain turns to grab the scientist, he sees that the Doctor’s rocket has already taken off as well.

63 - In the meantime, Georgia, immersed in the regions of the Past, speeds towards the kingdom of Atlantis, in the year 8,000 B.C. Once landed, she hides her aero rocket in some bushes.

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64 - Georgia inspects an old document that her father gave her from which they managed to learn the ancient alphabet of Atlantis, and even speak the archaic language. “It seems that this piece of paper was written by a teacher ... Chal-Patzun,” she said.

65 - Georgia approaches the first person she sees and asks, “Where does Professor Chal-Patzun live?” The man smiles and replies “That crazy one? He’s convinced that Atlantis will disappear shortly. He lives at the end of this street.”

66 - Georgia, who knows the professor is right about his assertion that Atlantis will be swallowed up by the sea, knocks on the door of his strange laboratory. The voice from inside asks: “Who is calling? Are they coming to laugh at me? Why don’t they leave me alone?”

67 – “No, no,” said Georgia. “I believe that Atlantis will be swallowed up by the sea!” Upon hearing this, the professor opens the door wide. “You believe it? Come in!”

68 - Sivana’s daughter enters and sees a great map displayed on one of the walls of the strange laboratory. “You see?” Chal-Patzun points out to Georgia. “There is no land below the island. It will soon give way and be completely covered by the sea. But I have invented a machine that will save Atlantis…”

69 – “…and it works with a very rare element: Protium!” Georgia Sivana’s eyes sparkle with unusual malice as she says to herself: “It is exactly what I’m looking for!” Her bony hands caress a stick suitable for her purposes...

70 - …and a certain blow deprives the unfortunate professor of his senses. Georgia, after committing her treacherous act, says: “I am not interested in your stupid studies! All I’m looking for is the precious Protium!”

71 - Mary Marvel, having followed Georgia Sivana’s trail, arrives at the laboratory in time to hear Chal-Patzun’s cry of pain and a recognizable diabolical laugh—a characteristic of all Sivana family members.

72 - Mary’s fight with Georgia ends quickly. Sivana’s daughter is immediately tied to a chair and Chal-Patzun is lovingly helped by the incomparable Mary who—possessing the wisdom of Minerva—can speak and understand the extinct language of Atlantis.

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73 - Chal-Patzun, grateful to Mary, tells her everything: “Electrium, the result of the transformation of Protium into Neutrium, will be the element that, applied to my machine, will make Atlantis emerge on the surface.” “But in 20,000 years you will have death,” says Mary.

74 - “Yes,” Chal-Patzun agrees, “but my descendants will continue. My son is leaving for another continent. The secret will pass from family to family through the centuries.” Mary then confronts Georgia: “What do you want the Protium for?” The disreputable girl laughs: “It’s a secret of the Sivanas!”

75 - A terrible earthquake trembles... Atlantis is going to vanish! Mary has an idea. She thinks that perhaps magic lightning can transform the Protium and, grabbing a test tube, utters the magic word “SHAZAM!” and the powerful bolt strikes the tube.

76 - Mary Marvel has become Mary Batson. Feverishly, Chal-Patzun investigates the result: “Beta rays, Gamma ... No! It can not be! Only in 20,000 years can the elements be transformed! Atlantis is condemned to be covered by the waters of the sea!”

77 - Another aftershock, more terrible than the first, indicates that the tremendous cataclysm has entered its acute phase. The inhabitants of the city run in terror through the streets, trying to find shelter to protect themselves from the destruction predicted by the man they had called mad.

78 - The waves of the sea, high as the tallest mountains, roar frightfully. The Earth opens its entrails, volcanoes spew lava and fire... nothing can save Atlantis from its annihilation! People disappear, swallowed by the land and by the sea!

79 - In the laboratory everything is shaking. Mary, before she can utter the magic word, receives a blow that knocks her senseless. Chal-Patzun falls to the ground and dies. Georgia loosens her bonds and is free.

80 - Georgia walks quickly towards her rocket. She has achieved her objective! She has the Protium in her possession, as well as her hated enemy, Mary Batson! As Atlantis sinks ...

81 - … the rocket flies away, heading back to the Rock of Eternity. The laboratory of Chal Patzun, however, remains intact and, within it, is the remaining Protium, which in the Twentieth Century will be transformed into Neutrim.

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82 - Let’s go back to the moment when Doctor Sivana left the Rock of Eternity with Captain Marvel in pursuit. He sees the great rocket ship of the evil Doctor return to Earth at an enormous speed. Sivana wants to stay in the 20th century!

83 - As Sivana reaches his floating laboratory, he covers it by releasing dense clouds in order to mislead Captain Marvel when he reaches Earth.

84 - In the solitude of his laboratory, the perverse Doctor consults various documents related to ancient Atlantis. He learns of the wise Chal-Patzun and that his secret would be passed on from father to son. “Who could be the current descendant of him?” Sivana wonders.

85 - After consulting the Men of Science Yearbook, and verifying that the name of Patzun does not exist, he concludes that, since names change over the centuries, a scientist named Paterson could very well be the current descendant of the Atlantean professor. Sivana mounts his rocket...

86 - ...and heads to Paterson’s home. The cunning doctor was correct! Paterson is busy doing calculus aloud related to Sivana’s interests. The Doctor interrupts him, pistol in hand, forcing Paterson to accompany him to his underwater laboratory.

87 - Paterson secretly writes a message on the wall in hope that someone will read it and follow them. Sivana forces him to enter the rocket under the threat of his gun and via the aircraft they both reach the seashore.

88 - As the press publishes the news of Paterson’s disappearance, Billy Batson— determined to do his own investigation— goes to the professor’s home where his keen eyes discovers Paterson’s message on the wall: “Atlantic Coast, 35 Degrees.” Billy immediately shouts the magic word.

89 - Meanwhile, on the Atlantic Coast, Doctor Sivana’s waterproof air-rocket—also perfectly serving as a magnificent submarine—takes an agile plunge into the depths of the Ocean, closely followed by Captain Marvel, who has already located it.

90 - Captain Marvel contemplates the location where the submarine has submerged.

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91 - Captain Marvel plunges almost vertically into the sea. The underwater creatures gaze at the strange apparatus that is followed by that man in the red costume.

92 - In the background remain the ruins of Atlantis, perfectly preserved through the centuries—including the mysterious laboratory of Chal-Patzun, the remote predecessor of Professor Paterson, who is accompanied by Doctor Sivana.

93 - The two approach the door of the laboratory. Forced by Sivana, Paterson prepares to open the door when suddenly Captain Marvel appears…

94 - ...and unleashes a terrible blow to the Doctor. But, at that very moment, a gigantic octopus grabs Paterson. The Captain comes to save him, releasing Sivana who, taking advantage of the situation, gets into the rocket.

95 - The octopus is easily handled by the World’s Mightiest Mortal, but meanwhile, Sivana has managed to disappear. Captain Marvel and Paterson enter the laboratory.

96 - Inside the lab, Captain Marvel learns all the details involving the stolen Protium, therefore proving something unpleasant must have happened to Mary Marvel in the Past. He knows it’s imperative to prevent Doctor Sivana from taking over the Neutrium.

97 - Meanwhile, Sivana’s rocket returns carrying a moored gigantic electric eel charged with enormous voltage increased by the pressure of the water. It comes in contact with Captain Marvel which produces a tremendous shock, as powerful as a Shazam lightning bolt...

98 - …and transforms him into Billy Batson. Paterson tries to save the boy by taking him into the laboratory, but the World’s Wickedest Scientist appears, wielding a gun.

99 - Sivana fires mercilessly, killing Paterson. The vile Doctor cackles: “I have the Neutrium in my possession. I will take only one test tube so that it can be transformed into Electrium and so my son will come for it in the future!”

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100 - Sivana picks up Billy and, with the test tube in hand, enters the rocket and takes off, leaving behind the submerged kingdom of Atlantis, the corpse of Professor Paterson, and the skeleton remains of Paterson’s remote ancestor, Chal-Patzun.

101 - Ten thousand years into the Future, a strange submarine reaches the depths of the sea. It is navigated by Chass-Passon, a direct descendant of Chal-Patzun of ancient times.

102 - The first thing his eyes see are two skeletons: those of Chal-Patzun and Paterson. Chass-Passon, following the instructions passed from family to family, prepares to collect the Electrium, an element resulting from the transformation of the Neutrium and which will save Atlantis.

103 - Chass-Passon places the test tube containing Electrium in a complicated device and, moving a lever with all his might, the strange machines are put in motion, producing the great physical phenomenon that will cause the astonishment of future generations.

104 - The experiment has paid off! The Electrium produces such a force that the island is rising from the bottom of the Ocean. Soon the ancient ruins of Atlantis will appear on the surface, covered with algae and mollusks.

105 - Celso Sivana’s pocket-rocket arrives in time to see the great miracle—the marvelous spectacle unveiling the appearance of Atlantis in the middle of the turbulent waters. Celso lets out a cry of astonishment as he comprehends what had once seemed unachievable.

106 - Celso lands in Atlantis and watches from a distance as Chass-Passon walks out the lab door, praising God for the miracle that just occurred.

107 - As the humbled professor gazes towards the heavens, the perverse Sivana Jr. uses a wrench to wield a blow to the head of Chass-Passon.

108 - But before Celso can enter the laboratory, Captain Marvel Jr. appears, the strongest boy in the world, and strikes the evil young Sivana.

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109 - However, Celso is as clever as he is cunning. He takes a bunch of seaweed and throws it in Captain Marvel Jr.’s face, momentarily blocking his vision. Sivana Jr. then hides to watch events unfold.

110 - When the World’s Mightiest Boy manages to remove from his face the algae thrown at him by Celso, he enters the laboratory and revives Chass-Passon, the direct descendant of Chal-Patzun.

111 - Chass-Passon tells Captain Marvel Jr. all the details of what happened, and also tells him that he carries with him an atomic machine gun which, if you add a tube of Electrium to it, becomes operative.

112 - The two take a moment for formal introductions: “I am Chass-Passon. What’s your name?” This has always presented a little problem for Captain Marvel Jr., because when he pronounces his name, he is transformed into Freddy Freeman.

113 - “My name is Captain Marvel Jr.!” BOOM! One magic lightning bolt, and the Boy in Blue automatically becomes the crippled newsboy.

114 - The moment is used by the callous Celso to throw a stone of considerable size at Freddy’s head, as the poor boy collapses to the ground. Chass-Passon is so surprised that he cannot even articulate a single word, but reacts by pointing the rifle at Celso.

115 - Chass chases after Celso. “I can reduce you to atoms with my disintegrating machine gun!” he shouts to Sivana Jr., who manages to hide among the ruins.

116 - When Chass-Passon passes by, Celso pushes from his hiding place a piece of a great column that falls on Chass and kills him instantly. “Now I’ll reduce that miserable Captain Marvel Jr. to atoms!” says Celso. “But wait! There would be no one to witness the triumph of the Sivanas!”

117 - After collecting all the Electrium he wants, Celso takes the unconscious Freddy in tow and rides away in his rocket, disappearing into space and leaving behind a trail of terror in resurrected Atlantis.

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118 - Returning from the Past and the Future, siblings Georgia and Celso Sivana find themselves at the Rock of Eternity, then fly off together towards Earth in the direction of the floating laboratory where their devious father is located.

119 - The wicked three have triumphed: Doctor Sivana has the Neutrium and Billy Batson… Georgia has the Protium and Mary Batson… Celso has the Electrium and Freddy Freeman. “We are geniuses!” the Doctor exclaims. “With these elements we will defeat the three Marvels!”

120 - Doctor Sivana places the tubes in their corresponding places and makes his machine work a thousand wonders, just as it had been foreseen. What will he do with the enormous power emanating from his diabolical apparatus?

121 - Sivana grabs a huge knife and approaches Billy, Mary and Freddy. They naturally assume that he is going to cut their throats but, to their amazement, he cuts the ligatures tied to them, thus setting them free and ready to seize the moment!

122 - The kids pronounce their magic words, but the usual transformation does not take place. Cackling like a fool, Sivana senior tells them that their miracle of transformation will never happen again. With the three elements put together, the machine produces...

123 - ...such a huge quantity of Electrons that it forms a layer around the Earth. When they say the magic words, the bolt that comes from outer space collides with the layer of Electrons and, not being able to penetrate it, returns.

124 - The great air rocket returns towards Earth and lands at a magnificent palace built in a secluded place to keep away any intruders.

125 - The Doctor has the audacity to show Billy, Mary, and Freddy the prepared three thrones of the Sivana family: King Sivana, Princess Georgia, and Prince Celso.

126 - The three demented beings dress up in aristocratic horsemen attire as they fancy the idea of hunting as a sport … and Billy, Mary and Freddy are the ones to be hunted.

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127 - For their amusement, the sinister Sivanas decide to give the three kids a head start, joking about how hilarious the hunt is going to be.

128 - Billy determines that their best chance is to somehow get inside the saucer that acts as a floating laboratory.

129 - Passing through the riverbed, the kids manage to throw the Sivanas off their trail, and return to the palace. They do not enter the magnificent building, but instead go directly to something that interests them much more…

130 - They enter the rocket, then cruise across space toward the laboratory saucer they so desperately want to reach.

131 - Once in the laboratory, Billy shuts down the complicated machinery, thus making the protective layer of electrons disappear, freeing the path for the magic lightning of Shazam.

132 - The kids shout the magic words “SHAZAM!” and ‘CAPTAIN MARVEL!”— releasing the power of the three supernatural beings of Shazam.

133 - Magic lightning emerges and the Marvel Family appear again in the fullness of their powers. The attributes of the mythological characters—the initials of whose names form the word SHAZAM—are going to be demonstrated!

134 - The three Marvels immediately destroy Sivana’s elaborate mechanisms with great ferocity to ensure that they will never function again, neither for evil nor for good.

135 - Additionally, the Marvels blast through the very saucer that acts as a floating laboratory—the remains of which are scattered in small pieces throughout the atmosphere, thus eliminating any danger to humanity.

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136 - Then, having accomplished their mission, they launch themselves like fireballs towards Earth in order to arrive in time to prevent further evil deeds by the Sivana Family from happening.

137 - Meanwhile, in the palace gardens, Georgia is frustrated. “Damn! I completely lost the trail! I wish I could find Mary!”

138 - “Here I am, my dear friend!” Mary said, suddenly appearing to unleash a tremendous punch on her opponent. “Didn’t expect me from these heights, did you?” Georgia faints to the ground.

139 - Captain Marvel Jr. appears from the sky and takes the opportunity to vent his fury against Sivana’s son—who is quickly rendered unconscious.

140 - Doctor Sivana is, in turn, looking for the trail of Billy Batson when Captain Marvel suddenly emerges and knocks him out with a powerful a punch. Then the three members of the Marvel Family reunite…

141 - ...and later, in the palace, we find the Sivanas tied to their respective thrones—the result of three evil beings who wanted to take over the world by attempting to crush the Marvel Family!

142 - A police vehicle transports the Sivanas back to prison, where they will remain for as long as necessary, during which humanity will be able to breathe easy.

143 - The reign of terror has ended, and the three triumphant Marvels shake hands with each other. Each one, in their modesty, believes that the resounding victory is owed to the other two—but in reality, all three have contributed equally.

144 - And, as always, where there is evil and crime, there will be the three Marvels— fighters for freedom and justice, ready to defend the weak and the oppressed. LONG LIVE THE MARVEL FAMILY! [Copyright 1949 Fawcett Publications Inc. / FHER]

AFTERWORD I wish to thank my greatest supporters who have braved with me trips to comic and card shops: my wife Jillann, who helps prevent the house from getting cluttered with my passions, and our daughters Christina, Crystal, and Jael, who, on Javier Gonzales

more than one occasion, rode shotgun in the car with daddy and tolerated my latest adventure; it wouldn’t be as much fun if all of you weren’t always in my corner. —Javier Gonzalez

EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS’ GREATEST HEROES— NOW IN FABULOUS ONLINE COMIC STRIPS! by ROY THOMAS & BENITO GALLEGO 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!

NEW SEQUENCES CONSTANTLY BEING ADDED! ALL-NEW FULL-COLOR ADVENTURES —NOW PLAYING ON AN INTERNET NEAR YOU!

WINNING THE TRADE (PAPERBACK) WARS!

CONAN THE BARBARIAN

THE ORIGINAL MARVEL YEARS – EPIC COLLECTION

Vol. 5 – Of Once And Future Kings Collecting Conan the Barbarian #60-71, 1973 Conan Annual, & special material

by ROY THOMAS, JOHN BUSCEMA, et al. 360 Pages On Sale March 1, 2022 $44.99 US/$56.25 Canada ISBN #978-1-302-93353-1

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be” Part II Of Our Interview With WILLIAM FOSTER III On African-Americans In Comics Conducted & Transcribed by Alex Grand & Jim Thompson

A/E

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION: Our preceding issue [#173] spotlighted two pieces on black people in comicbooks—an overview by Barry Pearl, and (due to spatial limitations) the first half of an interview with retired college teacher William Foster III, author of the 2005 study Looking for a Face Like Mine. This concluding installment deals primarily with comics characters and creators in the 1970s and since….

is interesting because, in the ’70s, there are a lot of movements where the ‘60s start to manifest into mainstream. There’s a delay, and then suddenly it starts showing up in pop culture, more in the ’70s, like an explosion.

ALEX GRAND: So, as far as the ‘60s, we talked about Robert Crumb, we talked about Franklin in Peanuts… so now we’re going to enter the ’70s. This

FOSTER: Absolutely.

WILLIAM FOSTER III: Absolutely. AG: You mentioned Inner City Romance by Guy Colwell… Super Soul Comics, 1972, Richard “Grass” Green…

AG: Don McGregor’s Jungle Action series with

William Foster III at a comics symposium in 2013— sandwiched in between young African-American artist Billy Graham’s action-packed “Black Panther” splash page for Jungle Action #13 (Jan. 1975), with script by Don McGregor & inks by Craig Russell … and Gus Lemoine’s cover for the teenage title Fast Willie Jackson #4 (April 1977). This issue’s interview segment runs the gamut! All art scans accompanying this interview were provided by Alex Grand and/or William Foster III, unless otherwise noted. “Black Panther” page supplied by Barry Pearl; cover courtesy of the Grand Comics Database. [JA art TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.; FWJ cover TM & © Fitzgerald Periodicals, Inc.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

As We Were Saying… (Top left:) Actually, despite Alex’s commentary, interviewee Foster hadn’t actually mentioned Guy Colwell’s Inner City Romance by name earlier in their conversation (at least the taped portion of it)… although that 1970s underground comicbook was no doubt implicit in some of their remarks. Its five issues dealt with what Fantagraphics called, when reprinting them in a single volume in 2015, “the unpleasant realities of life in the inner city, where opportunities were limited and being on the lowest end of the economic ladder meant that one’s vision of the American dream was more about survival than lifestyle choices.” [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.] (Around the page:) Richard “Grass” Green and the cover of his 1972 Super Soul Comix #1 were on view in A/E #173, but its single issue from Kitchen Sink Press deserves a second look… as per these splashes from the lead-off super-hero tale and the “Black Eye” entry therein, plus its explosively four-color back cover. Like R. Crumb, only from a black man’s POV, Green used often-outrageous stereotypes to lampoon (and lambast), but always with a sense of humor and satire that threw the unwary reader off-balance. [TM & © Estate of Richard Green.]

