posted September 23, 2002 08:29 PM    

As I understand it, there are several problems with restoration. If you photocopy a page from a comic book you wind up with either a B&W white copy with several shades of grey or a color copy with several dots of color. With the B&W those shades of grey are made of many little dots of black--that black overlaps with the actual black inks so trying to make a B&W copy of just the actual inked lines without the grey involves somehow trying to get those little black dots out without also removing the inked lines.

With a color copy, the photocopy tends to fade the black lines and you have to get rid of all those color dots while at the same time retaining the inked black lines (which might actually look brown on a color photocopy).

Now you could just use the photographed pages and print those--and this has been done. Marvel has done it a lot and the recent Art Spiegelman Jack Cole's Plastic Man also does it. But you wind up with pages that look like photographs of comic pages--and the qualitative aesthetics of that are debatable.

As I understand it the usual practice these days has someone re-inking the entire page. The page is blown up to a larger size and the new inker tries to trace the exact lines of the original inker. This takes a lot of time, and you have to pay the guy doing the re-inking.

The Theakston process seems to have been some kind of process that bleached out all the color dots from an original comic book page, leaving only the black ink. This process, of course, destroyed the original comic book. Thus it was preferable to use comics that reprinted older comics (since the older comics tend to be higher priced collector's items). So if you have an eighty-page Giant from the sixties that reprints stories from the fifties, it's preferable to capture the images from that Giant rather than destroying more collectable fifties comics.

With the Superman archives, they Theakstonized a lot of the first volume because the original issues of Superman reprinted stories from Action. If one issue of Superman contains Superman stories from four issues of Action then you only have to destroy one issue of Superman rather than destroying four issues of Action. But as I understand it, most of the archives that have followed since then have not used the Theakston process as it is too costly.

In the sixties, most Giants didn't reprint forties material because DC didn't have the plates (or photostats) for those stories. They did reprint fifties stories because they had those plates (what happened to those plates in later decades? I don't know). In the late sixties (around when Carmine Infantino was promoted to an executive position), DC tried reprinting some older material. In these cases they had to re-ink the pages (Infantino himself re-inked a "Here Comes Alfred" story).

But only a few of these stories were done. As E. Nelson Bridwell explained it in a Superman letter column (I posted on this several months ago in the "Superman in the Seventies" thread), Carmine Infantino asked Jack Adler, National Periodical's production ace at the time, to come up with a process that would allow them to reprint older stories without laborious re-inking. Adler was an inventive genius (he had come up with his own 3-D viewer that was actually better than the later ViewMaster invention but he couldn't secure a patend, and when ViewMaster came along he was done out of a fortune), he did all kinds of production tricks that should have been impossible at the time given the printing processes for comics in those days--in the early seventies there were covers and even inside stories that used photographs, all thanks to Adler who often took the photos himself.

Accepting Infantino's challenge, Adler came up with a process that allowed National to reprint loads of vintage stories (and the early seventies comics of those days are full of these). Actually ENB says that Adler came up with two processes, one being more expensive than the other. I gather the cheaper process was the one that was mostly used on DC comics (although the Famous First Editions are quite good and maybe used the more expensive process).

Judging by the quality of some stories, though (eg. Lou Fine stories in the 100 Page Super-Specs, where Fine's delicates lines don't always reproduce) this cheaper process probably wasn't the greatest, but it did the job. Just what these two processes were I don't know. I expect, given Adler's genius for photographic processes, he may have used some fancy photographic techniques, perhaps using different color filters to filter out all the color dots on a comic page to render just the black inked image.

Why these processes aren't used now--what drawbacks make them unusable--I don't know.

I have both the Superman and the Batman From the 30s to the 70s, but not the Shazam! From the 40s to the 70s. I remember finding these Bonanza hardcover books in the early seventies--probably at Coles--reduced for sale. I think each book cost me about a dollar (I also got the Ms. paperback publication, Wonder Woman, which reprints 40s WW exclusively, at around the same time, probably at the same store, for about the same obscenely low price).

My Bonanza books are still in pretty good shape--that white paper has hardly aged at all--even though I've done nothing to preserve them and they sat for many years in my musty basement apartment, back when I lived in a basement suite. Consequently they do have a bit of a musty smell, but not as pungent as some books that I kept in boxes on the floor in that suite. I would prefer to have new-ink smelling editions to peruse, though.

I guess such huge volumes would have to be priced even higher than the archives--about the price of DC slipcover volumes. But such boutique items could probably be sold to old timers who tend to salivate over such things, and render DC a small profit.

posted September 24, 2002 12:07 AM    

All the years Australia (and NZ) were issuing reprint comic books -- the exact same comics as in America, except they were just nicely clean black and white, ie. all you got, basically, was the "inking" -- how were those comics (and this involves just about any and every DC comic) delivered to the Aussie publishers? Plates? What -- metal plates? I don't think there were photostats or photocopies or anything like that till the early 70s were there (I'm not sure about that)... And the Aussie reprints go wayyyy back. Anyway: you know what I'm asking.

posted September 26, 2002 03:35 PM    

While it might seem that I know a lot, I really don't. In my last post, I had to do a lot of guess work, and it's quite possible I was wrong on some things.

I've relied mainly on my memory--and my memory relies on things I've read in comics, magazines, books, and on these message boards.

Maybe I should have another look at the Metropolis Edition of The Amazing World of Superman--that was the book that first taught me about how comic books are made (and since there were lots of changes in this process after its publications, I'm overdue for a refresher course).

From that book, as I recall, National sent their pages to a company that did the separations, making negatives for the different four colours (a black negative, a blue negative, a yellow negative, and a magenta negative--which would each generate a corresponding positive lead plate), and then there was the company that actually printed the comic. So there were two companies involved in the process of printing the comic after it was produced at the National offices.

So it seems possible that either black and white pages were sent to foreign locations, and these were made into negatives there, which generated plates, OR the actual black negatives themselves were shipped to these foreign locations. I doubt they would have sent color negatives since this would have been an added cost--when they could just as easily have mailed notes on what colours should be used for each page.

All of this was done through the mails of course (I imagine they had to pay insurance on these shipments, since if these were lost or destroyed in transit it would cost them a lot in lost production).

What are separations? As I understand it (I have to use that phrase a lot here), someone takes the colors of the colorist as suggested colors for the page, but actually these are translated into numbers. The numbers reflect a ratio of different colors. For red, you have so much magenta (so many dots of magenta) for so much yellow to create an illusion of red. To create different browns or greys you have a certain balance of magenta, yellow, and blue to create the illusion of those shades. So someone creates a page of magenta reflecting those percentages, and likewise a page of blue and a page of yellow, in addition to the page of black (provided by the black inked page). When all these four colours overlap onto one printed page--voila--you get a full colour comic.

And man am I having a hard time as a Canadian deciding how to spell "colour." Since we're talking about American processes, do I use their spelling for these processes? or do I use the proper word, which for Canadians is "colour?"

posted October 06, 2002 06:56 PM    

circa 2000 BC--the Babylonian epic of Gilgamesh, legendary hero of Babylon.

2000 - 1400 BC--Minoan civilization on Crete.

1600 - 1100 BC--Mycenaean civilization in Greece.

over 3000 years ago
--Hebrew texts--Torah, Neviim, & Ketuvim (the 24 books of the Jewish bible)--tell of Samson (super-strong champion of his people), Moses (found in the bullrushes by an Egyptian princess) and others.
--Greek legends of Prometheus, Perseus, Herakles, Theseus, and others. Many Greek legends tell of super-strong heroes who were abandoned as infants and raised to manhood in foreign lands and humans with divine powers.

circa 700 BC--the Iliad & Odyssey by "Homer" recount in epic poetry the oral stories of the Trojan War handed down through many generations in Ancient Greece.

29 - 19 BC--until his death, Vergil writes the Aeneid, the Latin epic poem about the mythic founding of Rome.

1500 - 500 years ago--Celtic tales give rise to Arthurian legends of knightly heroes possessing great courage and strength.

