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Vol. 3, No. 89 / October 2009 Editor Roy Thomas

Associate Editors Bill Schelly Jim Amash

Design & Layout Christopher Day

Consulting Editor John Morrow

FCA Editor P.C. Hamerlinck

Comic Crypt Editor Michael T. Gilbert

Editorial Honor Roll Jerry G. Bails (founder) Ronn Foss, Biljo White Mike Friedrich

Cover Artist Howard Nostrand, Joe Simon, & Jack Kirby

Cover Colorist Tom Ziuko

With Special Thanks to: Alan Harvey Heidi Amash Roger Hill Ger Apeldoorn Jonathan Ingersoll Mark Arnold Sid Jacobson Rodrigo Baeza Alex Jay Bob & Becky Bailey Bill Jonocha Jean Bails Jay Kinney John Benson Marv Levy Lee Boyette Jim Ludwig Chris Brown Don Mangus Bob Burr Bruce Mason Mike Burkey Harry Mendryk Ernie Colón Brian K. Morris Jon B. Cooke Sumner Crane (Estate) Frank Motler Dave O’Dell Teresa R. Davidson John G. Pierce Angelo De Cesare Seth Powell Michaël Dewally Greg Preston Shel Dorf Joe Rubinstein Shane Foley Brian Sagar Bill Fugate Ramon Schenk Janet Gilbert Ken Selig Marvin Giles Marc, June, & Mike Gold Desha Swayze Julia Gorton Dann Thomas Rudolph Grey Jennifer Hamerlinck Jim Vadeboncoeur, Jr.

Contents Writer/Editorial: Happy Halloween From “HORROR-vy” Comics . . 2 “Silver Threads Among The Mold”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 An ominous overview of Harvey Publications’ 1950s horror comics by John Benson.

“Drawing Comic Books Is A Means To An End”. . . . . . . . . . . 13 Artist Howard Nostrand on Harvey Comics, Bob Powell, and Other Phenomena.

“You Could Get Away With Murder!”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Sid Jacobson speaks of his years as Harvey editor—and he’s proud, do you hear me—proud!

“Strange Things Went On In Those Days”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Artist Warren Kremer on Casper the Friendly Ghost and other four-color haunts.

“Come Back When You Learn How To Draw” . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 Harvey artist Ken Selig talks about the company early days under the Comics Code.

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! Doc Wertham’s Straight Talk About Comix! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Michael T. Gilbert annotates the juiciest quotations from Seduction of the Innocent.

A Memory Of The Early Detroit Triple Fan Fairs . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Bill Schelly spotlights Marvin Giles’ reminiscences of one of fandom’s earliest events.

FCA (Fawcett Collectors Of America) #148 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 P.C. Hamerlinck presents Marc Swayze, the Fawcett/Charlton connection, and Mr. Atom. On Our Cover: Our special thanks to collector Roger Hill for providing a page of original art by featured artist Howard Nostrand from Black Cat Mystery #44 (June 1953)—and to our esteemed copublisher John Morrow for providing a piece of unpublished art from the unreleased Stuntman #3 (circa 1946) by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby to put it in context. [Splash page ©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest; Stuntman art ©2009 Joe Simon & Estate of Jack Kirby.] Above: One of Warren Kremer’s most gruesome Harvey horror covers—but then, he only did a handful of covers in that genre, generally being content simply to do rough sketches from which other artists worked. But this “For Whom the Bell Tolls” masterpiece done for Witches Tales #25 (June 1954) amply demonstrates that it wasn’t because Kremer couldn’t hold his own with the best of them! Thanks to John Benson for the scan. [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.] Alter EgoTM is published 8 times a year by TwoMorrows, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614, USA. Phone: (919) 449-0344. Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: 32 Bluebird Trail, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: roydann@ntinet.com. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices. Single issues: $9 US ($11.00 Canada, $16 elsewhere). Twelve-issue subscriptions: $88 US, $140 Canada, $210 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. ISSN: 1932-6890 FIRST PRINTING.

writer/editorial

Happy Halloween From “HORROR-vy” Comics! nd not past time, either!