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

Black Panther… Luke Cage. Tell us, as you were reading these in real time… what did you feel was going on? FOSTER: Oh, man, it wasn’t easy. It’s that the counterculture was taking over. When you see a major trend come in or a major wave is coming through, it’s making money and you want to make money, too. So you try things out. You start seeing a lot more women manifest themselves in the comicbook world, and not just as superheroes but as policemen, or police chiefs in some cases, heads of government agencies, and politicians. It becomes easy for them. Like now, we have a template. The first ones were, like we said, there’s that kind of humor: “Oh, I got to go to the Senate and pass a bill, but first, I got to get my nails fixed.” But I’m remembering plainly, I had friends telling me they were told, “I don’t care how many degrees you have, every woman here starts in the typing pool.” Or, “You are not going to be able to get this job. Why should I hire you when you’ll just get pregnant, and go get married to someone, and I got to train somebody else?” Right to their faces, with no shame whatsoever. What I’m saying, and that’s horrible, is I’m coming in to the age where women are trying to get a fair shake, and a fair shake is for everybody. So, the ’70s is that. The language changes… Or ask anybody you know about Luke Cage. And that’s the last time you had a black guy say, “Sweet Christmas!” [chuckles] JIM THOMPSON: Well, it would have been on the Netflix show, two years ago. FOSTER: I was talking to one of the guys who did the Milestone Comics, and he was cracking me up with that. He said, “Yeah, me and the brothers are sitting around, and I heard somebody say, ‘Sweet Christmas!” [chuckles] I said, “Please, you’re killing me.”

There’s Always A “But”! This yarn by writer Stan Lee and artists Gene Colan & John Romita was the second tale in Marvel’s Our Love Story #5 (June 1970). The lead-off “confession,” with white protagonists, was titled “But He’s Not the Boy for Me!” (by Lee & John Buscema)—while the follow-up, from an AfricanAmerican perspective, was titled “—But He’s the Boy I Love!” Clearly, the implication of using the word “Boy” for a black man in 1970 slipped right past The Man—and his proofreading crew. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

But, also, there was another phase where every black super-hero had to have “Black” in front of his name. And that kind of got to be a joke. Even now, it’s still kind of a joke. But I understand what that was: Being black was important to say. And if this is the only way you can say it, that’s fine. JT: Did you see the Harvey Birdman [TV] episode with Black Vulcan. Have you gotten to that one yet. Alex? AG: Yeah. Yeah. I’ve finished the Harvey Birdmans; they are funny. JT: Black Vulcan is on the stand, and he doesn’t want to be called Black Vulcan. And he says, “I said to Aquaman, ‘Why don’t you call yourself White Fish?’” [chuckles] Continued on p. 33

Sidebar:

When Did Luke Cage First Say “Sweet Christmas”? by Brian Cronin A/E EDITOR’S INTRO: This piece, with lots more panels reproduced to underscore its points, was first published online on the “Comic Book Resources” website and is © 2016, 2021 by Comic Book Resources. Our thanks to CBR and Brian Cronin for allowing its publication.

n [the “Comic Book Resources” series] “When We First Met,” we spotlight the various characters, phrases, objects, or events that eventually became notable parts of comic lore, like the first time someone said “Avengers Assemble!” or the first

appearance of Batman’s giant penny [etc.]. Today, reader Chris Ghostly asked me on Twitter when was the first time that Luke Cage said his famous catchphrase “Sweet Christmas!” in a comicbook. Let’s find out! The first time Cage used any sort of exclamation was in Hero for Hire #2 (Aug. 1972)—by Archie Goodwin, George Tuska, & Billy Graham—when he shouted, “Mother of…!” He would use that expression in issues #5 & 15 as well.

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

And it’s been part of the Cage lexicon ever since, even making its way into the Luke Cage Netflix TV series! CBR Senior Writer Brian Cronin has been writing professionally about comicbooks for over a dozen years now at Comic Book Resources, primarily with his “Comics Should Be Good” series of columns, including “Comic Book Legends Revealed.” [ROY Here: Although the full “Sweet Christmas!” catchphrase was coined (or rather codged together) by scripter Bill Mantlo a bit after I’d stepped down as Marvel’s editor-in-chief, I’ve always defended its use from what I feel are over-zealous critics. “Sweet Christmas!” was, after all, the exclamation of one particular fictional character, not a phrase strewn about in comics as if it were a universal expression (viz, “Great Scott!” or “Holy Hannah!”). As I’m informed the later series House of M retroactively rationalized, Luke Cage supposedly started using it as a compromise when his mother made him promise not to swear; apparently, she accepted it, and so should we, whether one likes it or not. Characters should be granted their distinctive catchphrases, be they “Holy Moley” or “Great Caesar’s Ghost,” as idiosyncratic utterances by a particular character, without irrelevant quibbling about whether or not they were ever spoken by anyone in real life.]

Power To The People! (Above:) The first actual, full-on “Sweet Christmas!” escapes Luke Cage’s lips in Power Man #27 (Summer 1975). Script by Bill Mantlo; pencils by George Pérez; inks by Al McWilliams. Thanks to CBR & Brian Cronin. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.] (Right:) On the other hand, while the Cage-starring Hero for Hire was the first mainstream comic to feature a true black super-hero, the Grand Comics Database points out that Ebon #1 (Jan. 1970), written and drawn by Larry Fuller for the San Francisco Comic Book Company, pre-dated it as what amounted to an underground comic. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

The following issue [#3], also by Goodwin, Tuska, and Graham, introduced Cage’s first catchphrase, “Sweet sister!” Once introduced, Cage went to it a lot, including the next issue and twice in issue #5! He then used it repeatedly, in issues #8, 11, 13, 15, 18 (the book was retitled Power Man with issue #17), 20, 22, 23, & 24. It even made Gil Kane and Klaus Janson’s cover for Power Man #26! Hero for Hire #8 (April 1973), by Steve Englehart, George Tuska, & Billy Graham, gave us the one-word exclamation “Christmas!” for the first time. This very soon became his go-to catchphrase, appearing in issues #13-16, 18, & 20-24. In one of these issues without a simple “Christmas!” in it— Power Man #19 (by Len Wein, Tuska, & Graham), we get: “Holeeee Christmas!” Finally, in the summer of 1975, fill-in writer Bill Mantlo gave us the phrase that pays by mashing “Sweet Sister!” and “Christmas!” in a merger that took way longer than you would have thought, in Power Man #27 (cover-dated Oct. ’75). Art by George Pérez & Al McWilliams. And Mantlo brought it back quickly two issues later, when he once again filled in for regular writer Don McGregor. After McGregor mostly avoided using catchphrases, period, Mantlo turned to it again in issue #39. I suppose the thing that really solidified it as a catchphrase was when Marv Wolfman wrote Power Man #40 and thus a non-Mantlo writer used the phrase.

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

[Continued from p. 31] AG: Ha, that’s a good one. And then, in the recent Harvey Birdman Special, Black Vulcan became President of the United States, actually. FOSTER: You’re kidding. AG: You should check that out. It’s fun… like 2019, or recent. Yeah. Now, Black Vulcan is Black Lightning, right? FOSTER: Yeah. AG: Just so everyone knows this. FOSTER: And I can’t understand what happened, but I’m sure it was something legal. AG: Yeah. It was a legal thing with the name, yeah. FOSTER: What did you have? “Apache Chief”? JT: Yeah. The episode is “Apache Chief Episode,” where he goes to a Starbucks and burns himself on a hot cup of coffee… and he can’t grow after that. AG: Yeah. The pain was too much. [chuckles] Now, when you read the Don McGregor Jungle Action run, did you enjoy that run? What was your impression of it? FOSTER: Okay, now I’m going to put some grain in my eyes, because I’ve known Don for a long time. The title gives some people pause, but he was always trying to treat people as human beings. And that’s what happened with Black Panther for a long time. People didn’t know how to deal with him, so he was kind of a background character. Is he a monarch of a country? Is he a super-hero? How is he a person? At one point, I think he has a job as a teacher in a high school. So, they couldn’t really decide what they wanted to do with him as a character. And even up to not very long before the movie came out. I was reading the book on a regular basis. But I couldn’t read any more because I couldn’t tell where it was going. They were… very confusing. AG: You mentioned Storm… the creation of Storm in 1975… Len Wein, Dave Cockrum. She became a strong female black leader. What was your impression of Storm? You mentioned, “Yeah, she has blue eyes, but still, it’s an African princess.” Tell us your impression of Storm, and why is that important? FOSTER: I think it’s important, because you never had anyone like her before. It’s interesting that when they did the Amalgamation comics where they combined the Marvel and DC heroes… who does she combine with? She combines with Wonder Woman. And becomes Amazon, which tells you how powerful an image she had, that that was a natural fit. They didn’t have to explain that to anybody.

A Change Of Scene Despite retaining the official cover title Jungle Action, the locale of the “Black Panther” tales had switched by #21 (May 1976) to the U.S. and a story arc involving the Ku Klux Klan—complete with a burning cross with T’Challa tied to it! Script by Don McGregor; art by Billy Graham & Bob McLeod. Thanks to Barry Pearl. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

When Black Lightning Got Vulcan-ized (Above:) As alluded to by Alex and William, the hero Black Vulcan on the late-’70s TV animated series Challenge of the Superfriends is said to have been concocted primarily to get around the financial stake that original Black Lightning writer Tony Isabella had in the latter DC Comics character. But Tony and DC have settled their differences in recent years. Here is the animation studio’s character sheet for Black Vulcan; artist uncertain. (Left:) Here’s the real McCoy, as penciled by Trevor von Eeden (and inked by Vince Colletta) for the cover of Black Lightning #5 (Nov. 1977), under Tony’s writing aegis. [TM & © DC Comics.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

Rich Buckler & Don McGregor (left to right) were the original artist-and-writer team on the “Black Panther” solo series. Here they are at a comics convention not too many years back. Buckler passed away in 2017.

Kill Or Be Killmongered! (Left:) The second Rich Buckler/Klaus Janson title splash for “Black Panther” led off Jungle Action #7 (Nov. 1973). Script by Don McGregor. (Below right:) With Jungle Action #10 (July ’74), Billy Graham moved over from inking Hero for Hire to penciling “Black Panther” Thanks to Barry Pearl for both art scans. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Billy Graham in an undated photo, juxtaposed with his Luke Cage cover for Hero for Hire #5 (Jan. 1973). Graham passed away in 1997, at age 61.

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

As they tell her story, that changes over time. She has an African mother, and an African-American father. She has been a thief in Cairo, as a young kid.

characters, even going back to then, are often neutered to some degree.

AG: Yeah, because her parents were killed in an explosion.

JT: And you would have her taking showers naked… having rain on her… and she didn’t really like to wear clothes, and didn’t fully understand it. That was highly unusual at the time, where the black characters tended to have a stick up their ass. I mean, they didn’t have that because people didn’t want to see that to some degree.

FOSTER: So, they’re adding elements to the story, and then she becomes Kitty’s kind of like godmother. While she was a teenage girl, trying to make her way through… and Rogue, at the same time. So, she has a lot of different hats she wears… AG: Yeah. She’s very developed. I like her character as a person. Because I’ve read so much of it. FOSTER: I was surprised to see how much she called the Professor on ethical issues. And I thought that was important, to have somebody like that, because if you’re an all-powerful person, what’s going to stop you? As we saw in Jean Grey’s character, where there’s no governor, what happens? AG: She’s sexual. She has a sexual aspect to her. A lot of the time, black

FOSTER: Absolutely.

FOSTER: Oh, hell no… You know, well, they did want to see, but not in the crowd. Now, you guys know that Wonder Woman had a black sister, right? Nubia, who is like another person they didn’t know what to do with as a character. So, I guess I’m thinking that’s because we have these unresolved issues of race. We’re going to always be dealing with that kind of thing in this country. Where the idea is that, “Well, she’s black, so she can’t be this, but she can be that. If somebody says she’s white, she’d be that, but she can’t be this.” We’re going to be working with that for a little while, I suspect. But it’s something that comicbooks can’t… Well, they can ignore it, but at their peril, I think. I’ve dabbled in writing stories, and I’ve just began to appreciate that as it’s not as easy as it looks. Even if you go to the tropes that have been in place for decades. AG: Right. So now, later ‘70s, and this is an interesting thing you mentioned because you had an interview with [Grass] Green. I don’t know if this is still a thing or if it was really a thing back then, but he said that when he was younger, being both black and an artist in the black community, they would think he was maybe… FOSTER: Gay. AG: Gay or something. FOSTER: Or creepy. AG: Or creepy or some different thing. FOSTER: Or creepy gay. AG: Not that those two words are synonymous with each other. But just that that was what it was looked at as being. Was that a thing, first of all? And is that still a thing?

Gil Kane

Storm Warnings! Ororo, a.k.a. Storm, made her grand entrance on the Gil Kane-penciled portion of the cover of 1975’s Giant-Size X-Men #1. She’s been seen quite a bit since then. Top row of character pencils (and all inking) by Dave Cockrum. On the inside, of course, Storm was drawn by Cockrum and scripted by Len Wein; the pair had co-created the Kenyan mutant. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

FOSTER: It was a thing, and to certain people it’s still a thing. Okay… because I can hear the voice in my head. Just when you were saying that out loud, someone was saying, “What kind of man wants to be an artist?” Really. The kind of man who’s making more money than you’ll ever make in your lifetime, okay? [chuckles] The same people who tried to dissuade me from being involved with comicbooks because they couldn’t see a

Dave Cockrum & Len Wein (L. to r.) From the 1975 Mighty Marvel Con program book.

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

Paul Gulacy

Nubia… Short For Nubile Diana vs. Nubia on the cover of Wonder Woman #206 (June-July 1973). Art by Nick Cardy—though Don Heck drew (and Cary Bates wrote) the story inside. Nubia is coming back into prominence in recent comics, we hear. [TM & © DC Comics.]

place where we’d make any sense. We had to be serious, we have to march to a certain drum. You have to get a job that has this kind of… Really. And if I don’t do that, then I’m a failure? I’ll tell you what, why don’t I define failure for myself? That’s not the only way you can make a living. And I have young people now who I’d like to think I’ve influenced to follow their heart and did not make a dime, and they don’t care. And they’re doing fine. But there will always be people who would say that this is not a wholesome lifestyle, if you want to be an artist. AG: I see. Not wholesome. That’s the bottom line, I guess. There are a couple of things that happened in 1978, comic-wise, in this aspect that we’re examining here today. In ’78, and Jim’s a fan of this as well, is Sabre by Don McGregor, which was basically one of the earlier modern graphic novels… strong black adventure. But then at the same time, same year, you had Bill Mantlo’s 1978 story… It’s a “Spider-Man” story, the Hypno-Hustler. [Foster laughs] Just let the audience know,

Sabre Dance A black-&-white display drawing of the “ground-level comics” hero Sabre by Paul Gulacy—above the color cover of a French edition. Don McGregor wrote and co-created the character. [TM & © Don McGregor & Paul Gulacy.]

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

But that’s okay. You got to stumble sometimes, so you can figure out what you’re going to be. I’m surprised you knew about that. That just kills me, man.

The Beat Goes On! The Hypno-Hustler, introduced in The Spectacular Spider-Man #28 (Nov. 1978), has not been treated kindly by history—or at least by comics historians. Art by Frank Springer. Bill Mantlo wrote the story inside. The Grand Comics Database’s description of this issue’s yarn says it all: “Peter and his friends go to a disco to dance and end up hypnotized by the Hypno-Hustler and his backup band, the Mercy Killers.” [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

because, maybe it doesn’t know. What’s your impression of Sabre versus something like the Hypno-Hustler? And why is one maybe more successful than the other? FOSTER: Okay. Sabre was basically—if you look at him, he’s basically inspired by Jimi Hendrix; there’s no question. And he spoke lyrically. He didn’t give a straight-forward line, and it’s obviously post-Apocalyptic, wherever the hell that is. I don’t think it’s Earth. He uses his instinct, his natural ability, which we’ve always thought was kind of a ’60s thing. He has a gun, but it’s not the first thing he reaches for. He knows how to use a sword. The people who are after him, there’s no question that they have a hierarchy that they respect more than they respect anything else. They think of him as an animal, so he’s an outsider. But he’s an outsider that you admire because he’s moving as naturally as he can. Hypno-Hustler was voted the worst supervillain in all of Marvel history. I don’t know who voted that, but my vote would’ve counted on that, too. Once again, somebody trying to take advantage of a trend, the disco era. And he’s introduced in the [Spectacular] Spider-Man comic, and literally, the outfit he’s wearing—only somebody who had no money, and you found some pieces somewhere and you put them all on, that would be him. [chuckles]

JT: It says something, though, about how far Marvel goes down in some ways. In terms of the major characters. Like they’re doing great stuff on the side. The Steve Gerber stuff and those things, and McGregor with Billy Graham… because we should mention Billy Graham, in terms of that, too. FOSTER: Absolutely. JT: But besides that, what’s actually going on with the Spider-Man books, and with The Fantastic Four, and after Kirby leaves. They go down pretty bad, because if you go to earlier Spider-Man… and I just want to say, The Prowler… Hobie Brown… that is a character that’s treated with respect. He’s a great Spider-Man complicated character. And then, you skip five, ten years, and you got that guy on the skateboard… FOSTER: [laughs] The Rocket Racer. JT: Oh, yeah. And they’re just awful. FOSTER: They’re fishing really hard to find somebody, you know… kind of crazy characters. [chuckles] Who was the guy in the giant wheel of death or murder…? JT: Yeah, the Big Wheel? FOSTER: The name is enough to warn everybody. The big wheel guy. JT: They’re terrible. AG: [chuckles] I wanted to mention Bertram Fitzgerald. His Golden Legacy series, his Fast Willie Jackson, 1976, with the Archie-type art by Gus Lemoine. You actually chatted with him as well… so tell us, what was

