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No. 24 May 2003
SPOTLIGHT ON The Magnificent
MORT MESKIN
Vigilante TM & ©2003 DC Comics
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Vol. 3, No. 24 / May 2003
™
Editor Roy Thomas
Associate Editors Bill Schelly Jim Amash
Design & Layout Christopher Day
Consulting Editors John Morrow Jon B. Cooke
FCA Editor P.C. Hamerlinck
Comic Crypt Editor Michael T. Gilbert
Editors Emeritus Jerry Bails (founder) Ronn Foss, Biljo White, Mike Friedrich
Production Assistant Eric Nolen-Weathington
Cover Artists Mort Meskin Dave Cockrum
Cover Colorist Tom Ziuko
Mailing Crew Russ Garwood, Glen Musial, Ed Stelli, Pat Varker, Loston Wallace
And Special Thanks to: Ger Apeldoorn Bob Bailey Mike W. Barr Bill Black Jerry K. Boyd Tom Brevoort Mike Burkey R. Dewey Cassell Chris Claremont Dave Cockrum Teresa R. Davidson Arnold Drake Shane Foley Gary Friedrich Mike Friedrich Glen David Gold Mark & Stephanie Heike Tom Horvitz Michael Kelly Ed Lahmann Stan Lee
Don Maris Robert Marquez Paty Peter Meskin Philip Meskin Joe Petrilak Wilson Ramos, Jr. Charlie Roberts Ethan Roberts Jerry Robinson Randy Sargent Jim Shooter Craig Shutt David Siegel Marc Swayze Dann Thomas Alex Toth Hames Ware Dylan Williams Tom Wimbish William Woolfolk
This issue is dedicated to the memory of
Biljo White (1929-2003)
MORT MESKIN: His Kith & Kin Section Contents Writer/Editorial: “Mort Be Nimble, Mort Be Quick!” . . . . . . 2 “He Raised the Artistic Bar!” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Jim Amash’s Short Celebration of the Life and Legend of Mort Meskin. Alex Toth: Homage to Mort Meskin: Maestro . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 “He Thought He Was a Great Comic Book Artist!” . . . . . . . . 9 And he was right! Jim Amash talks with Mort Meskin’s sons Peter & Philip.
Portrait of a Collector: Ed Lahmann Revisited! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 Bill Schelly interviews a star of 1960s fandom—and remembers the late Biljo White. The Marvelous World of “What If?”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 Michael T. Gilbert on some Marvel Age comics covers that never happened!
FCA (Fawcett Collectors of America) #83. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 P.C. Hamerlinck proudly presents Marc Swayze and William Woolfolk. X-Men: From Silver to Bronze Section . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Flip Us! About Our Cover & Contents Page Illo: We wanted you to see it both in color and in black&-white. Collector Ethan Roberts, who acquired this great display drawing a few years ago (he says it belonged at one time to Meskin’s artist-friend George Roussos), believes it may be Mort Meskin’s original concept drawing—i.e., the first illo ever!—of the DC hero The Vigilante, who appeared for years in Action Comics and even had his own movie serial. We suspect Ethan may be right, for the original art is partly colored, almost certainly by Meskin, with a red bandanna mask—a light blue shirt (it became solid blue in the comics)—and white pants (colored light blue in Action). Our thanks to Ethan for letting us print this never-before-published piece. [Art ©2003 Estate of Mort Meskin; ©2003 DC Comics.] Alter EgoTM is published monthly by TwoMorrows, 1812 Park Drive, Raleigh, NC 27605, USA. Phone: (919) 833-8092. Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: Rt. 3, Box 468, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices. Single issues: $8 ($10 Canada, $11 elsewhere). Twelve-issue subscriptions: $60 US, $120 Canada, $132 elsewhere. All characters are © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © Roy Thomas. Alter Ego is a TM of Roy & Dann Thomas. FCA is a TM of P.C. Hamerlinck. Printed in Canada. FIRST PRINTING.
Title writer/editorial
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“Mort Be Nimble–Mort Be Quick!” You may recall my writing some months ago, concerning Alter Ego, that “100 pages ain’t what it used to be!” Well, neither is 108 pages, my friend—for, with all the wondrous words and pictures this time about The X-Men on our flip side, and Mort Meskin on this, we ran so short on room that we had to knock our “re:” section with comments on A/E #19 forward into next issue, where we desperately hope to double up. (We had such informative, even controversial comments on our Dick Sprang and especially Fred Ray coverage in #19 that we didn’t want to squeeze things!)
Yank, Golden Lad, and all the rest. Thanks to the Meskin clan, Dylan Williams, Tom Wimbish, Jon B. Cooke, and Jim Amash for getting us a plenitude of art to choose from. As usual, we had more than we could print—and we look forward to showing you more Meskin magic in issues to come.