Sure, the focus in Alter Ego is primarily on heroic comic books through the mid-1970s, which means we tend to emphasize DC, Marvel, and Fawcett—for those were three of the industry leaders during the 1940s through 1953, when the latter killed its comics line, while the other two, of course, are still the most prominent companies in the field. And still spewing out super-heroes of one ilk or another.

Harvey Publications, on the other hand, got out of the super-hero business fairly early, after even radio’s Green Hornet failed to make much of a dent against the big boys. But, just as MLJ would become Archie Comics, with no peers in the production of teenage cartoon humor… so would Harvey emerge, beginning in the 1950s, as the main rival to Dell/Western in the genre of animation-style comics, as a multitude of titles starring Casper the Friendly Ghost and then Richie Rich helped it carve out a long-lasting niche in the field. Along the way, however, we mustn’t forget that Harvey also excelled in a couple of other areas. One of them was producing mags featuring such newspaper comic strip biggies as Joe Palooka and Dick Tracy. The other was horror comics. From the early 1950s through the end of 1954, when the Comics Magazine Association of America and its Comics Code deep-sixed color horror comics for some years, Harvey Publications staked a strong claim to being what then-editor Sid Jacobson maintains it was during that period: the foremost producer of top-quality horror comics after Bill Gaines’ EC Comics.

So when John Benson, a longtime EC enthusiast and editor/publisher of the elite EC fanzine Squa Tront, offered me the chance to publish a trio of unseen interviews with key personnel of the Harvey horror era (artists Howard Nostrand and Warren Kremer and editor Jacobson), as well as an historical piece John himself had written, I jumped at the chance. He had been considering printing all that material in Squa Tront, but realized that, since he publishes the zine on an irregular schedule, it might take years to fit it all in… and would squeeze out a lot of EC coverage in the process. And so a pact was struck between us. A Devil’s Bargain, perhaps—but one from which I think comics aficionados will benefit. And Jim Amash’s interview with artist Ken Selig, who came to work for Harvey in 1954 just as the horror comics were dying, forms a capstone (tombstone?) to the whole mehgilla…. Bestest,

PS: Oh, and thanks to Jim Ludwig, Mark Arnold, Michaël Dewally, Chris Brown, and several other kind souls who e-mailed me lots of Harvey scans when I sent out a call—right before I realized that John Benson had scanned so much art that I wasn’t able to use as much of their contributions as I’d have liked to. Thanks, guys—and I’m keeping all that luscious art on file for future issues of A/E! PPS: Our lamented letters section will return next issue.

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Part 1

The 1950s HARVEY HORROR COMICS

Silver Threads Among The Mold An Ominous Overview Of Harvey’s 1950s Horror Comics by John Benson

Author’s Introduction:

“What If They Gave A Comics Convention And Nobody Came?”

he 1981 Pleasure Dome Convention, held in Wilmington, Delaware, was really one of the great ones. Hosts and comics store proprietors Tom Watkins and Craig Dawson had arranged for a large, wellstocked dealers room, and the hotel facilities were outstanding. The theme of the convention was 1950s Comics, and a good complement of guests was lined up, including Dick Ayers, Jay Disbrow, Dick Giordano, Don Heck, Frank McLaughlin, Denny O’Neil, and Howard Nostrand. My recollection is that all, or at least nearly all, of these luminaries showed up. A swell little program book was prepared, with a specially done cover by Ayers, an interview with Nostrand, an article on DC “horror” comics by Robin Snyder, and one on the Harvey horror comics by yours truly.