“The Highs, The Lows… They’re Second Nature To Me Now” The above slightly altered lyrics from a Lerner & Lowe song in the classic musical My Fair Lady sum up our interview trio’s divergent feelings about three Spidey villains. (Left to right above:) John Romita’s cover for The Amazing Spider-Man #78 (Nov. 1969). The Prowler was the suggestion of young John Romita, Jr., years before he became a star comics artist in his own right. Script inside by Stan Lee. Amazing Spider-Man #172 (Sept. 1977), a bit less memorably perhaps, saw the debut of Rocket Racer, on a cover penciled by Ross Andru & inked by Frank Giacoia. The issue’s script was by Len Wein. And apparently our talking-head threesome even felt sorry for Rocket Racer when he faced the villainous Big Wheel in ASM #183 (Aug. ’78), on and behind a cover by Andru & Ernie Chan. Story by Marv Wolfman. But of course, as we all know, comics yarns that one person (or even three people) may hate may well be another fan’s nominee for a high point in the medium— and that, as the late inker Mike Esposito used to say, is what makes horse-racing! [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

he trying to do with Fast Willie Jackson? It didn’t go for a long time. Tell us what led to ceasing the publication of that comic. FOSTER: No problem. He started Golden Legacy for the same reason that brother Evans started All-Negro Comics. He said he got tired of not seeing black people in comics. So he would dedicate an entire series to that. And he said he was told by both black people and white people, “It will never sell.” No one would sell him Bertram Fitzgerald a subscription list, so he in the 1960s, and a house ad for couldn’t sell at newsstands Fitzgerald Periodicals, Inc.’s Golden where comicbooks were sold. Legacy series in the pages of his But he acted clever, and he got company’s Fast Willie Jackson #1 inventive. He went to grocery (Dec. 1976). [TM & © Fitzgerald stores and got advertising from Periodicals, Inc., or successors in interest.] different groups… like Pepsi and Coke… and sold them there, and he started doing very well. He also submitted to the Urban League and got support. And those books were amazing. By the way, it’s important to say, unfortunately, he’s no longer with us. He passed last year. Crushed my heart. He had to go and find his own printer, and a guy was stealing his designs and selling them off the books. He had to take that guy to court. While he was at the courtroom, he had a heart attack. Went to the hospital, came back out, and still won the case. So, what he was looking for in Fast Willie Jackson was something for young people. He said, “How can I tell if they’re reading this?” So they used a contest in the “Letters to the Editor” page and said, “If you can come up with a good ending for this story, we’ll use your story.” He said they got an amazing amount of letters coming back to them. He said it was an important thing for him to try out. And it was so different from Golden Legacy. And he particularly said, “You got to set it to the Archie art, which everybody recognized.” Those are becoming increasingly hard to find now, sadly. AG: Yeah. I managed to find one issue on eBay. The only affordable one I could find, yes. FOSTER: I’ll tell you what, talk to me, I’ll hook you up later… I know a guy. AG: [chuckles] So now, in the ‘80s, there’s a few things you mentioned like Daddy Cool in 1984. But it seems like it’s not as much as in the ‘70s and the ‘90s. It’s almost like there’s less of these in some way. FOSTER: Absolutely. I think it had to do with the economic conditions of the country at that time. And also, the political feeling on what was happening, too, because the Reagan years… [chuckles] It was interesting. Daddy Cool was deep, in that it was printed by the same people who did Player magazine… which was, how should we say it, adult entertainment? It was a large-sized format, and they reduced it later on into a paperback size. But the person who reduced it wasn’t paying attention; the page count was all off. It’s like reading a Japanese novel at a train station.

Fast—Faster—Fastest! (Across bottom of this page and next:) This issue and last, we’ve previously seen Gus Lemoine’s covers for Fast Willie Jackson #1, 2, & 4. Here are the remaining four, cover-dated February, June, August, and September of 1977. [TM & © Fitzgerald Periodicals, Inc., or successors in interest.]

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

Fresh Out Of The Gate From Fast Willie Jackson #1 (Oct. 1976)—a page featuring the comics’ cast of characters, and a perhaps unexpected gag from the issue’s back cover. Art by Gus Lemoine; scripter(s) unknown. Thanks to Barry Pearl. [TM & © Fitzgerald Periodical, Inc., or successors in interest.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

“The Slave Ship” Three of the five pages of a surprising story from Fast Willie Jackson #5. Within the familiar confines of an “Archie”-styled humor story, Gus Lemoine and the scripter relate a dream tale featuring a slave vessel, complete with black prisoners rebelling against the white crew. A truly new and welcome subversive approach to humor, especially for 1977! [TM & © Fitzgerald Periodicals, Inc., or successors in interest.]

But it was an amazing story, and for people who had never read Daddy Cool, he [author Donald Goines] wrote a lot of novels. He was very popular… if you can gauge the popularity of somebody who’s writing pretty much for the underground. But it was an amazing book, and I got my copy years ago because I saw it someplace and I said, “I got to do better.” And I picked it up, and it wasn’t back in print for like 20 years. So if you see one of the little paperback copies, let it go. Trust me. You need to do better. AG: But the ‘90s is a really interesting time… FOSTER: It comes back strong. AG: Yeah, it comes back really strong. Also, it’s not just comics… you also mentioned cards, right? They were a big thing in the early ‘90s. Even Marvel hopped on the bandwagon with their Marvel Comics Cards. There’s a huge card industry… even, I think, Revlon, that bought Marvel, also bought a card company. There’s this big thing for cards. And you mentioned that there were 1990 Miss Black America Trading Cards, the 1992 Civil Rights Movement Cards, 1993 African-Americans

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

A Golden Legacy, Indeed! Publisher Fitzgerald in later years, seen against a montage of artwork from his Golden Legacy series—and the cover & an internal splash page from Golden Legacy #16. According to the GCD, each of the 16 issues of GL was first published between 1966 and 1972, then reprinted in 1976. Seen on the cover of Vol. 16 are black inventors Lewis Latimer and Granville Woods. Scripters & artists, alas, unknown. [TM & © Fitzgerald Periodicals, Inc., or successors in interest.]

History Cards. So, tell us about the card market with this topic. And did you know about it at the time, or was this more of a later thing? FOSTER: I found out about it at the time because I taught a summer program at college. If kids took the summer course, they would get a leg up for when they decided if they wanted to go to this college or this school. It was a nice idea. It was great. And my students told me about these trading cards. I was surprised. I was a comicbook guy, but before the summer was out, I had 3,000 cards. And the majority of them were mostly super-hero, but other things as well. I was stunned to find that set of Miss Black America Trading Cards. But it was a promotional device for a lot of places. So that’s what they got into. Even at Milestone… AG: Milestone Comics, that’s a whole other thing. Yes. Dwayne McDuffie and those guys, yeah. FOSTER: I was going to say… a story about Dwayne McDuffie, when he initially went to Marvel… just a passing story. He said, “Give me control of your worst-selling book, and I bet you I’ll turn it around.” It’s exactly what he did. The worst-selling book was one about, after all the fights with super-heroes and gods and warriors and demons and stuff, there’s always a mess in the city. Who is the company that came through for cleaning? AG: Damage Control. FOSTER: That was the book he took. And I said, “I’ve never heard that…” But once he told me, I said, “Now, I got to read it now, because of you…”

Daddy Cool Donald Goines’ noir-ish novel was adapted in 1984 into a graphic novel by writer Don Glut and artist Alfredo Alcala—but William Foster says that “the page count was all off”… whatever he specifically means by that. There was also, according to the GCD, an edition from the French company Delcourt in 2017. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.] A/E’s editor contacted his longtime friend Don Glut about the matter. Don’s response: “I don’t recall complaining about anything when Daddy Cool came out and I read through it. Maybe he [Foster] had a bad copy? I surely would’ve remembered something that significant. Just checked my copy, and pagination is correct [therein]. By the way, I wrote a second one, Eldorado Red. Never came out, as DC didn’t sell well enough to warrant another. I don’t think it ever got beyond the script stage.” Maybe William meant that some pages had been left out of that one-and-only volume published?

AG: Yeah. I never thought about looking at it that way. I’m going to go back and look at those again. FOSTER: [chuckles] I was stunned. And Milestone has such an interesting story. Here’s the thing that some people got caught up in and they kind of got smacked hard… some people would tell the plot of their characters on the cards, and no comicbook. So how did you get the card—you couldn’t buy a set! You had to buy them five or six at a time. So, the idea was, we’ll get all of this money, and then they’ll find out what the story is like. But then you throw away a bunch of cards, you get a lot of copies, so no, that didn’t work out too well for some folks. But other people said, “We’ll do both. We’ll tell the story that’s in the book, or we’ll start a brand-new story, so you can

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

Trading Places (Above left:) A sample from the Library of Congress’ own “Knowledge Cards”—this one sporting an authentic photo of a sit-in from the 1950s-60s Civil Rights movement. (Above:) This display for a set of 1990 “Miss Black America” trading cards for sale appeared recently on the Internet. Miss Black America is identified as Rosie Jones. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

keep up with it,” and then, who was it… Shadow Hawk. Had the cards; all nine of them formed a picture. And that’s how the cards went into the books. They were smart. But I love getting my favorite characters. I got Wonder Woman, I got Superman, I got Batman, and the more I got them… Oh, I’m sorry, I got to mention Storm, and God knows, do you ever get enough Storm trading cards? But I can say, that’s probably how I got my 3,000 cards. I loved that. Let’s face it, for a young fan, they make a perfect gift. It’s not like I’m giving them a book, where the parents can say, “Well, we have to check this out.” You can see plainly on either side, what’s on the story, and it’s not going to be a problem. So, for a person like me who likes to encourage young people and not look creepy, that was exactly what those turned out to be… a perfect way of reading a little piece about the character. AG: Yeah. That’s right. Did Milestone achieve what they wanted to achieve? FOSTER: Ooh, interesting question. Yes… And no. It’s funny you should ask. It’s that they got the presence, and the one area that was a difficulty, and still is difficult, for all African-American comicbook publishers: distribution. If you don’t have any distribution, you’re pretty much going to [fail]… even if you’re online. It’s not the same. So, DC said, “We’ll cover that for you.” But then, as you should have suspected… You know who Daddy Warbucks is, right? BOTH: Yeah. FOSTER: Little Orphan Annie. Okay. Daddy Warbucks may look like a sympathetic old guy, but he never was going to let go of the reins. He

What’s The Damage? Far as we can tell by checking the GCD, Dwayne McDuffie wrote all twelve issues of Marvel’s Damage Control (three separate mini-series of four issues each), generally with penciler Ernie Colón, rather than taking over a failing title. But maybe we missed something? Above is the splash page of the first series’ #1, cover-dated May 1989; the other two series debuted dated Dec. ’89 and June ’91. Inks by Bob Wiacek. Thanks to Barry Pearl. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

Denys Cowan

Jimmy Palmiotti

A Milestone In The Comics Industry Milestone Comics was founded in 1993 by writer Dwayne McDuffie and several associates, including artist Denys Cowan, to showcase black and related super-heroes. It was distributed by DC Comics, but not directly under its control. Its four original titles— with all covers penciled by Cowan and inked by Jimmy Palmiotti—were Hardware #1 (April ’93), Blood Syndicate #1 (April ’93), Icon #1 (May ’93), and Static (June ’93). [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

don’t care what you think. So DC was always… “Well, no, you can’t put that stuff in.” “Wait a minute, our contract clearly says that… “ “Now, well, we say no.” So, it becomes that. One story, I don’t know if I wrote about it… Dwayne McDuffie wrote it, the lightning character… AG: Static. FOSTER: …has a girlfriend, and they’ve decided they want to have sex, so that’s the story. Okay? Now here’s the thing: DC didn’t want them to show a condom, and McDuffie said, “Wait a minute… if I had an image of her, and I put her butt in a prominent image on the front cover, you all would double the copies. You would’ve made twice as many copies.” [chuckles] And it was subtly done. It wasn’t like they were brandishing while putting them on, they were on the side table. But DC— And [McDuffie] said, the first time he found out about that is when the cover came out. He said no one talked about it before it came out, and they had an extra cover on top of it, and then you open up and then you saw it. But you couldn’t do it in the store. And he said that was pretty much it for him. They wanted editorial control over something that they really— That should’ve been made clear to everybody. I get the feeling it wasn’t. But then, how often does that come true with a partner? You think you understand each other, but somebody would go, “Oh, I’ll get away with what I want to.” That’s always going to be a nightmare.

Beyond The Shadow Of A Doubt A Shadow Hawk trading card, based on the Image Comics hero created by Jim Valentino. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

Don’t Give Me Any Static— Or, Better Yet, Do! (Near left:) Zina Saunders’ painted cover for Static #25 (Late July 1995) was a heavy romantic scene of Static and his ladyfriend—with a couple of condom packs lying on the floor. (Far left:) When the issue came out, however, writer/co-creator discovered that that cover was fronted by another cover, which consisted of just a closeup detail of the two lovers kissing. [TM & © DC Comics.]

JT: I want to talk about the success for a minute. My perspective a little bit in that, when I was teaching, I had Michael Davis come to the class. He’s something. He came. He’s one of the creators of Static. And I had a class of Duke students, and it was mostly white, and I had two black students. When he came in and I introduced him in connection with Static, none of the white kids had any idea who that was. One of the two black kids, the guy in the class, it was like introducing him to Elvis. He thought, Static… I mean, he explained to me after, he

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

AG: There you go… Internet. FOSTER: Yup, absolutely. And you could write, you can have a program that could draw, and if you had the Internet, you could distribute. And you don’t have to wait in line … Remember back when there were basically five comic companies, and you knew they took what they wanted, and they didn’t what they didn’t. And they hired guys to write what they wanted them to write. So, any kid who wanted to write a comicbook before computers… you’re doing it on the back of the paper that comes with your mom’s nylons, and you’re rolling them off on a rollerpress. But now, when I got involved with the IBCBP, the group of independent black comicbook producers, that was just amazing. And it has become an important network, and in fact, it mirrors a network that was in place when the black Pullman and black press kind of cooperated. Certain towns wouldn’t take black newspapers, and the Pullman would grab a bunch and throw them off when they knew somebody would pick them up. So, they kind of defeated that kind of thing, where you’re not going to get the news in many places. That was the same thing. When people realized they could cooperate with somebody other than the big guys and still get the job done, and be creative… That was what the ‘90s was about. AG: Wow, that’s cool. Yeah, because that’s what happened to TV channels as well, right? There were like three networks, and then suddenly, the Internet just changes everything… where they don’t have all the control… and knocked the whole filter on everything. FOSTER: Absolutely. Interesting that that happened to them, because that’s what movies had, until TV came in.

Still I Rise We suspect that the “Cartoon History of African Americans” to which Alex Grand refers is the book whose main title is Still I Rise. Its editors/ compilers are a couple named Laird. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

said, “You have no idea how important that character is to me.” So, every year, I would ask my black students, “What about Static?” Because I would talk about super-heroes. And that character’s enormously important to kids of an age that they were watching the TV show. It was huge. AG: Yeah, he had a cartoon for three years or something, right? JT: Yeah, and it was big with the black community. FOSTER: Didn’t it win a Peabody? JT: Yeah, I think it did. FOSTER: If I can say this, and nobody gets offended, he was like the black Spider-Man. JT: Before there was a black Spider-Man. AG: That’s a good comparison, actually. Now, there’s some other ‘90s milestones. We talked about the Dwayne McDuffie stuff. Barry Crockett the Motown Man, 1999… then there’s also this book that I actually found, though it was difficult to find… A Cartoon History of African Americans. It chronicles the history of blacks and Americans starting in 1619. And it’s like a visual or cartoon history of that. You mentioned that in your book. That came out in 1997. What was the energy of the ‘90s to suddenly bring out such an awareness, and such a curiosity about this? FOSTER: Oh, my brother, I got two words: Personal Computers.

AG: Exactly. And actually, comics almost kind of had that before TV even. Now, in 2003, a couple of things happened that you mentioned. There was, basically, a black Captain America, and it was a commentary on the government experimenting on African-Americans. Also, in the same year, Thunder is created… Black Lightning’s daughter. It seems like these things are happening in clusters. But tell us about those two characters. Why are they important going into the 21st century? FOSTER: Second-generation super-hero, been kicked around a little bit but not really done. But then, you find that they do it, and it’s an African-American family. And then, of course, now we had it as a TV show. Just amazing. Because they could have done any number of ways with that, because the characters have been around for a little bit. The first one that you asked me about—I’m sorry, go back for a second. AG: Oh yeah… Isaiah Bradley

Thunder—Minus Lightning Thunder, the daughter of Black Lightning, was introduced into the DC Universe in 2003 by writer Judd Winick and artist Tom Raney. [TM & © DC Comics.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

Robert Morales

Kyle Baker

Courtesy of Sean Howe.

a chance. It does not always have to be pretty and in the light. Sometimes it’s in the dark and we can still do some good stuff with it.

Red, White & Black The concept of a “black Captain America” who had been cruelly experimented on before Steve Rogers was given the perfected super-soldier formula was explored in the 2003 series Truth: Red, White and Black by writer Robert Morales and artist Kyle Baker. Most recently, Isaiah Bradley’s story was a key ingredient in the Disney+ streaming series The Falcon and The Winter Soldier. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

is the black Captain America, and the commentary on government experimenting on African-Americans. Tell us about your impression of that character. FOSTER: The Tuskegee Experiment, which a lot of people still don’t know about, where black prisoners were told they were given a cure for syphilis and gonorrhea, and in fact, they were not. They were given nothing, not even penicillin. The goal of the experiment was to see what would happen; the results would be that syphilis would be in the human body for 30 years. And they all died horribly.

AG: Sure. So, Jim probably has some final questions as well. But tell us about your exhibit, “The Changing Image of African-Americans in Comic Books.” And tell us about that experience for people that haven’t seen it.

FOSTER: It has grown exponentially from when I first started. I didn’t have a lot of images in the beginning, and now… I used to have to take the physical pieces out. I stopped that. Then I used to do it on slides; now I can do it on PowerPoint, which is great because I can include as many slides as I want to, I can import them if I need to, and nothing is imperiled. But the idea of, if you don’t see it, you don’t know it. Like he was saying, his students have never seen Static, and they didn’t know who the hell he was. Thank you for TV, thank you for movies now, you can’t say you haven’t seen him. Think about a media darling, a media phenomenon like The Black Panther. Around the world, billions of dollars are made… Sequel coming, couple of sequels coming. We know it’s coming.

So, someone said, what happens if the super-soldier serum given to Captain America… you really think that was given to him without trying it out on black people first? And that was what it was about. That Captain America is the benefit of having abused some black guys… to see how it’s going to work. And the fact that they made it a part of the continuity of Captain America’s origin for all time stuns me beyond words. I think that’s amazing, because I’m a DC kid, and how many years did I have to put up with imaginary stories, or stories that could’ve happened? It just seemed like a cop-out, but that’s what they did. [Marvel] said, “Nope, this is how we’re always going to play it.” AG: Yeah, this is the canon. This made it in. Yeah. FOSTER: I’m not saying that everybody else was a coward, but somebody took

Every Picture Tells A Story A photo taken of the exhibit “The Changing Image of African-Americans in Comic Books,” as curated by William Foster III.