8th century AD--the Old English poem of Beowulf (a dragon-slaying hero) is written down.

circa 1200 AD--the Elder Edda collection of Icelandic poems is written down.

13th century AD--in Iceland, Snorri Sturlusson (1179 - 1241) writes down the Prose Edda.

1468 - 1471 AD--Sir Thomas Malory imprisoned in Newgate prison in England until his death writes Le Morte d'Arthur, which is published on July 31, 1485.

16th - 17th century AD--legend has it that Rabbi Judah Loew of Prague (1525 - 1609) knew how to arrange the secret names of God in such a way as to create a Golem, a man brought to life out of clay, to serve his bidding and protect the Jewish people (the rabbi's name means Lion of Judah, by the way). When "emet" was written on the Golem's forehead it came to life. When the first letter was erased it left "met" meaning death and the Golem became dust. The Golem is said to have been a champion of the Jewish people in Prague before it crumbled to pieces; its remains are reputed to still exist in the "Golem's room" of an ancient Prague synagogue.

1752--Micromegas by Voltaire (Steranko offers this as one of the first works of speculative fiction about life on other planets).

1816--nineteen year old Mary Wolstonecraft--along with her lover, the Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley--spends a summer of poor weather as guest of George Gordon, Lord Byron (another reknowned Romantic), in his Swiss villa, along with Byron's doctor, John William Polidori. Given their imprisonment indoors, due to the weather, Byron proposes that the four of them each come up with a horror story. This gives rise to Mary's fantasy of a modern-day Prometheus (the Titan Prometheus stole fire from heaven and gave it to man, for which he was punished by the gods). Mary Shelley creates Victor von Frankenstein, a scentist who sparks human life in a dead form (like the Golem myth). This novel is completed in 1817 and then published in 1818 as Frankenstein; or The Modern Prometheus. Wolstonecraft and Shelley were married in 1817 after the unfortunate death of his first wife.

1865--De la Terre a la Lune (From the Earth to the Moon) by Jules Verne.

1876--August 13 - 17, at Bayreuth, Germany "Der Ring des Niebelungen" ("The Ring of the Nibelung") is performed for the first time in its entirety (over a four day period). Originally conceived by composer Richard Wagner in 1848 as an allegorical response to the revolutions throughout Europe in that year, this operatic cycle took decades to complete and ultimately bring to the stage. The cycle was drawn from the Nibelungenlied, an old German epic, and several Scandinavian sources including the Prose Edda and Elder Edda. The four operas in the cycle are: "Das Rheingold," "Die Walkure," "Siegfried," & "Gotterdamerung" ("The Rhinegold," "The Valkyrie," "Siegfried," & "Twilight of the Gods").

1883 - 85 --philosopher Friedrich Nietsche writes Also Sprach Zarathrustra (Thus Spake Zarathrustra) which announces the doctrine of the Ubermensch (Superman).

1898--The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells.

1901--The First Men in the Moon by H.G. Wells.

1903--"Man and Superman" by George Bernard Shaw is first performed on stage.

1905
--June 5, Wayne Boring born in Minnesota, USA.
--The Scarlet Pimpernel[i] by the Baroness Orczy is first published, several years after being written and after being performed on stage.

1912--"Under the Moons of Mars," by Norman Bean (aka Edgar Rice Burroughs), published in six parts from February to July in [i]All-Story Magazine (later in 1917 published as the novel A Princess of Mars); "Tarzan of the Apes", by Burroughs, published in October, also in All-Story.

1914
--June 28, the murders in Sarajevo of the Austrian Archduke Francis Ferdinand and his wife by a Serb assasin provide a pretext for "The Great War," now known as the First World War--a battle of European nationalist powers and their colonies around the world.
--July 10, Joseph Shuster born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
--October 17, Jerome Siegel born in Cleveland, Ohio, USA.

1915
--April 25, Mort Weisinger born in New York, NY, USA.
--June, Julius Schwartz also born in New York, NY, USA (in the Bronx).

1917
--March, Tsar Nicholas of Russia is forced to abdicate.
--November, the Bolshevik Revolution gives Lenin ultimate power over Russia.

1918--The allied powers defeat Germany and Austria, the Great War ends with a loss of ten million souls.

1919
--January - June, the Versailles conference, and the resulting Versailles Treaty, redraws the map of Europe and imposes heavy reparations and demilitarization upon Germany.
--Adolf Hitler joins the German Workers' Party.

1920
--February 17, Douglas Curt Swan born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, although his parents had previously moved from Saskatchewan, Canada (in a former generation the family name was shortened from Swanson to Swan).
--"The Mark of Zorro" (silent movie), directed by Fred Nildo, starring Douglas Fairbanks, Marguritte de la Motte, Noah Berry.
--December 15, Kurt Schaffenberger born in Germany.

1923
--the Shuster family moves from Toronto, Canada, to Cleveland, USA.
--November, Hitler leads unsuccessful putsch in Munich and is imprisoned.

1924 - 25 --Hitler writes Mein Kampf in prison.

1926--"Metropolis" (silent) directed by Fritz Lang, an example of German Expressionist film-making, tells the futuristic story, with certain religious overtones, of a struggle between the rich upper class (who live in the towers above the city) and the poor working class (who live and work below the city).

1927--May 20 - 21, Charles Lindberg makes first solo non-stop trans-Atlantic flight from New York to Paris.

1928--August, "Armageddon--2419 AD," a short story by Francis Philip Nowlan, is published in Amazing Stories, and then in 1929 is adapted as a comic strip, "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century."

1929
--January 7, "Tarzan" by Hal Foster and "Buck Rogers" by Dick Calkin first appear in newspapers.
--January 29, Thursday, Popeye first appears in the "Thimble Theatre" comic strip by Elzie Chrisler Segar.
--George Delacorte publishes The Funnies a weekly tabloid sized book of original comics pages that copied the format of the Sunday funny papers.
--"Black Tuesday," October 29th, the stock market collapses, bringing on the Great Depression.

1930
--The Gladiator by Philip Wylie introduces the modern-day superman, Hugo Danner.
--July 31, Thursday, beginning as a "host" of a pulp anthology radio show, The Shadow makes his first appearance on the "Detective Story Hour." Maxwell Grant (aka Walter Gibson) writes the first Shadow dime novel, "The Living Shadow," published in March, 1931.

circa 1931--Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster first meet at Glenville High School in Cleveland, Ohio, USA, and find a common interest in science fiction.

1932
--January, in the Bronx, Mort Weisinger and Julie Schwartz begin a mimeograph fanzine called The Time Traveller.
--Hitler consolidates his power in the German parliament.
--February 4 - 15, Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, USA.
--July 30 - August 14, Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, USA. A young Jack Cole bicycles 7000 miles from his home in New Castle, Pennsylvania, to Los Angles, California, to see the Summer Olympics, but doesn't have enough money for admittance when he gets there (the story of this youthful adventure appears, in Cole's own words, in the Steranko History of Comics, vol. 2--one should note that born December 14, 1914, Jack Cole (creator of Plastic Man) was of the same age as Siegel & Shuster--Bill Finger, co-creator of Batman and Green Lantern, was also born in 1914).
--summer, in the Bronx, Mort Weisinger and Julie Schwartz's fanzine (The Time Traveller) becomes a journal, Science Fiction Digest.
--October, in Cleveland, Siegel and Shuster launch their mimeograph fanzine, Science Fiction.

1933
--January, Siegel and Shuster publish in Science Fiction "The Reign of the Superman," written by Siegel, with illustrations by Shuster.
--January 30, the German chancellor refuses to cooperate with the Nazi party in the parliament and resigns; Paul von Hindenburg (president of the German republic) invites Hitler to become chancellor.
--"The Man of Bronze" by Lester Dent appears in the first issue of Doc Savage Magazine, cover-date March, 1933.
--March 4, in his inaugural address, the new US president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt states, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."
--in Germany, Jews are forced out of the civil service; Jews are sent to concentration camps.
--at Eastern Color Printing, Harry Wildenberg, M.C. Gaines, and Leverett Gleason invent the modern comic book, producing Funnies on Parade, then Famous Funnies.