On a sadder note, as this issue was in the final stages of preparation, word reached us that Biljo White had passed away unexpectedly. Bill Schelly has written a few words on p. 31 about this 1960s fan-artist and Alter Ego editor emeritus who founded the As for Mort Meskin: he’s not as influential fanzine Batmania, but well known nowadays as he should Johnny Quick employs Mort Meskin’s patented multiple images to show rest assured that we’ll have more to be by a comics readership that may his super-speed in Adventure Comics #131 (Aug. 1948). Repro’d from say about Biljo in a near-future believe the use of moody shadows in AC Comics’ Golden-Age Greats #13—more about this fabulous issue. He was one of the good guys; comic books goes back no further Bill Black mag inside! [©2003 DC Comics.] and to me personally, who visited than Frank Miller, but we’re here to him several times when we lived only half the width of Missouri apart, tell ‘em they’re dead wrong. Meskin was a master at the use of shading it’s going to take a while to sink in that he’s really gone. He was survived and blacks in comics, in addition to being a crackerjack storyteller and a by his wife Hazel, and she has our heartfelt sympathy. He was 73—but master of action second only to Jack Kirby and the barest handful of he left us far too young. others. Mort Meskin had it all—and we’re proud that Alex Toth, Jim Amash, and Meskin’s sons Peter and Philip took the time to tell us about Bestest, this remarkable man and artist. We regret that we didn’t get to print a few samples of his advertising work for BBD&O, but that just meant more room for Vigilante, Black Terror, Wildcat, Johnny Quick, Fighting
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The Magnificent MORT MESKIN part one
3
“He Raised the Artistic Bar!” A Short Celebration of the Life and Legend of MORT MESKIN by Jim Amash Mort Meskin started drawing comic books in the Eisner-Iger shop in 1938. His stay was brief, but he built up his skills to the point where he became the first artist to draw “Sheena, Queen of the Jungle,” proving that Will Eisner’s faith in him was justified. Meskin matured rather quickly as an artist. He had been well educated at Pratt Institute and had already done professional work for magazines, as well as a two-year stretch at a newspaper syndicate. He also studied some of the best artists of his time: Milton Caniff, Herbert Morton Stoops, Roy Crane, Alex Raymond, and Ed Cartier (whose pulp illustration influence was extremely evident in Meskin’s pulp work). Meskin left Eisner & Iger for the Harry “A” Chesler shop, but he didn’t stay there long, either. His work appeared in the comics published by several companies, including Timely, Lev Gleason, and MLJ (later known as Archie Publications), where he drew a variety of super-hero features, including “Bob Phantom,” “Captain Valor,” “Hercules,” “Captain Valor,” “Mister Satan,” “The Wizard,” and more. But he was still finding himself as an artist when he made his next stop, which was a long one, at DC Comics. It was at DC that Meskin found his artistic voice in comic books. He started there on the “Vigilante” feature, and was an immediate hit. “Vigilante” was really supposed to be a filler feature in Action Comics, but Meskin turned it into an artistic triumph. Every page was a visual treat as he refined his storytelling, which was strengthened by his dramatic compositions and his everincreasing use of black areas. His application of defined negative space to reinforce his scene staging only heightened his graphic imagery. Meskin’s compositional arrangements of grouped figures in a scene were always compelling, never contrived. People smiled a lot in his stories, as if to say to the reader, “Join in and have fun with us.” But, good as his drawing was, he never forgot to tell the story first. It was impossible a reader to stop and stare at just one panel, because Meskin knew how to draw the reader into the story and keep him there until the final panel. As experimental as his storytelling was on “Vigilante,” he raised the artistic bar once he was assigned to the “Johnny Quick” feature. While there were several comic book super-heroes applying super-speed as
Mort Meskin inking a page sometime in the 1950s—and a great “Johnny Quick” sequence from Adventure Comics #127 (April 1948) depicting multiple images of hands and arms or whole figures. Most Mort Meskin photos printed in this issue were sent by Dylan Williams, who works with Peter Meskin in running the <www.meskin.net> website, which we definitely invite you to visit! These photos are mostly from the personal collections of Meskin’s sons, Peter and Philip. [Art ©2003 DC Comics.]
their stock in trade, Meskin’s groundbreaking visual treatments of the hero in motion was a sight to behold. His utilization of multiple, fully-drawn images of Johnny Quick to portray rapid movement was inventive and effective. If Meskin was influenced by stop-action photography, his novel use of camera angles convinced any reader that Johnny Quick really moved that fast, leaving the company’s major speedster, The Flash, visually behind in second place. This approach to speed depiction required hard work with no shortcuts, which may explain why few others tried to duplicate it (Witness other artists like Ralph Mayo, who took the more conventional tack when he drew the feature... boring and lackluster by comparison.) Dan Barry, one of the great comics artists of the time, gave it a shot, as did Joe Kubert years later in the 1980s when he drew Johnny Quick on some of DC’s AllStar Squadron covers. However, these two great artists were the exceptions. With this body of work, Meskin became one of the most admired artists among his peers. Many compared his work, in quality and
All characters ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc.
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The Magnificent MORT MESKIN part three
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“He Thought He Was a Great Comic Book Artist!” And He Was Right! A Candid Conversation (or Rather, Two of Them) with the Sons of Golden Age Legend MORT MESKIN! Conducted & Transcribed by Jim Amash [INTERVIEWER’S INTRO: Mort Meskin left a great comic book legacy, but that’s not what makes him so extraordinary. As most people know, raising children is the most special of achievements, even when things run on an even keel. Battling personal and professional problems, Meskin continued to be a wonderful parent and role model for his two son, Peter and Philip. As Meskin was reluctant to publicly discuss his career or personal life, it falls to his sons to tell us about him (in separate interviews which we’ve combined for the sake of economy). From our vantage point, Meskin’s greatest success was the sons he reared and the feelings he engendered in others. If the make of a man is measured by what he leaves behind him, then Mort Meskin proved he was one hell of a man. —Jim.]
“How Do You Draw, Dad?” JIM AMASH: When and where was your father born? PETER MESKIN: As far as I know, he was born in Brooklyn, May 30, 1916. His full name was Morton Meskin. JA: Sometimes he signed his name “Morton Meskin, Jr.” PETER: He made that up. He also made up “Mort Morton” and, I think, “Mort Morton, Jr.” JA: Why did he invent the “Junior” part? PETER: I don’t know. I guess he was young and thought that the “Junior” would be cool or something. [laughs] His father’s name was Joe. One of my earliest memories of my father was that he would bring home copies of his comics to my brother Philip and me. We’d beg him to do it. We would immediately read them, whether there were two comics or twenty. We’d memorize every single word in every single comic, reading his stories first. We were his biggest fans and had a set of comics that you wouldn’t believe. You could show us one panel from a story of his and we could tell you where it came from. But most of those comics disappeared years later.
Mort Meskin with his sons Peter (left) and Philip (right, and the splash from the superbly-drawn “Johnny Quick” tale in Adventure Comics #127 (April ‘48). Unless otherwise noted, photos in this section are courtesy of Peter Meskin, provided by Dylan Williams from the <www.meskin.net> website. Give yourself a treat and give it a look! We’ve only shown the tip of the Meskin iceberg. [Art ©2003 DC Comics.]