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

Changes in nature on how these characters exist in literature and in media, and in legend. Superman has been around, what?… since 1938? You don’t even need to speak English to recognize his symbol. So, the same thing is happening for black characters, and them being not just uniquely associated with the United States; they have black super-heroes from every part of the world. You got to love it. And not just black… you have Israeli super-heroes, we have Italian super-heroes, we have Irish super-heroes. Thank you, Marvel, for that.

AG: Yeah. Now, coming into the present time, do you feel that this is an interesting and exciting new era? How do you feel about characters now, where they have representation? Do you feel like it’s been well done? Do you feel like it’s driven by some sort of like, “Okay, well, we need to make a race-based character, and we’ll do this.” Do you feel like it’s artificial? Do you feel like it’s genuine? What’s your impression? Since you experienced the whole gamut of seeing how this whole thing’s evolved.

AG: Banshee.

FOSTER: Sure enough. Something to think about. Something, too, is that we have a former U.S. President who is represented as a super-hero in any number of comicbooks. And that’s like amazing. All he said was that he was a fan of comics, and that’s all comicbook makers had to hear. And now, he’s represented as Superman in several different dimensions.

FOSTER: Yeah, from Ireland. You got Kurt [Wagner] from Germany…

JT: And the Spider-Man cover with him, his head on this… I’ve got that on the wall.

AG: Yeah, I love that whole era of X-Men.

FOSTER: I think it’s an important time. I think there’s always a chance of somebody’s doing something for money as opposed to

And then also, when they made the international X-Men in 1975, they have… Who’s the guy that uses his voice in The X-Men?

JT: There was a Native-American for two issues. AG: Yeah, Thunderbird. He got taken out quick, though. FOSTER: I thought his brother took over. AG: Well, his brother came in later, like in the late ‘80s… in New Mutants. He’s still around. I think he’s actually, like, three times stronger than his older brother. James Proudstar…. And then you have Forge, who I thought was actually pretty cool. He and Storm had a thing going on for a while there. FOSTER: Who was the young girl in the Native American outfit— she did something with the spirit or something? AG: Oh, maybe Alpha Flight… Talisman? And they had her dad, Shaman, right? He had the bag of leather, and then a demon head would pop out and he would be like, “Whoa, well, let’s put that back in.” Yeah. [chuckles] FOSTER: If we don’t have a sense of humor, this would all be wasted. But yeah, it’s interesting… I used to love the Legion of Super-Heroes… New Mutants, never so much. I did a comicbook with a friend of mine, and he’s Native American. It’s the first, as far as we know, African-American/Native American super-hero team. And it was just fun to do. We’re thinking about bringing it someplace else, and we’ll see what happens. But that’s a good trend for some people. That’s too much for some folks, I got that. I will use this, in the best possible way. If you’re used to white bread, then rye or wheat probably makes you crazy. AG: [chuckles] What about you, Jim? Are you a wheat bread kind of guy or what? JT: No, I’m rye all the way. FOSTER: See, I would have called you for a pumpernickel guy. [chuckles] But I think the biggest thing is that, when I take my exhibit out, everybody shows up. I have a part of it that I do, basically, just for people who are from an older generation, and talk about Krazy Kat, and talk about Woody Woodpecker, because I said, “You guys remember these characters?” Man, they’re jumping on it. It’s like you’d think I was in a room with 15-year-olds. That’s exactly why I do it, because you think that you don’t have anything in common with another generation, but you absolutely do. Oh, by the way, you talked about the public service ads… I just recently did some pieces about Joe Palooka… Frank Sinatra. They went pretty far. A few had made sure that there were people that would listen. This is an important message…

A United Nations Of Mutants! Giant-Size X-Men #1 (1975) had ’em all—a black African, a Native American, a German, a Russian, a Canadian, an Irishman, and a Japanese— courtesy of writer Len Wein and artist Dave Cockrum. Naturally, A/E’s effervescent editor isn’t too shy to point out that he had previously co-created the last three named above, and as Marvel’s editor-in-chief in 1974 had suggested reviving The X-Men as a vehicle for an international group of super-heroes, building on a more generalized suggestion by Marvel president Al Landau. But it was Len and Dave—and very soon Dave with writer Chris Claremont—who really made the new concept come alive! Thanks to Barry Pearl. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

for a better reason. And that’s just the chance you take. And something may be done badly, even when you’re striving for good intentions, absolutely. But I’ll take a shot. I’ll take a shot.

We’ve Got You Covered! Phil Jimenez’s alternate cover for Amazing Spider-Man #583 (March 2009), which was scheduled to come out as the 44nd President of the United States was being sworn in. It was around that time that Barrack Obama mentioned that his favorite comicbooks when he was growing up in the 1970s were Spider-Man and Conan the Barbarian. Clearly, a man of exquisite literary tastes! Courtesy of the GCD. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

My goddaughter and I, we never miss an opening of a super-hero movie, and we’re having the time of our lives, literally. She’s a lot younger than I, but it’s like we’re both kids. And we go to matinees so nobody else is there so we could be as loud as we want. I love that. Because that’s what I did when I was a kid. The movie, and the people you saw on the screen… this was not the time to be quiet… it’s a time to be exuberant. And that’s part of what youth is about. I think, if comics ever capture that or keep that, we’ll be okay.

recently published his Soul Love romance comicbook. FOSTER: Get out of here! No, they did not! JT: Yeah… No, it’s available. And I wondered what you thought of that, and what you thought of “Flippa-Dippa” and The Black Racer. Kirby attempting to do this is great and I love him. But what’s your thought on his DC stuff there? FOSTER: I think about it this way: Sometimes, you go to the dog pound and you want to bring home a big, big boxer or a German shepherd, and you bring home a poodle. [chuckles] Because nobody knows. It’s the most vicious poodle in the room, but nobody knows. Okay. So sometimes, you just hope against hope. But, no, thank you for telling me about that Soul Love. I’m going to do my best to find that, because I saw the Kirby magazine that showed some of the pages from that. I had never seen that! I said, “You mean they were planning to do a black love story?” AG: Yeah. It’s like 1971. The cool thing you’ll like about it, because I have it, TwoMorrows published it—the people who make The Jack Kirby Collector, they published this Soul Love. And they have Jack Kirby’s pencils, but painted by Alex Ross. It’s actually really nicely done, so you’ll really like it.

JT: I’ve got five kind of random questions now…

First one, which is brand new, and it’s only because you brought up the Legion of SuperHeroes: What was it about, in the ‘70s, putting all the black people on one island? Because in terms of Tyroc, on Krypton they had the Vathlo Island, the black scientists’ home… When you were reading that, did you say, “All right, I’m happy to see something, but this is [chuckles] crazy!” FOSTER: No… No. That was Kryptonian segregation, and I’m going to call it just what it was. JT: Yeah, it wasn’t good. And they never knew what to do with Tyroc, either. I mean, he comes, and “Hey, there’s a black Legionnaire!”—and then it’s like, nope, he’s gone. FOSTER: Yeah, get him a new tailor would’ve been the first thing they needed to do. That outfit was patooey!, weak, get out of here. [laughter] Don’t walk in my neighborhood wearing that towel! Okay. What gets me is that the first map of Krypton shows the island of the blacks, and they all got these monstrous Afros. It’s like the mid-‘60s. JT: Yeah, I was just talking about that just recently. Because nobody remembers that. FOSTER: I do. JT: I have the map, and an issue or two earlier, there were those characters. And they’re shown on like a television screen, checking in with them, with the scientists. They’re all kept on an island. All right, second question, but along the same time period: I have talked to a number of black artists that respected Jack Kirby for not drawing white people when he’s drawing black people, and trying to actually make them look different. I wanted to ask you about… They just

Hey, You—Get Offa My Cloud! Tyroc, official “champion” of the black people who inhabit the planet Marzal, originally voted the Legion of Super-Heroes “off the island” in Superboy #216 (April 1976). Script by Cary Bates; art by Mike Grell. Thanks to Bob Bailey. [TM & © DC Comics.]

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

Divorced Dingbat Souls The material Jack Kirby had produced for his 1970s concept Soul Love #1 was finally printed in its entirety as one-third of the 2019 TwoMorrows volume Jack Kirby’s Dingbat Love. The latter was a triple-header of a book containing three different projects the artist/writer had hoped to do for DC Comics: Soul Love (black romance stories), True-Life Divorce (just what it sounds like), and Dingbats of Danger Street, a successor to the oldtime Simon & Kirby “kid gangs” such as Young Allies, Boy Commandos, and “Newsboy Legion.” See ad on p. 57. [TM & © Estate of Jack Kirby.]

FOSTER: I’m sure I will. Thank you, gentlemen. Now, my birthday wishes have come true.

Elton Fax. Do you know of his work?

JT: All right. I notice in our conversation that we talk more about black characters and black comics than we do about black creators. Trina Robbins did one on women super-heroes. And then most of the rest of her work was on women creators. Do you have other work in mind? Are you going to do more on African-American comic creators at some point?

FOSTER: No.

FOSTER: I would love to. It’s one of the banes of my existence… it’s just hard to get to people. I got a big list of people. In fact, I’m going through my research piles now. And then… and this is not a shot to anybody, but it’s hard to get the rights to publish people. Because I understand how it is when you are like, underfunded; you think everybody’s trying to rip you off. I am not. But that surely sounds like what everybody says. But there’s a bunch of them, and I’ve been in touch with them since the late ‘90s. And I’m keeping track of as many people as I can. The opportunity I’m reasonably certain will make itself present. And I’m going to chase it down.

AG: And he did some Western pulp art and stuff, too, and a little bit in comics. I’ll tag you and add you on Facebook.

JT: And along those lines, I want to segue into the names of a couple of people that I have a special affection for. And the first one is somebody I know Alex wrote about. I’m interested in it because I’m interested in “Chalk Talk” during that certain period, especially in terms of religion.

JT: He was an African-American comic artist that did a lot of WPA stuff…

Jack Kirby at his drawing board during the era when Soul Love, et al., were envisioned. Thanks to Mike Mikulovsky.

FOSTER: Thank you. JT: Yeah. And he used to do “Chalk Talks,” too… so look him up, because that’s interesting. He’s fascinating, in terms of his history. Let’s talk just briefly about Matt Baker and his contributions, because he seems like somebody that ought to be covered in far more depth than he has been. FOSTER: Well, actually, you know that somebody put out a book about him.

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

Elton C. Fax JT: Yeah… but you didn’t!

Just The Fax, Ma’am Artist Elton Fax worked in various art fields, as per his drawingsfrom-life of a young woman… a 1943 example of his dialogueless comic strip Susabelle… and a 1945 illustration from the pulp magazine Western Action. Thanks in part to Lambiek Comiclopedia website. [© the respective copyright holders.]

FOSTER: No and somehow, I’ll bear the shame. [chuckles] But no, because I want to find out more about him myself. Somebody just had done some thorough research. Also, with who you mentioned, the creator of Torchy Brown, there’s a book about her out, which I was surprised to see.

AG: Yeah, Jackie Ormes. The Matt Baker book [from TwoMorrows] is good. I just finished that. Evidently, I don’t know if his family knew, but he had these two best friends. I think one was an Italian artist. He had a lot of friends that were Caucasian, in the art field, and a lot of them were Italians. And they were all buddies. Al Feldstein really liked him a lot, and they all worked in the same studio. It was interesting. His closest friend, who was an Italian guy and who was a comic artist, says that Matt Baker was actually gay, which I didn’t know, because he drew women so perfectly. FOSTER: No fooling. AG: But also, that he generally wouldn’t really talk too much about race, when he’d hang out with a lot of his friends. He was just very excited and

Baker Man, Baker Man… Artist Matt Baker with his friend Connie (otherwise unidentified), in a vintage photo supplied by Shaun Clancy… and a Baker splash page from Fox Features’ Phantom Lady #18 (June 1948). As far as many comics historians are concerned, the matter of Baker’s sexuality is both unresolved… and basically irrelevant. Writer unknown. Thanks to Matthew Peets for the art scan. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

enjoyed the culture of the moment a lot. But evidently, his Italian friend wanted him to be his best man at his wedding, but [Baker] didn’t want to put them in that position, or something like that. It’s actually kind of sad, because even the Italian friend and his wife were both [sad]… It was like a depressing theme that hovered over their wedding, that he opted out of being their best man because of stuff like that. It’s really interesting stuff. FOSTER: He didn’t want it to turn into “the thing” of the wedding. I got it. I’m feeling it. Listen, for both of you guys… A.C. Hollingsworth. JT: Oh, yeah. FOSTER: I love his work. And the fact that he turned into a fine artist, starting as a cartoon artist when he was 15… just an amazing story. I own some of the original pieces of his work… only because I was paying attention when some other people were not. JT: Oh, wow. That’s great. FOSTER: It’s very hard to find. JT: I want to get your feeling about the era we currently live in, of

You Call That Living? African-American artist Alvin Carl (A.C.) Hollingsworth’s signed splash page for the full-length, numberless, stand-alone Avon Periodicals comic City of the Living Dead in 1952. Thanks to Jim Ludwig for the scan; photo courtesy of Ken Quattro from his 2020 study Invisible Men: The Trailblazing Black Artists of Comic Books. [© the respective copyright holders.]

tremendous archival republication, just putting things back and making them accessible, like they haven’t been in a long time. The subject that I want to ask about is the one that didn’t happen, which is Captain Marvel and the Monster Society [of Evil]. It didn’t happen because Beetle-mania of worries about the Artist E.C. Stoner, later noted as a painter and black representation, of commercial artist, was the African-American the one character. And artist of many “Blue Beetle” stories in the when we’re doing this mid-1940s, including the cover for Blue Beetle historic art stuff, how do #36 (Nov. 1944). The kids being carried by the hero are Nell and Bruce Barth, a couple of realyou feel about it—should life youngsters who won an appearance in that the character be altered, issue in a contest held by Fox Features. As an cleaned up? Those pages added bonus, apparently a Beetlemobile made somehow are too central its debut in that very issue! Thanks to the GCD for to the storyline to limit the cover scan, and to Ken Quattro for the photo. it so… should they just Ken Q. profiled the late artist in Alter Ego #118. all be out there? I would [Blue Beetle is now a trademark of DC Comics.] normally say “all out there,” but when you get to something that’s so obviously going to have a children’s market… I’m just curious what your feelings are. FOSTER: They made several for-TV movies about The Spirit. Several. And interestingly enough, the Ebony character was much more palatable, and he was sharp, and there was nothing that anybody could complain about. So, to modernize the character, I got that. To try to bring it back in the old days in this day won’t work. It doesn’t work now. They tried that with Amos ‘n’ Andy on the radio. Two white guys imitating black people… who knew? But when it came into the TV show, this is the biggest conversation I had with my students about this. Their parents would say, “Look at all the black professionals being shown on Amos ‘n’ Andy: lawyers, doctors, judges, okay. But look at the parody of who we are overall. So, which would you rather have? I feel confident, and confident enough to speak that for myself, but not for anybody else. JT: Amos ‘n’ Andy’s horrid. Because my wife is a TV professor. She shows it in class, some aspects of it, and you’re both horrified, but

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

that’s real important. And comicbooks suggest an excellent way to introduce somebody. I mean, Hip Hop is an international media thing now. There’s hardly anybody who can’t get with it. JT: And it’s an amazing time when both in terms of comics and TV documentary, you can do so much with black history, from different voices in ways that really, really weren’t available for a wide distribution in earlier days. Along with that, in terms of fiction, I wondered if you’re up to date on certain black creative teams, and books, and specifically, what’s going on in something like Bitter Root right now. FOSTER: Oh God, yeah. Big fan. JT: I was hoping you were going to say that. Can you talk about that a little bit, because I’d like listeners who don’t know that comic, and a lot of them don’t, and maybe in the same way that my students didn’t know

Steamboat ’Round The Bend Billy Batson’s woefully caricatured sidekick Steamboat at least got the chance, in Fawcett Publications’ Captain Marvel Adventures #16 (Oct. 1942), to don a costume and fight crime as “the Harlem Marvel”—but that hardly made up for the offensive stereotype embodied in the ill-conceived character. Scripter uncertain; art by C.C. Beck and his studio. Thanks to P.C. Hamerlinck. [Shazam hero & Billy Batson TM & © DC Comics.]

the Kingfish is funny. I mean the lines are funny, and it’s very tricky, especially when you’re doing it in front of students, and the mix of how the reactions are. It’s a tricky business for sure. FOSTER: It is. I taught diversity as a diversity counselor and consultant for years, and the thing that we would ask somebody was: would it be funny if you changed the race of the people who were saying it? That kind of helped. JT: That’s exactly right. My penultimate question: Comics are an interesting vessel for telling black history. And that’s been especially noticeable in the last decade. And the two books I want to talk about would be the Hip Hop History Family Tree and March. FOSTER: I interviewed one of the authors of March. We got on the phone and truly, we must’ve hit a common chord, because we must have talked two and a half hours. And Hip Hop... I was on the Eisner Awards, I think, when that won an award. So I was very impressed with that. The work was amazing. And it wasn’t like anybody else could have done it that same way. Which means, if somebody else wants to do it in a different way, they most certainly can. And like most Hip Hop artists, they have their own take on it, when they were introduced to it, what influences they had. I think

All The Kingfish’s Men As interviewers and interviewee discuss, The Amos and Andy Show— including the 1951-53 TV version based on the original radio series written and performed by white actors in audio blackface—is extremely problematical, both because it was genuinely funny in a (mostly) non-racial way to many people of various ethnic backgrounds… and because, in the TV incarnation, the three major parts (Andy, the Kingfish, and the titular co-hero Amos) were portrayed by talented black actors. Amos was a straight man whom most viewers would find inoffensive but dull, while nearly every other black character on the show (except for Andy and the Kingfish) was a doctor or some other professional member of the African-American community. When the late Bob Greenberg, a show-biz friend of A/E’s editor, helped produce a famous documentary on the Amos and Andy TV series back in the 1980s, he had no problem in persuading Jesse Jackson and other black leaders to speak on camera in enthusiastic defense of the show. Still, it’s easy to see why it has its detractors. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

“You Got To Stumble Sometime, So You Can Figure Out What You’re Going To Be”

Ed Piskor John Lewis at the time of the March on Washington, 1963.