1934
--January 7, the "Flash Gordon" comic strip by Alex Raymond debuts.
--January, Hitler signs non-aggression pact with Poland.
--Hindenburg (over 85 years old) dies. Hitler combines the offices of president and chancellor, assuming the title, "Der Fuhrer" (the leader). Members of the German government and army are required to swear an oath of loyalty to Der Fuhrer. Hitler targets for death all those he sees as enemies--including military leaders, political opponents, communists, and Jews.
--June 11, "Mandrake the Magician" by Lee Falk first appears in newspapers.
--one summer night, Jerry Siegel dreams up his new idea of "Superman." He races to his friend Joe Shuster's house the next morning, where they brainstorm concepts for the character. Steranko's History of Comics states these seminal events happened in 1933, but Roger Stern (in his introduction to Superman: The Sunday Classics 1939 - 1943[i], published 1998) states they happened in the summer of 1934--since Stern's work is more up-to-date, I've accepted his dates over Steranko.
--"The Mightiest Machine," a story by John W. Campbell (aka Don A. Stuart), is published in [i]Astounding Science Fiction. The story features a superman named Aarn Munro.
--"The Scarlet Pimpernel" (talking movie) directed by Harold Young. Leslie Howard, stars as the Pimpernel, who is a weak fop as Sir Percy Blakenay. The incomparable Merle Oberon plays his wife, Lady Blakenay who scorns her husband's seeming lack of bravado. While Raymond Massey is cast in the role of the French villain who seeks to prevent the Pimpernel's tactics in saving many unfortunates from the guillotine. Raymond Massey had a long and distinguished acting career in the United States (he even played Abraham Lincoln), but he was the son of a wealthy and influential family in Toronto, Canada. It was said in Toronto there are two kinds of people, the masses and the Masseys. Raymond's brother, Vincent, distinguished himself as a commanding officer of the Royal Canadian Armed Forces in the Great War. In 1930, the politically active Vincent Massey became the first Canadian ambassador to the United States. By 1935, Vincent was in London, England, serving as Canada's High Commissioner to Great Britain. In this influential position, Vincent Massey was able to affect Canadian (and international) policy on the immigration of Jewish refugees then suffering under the brutal Nazi regime in Europe, but the high commissioner was no Pimpernel. The anti-semitic sentiments of Vincent Massey encouraged the Canadian government to close their doors to Jewish refugees. Vincent Massey's services to the Dominion were rewarded in 1952 when he was appointed as the first Canadian-born Governor General of Canada, a position he held until relinquishing it in 1959.

1935
--Germany resumes conscription and repudiates the Versailles Treaty. The Nuremburg Law strips Jews of German citizenship.
--Major Malcolm Wheeler Nicholson's National Allied Publications begins with New Fun Comics no. 1, cover-date February, 1935 (New Fun would be re-titled as More Fun Comics with issue 7); in New Fun Comics no. 6 (cover-dated October, 1935), Siegel and Shuster have their first comic book work, "Henri Duval of France, Famed Soldier of Fortune" & "Dr. Occult, the Ghost Detective"--both black & white one-page features. They offer "Superman" to Wheeler Nicholson, but this feature is declined. Later that same year, the Major launches another title, New Comics, cover-dated December, 1935 (eventually re-titled New Adventure and then Adventure Comics).

1936
--January, Sheldon Mayer comes to work for M.C. Gaines, where he sees the Siegel & Shuster "Superman" and urges its publication.
--February 6 - 16, Winter Olympics in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany.
--February 17, "The Phantom" by Lee Falk first appears in newspapers.
--the Spanish civil war begins, Nazi Germany supports the fascists in Spain.
--Hitler takes the Rhineland and signs the Rome-Berlin Axis pact with Mussolini (fascist dictator of Italy).
--August 1 - 16, Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany.

1937
--Siegel & Shuster create "Slam Bradley" and "Spy" for Detective Comics no. 1, cover-dated March, 1937, while they continue to shop around "Superman" with no luck.
--July 2, Amelia Earhart Putnam and her co-pilot Fred Noonan lost near Howland Island in the Pacific.
--Jewish passports are revoked in Germany (and German held lands).
--Major Wheeler Nicholson sells off his comic book company to his business partner, Harry Donenfeld.

1938
--the Anschluss proclaims Austria as part of Greater Germany. Hitler claims the Sudetenland in Czechoslavakia as a part of Greater Germany. Jews are required to carry identity cards. Jewish doctors and lawyers lose their licenses. Jews are banned from universities, kicked out of German schools.
--Action Comics no. 1, cover-dated June, 1938, featuring "Superman" by Siegel and Shuster.
--September 29, Mussolini, Hitler, Chamberlain (prime minister of Great Britain), and Edouard Daladier (prime minister of France) meet in Munich and sign an agreement allowing German occupation of the Sudetenland. Britain and Germany sign a pledge never to go to war against each other. Chamberlain returns to Britain and proclaims, "Peace in our time," brandishing the paper Hitler had signed.
--October 30, from New York Orson Welles broadcasts a radio adaptation of H.G. Well's The War of the Worlds; listeners tuning in late believe Martians have invaded the Earth and panic ensues.
--November 9, Kritstallnacht. On the orders of the German government, and organized by the Nazi Party, the homes, businesses, and synagogues of Jews are attacked, windows broken (breaking glass--Kristallnacht, "crystal night" was named for the breaking of glass); people are wrenched from their homes and businesses, beaten, shot or dragged off to concentration camps. Scores are killed, hundreds injured, thousands arrested.

posted October 06, 2002 07:44 PM    

quote:

---

India Ink:
comprehensive chronology of precursors and context for the creation of Superman by Siegel & Shuster

---

That is superb. A neat piece of work.

quote:

---

--September 29, Mussolini, Hitler, Chamberlain (prime minister of Great Britain), and Edouard Daladier (prime minister of France) meet in Munich and sign an agreement allowing German occupation of the Sudetenland. Britain and Germany sign a pledge never to go to war against each other. Chamberlain returns to Britain and proclaims, "Peace in our time," brandishing the paper Hitler had signed.

---

Yes, there was a hell of a lot going on in the world, never mind the debut of Superman comics.

posted October 06, 2002 08:53 PM    

So far, I couldn't track down the exact date of Julius Schwartz's birth, just that it was in June of 1915. Schwartz and Weisinger were born in the exact same year. I could only track down that Mort was born in New York, but not if he was born in the Bronx. In any case at some time in his childhood he was in the Bronx, and went to high school there--although I don't know if Julie and Mort went to the same high school in the Bronx. But they became part of the same science fiction club in the Bronx.

Although one year younger than Siegel & Shuster, Weisinger & Schwartz in the Bronx seemed to have led the way ahead of the Cleveland boys, as they put out their mimeo fanzine before Jerry & Joe. Not that it's likely the two pairs of teens knew anything about the other.

It's also interesting to find that both Boring and Swan were born in Minnesota, albeit fifteen years apart. I couldn't determine where Boring was born in Minnesota, although it seems he had some art school training in Minneapolis (where Swan was born).

I could rationalize including birth-dates for Boring, Weisinger, Schwartz, & Swan because they have some indirect relationship to the early Superman, and they are of later importance to the whole legend. But including Schaffenberger was possibly just a personal desire to include a favourite artist. Schaffenberger was at Fawcett mainly in the 40s, and didn't come to the Superman books until later in the 50s. And if I included Kurt--then why not Al Plastino, John Forte, Pete Costanza, Stan Kaye, Jack Burnley, et al? Well, because the date and place of Kurt's birth seemed significant--that he was born in Germany in 1920 brings a certain connection to the history that makes it more compelling.

I was also indulgent in including some info about Canada, but it's my home and I feel connected to Superman through all those Canadian connections. My indictment of Vincent Massey might have been too much for the purposes of this thread--although the irony of "The Scarlet Pimpernel" is one of those things that amuses me in a pessimistic way. I think that the movie on some level was meant as an allegory for the times. And there was a second movie (but I don't know. if it was with the same cast) which was about the Pimpernel during WWII, made in Britain to boost British morale during the war--where the allegory stops being an allegory and becomes a literal truth.