In fact, everything about the convention was great except one thing: attendance was literally about as near zero as you can get. It would have been ridiculous to hold formal panels, so the organizers

Which Way To The Witches? (Left:) Dick Ayers’ cover for the program book for the 1981 Pleasure Dome Comics Convention—the publication which first printed both this essay and John Benson’s interview with Howard Nostrand that begins on p. 13. (Above:) This Jan. 1951 cover for Witches Tales #1, probably drawn by Al Avison, started the New Year (and the second half of the century) off with a bang—or maybe with a scream. Except where specified otherwise, all art accompanying the four parts of this coverage of Harvey horror was supplied by John Benson… and special thanks to Jim Vadeboncoeur, Jr., for sharing with us his Harvey Horror Checklist, which proved invaluable for finding issue dates and other data. [Pleasure Dome art ©2009 Dick Ayers; cover of WT #1 ©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

made an announcement over the PA system that the pros would be sitting in the lounge area of the hotel lobby, and anyone who’d like to talk with them would be welcome to join them. Two or three people took up the offer. I had a nice conversation with Nostrand. One thing I recall is that as he was idly flipping through the program book he came to a page with a sports car in it reprinted from one of his Harvey horror stories, and he said, “That’s my car.” A pause, and then: “I drove it here today.” I was amazed that he still had the same car 28 years later. Below is my article for that program book, somewhat modified and slightly updated to eliminate some of the more glaring errors. As we indicated above, its title was…

An Ominous Overview Of Harvey’s 1950s Horror Comics

An Age Of Heroes The changing face of heroism at Harvey Comics. (Clockwise from top left:) Several of its super-heroes held their own with Superman, Captain America, et al., during the World War II years, as per this vintage house ad for Green Hornet, All-New, Speed, and War Victory. Radio licensee Green Hornet, at least, would live on into the “crime comics” era, but most of the rest ran out of steam early. Scan courtesy of Bruce Mason. [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.] An unpublished page from a story produced by the team supreme of Joe Simon & Jack Kirby for an unproduced third issue of Stuntman Comics, circa 1946—courtesy of John Morrow. One of its figures, of course, was used on this issue’s cover. [©2009 Joe Simon & Estate of Jack Kirby.] In May 1949, though, comic strip super-star Joe Palooka was still going strong in the 32nd issue of his own mag—and had even spun off humorous supporting characters like Little Max and Humphrey into their own Harvey titles. Max is the kid in the hat, at right center; Humphrey is the big guy wearing the cap, bottom center. Artist uncertain—but it probably wasn’t Palooka creator Ham Fisher. [©2009 the respective copyright holders.]

Silver Threads Among The Mold

Silver Threads Among The Mold Harvey Comics was a more stable company than many of the small, fly-by-night outfits that sprang up on the crest of the horror wave in the early 1950s. The company had started up in 1941 and was one of the few companies to survive and even thrive after the coming of the Comics Code. In the ’50s, Harvey published their standard fare of licensed characters (Joe Palooka, Dick Tracy) and “little kid books” (Little Max, Little Audrey), but also published a line of ’50s genre books: a couple of war books, a couple of romance books...and four horror titles. About nine months after EC started up their horror titles, Harvey brought out Witches Tales #1 (Jan. 1951). Six months later they converted an existing title (Blondie, according to Overstreet) to Chamber of Chills, starting with issue #21 (June 1951). As so often happened, such as with EC’s Haunt of Fear, the Post Office caught the title change and forced them to consider it a new title, and the fifth issue is numbered “5.” Two months later, Harvey converted Black Cat Comics, which had featured the super-hero character of that name, drawn by Lee Elias, into Black Cat Mystery Comics with issue #30 (August 1951). They attempted a slightly gradual conversion, with an Elias cover featuring the Black Cat character on the first horror issue, and cats on the next two covers. Inside #30, on the contents page (all Harvey books had a contents page), The Black Cat herself introduced the new editorial policy with all the subtlety of a candy merchant enticing school-children to try marijuana: “You’ll be seeing me in stories more thrilling and more terrifying than ever before. I won’t appear in all the amazing accounts myself, but each one of them is a story I want you to share with me because I’ve found it exciting.” Actually, she doesn’t appear in any of the stories, which are all horror tales, although the stories in the first issue are milder than the horror formula that Harvey had already established. Though it has more pages of art than the typical Harvey comic, this first issue has only three longer stories, a rare deviation from the Harvey (and industry) standard of four stories per issue. Early in 1952 horror seemed to be booming for Harvey, as it was for the whole industry. They stepped up their