Static Shock—I think there are people that don’t gravitate to that, and it’s a fantastic book. FOSTER: It’s interesting because I see different generations represented. Very Graphic Novels First of all, I love what they (Left:) Perhaps the most famous panel from any of the three volumes of the originally serialized do with the color foil and the graphic novel March, the story of the Civil Rights movement written by John Lewis & Andrew paging, and how they put it Aydin and drawn by Nate Powell. Lewis, of course, was a ’60s Civil Rights leader and later Congressman whose story the series related. together. I just liked it. I think somebody gave themselves (Right:) Ed Piskor’s cover for Fantagraphics’ Hip Hop Family Tree #1 – 1970s-1981. Piskor also a chance to do what you scripted the four-issue series. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.] would do if you had a book report due… run over to the local bookstore and flip through the pages, see-look before you buy it. But you’ll want to keep reading. So I’m going to treat books that way. JT: The writer, [David] Walker, did work on Shaft and some other books, and Sanford Greene was the artist on Power Man and Iron Fist, the recent version. So it’s an all-black creative team, which doesn’t really come along all that often. And it’s some great work. And it got an Eisner recognition this year. Yeah. FOSTER: Yes. See, and that speaks to… Because I’ve been on that [Eisners] committee and… you know… we were working really hard… and sometimes it’s not an easy choice, but in this case, I think they made the right one. JT: When did you do it? Which year? FOSTER: Oh my God, ‘14? 2014, I think? They usually pick out a really diverse team of people who come in, man… and it’s kind of intense, but it’s okay. And you’ll understand once you’ve been through, and you’ll understand exactly how serious it is. AG: I really enjoyed this, because when I read your book, I had already seen you in those two documentaries before, so I knew who you were. And you’ve commented in our group, and every time you did, even if it was a questionable character, you would chime in. And you always

Sanford Greene

Getting The Shaft

with some of his artwork for Batgirl and Iron Fist.

Sanford Greene’s alternate cover for Dynamite’s Shaft #4 (March 2015). [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

Part II Of Our Interview With William Foster III On African-Americans In Comics

The Weed Of Crime Bears... Bitter Root #1 (Nov. 2018) was the start of an 18-issue run for this Image Comics title by writers Chuck Brown & David Walker and artist Sanford Greene. The primary cover (at far left) was by Sanford Greene, though several alternate covers were also published, including the one at near left by Mike Mignola. Courtesy of the Grand Comics Database—which, however, has only the sketchiest info on the series. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

had something positive to say. Everything you write, there’s a positive side to what you’re putting. I always found that really fascinating, and I’d always study your comments. I’d be like, “Wow, that’s a great perspective.” So, it was exciting for me to read the book and to also meet with you today. Thanks so much for joining us today. Jim and I had a great time.

William Foster III

FOSTER: Well, listen, gentlemen, I had a great time as well. Oh, by the way, just to let you know, I’m negotiating for a third collection of essays, coming up. I’ll keep you guys posted.

in front of a montage of images of Luke Cage, Static, Black Panther, and Lobo—at the 2014 San Diego Comic-Con, where he accepted an Eisner Award on behalf of the late Orrin C. Evans, publisher of the groundbreaking 1947 All-Negro Comics. (See A/E #173 for coverage of the latter.) Thanks to Alex Grand for the photo and information.

AG: Yeah, absolutely. What’s the second one called?

At right is the cover of Foster’s second book, Dreaming of a Face Like Ours. [Characters TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

FOSTER: Thank you. Okay, now, you may have to go through me to get that one, too. But don’t worry, like I said, I’ll hook you up. [chuckles]

FOSTER: Dreaming of a Face Like Ours. AG: I’ll read that one next.

The Haunting Of JOHN BROOME

Part XVIII Of The Golden/Silver Age Writer’s 1997 Memoir EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION: As we near the end of Irving Bernard (John) Broome’s short and “Offbeat Autobio” My Life in Little Pieces, courtesy of his daughter Ricky Terry Brisacque, we encounter the closest thing to a “ghost story” that he offers up therein. It springs from his and wife Peggy’s (and their offspring’s) days in the quiet community of Wingdale, in rural Duchess Country, New York. Thanks again to Brian K. Morris for retyping the text for us….

A/E

Deuel Hollow Summers particularly, when Wingdale’s “little red schoolhouse” was locked and boarded up against flying squirrels and other equally cute

John & Peggy Broome in a photo taken during the early 1940s, when the whole world was at war—and when John had fairly recently sold a prose yarn to the Summer 1942 edition of Fiction House’s Planet Stories pulp magazine, which would even slap his name on the cover. His entry was titled “The Cosmic Derelict,” and its spooky interior illo by Robert Leydenfrost is as good a mood-setter for this issue’s installment of his book as we can come up with. Cover art by Norman Saunders. Thanks to Glenn MacKay & Art Lortie. For a pic of daughter Ricky, alas, you’ll have to hie you back to A/E #171 or before, since we’ve long since printed all the photos we have of the Broomes’ Baby-Boomer daughter.

Part XVIII Of The Golden/Silver Age Writer’s 1997 Memoir

When One Door Closes… (Left:) One of the more memorable scenes Broome wrote for the original six-issue run of The Phantom Stranger was this splash-page scene for “Doorway in the Sky” in issue #6 (June-July 1953). This splash page—which may or may not have been penciled by Murphy Anderson, but was definitely inked by Joe Giella —is especially memorable because it inspired Anderson covers both for that issue and later for Justice League of America #2 (Dec. ’60-Jan. ’61), not to mention Mike Bair’s for Infinity, Inc. #50 (May ’88). (Right:) The lead story in PS #6, though, advertised (falsely, as it turned out) some actual ghosts. Broome script, with Giella inks over Carmine Infantino pencils. Thanks to Jim Ludwig & Michael T. Gilbert. [TM & © DC Comics.]

and pestiferous marauders, daughter Ricky and I—she aged about 12 at this time—would take long walks through the still largely wild countryside around our house, usually under an agreement to keep going and not turn back till we came across something, some feature of the landscape, interesting enough to give a punctuation mark to our day’s ramble. This could be merely a stricken tree fallen neatly enough for us across an active stream, or a tottering old kiln from the period of the charcoal burners 100 years earlier when life roundabout, it appeared, had been much livelier than it was now. We had never before headed toward Deuel Hollow, a bit distant from our own more southeasterly Pleasant Ridge, and we knew little about it. And yet did not the appellation “Hollow” evoke in me a near-unconscious thrill of apprehension? Was there not, if one thought about it, something peculiar, unnatural, spectral even, about an area on Earth labeled by a term that was a very opposite of Earth, that was indeed a curiously unpleasant denial of Earth? True, Deuel Hollow in prosaic Wingdale, NY (population 500 all told, not including the inmates and staff—the total ran to thousands—of Harlem Valley State Hospital whose cluster of forbidding dull red-bricked buildings stood sullen watch

over the entrance to the village as one came up State Road 22 from the south), probably hadn’t the least power of enchantment required to plunge humans into prolonged deathlike slumber à la Washington Irving’s Sleepy Hollow in the neighboring Catskills, just across the broad Hudson a few miles west; but still, even if only subconsciously, I believe that as Ricky and I started out that morning, I was already to an extent on my guard. But to come back to our hike... As usual, on occasion, we had to climb through barbed wire or over dry stonewalls, across farmers’ pastures—but not their fields bearing crops—and through untracked woods. No one, so far as I know, ever objected to these bold intrusions, except once a short-tempered bullock, somehow untied, who with his poor eyesight started a whisk too late to get at us. The day was fine and at length we emerged from a dark cool wood into the scattered shadow around a sunlit glade, and at once the impact of the Hollow—for such it was—struck us. There was the silence. Not ordinary silence which is merely absence of sound, a negative thing: this silence had a queer positive quality as if not from something that was absent but from something that was there. The first thing she noticed, Ricky

The Haunting Of John Broome

of the way. It would have been easier to turn back, but stubbornly we pushed on as the rank odor of wild cucumbers grew stronger and stronger around us, intensifying my fear. I had always been a NOSE. Peggy calls me “white mouse.” And isn’t the olfactory the closest to what we struggling mortals call the sixth sense? I’d been plagued all my life by allergies, migraines—my first attack at age 12—and now over 80 by the Aging Process—named so by at least one encyclopedia I consulted under geriatrics—mysterious end-of-life but not particularly life-threatening onslaughts described by such eminent battle-worn octogenarians as Oliver Wendell Holmes—”Old age doesn’t come gently, but in the form of brazen insults and affronts”—and Elwyn Brooks White—best known as E.B. White—”Every morning, I get hit in a new and vicious way—Socko!” l suspected maybe by instinct—or sixth sense—the unpleasant smell came from snakes, rattlesnakes I thought, because I’d seen them around, one big bloated green and white critter in particular on the very road in front of our house who haunted my dreams for a spell, but my informant, Ms. Donna Hearn, who lives in Deuel Hollow and has been kind enough to reply to recent inquiries of mine, writes that her husband “has seen copperheads and smelled the smell you describe right around Deuel Hollow,” so I guess that’s a correction I accept: it was copperheads and not rattlers.

His Maiden Haunt Back in A/E #171 we showed you the splash page of the Broomeauthored “The House of Strange Secrets!” in Phantom Stranger #1 (Aug-Sept. 1952), which—as seen here on its second page—seems to be a “haunted house” story. However, in this series, supernatural phenomena almost always (always?) turned out to have a realworld explanation, and this was no exception. Art by Carmine Infantino & Joe Giella. Thanks to Jim Kealy. [TM & © DC Comics.]

said afterward, was no birds. And so it was: not a single one of the magnificent array of our Duchess County songbirds could be seen—or heard—anywhere in the thickly-leaved branches surrounding the sunlit core of the Hollow where we stood momentarily transfixed and—pour un oui ou un no—unwilling to advance into whatever other strangeness might be awaiting us in the path ahead. Finally, we started through the thick wild grass covering the glade and along with our first steps, a pang of such physical fear as I’d never before felt gripped my viscera. I remember the air itself became dense, like oncoming ocean billows, contesting every inch

Anyway, that’s it for this piece except for one thing. As we left the glade behind us and the strong fear dropped from me as suddenly as it had set in, we saw, to our surprise, an old house a short way off. Years and years away from a paint job, it seemed not just empty but abandoned, and sure enough, in due course, we learned from friends of ours who had not long before settled in the vicinity, a young couple I’m afraid I recall now only as Rolf-and-Violet as if they were always hyphenated that way and sans patronymic, that according to their new neighbors, there was a local tradition regarding that house: a dreadfully unhappy man had killed his wife and then killed himself, and after that no one had been able to live there for long before giving up and moving away. A pretty familiar tall tale, isn’t it? And yet, though skeptical by nature, I’m inclined to put a degree of faith in it. It’s now 38 years since Ricky and I came out into that sundrenched glade and I still can recollect perfectly how the force that existed there grabbed at me with a power and malevolence that, given the case of another man, one unlucky in his life and especially unlucky in the way fate had placed him in close proximity to it, might easily have driven him into a dark frenzy of murder and suicide. John Broome’s memoir will continue next issue.

JACK KIRBY’S DINGBAT LOVE

In cooperation with DC COMICS, TwoMorrows compiles a tempestuous trio of never-seen 1970s Kirby projects! These are the final complete, unpublished Jack Kirby stories in existence, presented here for the first time! Included are: Two unused DINGBATS OF DANGER STREET tales (Kirby’s final Kid Gang group, inked by MIKE ROYER and D. BRUCE BERRY, and newly colored for this book)! TRUE-LIFE DIVORCE, the abandoned newsstand magazine that was too hot for its time (reproduced from Jack’s pencil art—and as a bonus, we’ve commissioned MIKE ROYER to ink one of the stories)! And SOUL LOVE, the unseen ’70s romance book so funky, even a jive turkey will dig the unretouched inks by VINCE COLLETTA and TONY DeZUNIGA. PLUS: There’s Kirby historian JOHN MORROW’s in-depth examination of why these projects got left back, concept art and uninked pencils from DINGBATS, and a Foreword and Introduction by ’70s Kirby assistants MARK EVANIER and STEVE SHERMAN! (176-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $43.95 • (Digital Edition) $14.99 • ISBN: 978-1-60549-091-5

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Holy backstage pass! See rare, behind-thescenes photos of many of your favorite Sixties TV shows! Plus: an unpublished interview with Green Hornet VAN WILLIAMS, Bigfoot on Saturday morning television, TV’s Zoorama and the San Diego Zoo, The Saint, the lean years of Star Trek fandom, the WrestleFest video game, TV tie-in toys no kid would want, and more fun, fab features!

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The Original WOLVERINE Sketches—Revisited A Brief Reunion In Art—When 2020 Met 1974 by John “The Mego Stretch Hulk” Cimino

n 1974, it occurred to Marvel editor-inchief Roy Thomas that probably something like 5% or so of Marvel’s readers lived in Canada, so it seemed well past time that there should be a Canadian super-hero in a Marvel comic. And why not base that character on a tough and fearsome Canadian animal? Roy briefly considered the name The Badger, but the connotations of the word “badger” included pestering, bothering... i.e., being annoying. While a wolverine was not only a fierce little beast that was known to attack animals far larger than itself—its name also was close to the word “wolf,” and thus a much more dramatic word than “badger.” So “Wolverine” it was! So Roy called in Signing Bonus Incredible Hulk writer Len Wein and directed him to (Left to right:) Wolverine co-creator Roy Thomas, his manager John Cimino, and sketch(es) owner Vince Olivia pose with the framed John Romita concept drawings for the hero/villain, done in advance of the character’s debut at the introduce a Wolverine “villain” end of Incredible Hulk #180 (Oct. 1974). The setting was the headquarters of the Certified Guaranty Company in in that mag’s next issue. The Sarasota, Florida, where Roy had driven so he could sign a couple of thousand vintage comics sent in by fans. character was to be Canadian… Photo by Jon Bolerjack. also short, and fearsomely bad-tempered like his bestial introductory panel is based closely on Romita’s original design namesake. While Len was sketch for the character. working on the synopsis for the story, art director John Romita was asked to design the character, which he did with little or no input And where has Jazzy Johnny’s original sketch (actually a pair from Roy or Len. Len’s plot was soon given to regular Hulk penciler of sketches) been hiding? Herb Trimpe, and “The Wolverine” made his debut in the final panel of issue #180, leading into a full-fledged tale in the following On December 16, 2020, Roy was doing a special in-house issue… thus birthing one of the greatest and most popular comics signing at the headquarters of the CGC (Certified Guaranty characters ever created. An evolution Roy is still astonished by to Company) in Sarasota, Florida, when collector Vince Olivia brought this very day. in those very pieces and asked Roy to sign them. Vince originally bought the two-piece set from John Romita himself for a mere $100 Well, astonished or not, Wolverine is a hot commodity in in the mid-‘80s; but John decided that price was a little low and, the world of collectibles. The original art for the final page of The a couple of days later, asked for an additional $200 for it. Vincent Incredible Hulk #180, which features the first published appearance gladly paid both times. Today, I would estimate the value of the of Wolverine, sold for $657,250 in 2014, through Heritage Art two-sketch set could reach anywhere from $400,000 to $1,000,000 on Auctions. It should be noted that Wolverine’s pose in that final auction.

A Brief Reunion In Art—When 2020 Met 1974

Roy doesn’t specifically recall seeing these two sketches back in the day, as he was overseeing so many other projects; but he must have given his approval, since Stan Lee never got involved at that time. (After all, the mere introduction of a new Hulk foe wouldn’t have required the publisher’s approval.) Regardless, it was an incredible moment to be there and witness, and I’m sure somewhere in the ether Len and Herb were smiling along with everyone that was there as Roy signed both sheets. Roy—and surely Vince Olivia—were only sorry that Len and Herb weren’t around in the flesh to add their signatures as well.

Len Wein

John Romita

circa 1981. Photo courtesy of Bob Bailey.

From the 1975 Marvel Con Program Book.

John Cimino is a Silver and Bronze Age comic, cartoon, and memorabilia expert who contributes articles to TwoMorrows Publishing’s Alter Ego, RetroFan, The Jack Kirby Collector, and Back Issue. He runs The Roy Thomas Appreciation Board on Facebook and, though living in the Boston area, likes to drag Roy and Dann Thomas away from their daily chores on their South Carolina farm to comics conventions near you. Check out John’s blog at Hero-Envy.blogspot.com, e-mail him at johnstretch@live.com, or follow him on Instagram at megostretchhulk, because he likes the attention.

This Could Be The Start Of Something Big! (Left:) John Romita’s framed concept artwork for Wolverine, drawn circa spring of 1974, just after being additionally signed in 2020 by co-creator Roy Thomas. Courtesy of artwork owner Vince Olivia. (Above:) Penciler Herb Trimpe in 2014, holding up the original art (inked by Jack Abel) for the final story page of The Incredible Hulk #180, which had just been sold through Heritage Art Auctions for $500,000 (the auction house’s “hammer price” paid by the buyer was actually $675,250). Herb, sadly, passed away the following year. Photo by Jon Bolerjack. [TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.]

The Original Wolverine Sketches—Revisited

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

Sign Of The Times Roy puts his John Hancock on the second of the two concept sketches, while John Cimino jokingly imitates the infamous (and perhaps misunderstood) comics-convention photo that purported to show one of Stan Lee’s later handlers telling The Man how to spell his name as he signed a comicbook. Photo by Jon Bolerjack.

A pencil sketch of the original Captain Marvel, drawn by C.C. Beck for fan Gary Brown at the Palm Beach Con in 1975, [Shazam hero TM & © DC Comics.]

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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!

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!

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ALTER EGO #167

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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!

Salute to Golden & Silver Age artist SYD SHORES as he’s remembered by daughter NANCY SHORES KARLEBACH, fellow artist ALLEN BELLMAN, DR. MICHAEL J. VASSALLO, and interviewer RICHARD ARNDT. Plus: mid-1940s “Green Turtle” artist/creator CHU HING profiled by ALEX JAY, JOHN BROOME, MICHAEL T. GILBERT and Mr. Monster on MORT WEISINGER Part Two, and more!

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 HIGGERSON 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!

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PAUL GUSTAVSON—Golden Age artist of The Angel, Fantom of the Fair, Arrow, Human Bomb, Jester, Plastic Man, Alias the Spider, Quicksilver, Rusty Ryan, Midnight, and others—is remembered by son TERRY GUSTAFSON, who talks in-depth to RICHARD ARNDT. Lots of lush comic art from Centaur, Timely, and (especially) Quality! Plus—FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT, JOHN BROOME, and more!

ALFREDO ALCALA is celebrated for his dreamscape work on Savage Sword of Conan and other work for Marvel, DC, and Warren, as well as his own barbarian creation Voltar, as RICH ARNDT interviews his sons Alfred and Christian! Also: FCA (Fawcett Collectors of America), MICHAEL T. GILBERT in Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt, PETER NORMANTON’s horror history From The Tomb, JOHN BROOME, and more!