The Baroness Orczy's book (her name was Emmuska Magdalena Rosalia Marie Josepha Barbara, the Baroness Orczy) was one of those that I read as a teen which had a profound influence on me. The strange relationship between Percy and his wife is amazing. He's virtually masochistic, allowing his wife to verbally abuse him, all the while knowing the real truth. One evening after she denounces him, after she leaves, he kisses the ground at each place where her footsteps fell as she left him.

The attitude and look of Lois Lane in the stories from Action no. 1 and the reprinted version in Superman no. 1 have Lois looking a lot like Merle Oberon, and reflect that haughty Lady Blakenay personality (especially in the scene at the night club where Lois gives Clark a tongue-lashing). On the CBC, in Canada, they often play late night movies of old British classics, especially those Korda movies starring Merle Oberon. They did when I was a teen and they still do now. Ah, what a lady that Merle Oberon!

I goofed up on the italics with the [/i] a couple of times--but I always seem to goof up with those.

When they were in their teens Schwartz, Weisinger, and another science fiction fellow were crossing a street and hit by a truck which put Weisinger in hospital and this is when Weisinger became productive about writing science fiction. That's a rough encapsulation of something I read on a website--I'll see if I can track down the exact details later. Anyhow, this reminds me of Jim Shooter who started writing and drawing comic book from his sick-bed--and maybe that was a connection between the editor and the young writer. Confinement seems to bring about great ideas (or not so great in the case of Hitler).

Like Siegel & Shuster, Mary Wolstonecraft was a teenager when she created Frankenstein. And she was confined (by weather). But she probably was also depressed--her mother died in childbirth, she and Percy Bysshe Shelley had a tortured relationship, she had lost one child by him and was probably pregnant with another at that time in Switzerland at Lord Byron's villa. An important element of creation seems to be depression--but not depression the extent of an inability to act. Friedrich Nietsche was a very depressed man, and his philosophy was born from that.

posted October 06, 2002 09:05 PM    

quote:

---

Early Inspirations

Mort Weisinger attended high school in the Bronx. Born around 1914-1916, Weisinger belonged to a generation that included his friend Julius Schwartz, Jerry Siegel, Jerome Shuster and, chronologically, Jack Kirby. The comics talents born in the teens of the twentieth century would lay the foundations for the explosion of the medium made possible by talents born in the twenties (a Who's Who of Silver Age talent would mainly contain those names).

Weisinger came to comics indirectly through fandom. However, he came through science fiction fandom, rather than comics fandom. Not only had comics fandom not yet appeared in his youth; Superman, the archetype of the superhero, and the clay that Weisinger would eventually mold, would not appear until Weisinger grew up.

He formed a fan club that would ultimately generate (arguably) the first fanzine. He solicited memberships for his science fiction fan club, the Sciencers, through one of the pulp magazines of the day (probably Amazing Stories), a club through which Weisinger would encounter (as members) Julius Schwartz,

Weisinger and Schwartz began accumulating information about the authors of science fiction stories, generally through mail, and ultimately had a body of material that they decided to publish in a mimeographed newsletter titled The Time Traveller in 1932. The Time Traveller listed Weisinger, Schwartz, Forrest J. Ackerman, and Allen Glasser as editors.

The Sciencers understood networking. They solicited subscriptions to The Time Traveller by sending subscription notices to the addresses on fan letters in science fiction magazines like Amazing Stories; while the newsletter probably attracted under fifty original subscribers, it did become an early nationally distributed fan publication. Julius Schwartz names it as the first.

Soon after its inception, the Time Traveller began to include stories. It changed its name to Science Fiction Digest in 1933 and again to Fantasy Magazine in 1934. By the latter year, the piece had begun carrying stories by A. A. Merritt, John Campbell, and E. E. "Doc" Smith, all of whom became names in science fiction, and Otto Binder, whose work would also connect him in later decades to comic books.

The Solar Sales Service

According to Julius Schwartz, in 1934 an auto struck Weisinger, Schwartz himself, and Otto Binder while the three hiked in Palisades Park. While in the hospital, Weisinger thought about the connections he had made while researching authors and interviewing editors, and decided to turn the Sciencers' hobby into a livelihood. Schwartz and Weisinger thus solicited themselves as agents of the Solar Sales Service, promoting themselves as facilitators who, owing to their personal familiarity with a number of central editors in the science fiction field, could connect more directly to these editors than authors relying on mailed manuscripts that might wait indefinitely on an editor's desk.

Weisinger defined the essence of the editor's problem: Writers did not know what editors wanted, when they wanted it. A contact like Weisinger, however, did, and could direct manuscripts to where they had the best chance of filling a hole in a particular issue of a science fiction magazine.

Solar Sales Service attracted Edmond Hamilton as an early client, later hustling the likes of Stanley Weinbaum as well.

---

posted October 12, 2002 06:43 PM    

Owen Cardiff Darcy
Member posted October 11, 2002 06:15 PM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SIEGEL AND SHUSTER ARCHIVES VOL. 1 (228 pages)
DR. OCCULT, RADIO SQUAD AND OTHER FEATURES
NEW FUN THE BIG COMIC MAGAZINE #1, 2 and 6; MORE FUN THE BIG COMIC MAGAZINE #7 and 8; MORE FUN COMICS #9-50; and THE COMICS MAGAZINE Vol. 1 #1
JIGGER AND GINGER (2 pages)

New Fun The Big Comic Magazine #1
"Jigger and Ginger" (1 page)

New Fun The Big Comic Magazine #2
Jigger and Ginger in "The Escaped Convicts: Part 1" (1 page)

HENRI DUVAL (6 pages)

New Fun The Big Comic Magazine #6
"Henri Duval" (1 page)

More Fun The Big Comic Magazine #7
Henri Duval in "Rescuing the King: Part 2" (1 page)

More Fun The Big Comic Magazine #8
Henri Duval in "Rescuing the King: Part 3" (1 page)

More Fun Comics #9
"Henri Duval" (1 page)

More Fun Comics #10
Henri Duval in "The Capture of Duval" (2 pages)

DR. OCCULT (72 pages)

New Fun The Big Comic Magazine #6
"Introducing Dr. Occult" (1 page)

More Fun The Big Comic Magazine #7
Dr. Occult in "The Vampire Master: Part 2" (1 page)

More Fun The Big Comic Magazine #8
Dr. Occult in "The Vampire Master: Part 3" (1 page)

More Fun Comics #9
"Dr. Occult" (1 page)

More Fun Comics #10
Dr. Occult in "The Metheuselah Murders" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #11
Dr. Occult in "The Werewolf: Part 1" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #12
Dr. Occult in "The Werewolf: Part 2" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #13
Dr. Occult in "The Werewolf: Part 3" (2 pages)

The Comics Magazine vol. 1 #1
"Dr. Mystic" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #14
Dr. Occult in "Koth and the Seven: Part 1" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #15
Dr. Occult in "Koth and the Seven: Part 2" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #16
Dr. Occult in "Koth and the Seven: Part 3" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #17
Dr. Occult in "Koth and the Seven: Part 4" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #18
Dr. Occult in "The Life Ray: Part 1" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #19
Dr. Occult in "The Life Ray: Part 2" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #20
Dr. Occult in "The Lord of Life: Part 1" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #21
Dr. Occult in "The Lord of Life: Part 2" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #22
Dr. Occult in "The Lord of Life: Part 3" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #23
Dr. Occult in "The Lord of Life: Part 4" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #24
Dr. Occult in "The HD Murders" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #25
Dr. Occult in "The Shrinking Doom" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #26
"Dr. Occult" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #27
"Dr. Occult" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #28
"Dr. Occult" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #29
"Dr. Occult" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #30
"Dr. Occult" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #31
"Dr. Occult" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #32
"Dr. Occult" (4 pages)

RADIO SQUAD/CALLING ALL CARS (148 pages)