All Cats Are Black In The Dark Three of Black Cat’s nine lives. (Above:) Splash for Black Cat #22 (April 1950), the comic in which a glamorous movie star donned mask and scanty costume to battle hoodlums; thanks to Mike Burkey for the scan of the original art, from his website www.romitaman.com. (Left:) Harvey transitioned from super-heroics to horror by featuring Black Cat on the cover of issue #30 (Aug. 1951)… But all pretense that this was still her mag ceased when the title cut to straight-out terror with #31 (Oct. ’51). All three covers are by Lee Elias, who’s seen (on right in photo below) with co-publisher Alfred Harvey in 1947. Photo courtesy of Mark Arnold—who received it from Alan Harvey, Alfred’s eldest son. See ad for Mark’s publication The Harveyville Fun Times on p. 73. [Art ©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

three bimonthly horror titles to monthly publication for about eight months, and added a fourth title, Tomb of Terror (June 1952). This period of increased volume is, not surprisingly, the most lackluster in the run of the Harvey horror comics. Unlike their other titles, the Harvey brothers didn’t identify the horror titles as Harvey books on the cover. Perhaps they felt somewhat uneasy with this industry trend. They were slightly inconsistent here, though (as they were generally), because about ten issues of Black Cat Mystery do have the Harvey logo. The title also differs from the others in that the pages of the early issues are a quarter-inch wider. It comes as no surprise that all these titles abruptly ended their horror run with the December 1954 issues. The last two issues of all four titles are reprints of very early issues with new, toned-down covers, and Tomb of Terror was retitled Thrills of Tomorrow. But the titles didn’t die completely. Witches Tales became Witches Western Tales, with the word “Witches” in about six point-type on the cover. Black Cat reverted to reprints of the costumed heroine, then later returned to Codeapproved “suspense” material, including heavily-

Part 3 24

The 1950s HARVEY HORROR COMICS

“You Could Get Away With Murder!” SID JACOBSON On His Time As Harvey Editor Interview Conducted & Transcribed by John Benson

NTERVIEWER’S INTRO: My conversations with Howard Nostrand at the 1981 Pleasure Dome Convention and afterwards led me to talk with Sid Jacobson. I had amassed a complete set of the Harvey horror comics even before I met Nostrand, and was eager to make the acquaintance of the man who had edited the books. The interview took place on Nov. 13, 1984, at Marvel Comics, where he was then editing that company line of kiddie titles, known as Star Comics.

“I Really Think We Got Better” JOHN BENSON: This setup here at Marvel must be completely different from the way the Harvey outfit was, right? That was just a little joint, right? JACOBSON: Well, yeah, they all were, for a long time. This is unusual for anything in comics.

Triad Of Terror Sid Jacobson in a recent photo—overlooking artwork rendered by the two key Harvey horror artists interviewed by John Benson. (Above:) Howard Nostrand splash page from Black Cat Mystery #44 (June 1953), partly viewed on our cover. Repro’d from scan of original art, courtesy of Roger Hill. (Left:) Comic Book Artist #19 (2002) attributed the cover of Tomb of Terror #15 (May 1954) to Warren Kremer; editor Jon B. Cooke noted that: “Stephen Sennitt's final horror comics survey, Ghastly Terror, calls [it] the fourth most gratuitous pre-Code horror comic cover ever.” Ulp! We think we'll pass on checking out the three that beat it out! Photo courtesy of Sid Jacobson. [Art ©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

“You Could Get Away With Murder!”

JB: Were you the editor at Harvey? JACOBSON: Yeah. For most of... JB: What was your relationship with the Harvey brothers? JACOBSON: I worked for them. My sister had worked for them years before, when they did the Fun Parade and Buddies magazines. Those were the things that they started with. Army and Navy gag panel cartoons. That was really their start. So when my sister went to college, she did gags for them, she and some friends of hers. As a kid I got all those early Harvey comic books. JB: When did you start with them? JACOBSON: 1952. 1953?

