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82658 00454

Cover art & The Shadow TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./Condé Nast.

Roy Thomas' SHADOW-Haunted Comics Fanzine

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In the USA

No. 176 July 2022

BONUS!

Vol. 3, No. 176 July 2022 Editor

Roy Thomas

Associate Editor Jim Amash

Design & Layout

Christopher Day

Consulting Editor John Morrow

FCA Editor

P.C. Hamerlinck J.T. Go (Assoc. Editor) Mark Lewis (Cover Coordinator)

Comic Crypt Editor

Michael T. Gilbert

Editorial Honor Roll

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

Proofreaders

William J. Dowlding David Baldy

Cover Artist

Writer/Editorial: On The STREET & SMITH Where You Live . . . . 2 What The Shadow Didn’t Know! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Mark Carlson-Ghost relates the star-strewn history of Street & Smith in four colors.

Walter Gibson Remembers Street & Smith’s Comics . . . . . . . . 42

Charles Coll

The Shadow’s most important author, pulp & comics—interviewed by Will Murray.

Cover Colorist

The Greene Shadow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Unknown

With Special Thanks to: Heidi Amash Ger Apeldoorn Dave Berge Ricky Terry Brisacque Bernie Bubnis Mark CarlsonGhost John Cimino Chet Cox Mark Ellis Shane Foley Joe Frank Jeff Gelb Janet Gilbert Grand Comics Database (website) Jill Greene The Vernon Greene Family

Contents

Gwandanaland Comics William B. Jones, Jr. Jim Kealy Jim Ludwig Dennis Mallonee Bruce Mason Mike Mikulovsky Brian K. Morris Mark Muller Will Murray Warren Reece Randy Sargent David Saunders Scott Shaw! Carl Lani’Keha Shinyama Dann Thomas Anthony Tollin Geoffrey Wyncoop

This issue is dedicated to the memory of

Richard Lupoff, Steve Perrin, & Dan Nakrosis —also of Walter Gibson & Vernon Greene

The life and times of S&S artist Vernon Greene, explored by Anthony Tollin.

ForeSHADOWing The Batman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 The pulp-to-comics connection between the Knight of Darkness and the Dark Knight.

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! It’s a Cracked, (etc.) World—Pt. 2 . . . 55 A Michael T. Gilbert salute to Cracked’s greatest-ever artist—John Severin.

John Broome – The Penultimate Chapter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 Part XIX of the Golden/Silver Age scripter’s 1998 memoir.

Tributes to Richard Lupoff, Steve Perrin, & Dan Nakrosis . . . . . 65 re: [correspondence, comments, & corrections] . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America] #235 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 P.C. Hamerlinck presents Carl Shinyama’s look at Captain Marvel’s split personality.

On Our Cover: There were quite a few covers of Shadow Comics that would’ve made viable fronts for this issue centered on The Shadow and his colorful Street & Smith compeers, drawn by the likes of George Rozen, Vernon Greene, and Bob Powell, impressive talents all—but this fine symbolic image for Vol. 7, #2 (May 1947), by Charles Coll, with its overlapping pages, gave us a chance to ballyhoo what’s inside our issue, and we’re more than happy with our choice! Thanks to the Grand Comics Database. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.] Above: Probably the most endearing (and enduring) Street & Smith creation conceived especially for its comics line (as opposed to its pulps) was Supersnipe, “The Boy with the Most Comic Books in America”— and who lived a rich fantasy life because of them—the ultimate wish-fulfillment of just about every kid who ever read a comic. Incidentally, the archetypal cover of Supersnipe Comics, Vol. 1, #6 (Oct. 1942) by his creator, George Marcoux, was actually the first issue of his own title. Thanks to the GCD. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.] Alter Ego TM issue 176, July 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

On The STREET & SMITH Where You Live!

ime was when a huge segment of America lived on what could’ve been called “Street & Smith” Street.

short-lived comic strip from 1940-42… and of course the Street & Smith comicbooks, also commencing in 1940, which straddled the gun-toting pulp and mind-clouding radio versions, often in the same story.

The principal reason, of course, was The Shadow. Back between 1937 and 1954, the Street & Smith company’s flagship hero was probably nearly as well known as Superman— certainly familiar to more people than his comicbook colleague Batman… because The Shadow was damn near everywhere, as Mark Carlson-Ghost, Will Murray, and Anthony Tollin will make clear in the pages that follows. To most of the public, it was the radio Shadow who was best known: a cloaked, masked figure who could “cloud men’s minds,” thus making himself basically invisible, so he could frighten criminals into confessing their sins. (Presumably, they stayed scared long enough not to recant those confessions in court.) That macabre hero’s opening and closing radio taglines remain iconic enough that they are often quoted or paraphrased in various contexts even today. Opening: “Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!” (Followed by a sinister, echoing laugh and a groundswell of menacing music.) Closing: “The weed of crime bears bitter fruit! Crime does not pay! The Shadow knows!” (More laughter, more weird music.) Compared to the radio Shadow, his other incarnations were simply the icing on the cake: the pulp magazine that had begun in 1931 (because of radio, as Mark Carlson-Ghost will elaborate)… a popular Saturday-matinee movie serial released in 1940… a

As Anthony Tollin will remind us, the pulp-mag Shadow was an indisputable and profound influence on 1939’s Batman debut in DC Comics—to the point where the original Batman was not much more than The Shadow in a different set of threads. Still, because there’s really nothing ever totally new under the sun, even The Shadow was part of a long, long line… partly influenced, no doubt, by the 1905 novel The Scarlet Pimpernel and 1919’s masked pulp-mag swordsman Zorro… and by other progenitors who are usually overlooked. Shadow pulp co-creator Walter Gibson said he was inspired by nothing less than Bram Stoker’s Dracula—as well as by Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s 1859 haunted-house story “The House and the Brain.” And Wikipedia lists a French character called Judex, whose first film-serial episode was released in the U.S. as The Mysterious Shadow, while one author also notes that another silent serial, The Shielding Shadow, featured a “protagonist [who] had a power of invisibility.” Yeah, Doc Savage was the 1930s-40s Street & Smith hero whose magazine adventures would loom largest when republished in paperback beginning in the 1960s… but The Shadow is the one who’s cast the longest, well, shadow. But now I’ll turn things over to a handful of guys who know a lot more about The Shadow, Doc Savage, Street & Smith, and the whole macabre megillah than I could ever hope to….