More Fun Comics #11
Calling All Cars in "The Purple Tiger: Part 1" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #12
Calling All Cars in "The Purple Tiger: Part 2" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #13
Calling All Cars in "The Purple Tiger: Part 3" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #14
"Calling All Cars" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #15
"Calling All Cars" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #16
Calling All Cars in "The Maniac and the Cameraman" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #17
Calling All Cars in "The Dan Bowers Case: Part 1" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #18
Calling All Cars in "The Dan Bowers Case: Part 2" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #19
Radio Squad in "The Dan Bowers Case: Part 3" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #20
Radio Squad in "The Dan Bowers Case: Part 4" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #21
Radio Squad in "The Dan Bowers Case: Part 5" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #22
Radio Squad in "The Dan Bowers Case: Part 6" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #23
Radio Squad in "The Radio-Controlled Armored Car" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #24
Radio Squad in "Harry Owens Makes the Grade" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #25
Radio Squad in "The Booze Trucker" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #27
"Radio Squad" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #28
"Radio Squad" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #29
"Radio Squad" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #30
"Radio Squad" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #31
"Radio Squad" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #32
"Radio Squad" (2 pages)

More Fun Comics #33
"Radio Squad" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #34
"Radio Squad" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #35
"Radio Squad" (4 pages)

More Fun Comics #36
"Radio Squad" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #37
"Radio Squad" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #38
"Radio Squad" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #39
"Radio Squad" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #40
"Radio Squad" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #41
Radio Squad in "Death On the Telephone" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #42
Radio Squad in "The Gyp Conroy Case" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #43
Radio Squad in "The Purse Snatcher" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #44
Radio Squad in "The Invisible Terror" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #45
Radio Squad in "Framed For Murder" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #46
Radio Squad in "The Snipers" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #47
Radio Squad in "Terrorism Must Cease" 6 pages)

More Fun Comics #48
Radio Squad in "The Colossal Jewelry Store Robbery" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #49
Radio Squad in "The Guerney Brothers" (6 pages)

More Fun Comics #50
Radio Squad in "Car Stealing On Increase" (6 pages)

SIEGEL AND SHUSTER ARCHIVES VOL. 2 (201 pages)
FEDERAL MEN AND EARLY WORK
SIEGEL AND SHUSTER: DATELINE 1930s #1 and 2; NEW COMICS #2-11; NEW ADVENTURE COMICS #12-14 and 16-31; and ADVENTURE COMICS #32-41

EARLY WORK (51 pages; originally collected in SIEGEL AND SHUSTER: DATELINE 1930s)

Cover Illustration (1 page)
"The Strangest Story Ever Told" (1 page)
Untitled (1 page)
"The orchestra rises to a smashing climax" (1 page)
"Introducing... the Waif" (1 page)
"What'sa matter, Spuds?" (1 page)
"How To Become a Mental Marvel Overnight" (1 page)
"How could you, Smiley" (1 page)
"On invitation, the Tarrytown dramatic club" (1 page)
"Yippee! I've struck oil!" (1 page)
"What's the matter, Mommy?" (1 page)
"Two thousand years hence!" (5 pages)
"Good morning, Inko" (1 page)
"Deadly rays blaze! (1 page)
"Today we're going to have a lesson in self-restraint" (1 page)
"Open, you mugs! (1 page)
"Death Rides the Rails: Chapter 1" (1 page)
"Jerry has graduated from his high school paper" (1 page)
"So that's why he took my newspaper!" (1 page)
"Ouch! Is this soup hot!" (1 page)
"A pistol barks and the first half of the big game is ended" (1 page)
"My car, Jason!" (1 page)
"Cease all merrymaking" (1 page)
"And remember--" (1 page)
Cover Illustration (1 page)
"P-s-st! Try an' look innocent, Snoopy!" (12 pages)
"World In Future -- 1980" (2 pages)
"A car stops before the hospital" (1 page)
"Inko! I've an idea that'll knock you out!" (1 page)
"Bruce and Lieut. Macy hurry" (2 pages)
"Aha! He's up to something!" (1 page)
"Luke Foster, a romantically inclined citizen of Lone Peak" (2 pages)
"Straighten up, son!" (1 page)

FEDERAL MEN (150 pages)

New Comics #2
Federal Men in "The Manning Baby Kidnapping" (4 pages)

New Comics #3
Federal Men in "Airborne Revenge" (4 pages)

New Comics #4
Federal Men in "Submarine Terror: Part 1" (2 pages)

New Comics #5
Federal Men in "Submarine Terror: Part 2" (2 pages)

The Comics Magazine Funny pages) vol. 1 #2
"Federal Agent" (4 pages)

New Comics #6
Federal Men in "Attack On Washington: Part 1" (2 pages)

New Comics #7
Federal Men in "Attack on Washington: Part 2" (4 pages)

New Comics #8
Federal Men in "The Unknown Enemy: Part 1" (4 pages)

New Comics #9
Federal Men in "The Unknown Enemy: Part 2" (4 pages)

New Comics #10
Federal Men in "The Unknown Enemy: Part 3" (4 pages)

New Comics #11
Federal Men in "Nate Devlin Crashes the Movies" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #12
Federal Men in "Federal Men of Tomorrow" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #13
Federal Men in "Mad Knife-Killer Spreads Terror" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #14
Federal Men in "Junior Federal Men Vs. Blackie Flint" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #16
Federal Men in "The Chinatown Smuggler" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #17
Federal Men in "The Case of the Clueless Crime" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #18
Federal Men in "Torpedo On Wheels" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #19
Federal Men in "The Case of the Cinema Killing" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #20
Federal Men in "Junior Federal Men Vs. the Bank Robbers" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #21
Federal Men in "Junior Federal Men Vs. the Counterfeiters" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #22
Federal Men in "The Stolen Stamp" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #23
Federal Men in "The Junior G-Girls" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #24
Federal Men in "The Kid and the Waterfront Gang" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #25
Federal Men in "Junior Federal Men of the Future" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #26
Federal Men in "The Safety Patrol" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #27
Federal Men in "The Cobra: Part 1" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #28
Federal Men in "The Cobra: Part 2" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #29
Federal Men in "The Plot Against America: Part 1" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #30
Federal Men in "The Plot Against America: Part 2" (4 pages)

New Adventure Comics #31
Federal Men in "The Kidnapping of Peter Hazelton" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #32
Federal Men in "On the Wrong Side of the Law: Part 1" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #33
Federal Men in "On the Wrong Side of the Law: Part 2" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #34
Federal Men in "On the Wrong Side of the Law: Part 3" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #35
Federal Men in "On the Wrong Side of the Law: Part 4" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #36
Federal Men in "On the Wrong Side of the Law: Part 5" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #37
Federal Men in "On the Wrong Side of the Law: Part 6" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #38
Federal Men in "The Killing of Judge Thompson" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #39
Federal Men in "Reefer Madness" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #40
Federal Men in "The Tarryville Counterfeiters" (4 pages)

Adventure Comics #41
Federal Men in "The Deadly Snowfall" (4 pages)

SIEGEL AND SHUSTER ARCHIVES VOL. 3 (190 pages)
SPY AND SLAM BRADLEY
DETECTIVE COMICS #1-28

SPY (151 pages)

Detective Comics #1
Spy in "The Balinoff Case: Part 1" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #2
Spy in "The Balinoff Case: Part 2" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #3
Spy in "The Nearly-Weds" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #4
Spy in "The Balinoff Case: Part 4" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #5
Spy in "The Balinoff Case: Part 5" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #6
Spy in "The Investigation of Captain Hanley" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #7
Spy in "The COLOSSUS Disaster" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #8
Spy in "The Phony Pierre Blanc" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #9
Spy in "The Vanishing of R-42" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #10
Spy in "To Sink the ATLANTIS" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #11
Spy in "The ATLANTIS Aftermath" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #12
Spy in "Assassins in the Rue Molin" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #13
Spy in "The Peter Rawley Case" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #14
Spy in "The Golden Ray" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #15
Spy in "Mr. Death" (4 pages)

Detective Comics #16
Spy in "A Traitor In Our Midst" (8 pages)

Detective Comics #17
Spy in "The Hooded Hordes" (8 pages)

Detective Comics #18
Spy in "Death's Ruby" (8 pages)