BLACK HEROES IN U.S. COMICS! Awesome overview by BARRY PEARL, from Voodah to Black Panther and beyond! Interview with DR. WILLIAM FOSTER III (author of Looking for a Face Like Mine!), art/artifacts by BAKER, GRAHAM, McDUFFIE, COWAN, GREENE, HERRIMAN, JONES, ORMES, STELFREEZE, BARREAUX, STONER—plus FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT, and more! Edited by ROY THOMAS.

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(Above:) “Julius Caesar!” splash page from Mad #17 (Sep. 1954). Script by Harvey Kurtzman; art by Wallace Wood. [TM & © EC Publications, Inc.]

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

Don’t Get Mad… Get Angry! (Part 2) by Michael T. Gilbert

ast issue we reprinted a two-page magazine article from Mad #41 (Sept. 1958), purporting to instruct its competitors how do a better job stealing ideas from Mad. The response from the Mad imitators was, as expected, swift and vicious. Since we at Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt love “swift and vicious,” we’ve gathered more examples for your viewing pleasure!

The Horror! The Horror! For instance, how about “The Horrible Comic Story behind the Horror Story Comic Books!” from Whitestone Publications’ Lunatickle #2 (April 1956). This bizarre ten-pager was published by notorious schlockmeister Myron Fass, and drawn in a pseudo-Jack Davis style by the talented Lee Elias. Elias knew the subject well, having drawn some of the most gruesome horror covers in the early ’50s for Harvey Publications. Fass’s “Horrible Comic Story” wasn’t written in reaction to that specific Mad article, but does give an idea of how some rival publishers viewed Mad publisher Bill Gaines even before that. The story purports to tell the sordid story of ECHH Publications and their publisher, Samuel Grisly (maestro of horror comics!). As the story begins, sales for Grisly’s horror books are down the tubes, and he briefly considers jumping off a roof. Instead, Sam and his freelancers create horror comics on steroids… comics too horrible to even imagine! Naturally they start selling like hotcakes and their competitors take note, converting love and super-hero comics into horror comics. Cops and Robbers becomes Corpse Robbers, Sports Comics becomes The Corpse Vomits, Captain Quicktime (resembling the Golden Age Flash!) becomes Trapped In Quicklime! and so on. EC had actually done something similar, changing its lone super-hero title, Moon Girl and The Prince first into

(Above:) A fine selection of comic titles recently converted to horror comics! From Lunatickle #2 (April 1956). Art by Lee Elias; script by Jack Mendelsohn. [© Whitestone Publishing].

Moon Girl, then into Moon Girl Fights Crime (a crime comic), and finally into a love title, A Moon, A Girl…Romance! In our story art imitates life as the horror glut leads to a political lynching, led by Senator Egbert Keepoffer (aka Senator Estes Kefauver, who skewered Gaines when the publisher testified before the United States Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency in 1954). The story also included “expert” testimony by “Dr. Frederik Von Werthless,” clearly a parody of Dr. Fredric Wertham, who never met a comicbook he didn’t hate. At story’s end the verdict is clear, as the Senate committee gleefully tortures poor Sam Grisly in a pot of boiling water. Not too far from what really happened back then! The story was likely in part payback for Gaines’ creating the horror comics that led to the detested Comics Code, as well as his disastrous Senate testimony that subsequently brought the comics industry to the brink of collapse.

(Below:) “Famous Viennese psychiatrist” Doctor Frederick Von Werthless, from Lunatickle #2 (April 1956). Art by Lee Elias; script by Jack Mendelsohn. [© Whitestone Publishing].

(Above:) This panel from Myron Fass’s Lunatickle #2 lampoons Bill Gaines as Sam Grisly, and mentions his nemesis, Dr. F. Werthless. Wonder if he might have been referring to Dr. Fredric Wertham? Art by Lee Elias; script by Jack Mendelsohn. [© Whitestone Publishing].

Don’t Get Mad... Get Angry! (Part 2)

The script was by Jack Mendelsohn, who knew his subject well, having written stories for EC’s Mad imitation, Panic, and later for Mad magazine itself. I guess the Mad guys could take a joke. Or else they forgot who wrote the furshlugginer story!

Crybabies and Copycats! Another bone of contention was the fact that Mad’s copycats were called out by Mad (accurately!) for being cheap imitations of the magazine. Thimk magazine #4 accused Mad (also accurately!) of being similarly guilty. The issue also included a picture of an imitation Mad cover (changing the title Mad to Angry). A line of type covers a picture of Alfred E. Neuman holding a baby rattle that proclaims this to be a “Special Crybaby Issue.” Under the title “How to Put Out an Imitation of Angry the Sorehead Magazine,” Thimk had a point by point rebuttal of Mad’s attack, using the same format. Point one stated:

Point eight was even more barbed: “SELF-PITY. Accuse your competition of wanting to make money, implying that yours is a non-profit corporation contributing its services free of charge to the betterment of humanity. Refer tearfully to your “six years of hard work building a reputation in the humor and satire field.” Do not mention the fact that the editor who got the whole thing going has long since left your payroll.” That, of course, was a reference to Mad creator Harvey Kurtzman. In a similar vein (as opposed to “Humor in a Jugular Vein!”), the second issue of Satire Publications’ Loco Magazine (Oct. 1958) printed a two-page “Temper Tantrum Section,” bringing Mad to task for daring to call them (still accurately!) copycats. Their introductory comments made their intentions quite clear. “In a recent magazine article, one of our competitors got mad. The point they tried to bring out in their article was that it is a mean and nasty thing to try to compete with them in the satirical

“TITLE. if you want to do an imitation of “Angry,” you will have to have a title with a similar meaning. “Saturday Evening Post” might be a good choice, since it resembles “Angry” about as much as “Thimk” resembles “Mad.” Ha!

Double Trouble! When Mad attacked its imitators, one of them, Thimk, struck back, accusing them of copying, too. Thimk argued that Mad falsely claimed that ”…the satirical magazine is entirely your invention despite the fact that this type of publication was very big back in the 1920s.” Judging by the strip on the left from Cartoons Magazine, Vol. 20, #3 (Sept. 1921) by Al Zere ––predating Mad’s ubiquitous “Scenes We’d Like To See” feature by a few decades –– Thimk had a point! From Mad #29 (Sept. 1956), with art by Frank Interlandi. [TM & © EC Publications, Inc., & the respective copyright holders].

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

magazine field. The point they tried to bring out was that they should be the exclusive publishers of satirical material. But mainly the point they brought out was that all the other magazines in this field are really cutting into their sales as they try to make a super-duper fortune with such informative articles as how to be a… COPY-CAT!” Apparently, Loco’s clever cloning tactics didn’t work as well as they hoped. Within three issues the magazine was but a memory. Thimk lasted a marginally more impressive six.

Citizen Gaines! When it came to slagging Mad, we saved the best for last. During the early Kurtzman years, Mad had been a consistent humor innovator. By 1971 the magazine was just…consistent. Throughout the ’60s, under the direction of editor Al Feldstein, Mad was a runaway sales success. And with such success comes complacency. Like a warm McDonald’s burger, there was a comforting sameness to the product. Pick up Mad and you always knew you’d find Dave Berg’s “The Lighter Side of…,” Don Martin’s goofy cartoons, a beautifully-illustrated Mort Drucker movie parody and so on. Meanwhile, in the humor field, National Lampoon was the brash new kid on the block, specializing in nihilistic humor. Many of their contributors grew up reading the early Harvey Kurtzman Mad comics, either in the original printings or in the many paperback reprints. To those fans-turned-pros, the current Mad was bland porridge indeed! They demonstrated that in the November 1971 issue of Natlamp (#20) with a devastating lampoon of the Feldstein-era Mad. Under a John Romita faux Mad cover depicting a queasy Alfred E. Neuman, their contempt was palpable. First there was a knockoff of “Scenes We’d Like to See,” illustrated by Mad and former Panic artist Joe Orlando (the traitor!) The issue also included lampoons like “The Lighter Side of Dave Berg,” while another spoofed Mad’s predictably fawning letter pages. Ralph Reese was there, too, parodying one of Al Jaffee’s classic Mad “Fold-ins,” with a dead-on Wally Wood imitation. But they saved their most savage barbs for “Citizen Gaines,” written by John Boni and illustrated in classic Mort Drucker style by Ernie Colón. Employing the same narrative structure as Orson Welles’ classic movie Citizen Kane, we flash back to the early years of Mad, when a young Bill Gaines and Harvey Kurtzman sign a “Declaration of Principle,” making “satire” sacrosanct. In the course of the story, Gaines is portrayed as selling out those sacred principles one at a time… and adult satire with it (as Kurtzman fades into oblivion). It was a stinging piece, written by someone who obviously knew all the (Bottom of this and next page:) Loco Magazine #2 (Oct. 1958) featured their scathing “How To Be A Copycat” article. Bill Everett may have drawn it. [© the respective copyright holders].

Rain or Shine, Always Copy! Left, Kelly Freas’ cover to Mad #43 (Dec. 1958), next to John Severin’s version for Cracked #28 (Feb. 1963) on right. [TM & © EC Publications, Inc., & the respective copyright holders]

Don’t Get Mad... Get Angry! (Part 2)

(Above, Left To Right:) Angry Magazine from Thimk #4 (Dec. 1958), Sad Magazine from Frantic #2 (Dec 1958) and finally Bad Magazine –– a particularly inept Mad parody from the August 1964 issue of Esquire. What were they thimking? [© the respective copyright holders.]

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

inside dirt at EC. I’m not aware if Gaines or Feldstein (who was also briefly mentioned in the story) had any comments on it. Still, it had to hurt. Of course, Mad had the last laugh. Fifty years after that notorious parody, Mad is still publishing (reprints, at least!), while the National Lampoon, (which folded in 1998), didn’t even make it to the 21st century. There must be a lesson there…somewhere! If any of you schmendricks find it, let me know… ‘Till next time…

What, Me Funny? “Jazzy” Johnny Romita executed this faux Mad cover for National Lampoon’s Mad parody for their Nov. 1971 issue. Nicely done, but was former Mad cover artist Kelly Freas (my favorite!) busy that month? [© National Lampoon, Inc., or successors in interest.]

(Left:) Harvey Kurtzman, Bill Gaines, and even Wally Wood appear in the “Citizen Gaines” parody of Mad from National Lampoon #20 (Nov. 1971). Script by John Boni; art by Ernie Colón. [© National Lampoon, Inc., or successors in interest.]

by Peter Normanton

he hangman’s noose, the axeman’s block, Madame Guillotine, Old Smokey: their very mention is likely to arouse a whole host of emotions, every once in a while bordering on the extreme. Even supposing our liberal views, when so impassioned, how long would it be before we too threw the switch?

Fear not, for we are not here to debate the morality of the death sentence in modern-day society; rather, the next few pages will tread that dark corridor to uncover the odious glee relished by the horror comics of 70 years past in their sentencing of the condemned to a most unceremonious demise, invariably graphic in the finality of its display. In researching this piece, I was surprised to learn the United States remains the only country listed amongst the Western democracies to advocate the use of capital punishment in certain of its states, the governing institutions across western Europe having taken measures to abolish the practice towards the end of the last century. However, during the early 1950s, such harrowing decrees were commonplace amongst each and every one of these nations, making them fair game for the unscrupulous publishers of those disreputable horror comics. Let’s go back a few years further, for execution scenes were not the sole reserve of the crime and horror comics proliferating the newsstands of the late 1940s and early ’50s. These torturous spectacles were occasionally evidenced during the celebrated Golden Age of Comics. It’s hard to deny the notoriety of MLJ’s Hangman Comics, a title which left nothing to the imagination. From the covers you will see accompanying this piece, Hangman Comics was explicit in its exploitation of this form of punishment, as was its predecessor Special Comics.

From The Tomb

Timely were known to dabble with the execution-styled motif, with the cover to Marvel Mystery Comics #55 immediately springing to mind. When citing Timely Comics, we should remember they had Alex Schomburg at their behest, an artist whose bizarre sense of design could conceive the most elaborate ways of torment, before swiftly disposing of those who had fallen into his path. The potency in these images would be the precursor to the excess that followed, as this war-torn decade rolled into the four-coloured horrors of the next. Crime made a quite significant mark on the world of comicbook publishing during the 1940s, led by Lev Gleason’s Crime Does Not Pay. This title briefly flirted with electrocution covers not long after the war, as did Magazine Enterprises’ Manhunt and Prize’s Justice Traps the Guilty. Readers would have to wait until the autumn of 1953 for Justice Traps the Guilty #57 to showcase a true rarity—the suffocating terror of the gas chamber. In reality, such covers were few and far between. These comics were more inclined towards the violence dispensed by the genre’s ruthless scions of criminality. However, it wasn’t unusual for the denouements within to contain an unsettling reminder as to the day when judgment was finally pronounced. Such scenes were invariably short-lived, unlike those now spilling forth from the dreaded horror comic. Of all these terrifying titles, it was those published by EC Comics, a company which from humble origins had prospered to become one of the most impressive enterprises of the day, while simultaneously earning themselves a reputation for shameless audacity that set the benchmark. Their staging of these deathly punishments was macabre, pushing the boundaries of acceptability ever further, turning this also-ran outfit of the late 1940s into the one every other publisher took care to maintain a watchful eye for. As early as the summer of 1951, Crime SuspenStories #6 flabbergasted its newfound audience with Johnny Craig’s depiction of a hanged man, recently returned from the dead with but one thing in mind, the unassailable compulsion to seek out retribution. The attendant story “Jury Duty,” introduced by the Old Witch and ably abetted by her accomplice at the drawing board, one Ghastly Graham Ingels, was a characteristically grisly affair, its hideous narrative redolent of the Haunt of Fear. The Old Witch disclosed the tale of Peter Kardoff, a man who, having survived the gallows, forthwith sought to

Getting It In The Neck Whether it was death by hanging, the guillotine, or the dreaded electric chair, comicbook publishers couldn’t resist snuffing out a life or three, as evidenced by these covers: Timely’s Marvel Mystery Comics #55 (May 1944; art by Alex Schomburg)… Et-Es-Go’s Suspense Comics #12 (Sept. ’46; art by L.B. Cole)… EC’s Crime SuspenStories #6 (Aug.-Sept. ’51; art by Johnny Craig). No less grisly were stories in the latter issue by writers Bill Gaines & Al Feldstein & artist Graham Ingels, or in Tales from the Crypt #27 (Dec. ’51-Jan. ’52; script & art by the same team) and “The Hangman” in MLJ’s Special Comics #1-and-only, produced for Winter 1941, with art by Harry Lucey; writer unknown. [MMC cover TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.; EC covers & interiors TM & © William M. Gaines Agent, Inc.; Special Comics TM & © Archie Comic Publications, Inc.; other art © the respective copyright holders.]

Execution: Pre-Code Style

exact his revenge on those who had previously wronged him. Johnny Craig’s fascination with the hangman’s noose would see him return just a few years later to create the infamous head shot for Crime SuspenStories #20, a close-up of which appears at the introduction to this piece. Strangely, this time there was no obvious supporting story, an omission which continues to rankle, but the cover was designed to shock, and shock it most certainly did, making it one of the most desirable issues in comicbook history. As the shock waves diminished, Craig produced another hanging image for the cover to Vault of Horror #37 (see p. 72); but this was not just any death scene. His portrait is remembered for its stark exposition, the like of which has never since been repeated. Inasmuch as it was not strictly an execution, this remains a deeply haunting image. The air permeating this scene is unduly morose, imparting a sense of a man forsaken, left alone to die. The depth abounding in this illustration is distanced from the sensationalism attributed to so many of the covers of the period. Unfortunately for Johnny, the anti-comicbook crusade didn’t see it this way; his perturbing creativity was later singled out in the Senate Subcommittee Hearings on Juvenile Delinquency. Al Williamson and Angelo Torres would assume a more subdued approach when they guested as the art team for “Take Care,” the tale ushered in by John’s distressing cover. Despite their delineation of the death scene being mellow by comparison to the cover, it was nonetheless sinister, enhancing what was an atmospherically paced narration. That same issue gave those with a hankering for the execution-styled story one

Let Me Count The Ways… (From top right of page:) Similarly, the covers of MLJ’s Hangman Comics #2 (Spring 1942; art by Harry Lucey) & #8 (Fall ’43; art by Bob Fujitani) and Special Comics #1 (Lucey)… Lev Gleason’s Crime Does Not Pay #42 & 47 (Nov. 45 & Sept. ’46; art by Charles Biro)… and Timely’s All-True Crime Cases #27 (April ’48; penciler unknown, inks by Vince Alascia) all revelled in the terror faced by those forced to face their unholy destiny. [Covers TM & © respectively by Archie Comic Publications, Inc., the respective copyright holders, & Marvel Characters, Inc.]

From The Tomb

called “Chop Talk,” embellished by the darkly humorous brush strokes of Jack Davis. In this instance we were presented with a wretched soul thrown to the mercy of the executioner’s blade, forced to pay for his heinous crime over and over again. The axeman’s blade came down once again in Graham Ingels’ cover to the infamous Haunt of Fear #19 (see far left, top); on this occasion a double-bladed appliance had been selected to dispatch of the ill-fated. On this stage there could be no room for error, for the slightest miscalculation could have turned this into a blood-splattered frenzy, adding to the iniquity since cast upon this issue. Its notoriety was derived principally from Al Feldstein’s frightful “Foul Play,” illustrated by Jack Davis, but Graham’s cover would have raised the concern of many a well-meaning parent. The story inspired by Ghastly’s cover was a light-hearted jaunt, illustrated by Jack Kamen… light- hearted until the axeman’s blade was seen to fall at the finale. Jack Davis’ artistry has become synonymous with the covers to the later issues of Tales from the Crypt. He was on hand for issue #31, threatening with the axeman’s express style of execution; however, circumstance dictated this miserable fellow be prepared to have no more than his hands lopped off. Not so on the covers to issues #27, illustrated by Wally Wood, and #44, again by Jack Davis, with Madame Guillotine now in evidence. “Horror! Head It… Off” was earmarked as the climax to Tales from the Crypt #27, as ever rendered by Graham Ingels. This telling escorted its eager readers to the darkness that befell Paris in 1792, where the guillotine was plying its trade in the tumult of revolutionary France. Graham’s splash for this Bill Gaines/ Al Feldstein collaboration was indeed gruesome, but the next few pages were surprisingly devoid of the company’s customary proclivity for blood. The same could not be said of issue #44’s “The Sliceman Cometh,” scripted by Carl Wessler and again rendered by Ingels; this executioner was having great difficulty in escaping his own brother’s head. EC may have set the standard, but it was Timely/Atlas that introduced an element of historical fact into their tales of the French Revolution, notably “The Executioner,” in the pages of Adventures

Three Chops & A Noose (Top of page:) EC Comics had an uncanny knack for these execution-style covers, with artists Graham Ingels, Johnny Craig, Wally Wood, and Jack Davis (respectively) each relishing his own particular take on this unsettling phenomenon—as per the covers of Haunt of Fear #19 (May-June ’53), Vault of Horror #37 (June-July ’54), and Tales from the Crypt #27 (Dec. ’51-Jan. ’52) & #44 (Oct.- Nov. ’54). [TM & © William M. Gaines Agent, Inc.]