Bestest,

COMING IN AUGUST

177

A DON PERLIN-Led Potpourri!

acters, Inc. n Knight TM & © Marvel Char Werewolf by Night & Moo

• MOON KNIGHT vs. WEREWOLF BY NIGHT—a PERLIN action re-creation! • Artist DON PERLIN talks to RICHARD ARNDT about his long career at Marvel, DC, Hillman, Ziff-Davis, Fox, Harvey, St. John, and Charlton! Re-live his stellar stints on GHOST RIDER, WEREWOLF BY NIGHT, MOON KNIGHT, THE DEFENDERS, et al! • Mini-Marvel spotlights on Golden Age artist MARCIA SNYDER—the MARVELMANIA FAN CLUB of the 1970s—& WILL MURRAY on early Marvel variant covers! • Plus—FCA explores FREDDY FREEMAN’s friends & relations—MICHAEL T. GILBERT’s still CRACKED—a JOHN BROOME finale—& MORE!!

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CRED! Part One

What The Shadow Didn’t Know!

The Secret History Of Street & Smith’s Comicbook Line by Mark Carlson-Ghost

hat evil lurks in the hearts of men, The Shadow knew all too well. But the motives of the publisher, editor, and writer who produced his stories were far more complicated. The tone and tenor of the comicbooks published by Street & Smith were largely driven by three decidedly different men: publisher Allen Grammer, editor William de Grouchy, and writer Walter Gibson. Bits and pieces of their story have been scattered across various articles and books. Most popular culture historians have been more interested in the history of the characters of The Shadow and Doc Savage. Yet the story of the company that published them has its own intriguing twists and turns. The focus on their two star characters is understandable. In pulp magazines and later comicbooks, these heroes operated in a world of dark forces at work behind the scenes, a realm in which light struggled to break free of—yes—shadow. A feel of ’30s Pulp Fiction—The Mags, Not The Movie! menace permeated their stories, in which The two kingpins of Street & Smith’s pulp-hero line, depicted on classic magazine covers: The Shadow heroic vigilantes were almost as unfettered (Jan. 1, 1933) and Doc Savage (August ’33). Art by George Rozen & Walter Baumhofer, respectively. Thanks in their methods as their foes. (More on them to Anthony Tollin. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.] later.) But to understand the forces behind the creation of these compelling characters, we The reader will not be surprised by the last names of the two need to explore an origin story of a decidedly different sort. And it entrepreneurs. Francis S. Street, 36, was a businessman. Francis first unfolds in 1855! S. Smith, 24, was a writer. Smith’s first byline appeared on an

Street & Smith’s Popular Fiction Roots Street & Smith’s stewardship of popular fiction stretches back to the 19th century. That story is most fully told in the company’s official history, The Fiction Factory by Quentin Reynolds. Therein, Reynolds relates how in 1855 two employees purchased The New York Weekly Dispatch, the struggling periodical for which they worked. The Weekly’s subtitle was “A Journal of Useful Knowledge, Romance, Amusement, etc.” Though to say “purchased” doesn’t quite capture the arrangement. The owner, one Amos Williamson, offered his two employees a sweetheart deal: no down payment required, just pay him the $50,000 asking price from whatever profits they managed. The two employees readily agreed.

excitingly sordid serial entitled “The Vestmaker’s Apprentice; or, The Vampyres of Society.” Sales of the Dispatch doubled before the serial ended. By 1859, their debt largely paid, Williamson declared the two men fully in charge of the Weekly. The partnership of Street & Smith (always with an ampersand, not an “and”) was successfully launched. It was a venture that would flourish for over a hundred years!

Street & Smith, In The Flesh The two founders of a great magazine empire: Francis Scott Street (1831-1883) and Francis Shubael Smith (1819-1887). Thanks to Jim Kealy.

The success of the Weekly meant better rates for writers. By 1869, the periodical was home to the first serial written by Horatio Alger, Jr., who would soon find a lucrative niche in telling stories of

ambitious American boys overcoming poverty. Later that same year, the first of a series of extraordinarily popular sagas featuring Buffalo Bill saw print.

The Secret History Of Street & Smith’s Comicbook Line

to romance. As told in Theodore Peterson’s Magazines in the Twentieth Century, the wildly successful Love Story was the brainchild of editor Anita Fairgrieve. But it achieved its greatest success under the watchful editorial eye of Daisy Bacon. Love Story quickly progressed from a quarterly to a weekly publication schedule.