Getting A Toehold At Harvey Jacobson identifies Chamber of Chills #16 (March 1953) as one of the first Harvey horror comics which he edited. The Nostrand work to which he refers must be his story therein, “Curse of the Black Panther,” since its cover is signed by Lee Elias. [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

JB: Were you in charge of all of them? JACOBSON: All of them. Well, first I did all the weird and the war, and [Joe] Palooka. And then when all that changed, I did all the younger line, the “Casper,” the “Richie Rich,” etc. JB: What did Warren Kremer do?

Local Color Splash page of “Colorama,” the story from Black Cat Mystery #45 (Aug. 1953) which was scripted by the comic’s editor, Sid Jacobson. Thanks to Mark Arnold. [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.] Chris Brown, who wrote an essay about “Colorama” that unfortunately could not be squeezed into this issue, notes that Harvey reprinted the story (somewhat “censored” by the Comics Code) in Black Cat Mystic #61 (Jan. 1958)—then reprinted the reprint in Shocking Tales Digest in 1981. “The preCode version,” he reminds us, “was printed in black-&-white, one-quarterpage size in the Summer 1974 Graphic Story Magazine #16, and then again in black-&-white in the Spring 1991 comic Tales Too Terrible to Tell #2,” while “The Best of Horror and Science Fiction Comics from 1987 reprints the post-Code version in color. Sadly, the only way to own a color copy of the pre-Code version is to obtain a copy of Black Cat Mystery #45.” [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

JACOBSON: Same thing; we worked together. Warren had been there before I was. And he worked in the adventure, war, horror [genres]. And he had worked on Joe Palooka and Little Max, also. And I think he did some work on Humphrey. JB: There was a lot of good stuff in their horror comics. JACOBSON: Yeah, yeah! They were good. I did the good ones. JB: Why was [Lee] Elias permitted to sign his name and nobody else was? JACOBSON: Well, because they thought he was that important and that good, and he had a following. And he was good. I mean, [Al] Avison was there.... The first people they worked with were Avison, I believe Elias, and Joe Simon & Jack Kirby. So, there was really a special relationship they had. [he looks through the horror comics] Warren Kremer did some covers. And some stories. I didn’t do any of these early issues. I did “Transformation” [Witches Tales #14, Sept. 1952]. Or did I do that? No.

Sid Jacobson On His Times As Harvey Editor

In The Gato John Benson ran across the Spanish-language cover of Black Cat Mystery #47 (Oct. 1953) on eBay. He notes that “the Spanish lettering very carefully preserves the style of the English, and the coloring is the same, which suggests that the Spanish version may have been produced in the Harvey shop.” Art by Lee Elias. [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

JACOBSON: Harvey rates at one time were very good! They changed when they went into animation. It was a whole different structure. I don’t know what the artist rates there were, but I believe Elias got $60, Avison got $50, Warren got $40, Powell got $35, Sparling got $40. Powell got $35 because everyone knew that he had a factory, so that’s why that was $35. JB: [laughs] But his factory produced the best... JACOBSON: What can I tell you? You know, I didn’t make rates. But I don’t know if he got any more anywhere else. He did an awful lot for Harvey. But the rate, pencils and inks, was I think $35 for Certa/Belfi. $35 was a good rate, $35, $40. And the $50 and $60, no one else got that [but] Avison and Elias. There were a lot of people that got $40. JB: Avison got it [$60 a page] for loyalty? JACOBSON: Yeah, and he did a lot of other things; he’d do Dick Tracy, he’d do Humphrey. He was a very close friend of theirs, still is. [mutters] I think he’s their one last friend in the world.

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Part 4 41

The 1950s HARVEY HORROR COMICS

“Strange Things Went On In Those Days” WARREN KREMER On Casper The Friendly Ghost And Other Haunts

Interview Conducted & Transcribed by John Benson

NTERVIEWER’S INTRODUCTION: It was through Sid Jacobson that I met Warren Kremer. In fact, while I was interviewing Jacobson, he phoned Kremer and told him I would be contacting him. I visited Kremer at his home on April 1, 1985, and recorded the following interview. I had some idea that it might eventually be published (though I didn’t know it would be nearly 25 years later!), but my primary interest was to learn more about Kremer and his work on the Harvey horror comics. I had brought the entire set with me, and during the afternoon I asked Kremer to go over them and try to identify the artists. He also pulled out and showed me a great deal of the work that he had done over the years. (Unfortunately, I did not have the foresight to get copies of most of it.) Most of the casual discussion while we were looking over my comics has been eliminated from this transcript, but some has been retained because it describes the early work in his career or includes interesting comments on the horror comics.