Detective Comics #19
Spy in "Mirror of Doom" (8 pages)

Detective Comics #20
Spy in "Saving Senator Barkley" (8 pages)

Detective Comics #21
Spy in "The Affair of Baron Von Muldorf" (8 pages)

Detective Comics #22
Spy in "Break-In at the Bartilian Embassy" (5 pages)

Detective Comics #23
Spy in "The Celebrity Deaths" (8 pages)

Detective Comics #24
Spy in "Subterfuge At Sea" (6 pages)

Detective Comics #25
Spy in "The President's Assignment" (6 pages)

Detective Comics #26
Spy in "The Man Who Torpedoed Congress" (6 pages)

Detective Comics #27
Spy in "The Mysterious Murders" (6 pages)

Detective Comics #28
Spy in "Saboteurs Bob Steamer" (6 pages)

SLAM BRADLEY (39 pages)

Detective Comics #1
Slam Bradley in "The Streets of Chinatown" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #2
Slam Bradley in "Skyscraper Death" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #3
Slam Bradley in "Slam Delivers the Message" (13 pages)

SIEGEL AND SHUSTER ARCHIVES VOL. 4 (194 pages)
SLAM BRADLEY
DETECTIVE COMICS #4-18

Detective Comics #4
"The Hollywood Murders" (12 pages)

Detective Comics #5
"Undercover In Grade School" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #6
"Slam Bradley In Mexico" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #7
"In Atlantic City" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #8
"The Hillbillies" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #9
"The Human Fly" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #10
"In the Ring" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #11
"The Flying Circus" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #12
"The Lumberjacks" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #13
"At Sea" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #14
"Up North" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #15
"The Lady-Killer" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #16
"The Broadway Bandit" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #17
"Slam Bradley Gets the Air" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #18
"In the Stratosphere" (13 pages)

SIEGEL AND SHUSTER ARCHIVES VOL. 5 (191 pages)
SLAM BRADLEY
DETECTIVE COMICS #19-32 and NEW YORK WORLD'S FAIR #1

Detective Comics #19
"In Africa" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #20
"The Magician" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #21
"Seth and the Slave Ring" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #22
"The Return of Fui Onyui" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #23
"In Two Billion A.D.: Part 1" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #24
"In Two Billion A.D.: Part 2" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #25
"The Merrivale Mystery" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #26
"Artists of Death" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #27
"The Murderer on Vacation" (9 pages)

Detective Comics #28
"The Whitethorne Inheritance" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #29
"Slam Bradley" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #30
"The Granville Insane Asylum" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #31
"Slam Bradley" (13 pages)

Detective Comics #32
"Slam Bradley" (13 pages)

New York World's Fair #1
"Slam Bradley at the World's Fair" (12 pages)

posted October 12, 2002 06:46 PM    

The material in Vol. 2 from NEW COMICS #2-11, NEW ADVENTURE COMICS #12-14 and 16-31 (numbering continued from NEW COMICS) and ADVENTURE COMICS #32-41(numbering continued from NEW ADVENTURE COMICS) is cover dated Jan. 1936 - Aug. 1939.

The material in Vol. 3-5 from DETECTIVE COMICS #1-32 is cover dated March, 1937 - Nov. 1939.

The story in Vol. 5 from NEW YORK WORLD'S FAIR #1 was published in 1939 (no month given).

posted October 15, 2002 12:34 AM    

I was just looking at a reproduction of the cover to Superman #1, and it occurs to me that the logo ("Superman") must be hand-drawn.

posted October 22, 2002 05:08 PM       

Inside, there's an intriguing glimpse of a very early Superboy story. I was surprised to see young Clark Kent strutting around without glasses! And no Ma and Pa Kent in sight - at least in this short story, or much of a supporting cast at all, for that matter.

Apparently, it was a long journey to Smallville! (the Weisinger setting, not the TV show)

Here's the link:
http://dcindexes.com/

posted October 26, 2002 07:29 PM    

The Boltinoff (Clover and Dover) and Meskin (Johnny Quick) art is the best.

It seems like the influence of Simon & Kirby was being felt in those days (on Green Arrow and Aquaman).

posted October 27, 2002 05:59 AM    

quote:

---

Originally posted by India Ink:
The Superboy story has a certain Captain Marvel, Jr. feeling. I wonder who did the art--Fred Ray?

---

posted October 27, 2002 09:24 PM    

quote:

---

Originally posted by Steven Utley:
. . . I cannot perpend these early Superboy stories without thinking that several factors were at work here and, indeed, often in conflict with one another.

First, someone (almost certainly Harry Donenfeld, National's big kahuna) evidently was dissatisfied with MORE FUN COMICS' sales and wanted something new -- a new feature, a new format -- to attract readers. In consequence of that dissatisfaction, someone (probably Mort Weisinger) brainstormed and precipitated what we nowadays call High Concept. At National in the mid-1940s, what could have been Higher Concept than, "The Adventures of SUPERMAN When He Was A Boy"? What would have been more likely to attract readers than a slice off the Cash Cow of Steel? The impetus of this High Concept impelled someone (again, almost certainly Donenfeld) to the response, "Have it ready to go to the printer by Monday!" But then someone -- again, possibly Donenfeld again, or perhaps his lawyers, perhaps on account of ominous rumblings having been discerned emanating from those malcontents who had only created The Cash Cow of Steel (The Man of Steel [Superman]) (Jerry Seigel and Joe Shuster) -- waxed faint of heart and decided that the new feature (Superboy) should be introduced without fanfare into the middle pages of MORE FUN, which was six issues shy of transforming itself into a book of comical comics (a la those hot new cover-featured sensations, Dover and Clover) and packing off its own line-up of adventure heroes (The Green Arrow, Aquaman, Johnny Quick, The Shining Knight) to, well, ADVENTURE COMICS, whose own line of adventure heroes (Sandman, Starman) was about to be sent packing anyway. (As someone, probably not William Shakespeare, wrote, "You're sacked; get packed.") So why use Superboy to attract readers to Dover and Clover in MORE FUN when he (Superboy) was about to go to ADVENTURE (taking with him The Green Arrow, Aquaman, Johnny Quick, The Shining Knight, and presumably readers who were attracted to him and/or them) and leave MORE FUN to readers who had been attracted by Superboy (and/or et al) Dover and Clover if readers had no way of knowing that the book's (MORE FUN) hot new non-cover-featured feature was Superboy, and why leave MORE FUN to them (Dover and Clover) once having gone to the trouble (which of course no one had done until almost the end of Superboy's run in MORE FUN) of using Superboy to attract readers to them (same two as before) in MORE FUN if those readers were then supposed to follow Superboy and Co. (same four as before) over to ADVENTURE, whose sales, evidently so much worse than MORE FUN's, theoretically would have improved had Superboy been used therein (which he was not) to attract readers?

I was going to express this as an equation, but my grasp of mathematics is tenuous, I didn't get any further than High Concept and A Rush Job,

c+h

with c being "concept" and h being "haste," as in what makes waste, and now my head hurts.

---

posted November 06, 2002 05:39 PM       

All 3 stories are illustrated by Wayne Boring (Kurt Schaffenberger started drawing her in LL #1) and to my knowledge, have never been reprinted.

Interesting reading - and even in 1957 there are the sure signs of the painfully convoluted Weisinger plotting - particularly in the second story entitled "The Sightless Lois Lane", wherein Superman takes drastic steps to preserve his dual identity.

Enjoy!
http://dcindexes.com/

posted November 23, 2002 05:01 PM    

This part pertains to the early days of Superman...

quote:

---

CBA: Do you think that DC admired him because he was responsible for convincing the editors to publish “Superman”?

Merrily: I always got the idea from him that whenever anybody did anything for people like that, that then you’d have to do more the next time. In other words, if you were wonderful once, and the next time if you weren’t as wonderful, they’d get on your case. I remember him saying things like, “The more you do, the more you have to do!” [laughs] It’s not like they’d say, “Wow, you’re great!” They’d just want more out of you!