Having Ormond Smith served as the (1860-1933), flanked creative force by a 1908 issue of behind Street & the New Nick Carter Smith’s success Weekly and an 1897 for thirty-some edition of Tip Top Library, starring years, Francis “Frank Merriwell at Smith died in Yale.” Thanks to Jim 1887. His son Ormond took over as president of the Kealy for the photo. The Shadow’s History On Radio company, a position he would hold for the next four decades. His brother George served as vice president & In The Pulps equally as long. Members of the Street family were no The Shadow’s origins are deeply rooted in the history of Street longer involved in the publishing venture, though their presence & Smith. It is commonly known that The Shadow was originally in the company’s name proved just the unseen host of a radio show enduring. who would utter the famous words, Street & Smith continued to “Who knows what evil lurks in the be home to some of the best-known hearts of men? The Shadow knows!” popular-culture characters of the at the start of every episode. Those era. Nick Carter, splendid detective lines and the eerie laugh that followed and master of disguise, first made enlivened the imaginations of listeners the scene in 1886. With 1889, Ormond across the country. Smith began publishing dime novels, What is less commonly known is singularly devoted to unbridled that the name of the radio show that and often fantastic adventure. Frank The Shadow hosted was The Detective Merriwell, military school cadet, Story Hour, which had debuted on likewise began his adventures in that the CBS network in 1930. Detective format in ’96. Story was another of Street & Smith’s Under the leadership of Ormond highly successful pulps. The yarns Smith, the company seamlessly that unfolded on the radio show made a necessary transition from were adaptations of ones that had dime novels to pulp magazines appeared in the magazine. Street & to better cater to changing tastes. Smith sponsored the show as a way Pulp historian Ed Hulse describes of promoting its pulp line, as well as how New Buffalo Bill Weekly became broadening the scope of its business. Western Story Magazine, with editor Radio was a booming market, and the Frank Blackwell overseeing the savvy publisher capitalized on it. The transition. By 1921, Western Story was radio show would continue with The enjoying a circulation of over half a Shadow as nothing more than its host million. Other pulp magazines were until 1937. The total Shadow takeover soon added. Western Story rose to of the program followed. But that new heights, making a home for the was only long after the debut of The wildly popular stories written by Shadow’s own periodical. “Max Brand” (real name: Frederick Fascination with the mysterious Faust). His best-known characters, Casting A Long Shadow radio host prompted Street & Smith’s Destry and Silvertip, first appeared in The cover of the first issue of The Shadow pulp magazine, decision to develop a fully developed Western Story serials. cover-dated April 1931. Coming along just as the Great character to be featured in a pulp Depression was moving into high gear, Street & Smith’s Nor was Street & Smith only magazine devoted to his adventures. new magazine would nonetheless prove a considerable interested in action pulps for men. The Shadow Magazine appeared on success. Cover by Modest Stein. Courtesy of Anthony Tollin. In 1921 the company also issued the newsstands in the spring of 1931. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./ first pulp magazine entirely devoted The Condé Nast Publications.]

What The Shadow Didn’t Know!

Street & Smith approached a promising new writer to pen the character’s initial story under the pen name “Maxwell Grant.” His real name was Walter Brown Gibson.

Walter B. Gibson & The Shadow Pulps At the time he was tapped to do the “Shadow” stories, the 34-year-old Gibson was making a catch-as-catch-can living as a writer, though an interest in magic and mystery pervaded all his endeavors. Gibson recalled in The Shadow Scrapbook the work he was doing for newspapers at the time, providing everything from puzzles, magic tricks, and intelligence tests to exposés of fake psychics. Along the way, he had also sold a number of detective stories to Street & Smith. Hoping to do more, Gibson was in the right place at the right time, and was assigned the task of creating the first Shadow novel. As the story of the Shadow pulps has often and extensively been told, their history will not be a focus here. Let it suffice here to recognize that Gibson’s creation of the vigilante hero, his [fake] alter ego Lamont Cranston, and associated operatives (Harry Vincent and Moe Shrevnitz chief among them) proved wildly popular.

Walter Gibson as a young man. He recalled purchasing a copy of The Shadow, Vol. 1, #1, the day it came out in early 1931—and it sealed his destiny.

The success of The Shadow Magazine prompted the creation of several new “hero” pulps that featured their title characters in action rather than following the anthology format for stories Street & Smith had been accustomed to using. 1933 saw the debut of a modernized Nick Carter, a new character named Doc Savage, and Pete Rice (a modern-day cowboy), each featured in his own magazine. The following year, Bill Barnes, Air Adventurer also achieved immediate success.

The End Of A Family Dynasty: Enter Allen Grammer In the midst of this period of remarkable growth, tragedy hit the company’s leadership. In April of 1933, over two wrenching weeks, both Ormond and George Smith died. Incredibly, the two men had overseen the Street & Smith

operation since 1887. Bad news continued to plague the company. As Quentin Reynolds tells the story, one of George’s sons took over but died four years later. A son-in-law of George’s succeeded him and resigned after a year for reasons of poor health. The company was lacking clear direction at the worst possible time, as pulp-magazine sales in general were in a slump. A number of pulps introduced in 1936, The Whisperer and The Skipper among them, proved unsuccessful, adding to the company’s distress. Two years later, business consultants urgently advised family members with stock in Street & Smith to hire an outsider to run the firm for the very first time. They recommended a fellow by the name of Allen Grammer. What led the consultants to suggest this particular man as the company’s savior? A decidedly brief bio in Time magazine gives some clues. Grammer, described at 50 as “white-haired” and “supercharged,” had spent the last twenty years working for the Curtis Publishing Company, owners of The Saturday Evening Post and Ladies’ Home Journal, two powerhouses in the world of magazines. Grammer’s role at Curtis had largely been in improving efficiencies. He also “made a small fortune inventing new printing processes” along the way. Grammer had slowly worked his way up the corporate ladder, most recently serving as Secretary of the company. The consultants declared that it would take a fresh perspective to ensure the continued solvency of the operation. The Smith family promptly hired him. Grammer held a markedly more modern perspective than his predecessors. While Ormond Smith had been a cultured fellow, he believed the foundation of his family company was solidly grounded in popular culture. Grammer, for his part, felt little sentimentality for Street & Smith’s less than glamorous past. Given his experience with Curtis, what seemed to interest Grammer most was the modest success of Mademoiselle, a new “slick”-paged publication Street & Smith had introduced in 1935. Employees grumbled when Grammer decided to rid the company of the old-fashioned roll-top desks to which many felt emotionally attached. What’s more, in the ensuing years, Grammer moved Street & Smith’s offices “into a skyscraper, and fixed up the foyer like a cocktail lounge,” as one disgruntled staffer recalled—a setting far more suitable for the more modern enterprise Grammer hoped to foster. More substantive was Grammer’s mass cancellation of pulp magazines. Based on Jess Nevins’ calculations (in his excellent

A Bunch Of Guys Not Named Street &/Or Smith Workers in the stock room, and in the “work area,” at Street & Smith during its heydays. Jim Kealy says he found these in Wikipedia, and bless him for it!