Kremer Vs. Kremer (Above:) Warren Kremer and his wife Grace in 2002, the year before the artist passed away— juxtaposed with two primo specimens of very different styles of his comic art. (Far left:) One of his few finished horror covers, for Tomb of Terror #1 (June 1952). (Left:) A Kremer sketch of Richie Rich and Casper the Friendly Ghost, both of whom he drew for Harvey with phenomenal success in the 1950s and beyond. Thanks to Mark Arnold for sending the photo and the RR/Casper art; thanks also to photographer Bill Janocha and editor Jon C. Cooke for permission to use the photo, which appeared in JBC’s Comic Book Artist [Vol. 1] #19 a few years back. [Richie Rich & Casper TM & ©2009 Harvey Entertainment, Inc.; BCM cover ©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

“In Those Days Industrial Schools Were For The Dummies” JOHN BENSON: What was your first job? WARREN KREMER: I worked for the [New York] Journal-American [newspaper]. When I was in high school, the School of Industrial Arts... well, prior to that I was in the School of Music and Art, and that was for the fine arts, and that’s not what I wanted. I was a kid, what did I know? When they started Music and Art I was one of the first students. What

“Come Back When You Learn How To Draw” Artist KEN SELIG Talks About Harvey’s Early Comics Code Days Conducted by Jim Amash

Transcribed by Brian K. Morris

en Selig has had a long career, dating back to 1954, when he started at Harvey Publications as a production man, before becoming an inker and art director. After his Harvey days, Ken began inking for Archie Comics, where his work continues to appear in many Archie digests. From our private conversations, I know Ken is proud of having spent his life doing fun, wholesome comics for a young audience, not to mention the adults who also need a good laugh now and then. Since this month’s Alter Ego concentrates on Harvey Publications, I thought it was time to give credit to this dedicated cartoonist who has always been too modest to say much about himself. And since he is that way, we spent most of our time discussing some of the people he knew at Harvey, and in the process, learn a little bit about Ken, too. Special thanks goes to my good buddy Don Mangus for his diligent research, and to Ken for taking the time to share good memories of a good company, now gone, but certainly not forgotten. —Jim.

I Ink, Therefore I Am (Above:) Ken Selig working on an “Archie” page at a Holiday Inn while traveling in 2008. Incidentally, Teresa R. Davidson, who helped out her friend Jim Amash by forwarding this photo to us, says that she lettered the story he’s working on. Note that his makeshift drawing board is propped up by an ironing board. Thanks to Ken for all photos accompanying this article—and to Jim Amash & Teresa R. Davidson for forwarding them. (Left:) A page from Archie Double Digest #199 (Aug. 2009) that features Selig’s inks. Unfortunately, these publications don’t give credits, and Ken Is uncertain of the penciler, or when the story may have originally run. Jim Amash believes the page was penciled either by Pat Kennedy or his brother Jim. [©2009 Archie Comic Publications, Inc.]

“A Board Man” JIM AMASH: Let’s start with Alfred Harvey. KEN SELIG: Well, the biggest impression that Alfred Harvey made on me was with my youthful orientation, such as it was. Newspapers, more than comic books, meant everything to me. I didn’t come aboard Harvey Publications until 1954, although I did have an experience where I was turned away from Harvey in 1948, when I was in the High School of Music and Art in New York. During a brief vacation, I went up to Harvey, and was seen by a female editor who was really a rough sort, but I did have an impression from her that there was an honesty to it. What she had said to me was not too kindly: “Come back when you learn how to draw.” JA: There were two women editors there. One was Ann Barrett and the other was Louise Hill, who I think was who you were talking to. Do you remember anything about her?