CBA: Your dad entered the embryonic comic book field in 1935 by working on Wheeler Nicholson’s New Fun Comics. Did he ever discuss his relationship with Wheeler and his own experiences being a pioneer in the industry?

Merrily: I remember him telling me of instances where he got blamed for doing things that he knew better than to do. But that the person who had done them was afraid of being fired, and felt that my dad, being so young (he was only 18 when he started there) would only get yelled at, and (with the help of the culprit) could talk his way out of it. The guy said, “I told the boss you did this because you’re not going to get fired.” I remember my dad telling me, “It was the stupidest thing. I wouldn’t have even done anything that stupid!” So then, the guy brought him before the big boss and said, “I’ve already spoken to Shelly about this and he doesn’t need to be yelled at twice.” (My dad was thinking to himself, “You’d better not yell at me once….”)

CBA: In 1936, Max Gaines (who was working in a partnership with the McClure Syndicate) hired a young Sheldon to assist him with his burgeoning line of comic books. Did your father ever speak of his relationship with Gaines and how they worked together?

Merrily: Yes, often. A few things stand out in my mind. I remember him telling me about one particular incident when he was working on a story. It was still in his typewriter and Gaines came by my dad’s desk with a huge pair of scissors, and cut Dad’s article as it was coming out of the typewriter saying, “that’s all we have room for.” Snip! He cut it and made off with the top half. He was laughing about it when he told me, but I’m sure it frustrated him. He didn’t like that. M.C. Gaines was tough to work for. I think they had a good relationship, though. I think M.C. really, truly loved my dad. My dad and Bill [Gaines, M.C.’s son] were very close, also. He loved Bill. I think eventually my dad endeared himself to people, and they really liked him.

One other thing that stands out in my mind, and might have contributed to the fact that my dad tended to be a little superstitious. I have a picture of a really neat (about six inches high) statue that he carved of Max Gaines. One night while on the shelf my dad kept it on, it just cracked and burst into pieces. I was about a year old when this happened and my dad said I got scared and started screaming. (I don’t remember this—it was his account.) Anyway, the next day Gaines died tragically in a boating accident. While in a boat that another boat had crashed into, he was knocked into the water, and being that he couldn’t swim, drowned. My dad worked very closely with Gaines, and I get the idea that he and everyone that knew or worked with Gaines had a love/hate relationship with him. They loved him because they had a job and hated him because he was a pain in the neck (not the term my dad used!) to work for.

At Gaines’ funeral, the rabbi was going on and on about what a nice guy he was, and how much he would be missed. According to my dad, this made everybody in the synagogue realize that the rabbi had actually never met Gaines!

CBA: When your father was working at the DC/All-American offices, he was editing Wonder Woman and All-American and he was instrumental in the creation of a number of super-hero characters. Did he ever discuss that with you?

Merrily: A little, but I don’t remember very much about it. He had something to do with the Green Lantern, too, and he did talk about that. He felt that people loved super-heroes.

CBA: But he tended to concentrate on humor a little more.

Merrily: Well… he was so good at it. I don’t know which he enjoyed more. He liked super-heroes, but yeah, he loved being funny. There was no way around that. He loved being ridiculously funny. [laughs]

CBA: Did you father ever talk about DC’s relationship with Siegel and Shuster, who created Superman?

Merrily: If he did, I don’t remember. I do remember that he felt they should rethink their decision not to publish “Superman.” He encouraged Siegel and Shuster and helped them with the original storyboard until it was finally accepted and ultimately published. He helped do something that they would accept so it would get published because he thought they really were on to something. My dad is very good at seeing underlying things, the meta-message, and the way you could change something and the way things could be.

CBA: Instead of pigeon-holing...

Merrily: Yeah, exactly! He never did that. He was very capable of seeing the other side of something and what else could be developed. He was very good at that. He was frustrated with people when they couldn’t do that.

CBA: In the mid-1930s, Sheldon created a character that he was closely associated with: Scribbly, the boy cartoonist.

Merrily: He was Scribbly!

CBA: So Scribbly pretty much reflected your father’s personality?

Merrily: I think so. Pretty much. I read more of those than Sugar & Spike. Mr. O’Hara, of course, was M.C. Gaines. He didn’t make him look anything like him. “O’Hara” was an Irish guy. Not a short, bald Jewish guy, he had a lot of hair. Maybe to make him less recognizable. But that’s who it was. It was his boss. You can look at Mr. O’Hara in a story and you can bet that something Gaines did sparked that! [laughs]

---

The entire interview is well worth a look.

posted November 28, 2002 05:05 PM    

Action Comics #239 (April 1958)
Writer: Edmond Hamilton(?)
Artist: Wayne Boring

At the Daily Planet, Perry White hands out gifts -- and criticism. He gives his reporters, including Lois and Clark, new metal Press identification cards, with their names in cut-out stencil. Perry says, "A pity I can't give these to REAL reporters!" The editor thinks his reporters have been slack lately.

Lois tells Perry she is on the case of a big crime story. Clark tells Perry he is about to get a "swell" story on Dr. Norton, a scientist who claims he can create new elements. As Clark leaves the Planet office for his interview, he mulls over the fact that Norton has talked of creating Kryptonite, something Clark wants to know more about.

A laboratory assistant enters the lab of Dr. Norton with Clark's new Press card in his hand. He tells the doctor that the reporter is waiting outside to see him. The doctor, however, is at a critical stage of an atomic experiment, and tells his assistant to have Kent wait in one of the offices till the experiment is completed. As Clark waits in an outer office for the doctor, he makes a discovery with his X-ray vision. Intending to make a quick check to ensure no Kryptonite is in the lab before he goes in, he finds that Dr. Norton's atom-generator's chain reaction is out of control and is going to explode. Clark switches to Superman and flies into the lab. Dr. Norton says, "There's not time enough to evacuate the area!" But Superman flies upward with the generator, a huge piece of broken floor still attached, and takes it into the stratosphere, far above the surface of the Earth. Superman is confident the explosion cannot hurt him, but as the generator explodes, it creates tiny particles of Kryptonite, just as the explosion of the planet Krypton created Kryptonite.

After the blast, a dazed Man of Steel heads back towards Earth, his hands covering his face. "My face! MY FACE!"

Superman kneels over a river to inspect his reflection. The tiny particles of Kryptonite have been driven into his face -- not enough to paralyse him, but enough to have scarred his face, changing it. The reader is not able to see the change. Superman decides then and there: "I can't let anyone see my face now!"

Superman hastily improvises some bandages to cover his whole face and head, after the fashion of the invisible man from the novel by H.G. Wells. He then returns to the laboratory to make sure there is no lingering radioactive contamination. As he completes his check, police and reporters arrive. Lois is horrified... "You mean, your face was disfigured? Oh, no..."

"It's true," says a bandaged Man of Steel. "I can't let you see what it looks like now!"

Lois is crying while other reporters discuss the situation. "But he doesn't say what his face looks like now!" .... "It must be fearfully scarred and changed, for him to hide it like that!"

Lois is hopeful that something can be done for Superman. "A plastic surgeon..." But Superman tells her no surgeon could possibly use a scalpel against his "impenetrable" skin. Superman tells her he will see what he can do to help himself, however.

Suddenly, Lois remembers that Clark Kent was supposed to be covering a story at this very laboratory, and wonders aloud where he is. Superman makes an exit, and speeds straight home to his civilian apartment. From his telephone, he gives his report on how Superman dealt with the laboratory disaster, but, as he explains to Perry, "...My narrow escape shattered my nerves! I'll have to take a little time off!" Perry thinks Clark is a "softie," yet reluctantly agrees to him taking time off.

When Lois hears of Clark's circumstances, her old suspicions about a Clark-Superman double identity are re-awakened. "That's funny -- Superman's face is disfigured, and now Clark won't show HIS face here!"

In the meantime, Superman is on a desperate quest to remove the facial scars. He sets up a super-chemical laboratory on a mountain-top and creates "powerful chemical solutions." It all ends in failure as Superman, his head bowed, realises no solution can dissolve the Kryptonite scars. "I'll have to try something stronger!"