CRED! Part Two

WALTER GIBSON Remembers Street & Smith’s Comics The Shadow’s Most Important Scribe— On Pulp Paper & In Four Colors

by Will Murray

ne of the most significant contributors to Street & Smith’s comicbook line was Walter B. Gibson, who wrote their Shadow novels as Maxwell Grant and scripted the character’s adventures in Shadow Comics between 1940 and ’46. Gibson’s involvement went beyond scripting. He conceptualized many titles for S&S, including Super-Magician Comics, which starred his friend, magician Harry Blackstone. Coordinating with editor William de Grouchy, Gibson organized Penn-Art, a “shop” consisting of out-of-work Philadelphia Ledger Syndicate newspaper artists, which produced many S&S comics features. It was also Gibson’s idea to depict The Shadow as a blue surprint whenever he was invisible. On January 27, 1985, I interviewed Walter about his comics career. It was fortunate I did so when I did. He passed away that December. Otherwise, most of this information would have been forever lost…. WILL MURRAY: When did your comics career begin?

Walter B. Gibson in his later years, with George Rozen’s cover for Street & Smith’s Shadow Comics, Vol. 1, #1 ([Jan. 12] 1940). Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Wyncoop, via Will Murray; thanks to Jim Ludwig for the cover image. [Cover TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.]

WALTER B. GIBSON: In 1937, I talked to Street & Smith about doing comics, and [S&S General Manager] Bill Ralston said, “The trouble is the syndicate comics are all being used up. You can’t get them anymore.” I said, “That means getting up your own.” He said, “That’s a lot of expense. The way to do these comics is to buy old ones from syndicates.” I said, “Why not get up some and sell them to syndicates, start comics, get paid by the syndicates, and get the rights to use them in comicbooks?” And I said we should begin with The Shadow. We didn’t do that right away. William de Grouchy later came in, and then they decided to do comics, starting with The Shadow. De Grouchy was a promotion man. Street & Smith was treating comics as promotion. As soon as they began, I went right in and insisted they use my scripts. Ralston okayed that, and so I did all the Shadow Comics. But I also did some “Doc Savages” and particularly some of the “Nick Carter” stuff. De Grouchy didn’t know how to get hold of artists, so he looked for someone to do it, and ran into that guy “Chiseler.” His real name was Chesler, but we called him “Chiseler.” He was a character, kind of a whimsical guy. WM: Harry “A” Chesler was one of the early comic “shop” proprietors.

GIBSON: Jack Binder was his right-hand man. So they gave Binder the first Shadow comic. Now they gave him a sort of synthetic “Shadow” script. They may have taken one of the radio plots. They just wanted to see what he could do with it. When I came in, they had that made up. So I said, “Go ahead and run it.” That was the first issue. From then on, I took over and tied them in with the pulp magazine. So de Grouchy broke off with Chesler and went with Binder. WM: I noticed that you recycled some of your Philadelphia Ledger Syndicate Shadow newspaper strips for Shadow Comics. GIBSON: The Shadow comic strip was actually my comic. I was the agent. I sold it, and I said they will also give us the rights to use it in any way. And so the same comic stories could be taken later and used in the Street & Smith comicbooks by breaking them into episodes. In one story, there was a blonde named Valda. The Shadow got into some place that had costumes and was moving around in the dark. And she found a black cat costume. She put that on and she was doubling for The Shadow. You couldn’t see her because she moved around in the dark, like he did. Well, that ran

Walter Gibson Remembers Street & Smith’s Comics

Harry “A” Chesler in a news photo from later years—and Gus Ricca’s cover for the Chesler-published Dynamic Comics #12 (Nov. 1944), whose chess-playing mobster type was rumored to have been visually modeled after Chesler himself. [© the respective copyright holders.]

and was later reprinted in Shadow Comics. One day I walked into Street & Smith and talked to de Grouchy. He said, “We’re going to get sued by the Bell Syndicate.” “What do you mean?” “What have you been doing—stealing their comic?” “What do you mean, stealing their comic?” “They’ve got a comic [strip] called Miss Fury, and Miss Fury goes around dressed as a black cat.” “Hey, don’t you remember my Valda in the Shadow strip two years ago? That’s where they got the idea.” They didn’t sue. [A/E EDITOR’S NOTE: According to Mark Carlson-Ghost in our lead article, Valda Rune’s

The Shadow Nose! (Above:) A page from the lead story from Shadow Comics #1, drawn by Jack Binder. Scripter uncertain. Courtesy of Anthony Tollin. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.]

cat-suit did not actually precede the launching of Tarpé Mills comic strip Black Fury (soon retitled Miss Fury).] WM: Super-Magic Comics came next, I believe. GIBSON: Street & Smith were always thinking of doing new comics at that time. So, the deal I proposed was this: The comics were selling for a dime, and would they give Blackstone returns at 5 cents apiece? That meant that Blackstone could order a thousand

Full Of Sound And Miss Fury (Above:) Valda Rune gets bereft of her cat costume in a “Shadow” story scripted by Walter Gibson and drawn by Vernon Greene. From Shadow Comics, Vol. 3, #2 (May 1943), reprinted from earlier newspaper strips. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.] (Right:) The masthead of Tarpé Mills’ Black Fury Sunday comic strip, which debuted on April 6, 1941, and was soon retitled Miss Fury. Reproduced from IDW’s hardcover Tarpé Mills – Miss Fury – Sensational Sundays 1941-1944, edited by Trina Robbins. [TM & © the respective trademark & copyright holders.]\

The Shadow’s Most Important Scribe—On Pulp Paper & In Four Colors

“This Looks Like A Job For…” SF and comics writer Otto Binder (see photo on p. 73) adapted part of Campbell’s Mightiest Machine in the pages of Shadow Comics, Vol. 1, #1. Its hero, Iron Munro, even sported a red cape, perhaps in keeping with Campbell’s (and others’) belief that his pulp creation Aarn Munro had been an influence on Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster’s Superman. Art by E.C. Stoner. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.]