“Come Back When You Learn How To Draw”

A Little White-Out For “Little Audrey” A “Little Audrey” half-page filler drawn for Archie by artist Steve Mufatti in 1951. Ken says, “These would come into the art department needing white-out in Audrey’s hair”—and it was Selig’s job as a production artist to apply it. Little Audrey had begun life as a series of Paramount cartoons between 1947 & 1959. [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

SELIG: I wouldn’t be able to put a name to her. She was something like a female in that Dick Powell movie, Murder, My Sweet, [chuckles] meaning that she was an arm-twister. But what I picked up from her was an aspiration that I had a respect for, meaning that she was telling it the way it was. And a guy like myself who was seeing himself as something like a hotshot who was going to burst on the scene and immediately write the next Great American Comic Strip... it obviously—just from her manner with me—was not going to happen. What she did was that she put me in my place. She was not there when I came back in 1954. That’s when I began to see the editors, Alfred Harvey per se. My first impression was because I was interviewed by the art director, Otto Pirkola, and then he called in Leon Harvey. Leon Harvey was the man who really gave me a grilling. Later on, his brother Alfred came in, a real big guy and very impressive. I was also introduced to Robert [Harvey] at the same time. I was a student at the Cartoonists and Illustrators School, where I’d gotten a recommendation from Silas Rhodes to go to Harvey. All three of them represented newspapermen to me, and that was, to me, all-important. I really wasn’t into comic books, I was into newspapers, but I needed work badly. I gathered from Otto Pirkola that the job was mine if I wanted it, and I would be replacing a fellow by the name of Don Heck. I got a job as a board man.

“They Were Twins, You Know” JA: What a terrible thought: “unnecessary cleavage.” Okay, who actually hired you? SELIG: Leon Harvey and Otto Pirkola. JA: Describe each person’s function, beginning with Alfred. SELIG: Alfred, being the president since 1940, was the man who originated the company, but he had brought in his brothers, Leon and then Robert. He started the company with Pocket Comics. Alfred wasn’t that self-evident. There was some kind of an agreement between Alfred and Leon— they were twins, you know—where the art department was Leon’s domain, and the editorial department was Alfred’s. Sid Jacobson was the chief editor, even though he may not have been called that. He sat in the room that was just bordering on Alfred’s office, so he had a lot more to do with Alfred than I did.

JA: Describe what a “board man” is for readers who may not know that term. SELIG: For the most part, a retoucher. When the end product came in from the cartoonists and the writer, it occasionally needed touching up or reviewing, and a board man’s job was to make corrections. When I signed on at Harvey, I was given a very difficult assignment: to adjust bust lines of the female characters in our comics. This was after Dr. Wertham and the Senate hearings about crime comics. The Harveys had to toe the line, and the unnecessary cleavage had to be eliminated.

Hittin’ ‘Em With Their Pocket Book Pocket Comics #1 (Aug. 1941) was Harvey’s first comic book— and was, as the name implies, “pocket-size,“ though with 100 pages. The art has been (very tentatively) credited to Bob Powell by the Grand Comic-Book Database. [©2009 Harvey Publications or successors in interest.]

I was very impressed by Leon’s very polite manner. Alfred was a little more flamboyant. Alfred was what I called an ex-newspaperman. Harvey Comics at that time dealt with the newspaper syndicates. This is one of the reasons why I wanted to work there. I thought if I couldn’t get onto a newspaper, which I tried very hard for, I could get as close to a newspaper as possible. It was this company, Harvey Comics, which in 1945 started publishing Terry and the Pirates comics. That meant to me that they had some kind of affiliation with the Chicago Tribune, New York News, and I had an idea I could fit in there somehow. JA: Harvey was publishing a lot of newspaper strips as comic books, like Dick Tracy, Kerry Drake, and Steve Canyon. SELIG: Yes, and Alfred was what you might call the editorial director, but their functions seemed to overlap. By their own

Author ToplineArchive Comic Fandom

A Memory Of The Early Detroit Triple Fan Fairs And Some Who Were There I

by Marvin Giles letter to Roy which accompanied this piece, he wrote: “Through telephone communication with my long-time friend Shel Dorf [whose article on the first Detroit Triple Fan Fair appeared in A/E #31], I learned that you plan to have [articles] in Alter Ego relating to the earliest comic conventions. So at Shel’s behest, I am sending to you my own recollections of those days when we were all younger – but with little foreknowledge of the exciting times yet to come. It is my hope that you will be able to use this account that I have ‘jotted down’ in your fine magazine.”