Execution: Pre-Code Style

into Terror #16, illustrated by Vic Dowling, whose time in comics dated back to the 1930s, with the inks for this piece supplied by Bob Stuart. There was considerable emphasis placed on the image of the gallows in the opening splash, but the focus of this tale was Tourneau, the Chief Executioner to the ill-starred Louis XVI, and his search for a swifter means of expediting those who had already been accused. A decapitating machine, designed by one Doctor Guilllotine, would effectively satisfy his quest, while paradoxically becoming his undoing. History remembers the physician Joseph Ignace Guillotine as the man whose proposal it was to introduce this device, despite his misgivings as to the ethics pertaining to the death sentence. He was later incarcerated during the Reign of Terror, before being granted an amnesty following Robespierre’s fall from grace. I have yet to find a pre-Code horror comic that credits the true inventors of the prototype for this ghastly device as German engineer Tobias Schmidt and Antoine Louis, who also practised as a physician. If you will pardon the pun, Atlas were now on a roll, following two issues later with Adventures into Terror #18’s bizarre “Don’t Lose Your Head,” startling its readers from the outset with a graphic guillotine splash now attributed to the assured penmanship of John Buscema. In the past, Stan Lee has been candid about his emulation of EC’s fare, as evidenced in Atlas’s penchant for mock humour on so many of their horrorrelated covers. When Bill Everett was handed the idea for a cover, you could almost guarantee a good helping of twisted jocularity; a striking example can be seen with the decapitated head fronting Strange Tales #16 (see p. 74). If you enjoy your black comedy, the accompanying story “You Can’t Kill Me,” ever so exquisitely rendered by Harry Anderson, won’t let you down. It didn’t end here. Astonishing #34 ran with an explicit guillotine cover from the diabolical imaginings of Joe Maneely, then supplemented the debauchery with “Heads Will Roll,” the tale of Andre Bottel, the executioner who, like so many of his kind, enjoyed his bloodthirsty work just a little too much, so much so that he embarked on a killing spree, leaving innocent men to fall victim to his beloved guillotine. That is, until his wife was found guilty of one of his sanguinary misdemeanours. It is worth noting that this same story title had been used a few months before, in Adventures into Weird Worlds #28. On this occasion, Paul Reinman was at the drawing board to render a hideous tale set in the London of 1591, where

Don’t Lose Your Head Later artistic star John Buscema had been a regular with the Timely/Atlas (future Marvel) line for only five years when he drew the above splash for that company’s Adventures into Weird Worlds #18, dated May ’53. [TM & © by Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Heads Up—And Maybe Off! With a mind to selling their wares, several publishers opted to go that one step further in their approach to execution covers. Running across the bottom of this & the preceding page: Timely/Atlas’ Astonishing Tales #34 (Aug. ’54; art by Joe Maneely), Charlton’s Strange Suspense Stories #19 (July ’54; Steve Ditko), Quality’s Web of Evil #5 (July ’53; pencils by Jack Cole), Black Cat Mystery #39 (Sept. ’52; Lee Elias), and Horrific #7 (Sept. ’53; Don Heck) would have had the kiddies readily handing over their pocket money. [TM & © by Marvel Characters, Inc. & the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

From The Tomb

his chilling brush strokes revealed him to be a horror artist of exceptional repute. In these pages, the heads of traitors were exhibited on pikes along London Bridge, an unseemly pageant if ever there was one. Even more so when they were heard to whisper, making accusations about their executioner. Joe Maneely’s cover to Astonishing #34 is considered a classic of its kind in its capture of that moment of execution in close-up, much like Johnny Craig’s image for Crime SuspenStories #20. Both Maneely and Craig had set out to shock their readers into buying these particular comics, and as history has shown they duly succeeded. Lee Elias had similar success back in the summer of 1952 with his excruciating witch hanging for the cover of Black Cat Mystery #39. If you are even vaguely familiar with Comic Media’s terrors, it will come as no surprise to learn Don Heck couldn’t resist including an agonising snap shot of the guillotine for Horrific #7 as part his infamous series of head covers. “Hangman’s Horror” made it to the cover of Quality’s Web of Evil #2 later on in 1952, albeit cleverly disguised to allay any would-be critics. Jack Cole complemented this image with nine pages of his acclaimed artistry, which lived up to everything you could ever wish of a pre-Code horror comic. Issue #5 of this title followed just a few months later with an insane electrocution cover rendered by Cole, rivalled only by Steve Ditko’s searing image fronting Charlton’s Strange Suspense Stories #19. These lurid covers were meant to have a dramatic impact, carrying with them a guarantee they stood out when placed next to those of their competitors on the shelves at the corner store. However, they could also attract the wrong kind of attention, prompting the well-intentioned to pry where they weren’t wanted. Strangely, one of the greatest mimics of the EC horror line, Harvey Comics, could lay claim to only one electrocution cover: the frenzied scene created for Black Cat Mystery #33, the intensity of which was probably just enough for many casual onlookers. Tomb of Terror #10 menaced with the noose, but the verdict to the story “The Trial” bequeathed a form of capital punishment beyond the ken of mortal man. Harvey’s lust for horror lay in so many areas; capital punishment apparently wasn’t one of them. Insofar as Atlas had made an effort to insert an aspect of historical accuracy into their tale of the guillotine, Ace’s approach in Hand of Fate #18’s “The Spectral Executioner,” set in the Poland of 1848, was somewhat dubious. The background to this piece rested with the country’s rebellion against its Russian oppressors, quite topical given the western world’s mistrust of the Soviet Union at the time of publication. In truth, the uprising in the spring of 1848 was a doomed show of force against Prussian rule. Having captured Paulus, the leader of the Polish underground, Colonel Ivan Deltchev, the head of Russia’s military police, prepared for his interrogation in the confines of his torture chamber, with the specific intention of destroying those who supported this thriving underground movement. The panels depicting Paulus’ mutilation were unusually severe for an Ace title, having more in common with certain of the company’s more bloodthirsty rivals. However, hanging scenes were no strangers to Hand of Fate, with the covers to issues #13, #24, and #25 running with a series of harrowing depictions, alas, not one of them followed with a suitably fitting story. When a hanging story appeared in The Beyond #10—“The Spell of the Hanging Tree”—the critical scene was somewhat fleeting. The events therein were primarily concerned with the creation of a violin from the bark of this deathly tree to assist in the conjuring of a hanged man to a new semblance of life, returned in the guise of a ravenous werewolf. Voodoo #13’s “Gallows’ Curse” adopted a similar theme, but these gallows were chopped down to give birth to an evil marionette, one with an uncanny likeness to the last man to ascend the scaffold in this foul locale. These are but some of the pre-Code tales conceived to illustrate the anguish of the execution. Be warned, for there are countless others still waiting to be discovered in the pages of the horror comics from this dark epoch. Such was their allure that they would sentence the four-coloured terrors of this remarkable era in comicbook publishing to an ungracious demise, spelling the end for the hangman’s noose and its pernicious ilk. Long before comicbooks popularised these terrors, executions had been carried out far from public view. The fairground attraction of the gallows had been outlawed in Britain by the Capital Punishment Amendment Act of 1868, with the last public hanging in the United States having taken place in 1936, consequent to the introduction of the electric chair. To have observed such propriety was not the way of the horror comics. They insisted the kiddies come face to face with these atrocities, staring the victim right in the eye, mere seconds before they went to meet their maker. The fervour surrounding these murderous portrayals was insane, paralleling the lunatic furor running rife amid the public hangings of the previous century. Curiously, the Comics Code would put an end to the death sentence in the much-maligned comicbook in November of 1954, a considerable length of time before the governments of the Western democracies ventured to follow suit.

Death Be Not Proud (From top of page:) The gas chamber scene from Prize’s Justice Traps the Guilty #57 (Dec. ’53; art by Marvin Stein) was truly disturbing—while artist Harry Anderson preferred to go with his own macabre mirth on his cover for Timely/Atlas’ Strange Tales #16 (March ’53)—and Quality’s Web of Evil #2 (Jan. ’53) fronted another shocker—though this time by an unidentified artist! [Strange Tales cover TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc.; other covers TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]

In Memoriam

Richard Corben (Oct. 1, 1940 – Dec. 2, 2020)

“A Sweet And Generous Soul” by Stephan Friedt

ichard Corben was born on his parents’ farm in Anderson, Missouri, and grew up in Kansas. Starting at an early age, he drew comics and dabbled in animation, He would go on to earn a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the Kansas City Art Institute in 1965, while he was also training and competing in bodybuilding, which he would later drop to devote himself to art. He started in animation, dabbling in underground comix, providing art for several science-fiction titles like Grim Wit, Slow Death, Skull, and his own Fantagor. In 1970, he graced the pages of Warren magazines Creepy, Eerie, Vampirella, 1984, and Comix International with artwork and flexed his coloring skills in issues of The Spirit.

Richard Corben and a dynamic poster featuring his adventure hero Den. The latter courtesy of Heritage Art Auctions. [© Estate of Richard Corben or successors in interest.]

In 1975 he submitted work to the new French magazine Metal Hurlant, which started his run of stories in the American version, Heavy Metal… including “Den,” which would lead to the section of the Heavy Metal Movie highlighting his character. In 1976 he created the artwork for a groundbreaking graphic novel, Bloodstar, adapted from a Robert E. Howard short story. He would establish his own imprint, Fantagor Press, from 1986-1994, where he would reprint and expand upon several of his story lines, including “Den.” Over the years Richard would collaborate with writers such as Bruce Jones, Harlan Ellison, and Jan Strnad. He also provided the cover artwork for comic writer Steve Englehart’s novel The Point Man. He won Shazam fan awards in 1971 and 1973; an assortment of Warren Awards during the mid- to late 1970s; Eisner awards in 2009 and 2011; Ghastly Awards in each year from 2012-2015; and won the prestigious Grand Prix at Angouleme, France in 2018. He was inducted into the Eisner Hall of Fame in 2012. For this tribute, Corben’s longtime collaborator Jan Strnad said of him: “The thing I remember most about Richard was that he loved to laugh. He found amusement in ordinary day-to-day things and in media from the Three Stooges to Monty Python. One of the first illustrations he did for Anomaly—maybe the very first—was a contents page depicting a nude woman atop a wall, dropping a flower pot toward the head of a goofy minstrel. “He and I riffed on Richard’s heroic character Den with the spinoff ‘Denz’ for Penthouse Comics, and Richard alone rendered his own twisted take on Roman mythology, Denaeus, years later. There’s humor in our Mutant World graphic novel, in the short piece we did for Warren Publications, ‘Bowser,’ about a boy and his pet… thing. Richard alone created ‘Mangle, Robot Mangler’ skewering ‘Magnus, Robot Fighter.’ And so very much more. He was a sweet and generous soul.”

In Memoriam

Román Arámbula (1936-2020)

From Guadalajara To Hollywood by Scott Shaw! A/E EDITOR’S NOTE: In lieu of a precise obituary of Romàn Aràmbla, fellow cartoonist Scott Shaw! elected to write a longer, more biographical tribute.

omán Arámbula, the cartoonist best known for—and proudest of—his 15-year stint on King Features’ Mickey Mouse syndicated daily and Sunday comic strip (1975-1990), died following a heart attack on March 19, 2020. He was 83. Arámbula was born in Guadalajara, Mexico, on Sept. 18, 1936. His father was of Basque descent; his mother was from Asturias, also in Spain. He had four brothers and two sisters. Their dad often redrew images from comicbooks to entertain the kids. As a child, Román was transfixed by the animated cartoons of Walt Disney Productions, Tex Avery’s Droopy, and William Hanna & Joseph Barbara’s Tom & Jerry for MGM. He likewise admired the American comicbook artist Will (The Spirit) Eisner and Mexican comicbook creators Germán (Los Supersabios) Butze, caricaturist Antonio Arias Bernal, and Ernest Garcia “The Chango” Cabral. Once, during the 1950s, while studying drawing and fine art at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, Román heard that legendary muralist painter Diego Rivera would be lecturing there. Assuming Rivera would simply spout Communist propaganda,

Román Arámbula and two of his Mickey Mouse dailies from the late ’70s and ’80s. Scripts by either Del Connell or Floyd Norman. Thanks to Scott Shaw! [Strips TM & © Disney.]

Román sat by the door so he could exit any time he’d had enough. But Rivera only discussed art, and in such a vivid way that Arámbula signed up to attend three exclusive lessons by the Master of Murals. Rivera was in ill health, dying only two years later, but he taught Román the value of working quickly and efficiently. Answering a newspaper ad placed by cartoonist Ignacio Palencia, Román became his background assistant for a year. Later he assisted Antonio Gutiérrez. Román drew stories, gag cartoons, and caricatures for a variety of Mexican comicbooks and magazines, eventually working for the comics publisher Editorial Argumentos. For a time he was even employed by a pottery factory, adding his decorative designs to each piece with a few strokes of the brush. His drawing ability was noticed by Richard K. Tompkins, the owner of a local animation studio, Dibujos Animados, who hired him to work on TV commercials despite Román’s complete inexperience in the medium. Within a year, Arámbula joined another local studio, Gamma Productions, which produced animation for American TV cartoon series such as Jay Ward Productions’ Rocky and His Friends and Dudley Do-Right, as well as Total Television’s King Leonardo and Underdog. It was there that Román learned storyboarding, layout, animation, and camera mechanics. He once claimed his personal animation footage record was 700 feet in one week.

“The Mickey Gang” Román Arámbula and other Disney artists associated with Mickey Mouse in the last quarter of the 20th century. Román is seen third from the left. Courtesy of Scott Shaw!

When Gamma finally closed its doors in 1967, Arámbula illustrated several children’s books before being hired by Keitz & Herndon, a small animation studio in Dallas, Texas, and moving to the United States to work on Jot, an animated children’s TV program produced by the Southern Baptist Radio and Television

In Memoriam

Commission as their version of Davey and Goliath. Román also contributed to an educational animated TV special about solar panels on the moon for ABC-TV. He was very proud of this latter project, which required some very time-consuming animation. However, Arámbula didn’t enjoy working in Dallas because of many of the locals’ racist attitudes toward Hispanics. In 1970 he moved his family to Los Angeles, where he soon landed a job drawing layouts for Hanna-Barbera Productions’ Scooby Doo, Where Are You? and Josie and the Pussycats and other series for H-B and Filmation between 1970 and 1974. “In those days,” Román said, “the studio was much like Gamma, with lots of cubicles, lots of artists, and lots of production.” He also found time to animate on H-B’s Charlotte’s Web (1973), plus storyboarding on Sam Singer’s Tubby the Tuba (1975) and boarding/animating the main titles for 1975’s Supercock, a feature live-action film about illegal cockfighting. In 1971, Román began drawing “Donald Duck” comicbook stories, both for Western Publishing (at least eleven “Donald Duck” stories with inker Steve Steere) and for the Walt Disney Company’s “Studio Program,” which oversaw the creation of new material intended solely to sell to their foreign licensees. Yet, after four years, Arámbula was “tired of the rat race in America.” His friend, Belgian cartoonist René Goscinny, offered Román a gig in Paris, working in his Studio Idéfix on the 1976 animated feature The Twelve Tasks of Astérix. But just as the Mexican cartoonist began to get his family all packed up... …he received a job offer he never expected—from the Walt Disney Company. In 1975, Floyd Gottfredson, the artist of King Features’ syndicated Mickey Mouse comic strip for the past 35 years, decided to retire, and Disney needed a reliable replacement—fast! According to Román, his Disney bosses asked him to draw some comic panels... and asked, by the way, whom did he prefer to draw—Mickey or Donald? Without a clue to their intention, Román chose Mickey. He wound up illustrating a script starring The Mouse, which earned management’s praises... and a query as to whether he’d be interested in taking over the daily Mickey Mouse strip? Immediately?? Arámbula instantly accepted. His first Mickey episode appeared in print on November 15, 1975.

starring H-B’s Undercover Elephant, and pieces for the studio’s foreign publishers. I inked most of those; I always dug Román’s bouncy style, not exactly H-B but certainly with a similar vibe. Román was proud that he always met his Mickey Mouse deadlines, so he wasn’t worried about getting busted for taking on additional work. But there were other issues he still had to deal with. A certain degree of resistance to Román being “handed” the Mickey Mouse assignment pervaded the studio. He wasn’t considered a “Disney man,” and he hadn’t done his time “in the barrel” of experience. It wasn’t pleasant for Román, who suspected that racism played a part in his dilemma. Things came to a head in 1987, when his supervisor insisted Arámbula be at work during the next week, even through the 4th of July. When he tried to get a clear reason, Román was accused of being a “troublemaker.” He filed a grievance complaint with the union but soon received a letter from Disney executives, noting that his contract would expire in 1989 and Disney definitely wasn’t interested in renewing it. Since Román was actually far ahead of his deadlines, his final Mickey Mouse strip saw publication on January 6, 1990. Although Román would go on to work on a few of Disney’s animated TV shows in the 1990s, he discovered that he was only allowed to work as a freelancer, because he was still officially blacklisted over the July 4th incident. After Román’s backlog of Mickey Mouse strips ran out in 1990, he returned to the animation industry, mostly storyboarding TV cartoon series for Marvel Productions, Universal Studios, HannaBarbera, DIC, Warner Bros., Wang Film Productions, Hyperion, Film Roman, and Disney, through 1998. After that, he became an animation teacher at Mt. San Antonio College. He also drew a few “Goofy” stories for Disney Comics. In 2011, Román Arámbula sat down for an interview with The Animation Guild, in which he talked about his life and career. You can listen to it at: https://animationguild.org/oral_history/ roman-arambula/ Scott Shaw! is an American cartoonist who has worked extensively in both the animation and comicbook fields, including stretches for Hanna-Barbera Studios and as co-creator of the 1980s DC series Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew!