Comics was prepared, featuring the star of that S&S pulp title, but it was never released, its orphaned features scattered over several titles. A significant footnote to comics history was once revealed by Walter Gibson. In 1939, Everett M. “Busy” Arnold approached him about licensing The Shadow for a planned newspaper comicbook supplement. But Street & Smith refused to license the character. Consequently, Arnold turned to artist Will Eisner, who created the legendary Spirit as a Shadowy substitute hero!

Sources: “Inside John W. Campbell,” Sam Moskowitz. Fantasy Commentator, Vol XI, Numbers 3 & 4, Spring 2011. “Spotlight on Iron Munro,” Anthony Tollin. The Shadow, Volume 105, Sanctum Books, 2016.

Will Murray

Will Murray is the author of pulp crossover novels such as Doc Savage: Skull Island, Doc Savage: The Sinister Shadow, King Kong vs. Tarzan, and Tarzan, Conqueror of Mars. He created the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl for Marvel Comics.

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CRED! Part Three

The GREENE Shadow

The Life & Good Times Of Artist VERNON GREENE by Anthony Tollin

he Shadow has appeared in numerous comicbook series since his four-color debut in Shadow Comics #1, with his adventures visualized by many talented cartoonists and illustrators. However, Vernon V. Greene holds the distinction of drawing The Shadow’s first illustrated adventures in both comicbooks and newspaper strips! Vernon Van Atta Greene (Sept. 12, 1908–June 5, 1965) was born in Battle Ground, Washington, and grew up on a 650-acre ranch. After working as a logger and blacksmith, he attended the University of Toledo before beginning his art career in 1927, producing sports cartoons for the Portland Telegram. He moved to the Toledo News-Bee in 1929, and continued his career at the Toledo Blade (1930-32). “Around that time, Vernon Greene left Toledo, Ohio, where he had been doing sports cartoons, and came to New York to do political cartoons,” Walter Gibson recalled. “A highly versatile artist, Vernon took on other assignments and in 1935 began ‘ghosting’ the black-&-white daily strip for the popular comic Polly and Her Pals. He liked the work so much that he began looking forward to the day when he could illustrate a comic strip on his own. “Late that same year I met the manager of the Ledger Syndicate on a train from New York to Philadelphia. I gave him a copy of Zemba, my latest Shadow novel, and after he read it, he called me up and said that when the time was right, he would like to start a new comic strip based on my Shadow novels. “That time came in 1940 when Street & Smith decided to add comicbooks to their magazine line, with The Shadow as the leader. I reduced excerpts from ‘Shadow’ stories to short comic strips, and one was turned over to Vernon Greene, who was intrigued by the possibility of extending the continuity to cover the entire novel. I contacted the Ledger and they liked the idea, so Vernon finished the first week of art while I was finishing several weeks of continuity. We went to Philadelphia together and made an instant sale. Back in New York, terms were approved by Street & Smith, who arranged to have the strip remade into pages for the Shadow Comics. “From then on, the project really rolled. We went over the scripts together in New York, except when I mailed them in from Maine or Florida, though there were times when I sent them out to Washington; Vernon liked to go there for vacations, but he

Vernon Greene as a young man with his own 1942 Christmas card—and (below) a 1940 sample of his Shadow comic strip, as scripted by Walter Gibson. Thanks to Anthony Tollin, Jill Greene, & the Green Family Archives. [Shadow strip TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications.]

always took some work along. The finished artwork went directly to Philadelphia, where it was duly processed into strips that the syndicate sold to an increasing list of newspapers; then it came to Street & Smith, where it was made over into comic pages.” As the strip’s newspaper list shrunk during the early months of the war, Gibson often didn’t receive compensation for his newspaper continuities until he resold the scripts to Street &

CRED! Part Four

ForeSHADOWing The BATMAN The Pulp-To-Comics Connection Between The Knight of Darkness & The Dark Knight by Anthony Tollin

hile visiting with a wealthy friend, Gotham’s police commissioner receives a call informing him that a chemical executive has been murdered. Arriving at the crime scene, the commissioner and the young socialite learn that detectives consider the victim’s heir to be the prime suspect. However, the relative reveals that the murdered man had three business partners in a chemical syndicate, one of whom phones to report that he, like the victim, has received a death threat. The commissioner, minus his friend, departs for the caller’s mansion where murder is already claiming its second victim. The killer steals a document from his victim’s safe, but he and an accomplice are stopped by a “bat-like” crimefighter during their rooftop escape. Arriving police The Shadow Of The Bat mistake the black-garbed crimefighter The Shadow may have preceded Batman as for the murderer, but the mystery man a fictional character by several years—but escapes with the recovered document. Batman made it into comicbooks first, on Meanwhile, one of the two surviving Bob Kane’s iconic cover for Detective Comics partners arrives at the laboratory and #27 (May 1939). The cover of 1940’s Shadow is imprisoned in a glass gas chamber, Comics #1 was seen on p. 42, so at right is but the mystery man enters the a later Vernon Greene cover (for Vol. 2, #6, deathtrap and plugs the gas jet with Sept. 1942) on which The Knight of Darkness a handkerchief. Escaping from the swings on a rope à la the Dark Knight. Thanks to the GCD & Mark Carlson-Ghost. [TM & © DC gas chamber, he captures the hidden Comics & Advance Magazine Publishers/The plotter’s accomplice and prevents Condé Nast Publications, Inc., respectively.] the murderous mastermind from killing his final partner. The Knight of Darkness reveals the details of a sinister plot to take over ownership of the chemical plant, gleaned from the recovered document. The next day, a police official expresses interest in the Dark Avenger’s crimefighting activities, while the socialite discusses the events with a man who has no inkling that the millionaire is secretly the master sleuth who solved the case. This plot, originated by pulp writer Theodore Tinsley for Partners of Peril, is familiar to legions of comics fans who have never read his 1936 Shadow novel—since every key plot point in it was lifted by Bill Finger for Batman’s