JA: Philip, what are your earliest memories of your father? PHILIP MESKIN: As you know, our nuclear family broke up early. I was in the third grade. I remember crawling around Prospect Park with my father and Peter. I remember living with my grandfather when I was about one or two years old. I also remember going to Paris with my mother and brother on a trip. My father didn’t come along. JA: Did your father have any siblings? PETER: Yes. He had a brother, Nat, and a sister, Muriel. They both passed away before he did, though. Uncle Nat was the oldest and Aunt Muriel was the youngest, so my father was the middle child. JA: What art education did your father have? PETER: He went to Pratt Institute. He never graduated but went there for two or three years. He really learned how to draw human anatomy. He was respected for that. I remember one of the sculptures he made at home. It was a plaster cast of Moses, a copy of the one with horns by Michelangelo, and he could name every muscle in the figure. He also
26
Mort Meskin
before Johnny Quick, but the former’s movements were usually depicted with speed lines which didn’t show actual body movement. —Jim] Another favorite memory of my dad was near the end of his life when we were walking in the park. He already had cancer and his larynx was removed. We went to lovely Manor Park in Larchmont. It was on the water in a beautiful neighborhood, and we talked about life and art and just really enjoyed being together for that hour and a half. We were looking at the boats on the water; it’s not very far from where I taught sailing. We always loved being near the water together. That was a special time. Right after that he became incapacitated and wasn’t able to take that walk again. I must tell you that the reason I became a U.S. Coast Guard Captain was because of the early influence of my dad taking Philip and me to boatyards where the boats were dry-docked in Brooklyn. He’d paint them while Philip and I were climbing on the boats and playing around. It was only much later that I realized it was my early love of playing on boats while my dad painted that made me love them and everything connected to them and the sea. Why else would a boy from Brooklyn grow up to be a charter boat captain in the Caribbean? It’s as if every memory of my father being my father, of time we spent together as father and son, has become sacred to me.
with it. It makes me feel great to see the respect he’s gotten and I wish it could have happened more when he was alive. JA: He didn’t know how much people loved his comic book work, did he? PETER: Not really. He knew it from the family. From Molly’s family. That’s all that really seemed to matter to him. He turned down interviews and trips to the San Diego Comics Convention and other places. He didn’t want anything to do with it. He wasn’t very shy at this point and could talk a blue streak, but he’d left comics behind. He was very loved by Molly’s family and by us. He really lived a very happy second life. When we buried my dad, Phil, my wife, and I placed some of his paint brushes in his coffin so that he could continue to draw. During the outdoor ceremony, I was looking up at the sky and I was thinking, “Okay, Dad. I really need you to paint some rainbows for me now.” Whenever I see a rainbow, it’s as if my father has painted it especially for me. [JIM AMASH’s lifelong addiction to comics has resulted in a Master’s Degree in Fine Arts, an eight-plus-year stint running a comic book shop and comics conventions, a decade-plus career inking for Archie, Disney, and others, and one hell of a hangover. He finds that interviewing comics creators brings him as much personal satisfaction as any other comic-related endeavors. He lives in North Carolina with his wife Heidi and seven cats, all of whom stopped listening to him years ago, in order to protect themselves from an endless torrent of bad puns and defective one-liners.]
I’m looking as I talk to you at a painting my dad did of two boats in dry dock on wooden supports. On one of the boats, it says, “Happy Days.” It’s my favorite painting because it reminds me of the wonderful times I shared with my father and brother, when we were a family. JA: Did you ever take your dad sailing? PETER: I never got him out sailing, but once I took him to sit in the boat at the mooring. I remember him looking around with satisfaction and saying, “I like this.” But for some reason he never found the time to actually go sailing.
“I Really Need You to Paint Some Rainbows for Me Now” JA: Philip, do you have a favorite memory of your father? PHILIP: The most emotionally positive memory I have of him was when he came to Israel for my wedding. It really broke me up, and I realized at that point that I might not ever see him again. I was living in Israel, and for me, it was forever. I didn’t see going back to America, and he wasn’t getting any younger. This was in 1978. I don’t know what I was thinking, but that’s what it felt like. JA: How does it feel to know that your father’s work was and is so well respected and remembered? PETER: It makes me feel absolutely wonderful. I know he would have liked some more attention during his life and wanted me to help him to do that. That’s why I’m so happy about the website that Dylan Williams has developed <www.meskin.net> and about giving interviews. He never really told me that he wanted to be recognized, but I always had the feeling that he’d appreciate it as long as he didn’t have to be involved
The shadows know! Mort Meskin in a heavily-shadowed photo—and an inked but unlettered page from an unidentified (perhaps unpublished) Crestwood crime comic from the 1949-56 period, when he worked for that company. Since shadows and blacks were, from first to last, an integral part of Meskin’s style, it seemed appropriate to end this coverage of the Golden Age great with this pair of images. Thanks to Tom Wimbish and Dylan Williams for forwarding the art-scan; it and the photo can also be viewed on the Meskin website operated by Dylan Williams and Peter Meskin at <www.meskin.net>. [©2003 the respective copyright holders.]
Title Comic Fandom Archive
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In Alter Ego #6 (“Vol. 1,” April 1964), then-editor Ronn Foss featured a brief biography of A/E contributor Ed Lahmann, entitled “Portrait of a Collector.” Since forty or so years have passed since then, it seemed time to visit Ed again, in…
Portrait of a Collector by Bill Schelly
ED LAHMANN Revisited!