While this is going on, the citizens of Metropolis are shocked at the news about Superman. A typical family is pictured (father smoking a pipe, pretty wife with nice hair-do, and a little boy complete with striped t-shirt) watching television as the newsman asks of Superman's face, "Is it scarred so terribly he can never show it again?" In an effort to be even more helpful, the TV newsman holds up an artist's impression of what Superman may look like now, under the bandages. At the sight of the hideously disfigured countenance, the little boy bursts into tears... "I don't wanna see Superman look like that...!" His mother consoles him... "He may not look that bad! We -- we must hope for the best!"

Even in the midst of his own worries, the Man of Steel keeps watch over Metropolis. He spots a speeding getaway car, the police in hot pursuit. He flies down and grabs the getaway car right off the road. The criminals are astounded, figuring Superman would have too much on his mind right now to bother with them. "You figured wrong!" Superman tells them. "My face may have changed, but my feeling toward thieves is UNchanged!"

Outside police headquarters, reporters corner Superman, holding up the drawing from the TV news item. They ask him if this is what his face now looks like. Superman tells them he cannot give a statement. "But," asks a reporter, "will we ever see your face again?" Superman tells him... "I can't promise that!"

Increasingly desperate, Superman unwraps the bandages as he approaches an erupting volcano. Perhaps, he thinks, the terrific heat of an active volcano might burn off the Kryptonite scars. But after a dive into flaming lava, the scars remain. "It'll have to be something stronger than fire -- "

Night falls, and the Man of Steel zooms homeward to his city. A storm is approaching Metropolis, which gives him another idea. As terrific bolts of lightning are generated by the storm, Superman takes them full in the face, but even this force cannot affect the Kryptonite scars.

The strongest force in nature having failed him, Superman wraps his head in bandages once again, and, as he is doing so, from his high vantage point he sees a lightning bolt strike a river tanker, setting it ablaze. The crew manage to escape using lifeboats, but the Man of Steel, in order to prevent a gasoline explosion, dips the ship underwater. Unfortunately, the fire has burned away the bandages, and his face, which the reader still has not seen, is once again exposed. He searches the river bottom and finds an iron plate from an old shipwreck. He bends the iron plate into a full-face mask, secured in place by a piece of chain around the back of his head.

He tows the fire-damaged tanker back to shore where reporters have gathered, and by the time they see his new mask, it has eye-slits cut into it, presumably made using heat-vision. A reporter assures Superman that no matter how badly marred his face is, he'll always be the city's hero... "Can't you show your face?"

"No," says Superman, "not the way it is! Never!"

A reporter tries a new angle. "What if this isn't Superman at all? It could be an alien being from another planet with super-powers who's taken his place..."

Superman doesn't reply to this ridiculous piece of speculation, but Lois is horrified... "You're just trying to make a sensational scoop! It isn't true!"

Later, Superman sits in a secluded area of what looks like a city park, brooding over his terrible problem. "No natural force is stronger than lightning, yet there must be SOMETHING that would do it..." While the Man of Tomorrow is deep in thought, Lois Lane has snuck up behind him, intending to snatch off the iron mask and prove the "alien" story untrue. Superman is so preoccupied, he doesn't even detect her presence. But, at the last moment, her hands reaching out, Lois balks. "No," she thinks, "I can't do it! Superman has done so much for us all -- I can't disobey him and expose his poor disfigured face!"

Soon a sensational newspaper "extra" hits the night-time streets, with a ghastly alien visage under the headline: "Is an alien impersonating Superman? Is this his new face?" At the office of the Daily Planet, Perry explodes. "We'll put out an extra denying this wild story! Get everyone on the job, including Clark Kent, nerves or no nerves!"

(In an interesting continuity gaff, an editorial slip-up perhaps, the sensationalist paper Perry is holding up and railing against is a Daily Planet edition!)

Superman, in his civilian apartment, his face in shadow, takes the call from Lois that he must return to work at the Planet. He knows he must go, for her suspicion is plain, and other people will eventually suspect also. Superman changes to his Clark Kent clothes and attends to his face at a mirror. "Only one way I can do it, and that's to hide my scars..." Now the reader has their first glimpse of the Man of Steel's face since the accident. He looks like Clark should usually look, except that he has affixed a small strip of adhesive tape to his forehead. "It'll look like a band-aid and hide the scars I cannot permit anyone on Earth to see!"

Clark arrives at the office to begin work on the night-time "extra". Lois seems disappointed that Clark's face is unchanged, "except for that adhesive tape!" Clark explains he got an accidental bump today, undoubtedly due to his jumpy nerves. Lois figures she must have been wrong, for "no small scar on his forehead would make Superman hide his face so desperately."

Perry wants his reporters to churn out stories re-telling the great things Superman has done for the people to show how silly the "alien" story is. Clark thinks... "I'll have to work fast -- the Kryptonite radiation from my scars will soon burn through the thin adhesive!" As Clark works, he runs out of time, for the radiation starts to burn through. He looks at his reflection in the windowpane to his left... "In a moment they'll all see -- " Desperately, Clark sends "concentrated X-ray vision" to blow the fuses in the office and douse the lights. With the office plunged into darkness, Clark starts changing to Superman. Then, an "amazing apparition" appears in the dark... "Look -- Clark Kent's NAME in glowing letters! And it's moving!" .... "What in the world's causing that?"

An instant later, Superman streaks upward from the Planet building. "The atomic radiation of my Kryptonite scars burned through the adhesive!" As he peels away the strip to reveal the words "Clark Kent" imprinted onto his forehead, the Man of Tomorrow thinks, "Atomic action -- why didn't I think of that? It was that atomic explosion that caused it all in the first place!" Superman thinks back to the accident. The atomic generator exploded, creating Krytonite particles which blasted Superman's face through his own metal stencil Press card which Dr. Norton had laid down on the generator. This branded Superman with his own name. As he looked at his relection in the river for the first time after the accident, he decided, "If anyone sees this, my identity is out -- I've got to hide my face!"

Having hit upon the "atomic action" idea, Superman speeds to a far away region of the universe to find a planetoid of almost pure uranium. Arranging a fuse for detonation, he initiates the mightiest atomic explosion of all time and bathes in the released forces.

Finally, "It worked! The atomic blast didn't harm my invulnerable body but it burned out the Kryptonite particles that scarred me!"

Replacing the adhesive strip while in his Clark Kent identity, the Man of Steel returns as Clark to the Planet with an excuse about having gone for fuses. Lois wants to know the reason for the words "Clark Kent" glowing in the darkness of the office. Clark explains that it was his metal Press card which had been charged with "glowing particles" after being put down on the atomic generator in Norton's laboratory, and which had been returned to him by Superman.

posted November 30, 2002 08:31 PM    

EC is lauded for its subversive slant on 50s Americana. But you don't have to read EC to find this. It's everywhere. All kinds of repressed fears coming to the surface.

One thing that is so charming about many of the classic Superman stories is the way they fit a kind of model of action. Beginning in the Daily Planet. A sort of signal to the reader that this is another routine day, but just wait--soon the routine will be blown apart somehow.

My brain isn't up to developing these ideas much further. But one day maybe I'll revisit this topic.

posted December 04, 2002 03:27 PM    

quote:

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Originally posted by India Ink:
For future reference, I thought I would post this link that was put up on another thread concerning Earth 2 Superman (not the same as Siegel & Shuster Superman in my view)...
http://my.execpc.com/~icicle/SUPERMAN.html

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I detest origin-interference stories, one example being that "Earth-1 Superboy" trained "Earth-2 Super-boy" in the use of his powers, then when "Earth-2 Super-boy" grew up, he adopted his Superman identity based upon the example of "Earth-1 Superboy."

Honestly, I don't know how writers come up with such garbage.

As a contrast, I've just been re-reading Green Lantern from Showcase #22 through the early issues, and it's so impressive how John Broome continually revisited his initial "sketchy" Green Lantern origin, slowly fleshing out all the details of the deeper significance of Abin Sur passing the Battery to Hal Jordan. He did this carefully, and with great integrity.

posted December 05, 2002 04:15 PM    

But the integrity of the original work remains.