1939 debut, “The Case of the Chemical Syndicate”! In fact, Batman’s co-creator freely admitted that his “first script was a take-off on a ‘Shadow’ story.” Bob Kane also acknowledged The Shadow as a major influence on Batman’s creation: “I suppose both The Shadow’s cloaked costume and double-identity role, as well as the extraordinary acrobatics of Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., did more to my subconscious to create the character and personality of Batman than any other factors.” Later statements by Bob Kane assigned more credit to Johnston McCulley’s Zorro, as portrayed by Fairbanks in the 1920 film The Mark of Zorro. However, it now appears that even the connections to Zorro and Fairbanks’ acrobatics may have originated with Finger rather than Kane. As historian Jerry Bails observed, “Bill maintained (well into the 1960s) a file of Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., photo stills. He showed me the file and said that he would attach selected photos to finished scripts for Bob and his assistants to use as models. I recognized pose after pose. The stills I saw (and had never

ForeSHADOWing The Batman

Pardon Me, May I Borrow That Giant Inverted Bowl? The Tom Lovell two-page (“double-truck”) illustration for the Nov. 1936 issue of The Shadow pulp magazine… contrasted with a “Batman” panel from Detective #27 that reveals some of the machinery Bob Kane swiped from the Lovell art. “Batman” script by Bill Finger. Thanks to Anthony Tollin. [TM & © Advance Magazine Publishers, Inc./The Condé Nast Publications & DC Comics, respectively.]

seen before that date) were the familiar swinging poses that characterized the Acro-Batman that was so popular in my youth.” Kane’s claims of a Zorro influence were accepted for years, even though there is virtually nothing of Zorro in the first year of Batman. The grim Batman mimics the somber Shadow, not the devil-may-care caballero, while Bruce Wayne’s actions parallel Cranston’s and lack the effete behavior of Don Diego. Certainly, the friendship between a police commissioner and his crimefighting ally’s alter ego had already been developed in The Shadow Magazine and the popular radio series. Kane fully participated in the Bat-adaptation of Partners of Peril, swiping a rooftop chimney and laboratory machinery from the Tom Lovell Shadow illustrations reproduced on this page. Many other elements from The Shadow Magazine filtered into Batman stories. The Dark Knight inherited The Shadow’s talent or escapes from diabolical death traps, beginning with Partners of Peril’s glass gas chamber in Detective Comics #27. Batman’s mastery of escape was a legacy from Houdini to his biographer Walter Gibson and on to Bill Finger via The Shadow. Partners of Peril is the smoking gun that proves the Shadow/

Batman connection. It also raises questions about Bob Kane’s actual contribution to Batman’s creation. It’s fair to ask: If Bill Finger’s first “Batman” script was lifted from an earlier Shadow novel and the writer also suggested the Caped Crusader’s bat-eared cowl, bat-scalloped cape, black-and-gray costume, and utility belt, what did Kane personally contribute to the feature that bears his creator credit, other than its title? In later years, Bob Kane publicly lamented that Bill Finger had not shared byline credit, though the artist claimed to be the sole creator of Batman while Finger was alive, even threatening lawsuits against researchers who reported the writer’s contributions. While his initial “Batman” story was lifted from Partners

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

It’s A Cracked, Cracked, Cracked, Cracked World! (Part 2) by Michael T. Gilbert

hen I was a kid, Cracked was the magazine you’d buy if Mad was sold out. Unless Sick was on sale.

It’s not that Cracked was bad. There were actually some excellent art and some decent articles. Early on, you might find stories illustrated by Russ Heath, Al Williamson, Joe Maneely, Bill Elder, or Jack Davis, and in later years, excellent work by Steve Ditko, Bill Wray, Dan Clowes, and Mort Todd. I even sold them a story once (which gives you a rough idea of their sometimesquestionable standards!). And of course, Bill Ward’s sexy women got young male hearts beating a little faster. But it wasn’t Mad. Still, over the years Cracked grew on me, as the magazine developed its own distinct personality. And a large part of that personality came courtesy of former Mad artist John Severin. He became Cracked’s house artist, often drawing multiple stories each issue, as well as most covers. Fantagraphics co-publisher Kim Thompson once wrote, “I don’t think I’m alone in thinking of Cracked for most of its run as ‘a bunch of crap… and John Severin.’” Not entirely fair, but I think you get the idea.

Certifiably Mad The Western parody “Varmint!” in the color comicbook Mad #1 (Oct. 1952) was Severin’s debut in that mag, years before he defected to Cracked. [TM & © EC Publications, Inc.]

The Original Mad-Man! Severin was one of the original Mad-men, drawing his “Varmint!” story for Mad #1 for October 1952. The artist contributed to nine issues between 1952 and 1954 before parting ways with Kurtzman, the only one of the original Mad artists to do so. Severin and Kurtzman both stated that the two old friends had a falling out over critical comments Harvey had made concerning John’s art. Additionally, Kurtzman insisted on providing layouts for all the artists, which Severin resented. That would explain why he also opted not to join Kurtzman on his other ill-fated ventures (though Severin did take over the editorial reigns of ECs Two-Fisted Tales when Kurtzman quit the title due to Harvey’s ever-increasing Mad workload). Severin didn’t lack work in 1954. Fast and talented, he was kept busy by Marvel doing war, horror, and even humor for some of their own short-lived Mad clones (Crazy, Wild, and Riot). He also did a long stint on Prize’s Prize Comics Western, illustrating his signature character American Eagle (your typical “noble Indian” warrior).

John Severin in the 1960s, flanked by a few his many covers. In addition to Cracked, we can see EC’s Two-Fisted Tales, Prize’s Prize Comics Western, and Timely/Atlas’ Sailor Sweeney.