Introduction: I’ve never had the good fortune to meet Ed Lahmann in person, but I feel as if I know him better than many of the comics fans I’m in touch with—mainly because of his penchant for phoning every month or two to chat. He began calling shortly after The Golden Age of Comic Fandom appeared in 1995, so we’ve covered a lot of ground in the past eight years. For me, a child of the 1950s, it’s been fascinating talking to a fellow who was nine years old when Superman #1 was published, the prime age to read and enjoy comics. Ed has given me a window into the first great days of comic books, as well as the early years of fandom, since he got in on the ground floor. On top of all that, Ed is a prolific artist, working mostly in colored pencil. The Comic Fandom Archive is proud to be able to show visitors some of the many portfolios that Ed has donated. It’s a shame we can’t run some of these marvelous illustrations, but our black-&white printing simply wouldn’t do justice to them. BILL SCHELLY: When and where were you born? ED LAHMANN: I was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on December 24th, 1930. SCHELLY: I always like to know something about the parents of the people I interview. How would you describe your folks? LAHMANN: My father’s name was Clarence Lahmann, and my mother’s was Beatrice. They were both college graduates. Dad was an industrial engineer. Mom was set to be a teacher of English literature and grammar. My mother was a genius and Dad wasn’t far behind. Dad was an employment manager for the G&J Rubber Company (later U.S. Royal); he lost that job due to the Depression, but managed to get another job at the Real Silk Hosiery mills, and it was at this time he met Mom on a streetcar ride home. They got married, and then I entered the picture. Things really got rough for the next three years until Dad landed the job with Roosevelt’s WPA during the war. After the war he went into real estate, but then had a major stroke in 1949—just as I was graduating from high school—and passed away just a few years later. He was just 64 when he died, but Mom lived to the age of 99. SCHELLY: Tell us about your early family life, and how you got into reading comic strips. LAHMANN: My father was a great reader of the comic strips. He subscribed to all of the local papers, and on Sunday mornings he would go to the local newsstand and also get the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Herald American. Practically every syndicated strip was
Ed Lahmann today (left), with his two favorite comic books—and in 1974, with a whole wall-full of colorful classics. Photos courtesy of Ed.
covered in our house. My father taught me how to read using these early comic strips. I was reading clearly by my third birthday. I really didn’t develop a favorite comic strip until I was about seven years old. It would probably have been Flash Gordon at the time, but I also liked Tarzan and Dick Tracy. SCHELLY: When comic books came along, how did you become aware of them? LAHMANN: I had an older cousin, Herbert Lahmann, who had the early Famous Funnies, More Fun, New Fun, Popular Comics, Tip-Top Comics and King Comics. The first comic book I ever bought myself was an early Tip-Top Comics. A gentleman lived next door to me who worked for DeWolfe News, a periodical distributor, who gave me all of his damaged returns, with half or no covers. I remember he gave me a nice copy of Marvel Comics #1. It only had part of the back cover missing. When my mom would go downtown shopping with her mother, she would always bring me back four or five comic books. My dad never bought me any comic books until, in the late 1930s, he brought me home Superman #3. From time to time he would buy me others, and when Gilberton’s Classics Comics came out, he bought me all of those up until I decided to buy them for myself. SCHELLY: What were your favorite comics during World War II? LAHMANN: My favorites were Popular Comics, King Comics, TipTop Comics, and in the hero genre, Detective Comics, Action Comics, Flash Comics and Whiz Comics. Plus my special favorite, Joe Jinks #12. During those early years of comic books, in my neighborhood we traded all the time. We also traded the Big Little Books. I liked all the genres. That’s why I had such an affinity for Popular Comics. SCHELLY: Of the comic book publishers during the Golden Age, do you have a favorite? LAHMANN: Looking at their entire outputs, I would have to say Quality is my favorite, overall. But I have to mention Dell, as Popular
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Marc Swayze Mac Raboy was illustrating a feature called “Dr. Voodoo,” which could be considered Raboy at his greatest. I don’t know who wrote the “Voodoo” thing or whose concept it was, but it was far ahead of its time and so much in the category and quality of the Prince Valiant and Flash Gordon newspaper features that it looked out of place in comic books. “These’ll give you some idea of what’s been going on.” It was Herron dropping several comic books on my new drawing board. “When you’ve finished, maybe you’ll see that they go back in the library.” Library? Wow! Fawcett maintained a library right on our floor, complete with librarian and scores of magazines, books, and movie stills. The books on my table, Whiz Comics and Captain Marvel Adventures, told me much but still left me with questions I wanted to ask about the drawing of the character and the art style. Later, as I set the books aside, Beck came over. “Why don’t you and I go out for a beer when we get off?” he said. “I’d like to talk to you.” “Fine,” I said. “I’d like to talk to you.” In the days that followed I got to know this fellow, Beck. I’ve always called him “Beck.” Everybody did. Once in a while a “C.C.” would sneak through, and now and then a “Clarence.” But usually it was just “Beck.” [Marc Swayze’s reminiscences of his early days with Fawcett, Captain Marvel, and the Golden Age of Comics will continue next issue.]
The Marvel Family by Swayze, from Captain Marvel Adventures #18 (Dec. 1942)—a panel detail from the hardcover Shazam! from the 40’s to the 70’s. [©2003 DC Comics.]
Al Allard wasn’t the type to raise cupped palms and shout, “Give me your attention, please!” Instead, he spoke softly to the nearest artist and introduced me. Al Pauly, logo designer supreme, had come east with the company several years back and seemed to know everybody in the department. A likely one to show the “new guy” around. Most of those present worked at tables adjusted to waist-high level. They were, it was learned, layout experts who maintained a close tie with their editors in arranging the pages of the magazines to which they were assigned. Scattered among them were three comic book artists and a letterer: C.C. Beck, whom I had met in the outer office, Pete Costanza, Mac Raboy, and Angelo Grasso. Beck was drawing “Captain Marvel,” of course, and doing some of the greatest “Captain Marvel” art of all time… also some of the greatest C.C. Beck work. Pete Costanza spoke of having drawn “Golden Arrow,” but was transferring his efforts toward assisting Beck.
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The Human Side of the Golden Age
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The Human Side of the Golden Age Golden Age Writing Great WILLIAM WOOLFOLK Interviewed by P.C. HAMERLINCK [Introduction: American writer William Woolfolk’s career of 60+ years is still going strong today. An accomplished writer, novelist, playwright, essayist, columnist, and publisher, he was one of the highest-paid, most sought-after writers of the Golden Age of Comics, where some of his peers referred to him as “The Shakespeare of Comics.” His comics writing résumé is an impressive list of classic comics characters: Captain Marvel, Captain Marvel Jr., Ibis the Invincible, Superman, Batman, Captain America, Blackhawk, Plastic Man, The Spirit… and the list goes on. [Golden Age Comics fan Shaun Clancy originally put me in touch with Mr. Woolfolk in 2000. A correspondence and friendship had begun, resulting in Woolfolk’s fascinating essay, “Looking Backward… from My Upside-Down Point of View,” published back in FCA #65 (Alter Ego V3#6). It was a joy to present the article by one of comics’ greatest writers, but I knew as I painstakingly edited Woolfolk’s 40+ pages down to 9 pages, that a follow-up interview would definitely be necessary. [I was honored to briefly meet Mr. Woolfolk (and his daughter, Donna, also an accomplished author) in person at the 2002 San Diego International Comic-Con, where he received an Inkpot award. It was Woolfolk’s first-ever convention appearance... and I’m glad I put David Siegel in touch with him, the man who was instrumental in getting Bill to the show. Bill resides in upstate New York, where he’s busy working on several projects. Our interview was conducted in late 2002 via e-mail. —P.C. Hamerlinck.]