This was the assignment Román had yearned for his entire life; and for the remainder of it, he regarded his work on the Mickey Mouse comic strip as his proudest achievement. By then, the strip had long since abandoned storylines in favor of self-contained gags. Román penciled and lettered the strip in that same mode. Originally he drew only the daily episodes; the Sunday page was still drawn by Manuel Gonzales until 1981, after which Daan Jippes, Tony Strobl, and Bill Wright took over for a year. From 1983 on, Arámbula drew the Sunday episodes as well. Throughout his run, Román illustrated gags written by Del Connell and, after 1984, Floyd Norman. Among his inkers between 1983-89 were Bill Wright, Bill Langley, Jules Coenen, and Larry Mayer. Román was a longtime member of the Animation Guild, I.A.T.S.E. Local 839, and CAPS (Southern California’s Comic Art Professional Society). In 1984, he received an Inkpot Award, the San Diego Comic-Con’s career recognition award. While working on the Mickey Mouse strip, Román moonlighted on other projects. Mark Evanier, editor of a line of Hanna-Barbera comics for Marvel through the studio, said that “[Arámbula] would draw two weeks’ worth of the strip every other week, and in the weeks he wasn’t working on that, he drew comics for me.” In 1978-79, Román penciled Marvel’s Laff-A-Lympics series, a story

“Arámbula’s Bleakest Cartoon” That’s the appellation Scott Shaw! attached to this private illustration drawn by Arámbula circa 1989, when he was on the verge of leaving the Mickey Mouse strip. [Mickey Mouse TM & © Disney; other art © Estate of Román Arámbula.]

Hi Roy— Hey, you win! Simple as that. No more jokes from me. You are the master of the fan-foto universe! The pic of a barely-out-of-diapers Mike Friedrich sitting on your lap at the 1967 NY Con is absolutely astounding. I bet you have a photo of you and everyone sitting around you that day, just in case they later had a career in comics and eventually did an interview for Alter Ego. You win. It’s impossible for me to milk any more humor out of your photo-à-go-go lifestyle. Hope you’re satisfied. Now a few words about #164: Super-memory, great attitude, and a very likable personality in the A/E spotlight this issue [i.e., Mike Friedrich]. And a surprise ending! Now being a deacon and all. He comes across as a confident professional. Gosh. Carlson-Ghost’s piece is fantastic. The shock of seeing comics I never knew existed and the story behind their existence is impossible to put down. His style of writing is perfect. Along with the facts, he “pops” a teaser line at the end of some paragraphs to almost make it a mystery. Just had to read it complete in one sitting. And the A/E Graphics Dept. complemented this article perfectly. (I do not see a listing for the Graphics Dept. employment, so I will assume it is probably some young kid helping out on weekends. Give him a raise for this one.) Hey, if it’s A/E and “Mr. Monster,” it must be “PAM TIME.” Always interesting to read Pete Morisi’s comments.

ood news and bad: First, what better art spot to start off this letters section than Shane Foley’s homage to the early-1940s “Captain Marvel” work of the great C.C. Beck—as artfully colored by Randy Sargent? Answer: none. So here it is—with our Alter Ego “maskot” standing in for the Big Red Cheese. Thanks again, guys! [Alter Ego hero TM & © Roy & Dann Thomas; costume designed by Ron Harris; other art © Shane Foley.]

Okay, so Shane’s drawing is the good news. Here’s the bad: Somehow, somewhere, between the prepping of last issue’s “re:” section and this one, my (Roy’s) entire manila-folder-full (and I do mean full) of letters and e-mail printouts on A/E #164-170 went AWOL, somewhere in the infinite innards of my office, which basically (with my numerous bookshelves and filing cabinets and three sullen chinchillas named Bram, Lucy, and Snit) makes up the below-ground floor of the Thomas residence. I’m about to begin an autumn cleaning of the whole area, at wife Dann’s “request,” which will probably last into winter, so that file may turn up between now and preparation of A/E #175, but I’m not as hopeful as I could be. Possibly it got accidentally tossed out in some earlier clean-up; if so, that was no easy task, as the folder was well over an inch thick! Meanwhile, I did what I could: I went through the “deleted” files on my PC and scrounged up a number of letters on Alter Ego #164, though I’m positive some eluded me. For one thing, I only ran across one missive related to the lead interview with DC/Marvel/Star*Reach talent Mike Friedrich, and I’m sure there were more. The e-mails I did unearth dealt primarily with the other major piece in the issue, Mark CarlsonGhost’s long study of Rural Home Comics and other bottom-feeding comics publishers during the late World War II years, which I’ve made no bones about considering one of the articles I’m proudest of running in this magazine, both for its scholarship and for its excellent writing. (So naturally I’m chuffed that we’ll have another Carlson-Ghost offering, on The Shadow and other Golden Age comics put out by major pulp-mag company Street & Smith, just two issues from now.) Anyway, here’s our first communication on #164, from regular Bernie Bubnis, and glad to have him!

FCA! Great “cover.” The whimsy of it all is magnetic. And a great article connecting The Shadow to so many diverse personalities. It took me a few years to “get” Kerouac but enjoyed the moments I thought I understood. Returning to his work when I reached my twenties was a pleasure. Loved this piece by Brian Cremins. It made me think of my yesterdays. Especially the pic of Shadow #1, a comicbook Len Wein and I tried to pull out of each other’s hands when we found it—in a cardboard box of comics marked “25 cents” at the Jay Bee Magazine store on 42nd St. and 6th Av, NYC. I “lost” and settled for Zip #1. Roy, we didn’t know we had the world in our hands back then. But I’m glad to have A/E #164 in my hands today! Bernie Bubnis Wish you were accurate, old buddy, in saying that I must have a photo of myself with every comics pro I ever met. Alas, in those days when we didn’t all carry around a camera as part of a pocket phone/computer, most of us only took snapshots on official occasions, or if we happened to be camera buffs (which I wasn’t—and neither were most other comics people I knew). That’s why I have no two-person photos of myself with Jack Kirby, Herb Trimpe, Marie Severin, and so many 1960s and later Bullpenners— not even Stan Lee—let alone DC personnel and others I interacted with. So thank Crom somebody snatched that shot of me with Mike Friedrich, the Romitas, John Verpoorten, Archie Goodwin, and Jim Steranko! Otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to prove I ever even met all those great guys! Next up, another oft-recurring presence on these pages, long-time and erudite comics/science-fiction fan John Benson: Roy, I read Mark Carlson-Ghost’s amazing piece on Rural Home Comics at one sitting with great pleasure. Incredible research, well-written, and profusely illustrated—what a magnificent re-creation of a sleazy era of publishing! I have one comment, about the cover of Toytown Comics #3 on page 54. Circa 1982, Carl Wessler sent me this cover as an example of his art, and I ran it in [my magazine] Squa Tront 9 (page 38). He

re:

Carter, so they will appreciate this look at the inner workings of Rural Home, et al. Michael Sanchez has a near-complete Centaur collection and wrote many articles for Comic Book Marketplace [magazine] back in #8 or thereabouts. Michael has Parkinson’s disease, so another friend, Jeff Kepley, is helping him on a feature about where all the “Little Giant” material came from (it’s all reprints), and also on a timeline/editor/publisher guide to the various transitions from one company to another. They are working to picture every CMC title, I think. Carter said he’d do one or the other piece in one of the semi-annual CBM issues (honestly, I am not very familiar with them). I guess Diamond/Gemstone does one once in a while? I’m impressed to hear [your own high praise] for Mark Carlson-Ghost’s article. He went far beyond what I imagined he would put together. Bud Plant That makes two of us, Bud. I’ll confess that, though the owner of a basically complete set of Comic Book Marketplace issues over its couple of decades of life, I wasn’t aware it was still around in any form, nor what its former editor Gary Carter was up to. Perhaps the current incarnation is a digital one; I don’t generally keep up with those, as I do quite enough reading of text on a PC screen already, thank you very much—but if it’s still around in print in any format, I’ll definitely have to pick it up. And if your friends have any leftover material related to the Golden or Silver Ages, I hope you know where to suggest they might submit it. One correction to the captions I wrote for Mark’s article follows below, from FCA editor P.C. Hamerlinck: Hi Roy,

Repeat, Harlequin, Said The Star*Reach Man! The splash page of Mike Friedrich’s notorious “Harlequin Ellis” story in Justice League of America #89 (May 1971), from his run as only the third regular writer of the landmark series. The final page of this tale was depicted in A/E #164. Art by Dick Dillin & Joe Giella. Thanks to Jim Kealy. [TM & © DC Comics.]

sent the cover only, not the comic, and it was obvious that he had kept it in his files since it was published. At the time, he provided an overview of his career, which I outlined in that same issue. An excerpt: “One of Wessler’s early accounts (starting in 1945) was writing, drawing, and creating characters for ‘animated’ type stories for Rae Herman [at Orbit/Toytown]. One of the features he recalls creating was ‘Upan Atom,’ an atomic-powered baby. ‘I delivered finished jobs—no editor’s approval,’ he says. He also drew covers for their ‘animated’ titles.” You’ll note that the cover in question isn’t signed, and Lenny [L.B.] Cole nearly always signed his covers. Cole may have inked it, but I’d be willing to bet that Wessler drew it. John Benson Good to know, John. Like most fans of the comics of the ’40s and ’50s, I tend to think of Carl Wessler as a writer, period. Interesting to hear that he and frequent cover artist L.B. Cole may have teamed up for that particular cover. Bud Plant, who’s owned and operated a bookselling service for decades, took an interest in references in Mark Carlson-Ghost’s article to the Little Giant comic, and sent this welcome info: Hi Roy— A couple of my buddies are working on the history of Centaur/ Comics Magazine Co./Temerson for a piece or two for Gary

I noticed in Mark Carlson-Ghost’s article, page 37, that the “Captain Truth” story from Gold Medal Comics #1 is not by Mac Raboy. The artwork is by Bob Fujitani. And the GMC cover shown is by John Giunta. However, Fujitani had no involvement with Spark’s Green Lama, so far as I know. It was Harry Anderson who pitched in on GL (issues #3 and 5) when Raboy fell behind on the stories. P.C. Hamerlinck Thanks, P.C.! Although my source for that artwork indicated it was by Raboy, Michael T. Gilbert also informed me that the artist was actually the late great Bob Fujitani. I must be the only editor in that issue who didn’t know the truth about “Captain Truth”! Got any compliments, complaints, or other correspondence you’d like to send our way? We’re a slow-moving target at: Roy Thomas e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com 32 Bluebird Trail St. Matthews, SC 29135 The Alter-Ego-Fans chat group is still going strong at https:// groups.io/g/Alter-Ego-Fans. If you can’t get in to join, just contact moderator Chet Cox at mormonyoyoman@gmail.com and he’ll escort you on board. This discussion group deals with many Golden- and Silver-Age matters, and I both pass on info and plead for help from time to time. If you do Facebook, you might enjoy the Roy Thomas Appreciation Board, named and managed by John Cimino, which is the chief source of info on my comics convention appearances and store signings, as well as sightings at the local Walmart. And it’s “interactive”—whatever that means!

[correspondence, comments, & corrections]

Out-Foxed Again! (Above left:) The cover of this 1944 paper-restrictions-skirting one-shot, All Great Comics, from the infamous publisher Victor Fox, didn’t quite make it into A/E #164. The “Captain Jack Terry” panels Photostatted from inside are by Manson Paddock, “The O’Brine Twins” by Jack Farr—not sure about “Joan Mason,” but, believe it or not, she was a reporter at a newspaper called… The Daily Planet! (Above right) Did we say “one-shot,” boys and girls? In 1945, Fox unleashed a second unnumbered issue, featuring ’statted cover art by E.C. Stoner (“Green Mask”), the O’Brines (Farr), and whoever drew “Joan Mason” and the SF feature “Rick Evans.” These experiments apparently paid off well enough that, in 1946, Fox went for a three-issue series of All Great… numbered #1, #14, & #13, in that order, if the Grand Comics Database is right. We did tell you that Victor Fox was “infamous,” didn’t we? Thanks to Chet Cox for the 1945 cover, the GCD for the other. [© the respective copyright holders—yeah, right.]

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OUR ARTISTS AT WAR The first book ever published in the US that solely examines War Comics published in America! It covers the talented writers and artists who supplied the finest, most compelling stories in the War Comics genre, which has long been neglected in the annals of comics history. Through the critical analysis of authors RICHARD J. ARNDT and STEVEN FEARS, this overlooked treasure trove is explored in-depth, finally giving it the respect it deserves! Included are pivotal series from EC COMICS (TwoFisted Tales and Frontline Combat), DC COMICS (Enemy Ace and the Big Five war books: All American Men of War, G.I. Combat, Our Fighting Forces, Our Army at War, and Star-Spangled War Stories), WARREN PUBLISHING (Blazing Combat), CHARLTON (Willy Schultz and the Iron Corporal) and more! Featuring the work of HARVEY KURTZMAN, JOHN SEVERIN, JACK DAVIS, WALLACE WOOD, JOE KUBERT, SAM GLANZMAN, JACK KIRBY, WILL ELDER, GENE COLAN, RUSS HEATH, ALEX TOTH, MORT DRUCKER, and many others. Introduction by ROY THOMAS, Foreword by WILLI FRANZ. Cover by JOE KUBERT. (160-page FULL-COLOR TRADE PAPERBACK) $27.95 • (Digital Edition) $14.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-108-0 • NOW SHIPPING!

JOHN SEVERIN: TWO-FISTED COMIC BOOK ARTIST A spirited biography of the EC COMICS mainstay (working with HARVEY KURTZMAN on MAD and TWO-FISTED TALES) and co-creator of Western strip AMERICAN EAGLE. Covers his 40+ year association with CRACKED magazine, his pivotal Marvel Comics work inking HERB TRIMPE on THE HULK and teaming with sister MARIE SEVERIN on KING KULL, and more! With commentary by NEAL ADAMS, RICHARD CORBEN, JOHN BYRNE, RUSS HEATH, WALTER SIMONSON, and many others. By GREG BIGA and JON B. COOKE. NOW SHIPPING! (160-page FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER) $39.95 • (Digital Edition) $14.99 • ISBN: 978-1-60549-106-6

AMERICAN TV COMIC BOOKS (1940s-1980s)

Hot on the heels of Back Issue #128, AMERICAN TV COMIC BOOKS (1940s-1980s) takes you from the small screen to the printed page, offering a fascinating and detailed year-by-year history of over 300 television shows and their 2000+ comic book adaptations across five decades. Author PETER BOSCH has spent years researching and documenting this amazing area of comics history, tracking down the well-known series (Star Trek, The Munsters) and the lesser-known shows (Captain Gallant, Pinky Lee) to present the finest look ever taken at this unique genre of comic books. Included are hundreds of full-color covers and images, plus profiles of the artists who drew TV comics: GENE COLAN, ALEX TOTH, DAN SPIEGLE, RUSS MANNING, JOHN BUSCEMA, RUSS HEATH, and many more giants of the comic book world. Whether you loved watching The Lone Ranger, Rawhide, and Zorro from the 1950s—The Andy Griffith Show, The Monkees, and The Mod Squad in the 1960s— Adam-12, Battlestar Galactica, and The Bionic Woman in the 1970s—or Alf, Fraggle Rock, and “V” in the 1980s—there’s something here for fans of TV and comics alike! (192-page FULL-COLOR TRADE PAPERBACK) $29.95 • (Digital Edition) $15.99 ISBN: 978-1-60549-107-3 • SHIPS SPRING 2022!

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The Golden Age comics of major pulp magazine publisher STREET & SMITH (THE SHADOW, DOC SAVAGE, RED DRAGON, SUPERSNIPE) examined in loving detail by MARK CARLSON-GHOST! Art by BOB POWELL, HOWARD NOSTRAND, and others, ANTHONY TOLLIN on “The Shadow/Batman Connection”, FCA, MICHAEL T. GILBERT, JOHN BROOME, PETER NORMANTON, and more!

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 show how Kirby’s epic came about, where it was going, and how he would’ve ended it before it was cancelled by DC Comics! (160-page FULL-COLOR TPB) $26.95 (Digital Edition) $14.99 • Now shipping! ISBN: 978-1-60549-098-4

CBA BULLPEN

Collects all seven issues of JON B. COOKE’s little-seen fanzine, published just after the original COMIC BOOK ARTIST ended its TwoMorrows run in 2003. Interviews with GEORGE TUSKA, FRED HEMBECK, TERRY BEATTY, and FRANK BOLLE, an all-star tribute to JACK ABEL, a new feature on JACK KIRBY’s unknown 1960 baseball card art, and a 16-page full-color section!

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KIRBY COLLECTOR #83

RETROFAN #20

Fourth World, and hidden worlds of Subterranea, Wakanda, Olympia, Lemuria, Atlantis, the Microverse, and others! Plus, a 2021 Kirby panel, featuring JONATHAN ROSS, NEIL GAIMAN, & MARK EVANIER, a Kirby pencil art gallery from MACHINE MAN, 2001, DEVIL DINOSAUR, & more!

“Famous Firsts!” How JACK KIRBY was a pioneer in comics: Romance Comics genre, Kid Gangs, double-page spreads, Black heroes, new formats, super-hero satire, and others! With MARK EVANIER and our regular columnists, plus a gallery of Jack’s pencil art from CAPTAIN AMERICA, JIMMY OLSEN, CAPTAIN VICTORY, DESTROYER DUCK, BLACK PANTHER, unseen ANIMATION CONCEPTS, & more!

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BACK ISSUE #134

BACK ISSUE #135

COMIC BOOK CREATOR #27

BRONZE AGE RARITIES & ODDITIES, spotlighting rare ‘80s European Superman comics! Plus: CURT SWAN’s Batman, JIM APARO’s Superman, DAVID ANTHONY KRAFT’s Marvel custom comics, MICHAEL USLAN’s unseen Earth-Two stories, Leaf’s DC Secret Origins, Marvel’s Evel Knievel, cover variants, and more! With EDUARDO BARRETO, PAUL KUPPERBERG, ALEX SAVIUK, and more. Cover by JOE KUBERT.

SILVER ISSUE, starring the Silver Surfer in the Bronze Age! Plus: JACK KIRBY’s Silver Star, SCOTT HAMPTON’s Silverheels, Silver Sable, Silver Banshee, DC’s Silver Age Classics, and more! Featuring BUSIEK, BUTLER, BYRNE, ENGLEHART, STAN LEE, LIM, MARZ, MOEBIUS, POLLARD, MARSHALL ROGERS, ALEX ROSS, JIM STARLIN, and more. Cover by RON FRENZ and JOE SINNOTT.

Extensive PAUL GULACY retrospective by GREG BIGA that includes Paul himself, VAL MAYERIK, P. CRAIG RUSSELL, TIM TRUMAN, ROY THOMAS, and others. Plus a JOE SINNOTT MEMORIAL; BUD PLANT discusses his career as underground comix retailer, distributor, fledgling publisher of JACK KATZ’s FIRST KINGDOM, and mail-order bookseller; our regular columnists, and the latest from HEMBECK!

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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 (the unseen black romance magazine)!

OLD GODS & NEW: KIRBY COLLECTOR #82 “THE MANY WORLDS OF JACK KIRBY!” A FOURTH WORLD From Sub-Atomica to outer space, visit COMPANION (TJKC #80) Kirby’s work from World War II, the

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JACK KIRBY’S DINGBAT LOVE