Enter…Cracked! But Sev really made his mark when he drew a quiz show parody called “The $64,000,000 Cracked-Pot Question” for Cracked’s

It’s A Cracked, Cracked, Cracked, Cracked World (Part 2)

Fly Like An Eagle! The Native American hero American Eagle was Severin’s signature character in the late Golden Age of Comics. His feature ran from Prize Comics Western, Vol. 9, #6 (Jan. 1951), until issue #113 (Sept. 1955). Severin usually inked his own work, but would occasionally team up with fellow Mad (and Cracked) artist Bill Elder. Kurtzman actually preferred Elder’s inking to Severin’s own on the penciler’s work, which proved a point of contention between Harvey and John. (Left:) Severin’s cover for Prize Comics Western #100 (July 1953). (Right:) Elder inks Severin in this tale from Prize Comics Western #99 (May 1953). [© the respective copyright holders.]

premier issue in February 1958; he also designed the cover for that issue, executed by Bill Everett. It was the beginning of a long and fruitful association between one of comics’ greatest cartoonists and the #2 humor magazine in America. Severin and Cracked’s marriage lasted for over forty years in a combination of new material and reprints. During that time the prolific artist also drew stories for Marvel, DC, Warren, and other publishers. In 1985—interestingly, the same year Al Feldstein retired as Mad’s editor––publisher Robert Sproul sold Cracked to Globe Communications Corporation. Issue #213 (Aug. 1985) was Globe’s first, and shockingly Severin was nowhere to be found––even though his art had been well represented in the previous one (the last from Sproul’s Major Publications). The geniuses at Globe apparently thought the magazine needed a Major overhaul (pun intended!), and dumped their long-running (and expensive!) Cracked superstar. John didn’t appear in the next few issues either, but loyal Cracked fans must have voiced their displeasure––or possibly new, disappointing sales figures came in––and Cracked’s new owners

quickly reversed course. With issue #218, Severin’s art once again began appearing regularly in Cracked. His distinctive style could be seen there into the 21st century.

Cracked’s Granddaddy! In a biographical page for Cracked #347 subtitled “Artist John Severin: The Granddaddy of Cracked,” writer Barry Dutter wrote: “Over the years, John has drawn hundreds––maybe even thousands––of pages for Cracked, including movie and TV parodies, as well as regular features like ‘Hang-Ups’ and the western spoof ‘Sagebrush!’ At one time, John was drawing so much material for each issue, he started using pseudonyms, just for fun! One of the names he used was ‘Nireves’ –– ‘Severin’ spelled backwards! And then there are all those covers, covers, covers!” Dutter’s bio then added: “John clued us in to the origin or our own mascot, Sylvester. Jackie Gleason used to have a skit on his TV show where he played a guy who ran a moving company, and there was a little guy who worked with him. Bob Sproul, the publisher, said, ‘Let’s do

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt!

on a variety of projects in his later years. John Severin died February 12, 2012, at age 90, leaving behind a legacy of remarkable consistency, talent, and integrity. And an awful lot of happy Cracked memories! Till next time…

Next: “Spy vs. Spy”? Nope! Cracked vs. Mad—to the death!

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JOHN BROOME – The Penultimate Chapter Part XIX Of The Golden/Silver Age Scripter’s 1998 Memoir

A/E

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION: For nineteen issues now, though not quite in an unbroken string, this magazine has serialized writer Irving Bernard (“John”) Broome’s slim volume My Life in Little Pieces – “An Offbeat Autobio,” which was published at the turn of 1998, roughly a year before he passed away at age 85. Our thanks to his daughter, Ricky Terry Brisacque, for her kind permission to reprint this very limited-edition book… and to Brian K. Morris for retyping it onto a Word document….

Temper, Temper I once asked wife Peggy: Why, when the world could so quickly forgive tennis wight John McEnroe his court antics and temper tantrums and take him so lovingly to its bosom on his retirement, she couldn’t seem to forgive or ever forget a single one of her spouse’s occasional outbursts down the decades of our marriage; and she replied: “I’m sorry. You’re just not a good enough tennis player.” And yet a reasonably mercurial temper came to me legitimately enough, it’s pretty clear, via my paternal grandfather, squat, burly, mustachioed lgnatz Broome, he who presciently spared his progeny-to-be (three girls and two boys, not to speak of their offspring) such unenviable life experiences as being frozen to death in an experimental ice-filled Jacuzzi, or being done equally to death in showers unexpectedly laced with—of all things—potassium cyanide, by shaking the dust of his native Poland from off of his feet fifty years before Hitler and making his way young and alone to the terrifying but alluring New Land across the seas. ****** In the family, Grandpa Broome’s temper was as celebrated as Grandma Broome’s cooking—twin memory bits that segued together at the yearly Passover seder evenings, held usually in their home, where a single look from Grandpa’s dark flashing eyes lasering across the spotlessly white tablecloth laden with pitchers of Grandma’s honeycolored raisin wine and platters piled high with succulent patties of her special gefilte fish—the gentle lady, it was said, had as a young girl been a cook, or at least a scullery maid, in the kitchens of Emperor Franz-Joseph of Austria-Hungary—could instantly immobilize a restless l0-year-old, seated foremost among the small fry as the family’s first male grandchild, with the force of a true laser shot. ******

John & Peggy Broome on the left, during the period of his service in World War II, with a pair of unidentified friends—and a page from JB’s Carmine Infantino-illustrated yarn “Danger on the Martian Links,” one of the “Strange Sports Stories” in The Brave and the Bold #46 (Feb.-March 1963). Maybe the renowned Golden/ Silver Age comics scribe wasn’t a “good enough tennis player” for his wife’s tastes, but he could sure spin a mean tale about playing golf on the Red Planet for his editor (and the best man at their wedding), Julius Schwartz. Thanks to Ricky Terry Brisacque & Jim Kealy. [Page TM & © DC Comics.]