Bill Woolfolk (at far right) and chums at the San Diego Comic-Con, August 1, 2002—Bill’s first! [Left to right in back:] Longtime “Aquaman” and “Metamorpho” artist Ramona Fradon... Donna Woolfolk Cross... David Siegel... Dick Ayers (among other things, a Timely/Marvel mainstay from the late ‘40s through the ‘70s)... and William Woolfolk. Center with hat: Lindee (Mrs. Richard) Ayers. [Photo ©2003 Charlie Roberts.]
WILLIAM WOOLFOLK: I feel like someone poised in the middle of a high dive into an empty swimming pool, but I’ll do my best to answer your questions. PCH: Thank you, Bill. First of all, I want to ask if you have a basic philosophy behind writing fiction?
PCH: Comic stories from the Golden Age were generally action and plot driven, yet your comic scripts always gave special attention to characterization, making for a better developed, wellrounded, and interesting story. Did you knowingly strive to expand the comic book story beyond its established, streamlined formula? Did you always go about treating the comics as a valid literary art form…or did you view it as simply another job that will help pay the bills?
WOOLFOLK: My basic philosophy in writing fiction is derived from whoever said that what was crucial in writing fiction is to achieve “a suspension of disbelief” in the reader. Until the reader is willing to at least temporarily suspend his disbelief, he will not willingly attend to your story or accept the actions your characters engage in. This sounds more formidable than it is. If you simply put interesting characters into interesting situations, you will hold the reader’s unskeptical attention. PCH: When preparing a story, specifically a comic book script, did you first write out a rough draft/outline containing the plot and sub-plots, or did you simply prepare it mentally without the use of extensive notes?
WOOLFOLK: In preparing a story for any medium, from comic books to novels to television or movies, I always work out a rough outline in advance. This outline is subject to change, often many changes, but at least it gives me a framework within which to operate. Without it, I’m like someone in free-fall without a parachute.
A Fawcett house ad from Captain Marvel Adventures #5 (Dec. 1941), with art by Mac Raboy. Captain Nazi was one of Bill Woolfolk’s most notorious additions to the Fawcett Universe. [©2003 DC Comics.]
WOOLFOLK: I’m flattered by your description of my work. I did come from a writing background, in
Title writer/editorial
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The Men Called “X” Claremont interview till next issue, where it’ll be accompanied by still more cataclysmic Cockrum art. Since A/E is primarily a Golden and Silver Age fanzine, we hadn’t intended to delve past the first year or so of the revived mutants, and that primarily because I had a personal hand in their rebirth—but once Dave and Chris began giving their own colorful takes on the still-controversial “Dark Phoenix” saga, Jim A. sure wasn’t about to turn off his tape recorder!
This is it—the most pages yet dedicated to a single theme in an issue of A/E—all 52 pages of this side of the mag! Originally, our aim was simple: an interview with or article on each writer of the Silver Age X-Men (Stan Lee, Gary Friedrich, Arnold Drake, and yours truly—and we’d have wanted to talk with Kirby, Roth, et al., if they were still among us, but sadly they are not)—plus interviews with the scripters and first artist of the “New X-Men” in 1974-75 (Mike Friedrich, Len Wein, Chris Claremont, Dave Cockrum)—separated by a comic-con panel featuring three of the above plus late’70s Marvel editor-in-chief Jim Shooter and a piece on the un-used X-Men screenplay Gerry Conway and I wrote indirectly for Orion Pictures circa 1983. But the best-laid plans of mice and mutants gang aft aglay, as somebody once quipped.
From a cover that spotlights the “New X-Men,” to contentspage art of the late-’60s group, to the above drawing of the early-’60s mutants—our first three Cockrum art spots are moving backward in time! A panel from the unpublished Roger Stern-Dave Cockrum-Joe Rubinstein X-Men, of which more to come. [©2003 Marvel Characters, Inc.]
For, between the meaty reminiscences that Jim Amash and I gleaned from the above creators, the X-Men panel, and all the artwork provided by Dave Cockrum and a few others, we had to postpone coverage of the shelved screenplay for another day, and leave two-thirds of our
Thanks to all concerned for their enthusiastic cooperation, and to Jim Amash in particular for half a dozen incisive interviews which add to our knowledge about the first dozen years to two decades of what is now the bestknown super-hero group of all time.
As for the source of our title—for it to ring a bell, you’d have to know that off and on between 1944 and 1952 there was a radio series titled The Man Called X, starring English actor Herbert Marshall as an urbane spy who, so far as I can recall from the time when I listened to it, was never, ever called “X” by anybody.
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• JACK COLE Remembered! An appreciation by ALEX TOTH—and JIM AMASH interviews his brother DICK COLE and several of his colleagues at Playboy! Plentiful and rarely-seen Plas art by COLE, ALEX KOTZKY, JACK SPRANGER, and others! • CHRIS CLAREMONT on The X-Men, part 2—featuring still more never-beforeseen art by DAVE COCKRUM! • WILL MURRAY on “Lost Comics Lore”! • ROY THOMAS on All-Star Squadron #1 and its 1940s roots, with scarce art by JERRY ORDWAY, RICH BUCKLER, SHELLY MOLDOFF, MORT MESKIN, et al.! • MICHAEL T. GILBERT—BILL SCHELLY—FCA with CHAD GROTHKOPF, C.C. BECK, & MARC SWAYZE—and SPECIAL SURPRISE FEATURES! Edited by ROY THOMAS • 108 PAGES!