[correspondence, comments, & corrections]

Now, a few words about the Bill Schelly tribute in A/E #165, from regular correspondent Bernie Bubnis: Hi Roy— Just a moment to remember, please… just why Bill Schelly means so much to me. This is a story about a friend who passed away. I will tell a portion and then I will turn this page over to him. After all, he is the poet whose words have entertained and taught the majority of the people who may read this. There was a time, before caller ID: If a phone rang after the 9:00 P.M. Witching Hour, you knew this had to be bad news. As my heart beat louder, I put the receiver to my ear. “Hello?” Bill Schelly You are not going to believe this, but it hard at work on a fandom project circa 1999—and the original 1964 Comicon button that Bernie Bubnis sent him was a guy in Seattle with a clock that for his Comic Fandom Archive in 2010, along with his note to Bill. It became one of Bill’s proudest possessions. read 6:30 P.M. asking me questions Photo courtesy of Jeff Gelb. about things I did as a kid thirty years earlier. And Holy Cow, he knew more for me. Something I can remember every time I look at the about me than I remembered myself! It was Bill Schelly, and he was button. He was impressed by how thrilled I was. Maybe for the preparing a book on early-1960s comic fandom and wanted to check first time, he “got” how much my experience in fandom when I his facts about my involvement with an early comic convention in was a teenager meant to me. 1964. I’m glad I did not hang up, because I would never have gotten The year 1964 resonates with me because that’s the year I to know one of the finest men I have ever known. heard about, and became active in, fandom. I kept in contact with him over the years and routinely asked I can’t think of anything that’s happened during all my for his advice on a number of issues. One phone call, and the rest of research that tops this. our friendship existed only as e-mails. Hard to believe that you can develop a friendship with merely printed words from a computer The 1964 Comicon button is now proudly displayed in the keyboard, but then, this is Bill Schelly I’m talking about. Comic Fandom Archive, perhaps the coolest item in the aforesaid collection. I shared some bad family news with him, and he wrote on August 16, 2010: Thanks from the heart. I have my own personal family tragedy going on right now, with my son who is terminally ill, so I am extremely empathetic toward those who lose loved ones prematurely. My son Jaimeson is just 20. The attached photo is me and him visiting Stephen Colbert in NYC back in April. This was my first introduction to his son, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. We talked about collecting Holy Grails. Mine was an old fanzine I published but could not ever find a copy of for sale. He wrote me: As a fandom historian, obsessive as hell about this stuff, the Holy Grail for me is 1964 Comicon pins that Art Tripp got made. You don’t have a stash of ’em, do you? Of course not… but what’s odd is, I’ve never seen one, or run across anyone who ever had one. And you know how fans save things! I only had one left. To me it was just like all the other fan memorabilia I ever had. Fun to look at and then I put it back in its box. Maybe put it in my coffin with me someday. It just was not my Holy Grail. I never forgot that 9:30 P.M. phone call years before. Bill made sure that a forgotten day in 1964 would never be forgotten again. This button belonged with someone who would treasure it. I also never forgot the letter he sent me after I mailed him the Art Tripp Comicon 1964 Button: The button arrived yesterday! I had my son, the one who is seriously ill, open the package

Bill My love always to two people I have never met, Bill and Jaimeson. My new Holy Grail is to see Bill again… someday. Bernie Bubnis Amen to that, Bernie. There isn’t anything left for us to add—except to say that our next letters section will probably have additional comments about Bill, responding to the second part of Jeff Gelb’s assembled tribute to him. Any praise, plaudits, or pans to send concerning this issue? Address all such comments to: Roy Thomas e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com 32 Bluebird Trail St. Matthews, SC 29135 The Alter-Ego-Fans chat group is still holding forth 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 in friendly fashion. This long-running discussion group deals with various Golden and Silver Age matters, and also gives Ye Editor (Roy) a place where he can plead for help from time to time to time. Roy’s manager John Cimino operates the Roy Thomas Appreciation Board on Facebook, making it the major source of info on my comics convention appearances, store signings, and other sightings. Check it out and sign up! [See ad on p. 80.]

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Getting In The Spirit Of Things

Captain Marvel’s (and Billy Batson’s) Forgotten Ability! by Carl Lani’Keha Shinyama

n age-old question: When Billy Batson says his famous magic word and transforms, does he actually become Captain Marvel, or does Billy go into limbo once Captain Marvel appears? This puzzler has been asked over the course of many decades, following the original Captain Marvel’s heyday at Fawcett, one that fans continue to inquire about and debate to this day. It has, at different points in time, been posed to C.C. Beck, Captain Marvel’s artistic co-creator, and to Otto Binder, Captain Marvel’s main and most prolific writer in the Golden Age. In what is arguably a surprising fact, despite both Beck and Binder being Captain Marvel’s longest-tenured artist and writer respectively, Beck and Binder each gave differing answers.

Jack Binder, C.C. Beck, & Otto Binder (Left to right:) The “Mary Marvel” artist≥… the artist/co-creator of “Captain Marvel!”±… and the major writer of “Captain Marvel”… all enjoying a convivial moment in the 1940s. This is part of a photo sent by Binder to A/E’s editor circa 1964.

In Beck’s case, citing his work from Whiz Comics #2 (Feb. 1940—actually the first issue), he made it plain that in Captain Marvel’s first appearance, Billy Batson became Captain Marvel. Nothing more, nothing less. States Beck: “In the first issue of Whiz Comics old Shazam told Billy that by speaking his name he would become Captain Marvel and vice versa. It was that simple; I don’t know why anyone ever felt the need to analyze it.” [Fawcett Companion, p.143] Indeed, as Beck correctly says, in Whiz #2, when Billy Batson first said the magic word and transformed into Captain Marvel, the text in the caption box stated plainly: “As Billy Batson speaks the magic word he becomes Captain Marvel!” Meanwhile, Binder’s answer was that Billy Batson and Captain Marvel were separate individuals. Or rather, he acknowledged that that was how they were written in the comics:

When Friends Fall Out This installment of FCA explores the question of whether Billy Batson and Captain Marvel were one entity—or two. If the latter, then what could’ve been more inevitable than that, sooner or later, they’d have a quarrel! Art for the cover of Whiz Comics #53 (April 1944) by C.C. Beck & Pete Costanza. [Shazam hero & Billy Batson TM & © DC Comics.]