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The Men Called “X” part one
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“I Wanted Magneto to End Up Being Professor X’s Brother!” STAN LEE Talks to ROY THOMAS about the Early Days of The X-Men –––and Even “The Doom Patrol” Interview Conducted by Phone – Feb. 11, 2003 Transcribed by Brian K. Morris [NOTE: Since Stan Lee was the co-creator and first writer of The X-Men, beginning with its first issue in 1963, I could hardly conceive of doing a special issue on Marvel’s merry mutants without getting his thoughts on the matter. I promised him our phone talk between L.A. and South Carolina would take only about fifteen minutes, and I was as good as my word. —Roy.] ROY THOMAS: I always considered it strange that Marvel came out with two super-hero groups at virtually the same time: The Avengers and The X-Men. I was curious why that happened. STAN LEE: They came out at the same time? RT: Within a couple of weeks of each other, at most. LEE: Well, I never thought of them as being similar, because The X-Men was a totally new group of new characters. And The Avengers was just a bunch of guys I put together, but we’d seen them all before. So I never thought of them as being a new group. RT: It seemed to me when I first saw it that, as opposed to The Avengers, The XMen was more in the vein of Fantastic Four—a group created as a group, only with the teenage appeal of Spider-Man. Did you have any of that consciously in mind when you did it, sort of combining those two books? LEE: [laughs] I don’t think I was thinking of that. I think all I was trying to do—and again, I don’t remember it—it may be that [Marvel publisher] Martin Goodman said to me, “Why don’t you do another group?” Because if the Fantastic Four was doing well— RT: So you did two of them. LEE: You’re right, The Avengers were a group. But we always had guest stars. To me, this was the ultimate “guest-star.” [laughs] We had five guest stars in one story. RT: I remember you told me soon after I came to work for you in 1965 that your original name for the comic was The Mutants, but Martin Goodman nixed it. I was wondering why you went with that name, and why he nixed it.
Stan Lee in the Silver Age—as seen in the set of Bullpen photos sold in the early ’70s—and the cover of A Certain 1963 Comic Book that is worth a lot more now than it was then, from the black-&-white pages of The Essential Uncanny X-Men, Vol. 1. Thanks to R. Dewey Cassell for reminding Ye Editor that the set of photos had ever even existed! This one was taken circa late spring of 1970, as shown by the cover proofs on Stan’s office wall. [©2003 Marvel Characters, Inc.]
LEE: Well, I wanted it to be called The Mutants because they were mutants. [laughs] It seemed like the logical name. And I remember this, because I’ve told this story so often—he nixed it because, he said, “Nobody would know what a mutant is.” He didn’t think people understood that word. But if people wouldn’t know what a mutant is, how the hell are they going to know what an “X-Man” is? I needed another name, and I’d decided to call the professor, Professor X. And they were characters with “extra” powers. And somehow, at some point, it made me think of them as The X-Men. You know, Professor X, and they had an “X” power. Of course, one of them was a woman, so I shouldn’t have done that. [laughs] RT: Well, “X-People” or “X-Persons” wouldn’t have sounded very good. I’m curious, did you make up all five of the characters when you made up the idea, or did you leave who some of the particular characters were up to Jack? LEE: Oh, no. I always made up all of them, in all the books. Jack was just the guy to whom I’d say, “Hey, I’ve got something for you to draw.” Of course, after that, his contributions were considerable. [laughs] But in the beginning, I used to just hope he’d like it and say, “Oh, great. I’ll draw it.”
The Men Called “X” part two
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“I’m Proud of Both My Runs on The X-Men!” A Fond Look Back by the Marvelous Mutants’ Second Scripter, ROY THOMAS “Another Mighty Marvel Bullpen Surprise!” “X” has traditionally and mathematically stood for the unknown—the mysterious factor in an equation, either algebraic or human. And, despite the unique talents of the individuals involved with The X-Men after its mid-1970s return, it’s certainly unknown and perhaps ultimately unknowable precisely why that comic became, twenty-plus years ago, Marvel’s best-selling title, surpassing even The Amazing Spider-Man, just as the latter had once passed Fantastic Four. That hardly seemed a likely scenario back in the 1960s, let alone the first half of the 1970s, when there was no original X-Men book. Sure, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby started The X-Men out well, and it always had its following. But in the ’60s it never approached the popularity of The Avengers, let alone of F.F.. And once first Jack, then Stan, departed within a few issues of each other—Jack after #17 (Feb. 1966), Stan with #19 (April ’66)—The XMen began a slow decline which ended in cancellation. I know because, to a certain extent, I suppose I was a part of that late-’60s decline. I’m proud to this day that Stan passed the scripting of X-Men on to me with #20 (May ’66). He handed me already-penciled pages by Werner Roth, who had taken over full penciling with #18, after a brief apprenticeship over Jack’s layouts. As per all my previous hero scripting for Stan (one “Iron Man,” two late Ditko “Dr. Stranges,” and Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos), I started out with a story already plotted by Stan and the penciler. It was Stan and Werner who teamed up mutants Unus the Untouchable and The Blob, decided how Professor X lost the use of his legs at the hands of the recurring villain Lucifer. I was simply the hired gun—or rather, hired typewriter. But I was happy to pick up the torch.
This photo of Roy Thomas from the Silver Age Bullpen series (courtesy of R. Dewey Cassell) has gotta be an early shot, since after ’66 or ’67 the Rascally One rarely wore a tie to the Marvel office! Roy wrote the original X-Men and helped jump-start the new mutant group, both of which are pictured in this Dave Cockrum art—done for a Slurpee cup, Dave tells us. [©2003 Marvel Characters, Inc.]
The Marvelous Mutants’ Second Scripter
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there’s just a bit too much of it. And even that is a subjective opinion, not shared by everyone who read the issues, I’m happy to say.
“Let’s See How a Swingin’ Staff Handles a Yarn All by Their Lonesome!” The first sour note for me on X-Men came with my second issue, #21. I learned that, for reasons never made clear, Stan had told the artist that he (Werner) would be plotting the upcoming issues, and I’d be simply writing dialogue and captions for them. Now, understand: in those days, Werner wouldn’t have received one extra cent if he had plotted all stories with no input from me; I’d still have received my full script rate, then probably $10 a page. But I felt that I, not Werner, should be plotting the stories. I said so to Stan and prevailed, though I’m not sure how much I contributed to the plot of #20 (“From Whence Comes... Dominus?”) and how much is Werner’s or, indirectly, Stan’s. Werner himself seemed happy either way, and to this day I’ve no idea whether the plotting thing was his idea or not. He was older than most other artists I’d worked with, or so he appeared to me at the time; and though he was always friendly, his enthusiasm for comics seemed limited. Yet he was certainly not un-inventive, as witness page 17 of #20, where one panel on a six-panel page shows five mutants on three sets of stairs ascending the face of Dominus’ enormous machine. Like John Romita, Gene Colan, and other Bullpenners, he had been drawing romance comics for DC and, finding himself with less and less work as that genre slowly imploded, had wandered over to Marvel. Like Colan, Mike Esposito, and others, he opted at first for a pseudonym: “Jay Gavin,” taken from the first names of his sons—a common ploy in those days.
Splash of X-Men #20, repro’d from the black-&-white Essential Uncanny X-Men, Vol. 1. The word “Uncanny” was retroactively added to the 1960s title later to avoid confusing with the new X-Men mag begun in the ’90s. [©2003 Marvel Characters, Inc.]
Although X-Men hadn’t been one of my favorite comics before I’d entered the field, I enjoyed writing the mutants—especially The Beast, with his voluminous vocabulary. The others, however, I found less differentiated than Sgt. Fury’s six buddies.
All I recall about doing the “dialoguing” (a term not then in use) on #18 is that, as I’d done with earlier super-hero efforts, I taped tissue paper over the original twice-up penciled art and drew on balloons and captions containing the “copy” (as we called it, taking a term from advertising). I can’t remember if it was my decision to have so many people on the splash talking, or whether Stan added even more balloons when he went over my script with me. I know there were changes; I just don’t know what they were. I do know I hadn’t indicated any more balloons than are there in the published comic: a grand total of ten, not counting the introductory caption and the credits. Stan added the blurb reading “Another mighty Marvel Bullpen surprise!” with an arrow pointing to my name beneath his. I was flattered to have him draw attention to me, indicating he wasn’t totally ashamed of the script. But then, if Stan hadn’t felt I was up to the job, he wouldn’t have given me The X-Men, less than a year after I’d walked in the door. My early X-Men is certainly copy-heavy, even for me. Something about Werner Roth’s pencils lured me into giving most people in the panels dialogue; they usually looked as if they were all talking. But that’s not Werner’s fault. He and I were both simply doing what we felt Stan wanted. Stan seemed to like our X-Men. After all, he hadn’t exactly been shy about sticking lots of word balloons into Werner’s panels himself, as witness #19, page 11: its final 1/3-of-a-page panel contains seven characters—and eleven word balloons! Actually, I’m not at all ashamed of my X-Men dialogue my first time around, even though I feel my second stint (mostly with Neal Adams) was superior. I don’t think that, for the most part, it’s bad dialogue...
“If a super-villain isn’t much by himself, put him in a group with several others!” That was Stan the Man’s philosophy—and it worked pretty well in X-Men #22-23 with Unicorn, Scarecrow, Porcupine, The Eel, and Plant Man. Script by Roy Thomas, art by Werner Roth & Dick Ayers. Repro’d from a photocopy of the original art, courtesy of Mike Burkey. See Mike’s ad elsewhere in this issue. [©2003 Marvel Characters, Inc.]
The Men Called “X” part five
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The X-Men: “A Cool Concept!” A Panel on the Silver & Bronze Age X-Men –-––with DAVE COCKRUM, JIM SHOOTER, ROY THOMAS, & ARNOLD DRAKE Conducted by Craig Shutt (June 11, 2000)
Transcribed by Brian K. Morris
[NOTE: On June 9-11, 2000, the city convention center of White Plains, NY, an hour from New York City out in Westchester County—yes, the same Westchester County that has been home to Professor Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters—hosted Joe Petrilak’s All Time Classic New York Comic Convention, with one of the greatest guest lists of Silver and (especially) Golden Age talent anywhere, ever, period. Alter Ego plans to devote an entire issue to it in The panel gets under way with the moderator and the three previously announced the near future. One Silverguests (left to right): Craig Shutt, Jim Shooter, Roy Thomas, and Dave Cockrum; and-Bronze Age event was an photo courtesy of Joe Petrilak—plus Dave Cockrum and Gil Kane’s cover for GiantX-Men panel, hosted by Craig size X-Men #1 (1975). Dave discusses who did what on the panel. And learn more Shutt, writer of the “Ask Mr. about it in our interview with Dave, later this issue. [©2003 Marvel Characters, Inc.] Silver Age” column for The Comics Buyer’s Guide. I’ve had to edit and telescope the panel slightly to fit it into this special X-Men issue with so many interviews. Special thanks to Joe Petrilak! —Roy.] CRAIG SHUTT: I have the easy task of introducing three guys who really don’t need any introduction. To my immediate left is Jim Shooter, who worked as editor-in-chief for a number of years on The X-Men... Roy Thomas, who did many of the classic stories with Neal Adams and had some input on the new X-Men when they were first being started up... and Dave Cockrum, whose sketchbook held many of The X-Men, even before any of us had ever seen them. What I’d like to ask each first is: from your time with The X-Men, what do you consider one of the highlights, or one of the key things that you remember best from those years? JIM SHOOTER: Well, I’m kind of one of the least involved here of any of these guys, so... [passes the microphone to Roy, who passes it to Dave] DAVE COCKRUM: Well, it was just mainly fun, most of the time. You know, when you’re young and enthusiastic and a comics fan, that’s the most fun you can have, really. Marvel was a fun place to work, and getting to draw all these people
in Spandex, that was great. I guess, as far as The X-Men goes, “Kitty’s Fairy Tale” is one of my favorite high points, because we were just joking around and said, “Why don’t we do a fairy tale?” It was just spur-of-the-moment, off the top of our heads; we just spun that story out, and that was a gas. And the Brood stuff. The Brood were so nasty that, if Phoenix had eaten their planet, she’d have gotten a medal. [laughs] And I thought that was fun. Those were really mean buggers, you know. [to Roy] It’s your turn. ROY THOMAS: I enjoyed my two stints as writer on The XMen. The first was with Werner Roth, and later Don Heck and Ross Andru, as the second writer of The X-Men, after Stan Lee suddenly turned it over to me one day. But probably the most enjoyable time was working with Neal Adams on all but one of the issues of X-Men that he did. Despite deadline problems, it was always worth it in the end, because they were beautiful; they’ve been printed over and over again, and they deserve to be. It didn’t make any difference what the story was. Just to be knocked out by the beauty of those pages was enough.
But in some ways, the most satisfying thing to me personally is that, back in ’74, not long before I left the editor-in-chief job, one of my last acts was to say, “Hey, let’s revive The X-Men!”—which I’d always been wanting to do and had been trying to do, here and there. We made them an international group... figuring maybe this time they’d make it. Well, it turned out they did, more than any of us could ever have guessed. And I think that Dave Cockrum and Chris Claremont particularly, and Len Wein,
“A Cool Concept”
19
We’ll confess it up front, with no apologies: Dave Cockrum sent us a lot of rare artwork, and we intend to use nearly all of it in this issue and next! Of this drawing of the “old” and “new” X-Men, though, Dave writes: “Frankly, I don’t remember doing this. It was apparently done for an unused mug design for the Danbury Mint. Very little of this looks to me like my work. I think the inker must’ve heavily reworked it.” The inker is John Koblish, who has done work for both Marvel and DC. [©2003 Marvel Characters, Inc.]
who wrote the first story, and then later maybe John Byrne as an artist, too—that handful of people ended up turning The X-Men into something that none of us ever would have dreamed as late as 1974, ’75, which was that X-Men would become the hottest thing at Marvel Comics. If you’d told somebody that 25 years ago, they’d have locked you up in a room with Prez or Brother Power, the Geek. SHOOTER: X-Men was becoming the big hit while I was there. I didn’t do much with starting it, so it was always up front and important when I was there. There was an issue with Firelord that Dave drew. He had a big apartment in Queens, and before I found my own apartment, I stayed with him for a while. Well, look at the splash page with Firelord flying over the X-Men mansion, and picture me with a broom in my hand, standing on one leg in the living room. That was my debut in The X-Men. [laughs] He used to ask me to pose. He’d say, “Hold your hand like this.” “I can’t write while I’m holding my hand like this, Dave.” [laughs] But little bits of me crept into the art here and there, and that was fun. In some ways, The X-Men was sort of the hardest book; and in some ways, it was the easiest book. Chris Claremont deserves immense credit for the success of The X-Men; he wrote it and did a great job. A lot of writers—if something was wrong with a script, I’d call up them and say, “Hey, this doesn’t work,” and they’d say, “Well, if you want to change that, it’s okay,” and I would do a rewrite, and that was the end of it. Chris, the first time I changed a word, went ballistic. [laughs] Out of his mind, right? And then he said [angrily], “Just put an ‘X’ in the margin and tell me what it is.” So he would come in and see a little “X” scribbled in the margin. He’d say, [angrily] “What’s this?” I’d say, “Well, you know, it’d be nice to mention a character’s name in this issue, Chris.” And he would—[growls] then he’d go find a typewriter someplace and he would fix it. But he wanted every word to be his, okay? And it was. Okay, with a rare exception—a place where I accidentally wrote some suggested copy. And in the space allotted, he couldn’t figure out anything else to put in there and he was furious, but he had to use those words. Chris, also, was responsible for recruiting all the great artists on The X-Men. He really made it a personal mission. I think he even had some deal where he paid Tom Orzechowski extra to stick with lettering The X-Men. The same with Glynis Wein—Glynis Oliver—the colorist. He really made it his personal crusade to make that book work, and boy, did
it! So it was a joy working on it, and even though Chris and I argued like cats and dogs over the stories, as editors and writers do sometimes, I think all of us really felt we had something special going on there, and a lot of great moments. CS: I was interested in seeing what the new movie [the first X-Men film] does about mutants, and the prejudice against them. And I was wondering what you see as what their appeal has been over the years—if it was the prejudice and the misfits, or if it was the cool characters and the powers they had. SHOOTER: I don’t know. I mean, I think it was a cool concept. I think I really credit it to the fact that the people doing it did a better job than almost anybody else. They did really work their butts off, and Dave used to crash an airplane every issue. [laughs] THOMAS: One of the reasons it wasn’t as big in the early ’60s is because its time really hadn’t come yet. It was before the age of the teenaged super-hero. I noticed back in the ’50s, when I was a teenager, that the teenage idols kept getting younger. First there was Elvis, who was 21 when he really hit. A couple of years later, Ricky Nelson was 18 when he got big. And then suddenly there’s Fabian, who’s like 15 or 16—and I think this is what happened to comics, a decade or so later. Nor was the “outcast” thing quite as big earlier. Remember, ’63 was still the Kennedy years. But by the middle and late ’60s, with Viet Nam and civil rights and all that, the idea of the outsider as the hero came in big. And what did you have as the groups before that? You had Justice League of America. I mean, these guys are just a bunch of Rotarians with super-powers, you know? And the idea that they would ever argue was just beyond belief. The Fantastic Four argued and that was what made them fun, but they were still a group. Everybody knew where they lived. They were heroes and lionized. The Avengers were all heroes—everybody knew who they were, and they had a building. And the mutants were these guys, hiding out behind trashcans or trying to pretend they’re a bunch of innocent kids up in Westchester County. Where is that Westchester County? It’s a fictitious county like Gotham City, you know? [laughs] I think it was a combination those two things, and the incredible talents of the people who did it. Despite the fact that Len Wein did a very fine job with that first issue, and I had a little something to do with getting it going, it was primarily Chris, first with Dave and then with