NTRODUCTION BY BILL SCHELLY, CFA EDITOR: One of the great, largely untapped resources when it comes to the documenting of fandom’s early years is what must be a vast pool of memories stored in the heads of Those Who Were There. Matters of fact are available to anyone tenacious enough to do the research, but memories are one-of-akind. We are fortunate indeed, then, when fans share their unique remembrances with us. In this instance, the Comic Fandom Archive and Alter Ego are delighted to offer the memories of Marvin Giles, stalwart of comic fandom (and other fandoms’ too) as he casts his mind back to the mid-1960s. In Marvin’s

Speaking for Roy and all the A/E gang, Marvin, we are thrilled that you felt moved to submit the following evocation of the early Detroit Triple Fan Fairs, the first of which was held in July 1965, the weekend before the second New York City comics convention (which I like to refer to as the first “full-service” comicon). They were as important to fans in the Midwest as the early New York cons were to those in the Northeast, and are fascinating in their own way, for they were a little different in their multi-fandoms scope. We’ve had it on the shelf for quite a while now… and it’s high time we shared it with A/E’s readers… as Marvin takes center stage....

t was an age when we thought that we were alone, or nearly so, in our great love of the comics—represented in both comic books and newspapers, an integral part of illustrative art in totality. It was a time, too, when one might, as I did, haunt secondhand bookstores with the hope and expectation that he or she might find items of his or her longing—things that had for the eyes and the mind an intrinsic beauty—not given or many others to know, or so we thought.

The Fan And The Fair Marvin Giles at a 1960s comicon (photo courtesy of Jean Bails, from the Jerry Bails collection)—and the first official announcement of The Detroit Triple Fan Fair, as typed and printed on a spirit duplicator by Jerry G. Bails, founder of Alter Ego—and a co-founder of comics fandom itself. Note that “Comic Art” is listed third, after “Fantasy Literature” and “Films,” among the three principal themes of the convention/gathering. And notice the squib along the bottom, alerting fans to the upcoming article on fandom then about to appear in Newsweek magazine. Said article duly appeared in the Feb. 15, 1965, issue—and was reprinted as an item of comicshistorical interest in A/E #12, which is still available from TwoMorrows. [Art ©2009 the respective copyright holders.]

A Memory of the Early Detroit Triple Fan Fairs

I had come up from North Carolina only a few years before and had gone around to the bookstores in Detroit that specialized in older material and had broached the question to all: “What do you do with comic books, Big Little Books, pulp magazines, newspaper comics, and such items when they are brought to you?” And all of the answers were something like, “We have no market for that stuff. We trash it.” I made one proposal to these dealers: “I’ll make it worth your while to save these things for me.” And suddenly a new business was born for them, at least on a minute scale…. Soon afterward, I met Bob Brosch, a teenage youth, and his sister, and they had the same collecting instinct for this “glorious junk” (to use Jules Feiffer’s phrase) that I did. A little later still, Bob told me that he was taking a part in forming a convention in our Detroit city for those others who had interests similar to our own: this love of comics and related fields such as movies, radio, TV in its infancy, pulps, etc. I took absolutely no part in the planning for this one-day affair of July 24-25, 1965, though I did ask if I might deliver a talk on the writings of Edgar Rice Burroughs. My offer was accepted as part of the planned program. Came the day and there I was with my wife, Burda—and there were others, then of destiny unknown, but whose impact in comic-future would range from small to huge, and we were shaking hands with them, and it was our first day of meeting with some whose span of friendship for us reaches into this very hour. I shall not attempt to categorize them or their future fame, for really we were as one in our love of the comics. But: there was Shel Dorf, he of physical largeness. He looked like the football player that Milton Caniff would one day pattern after him in the strip Steve Canyon and name “Thud Shelly”—and he had a smile and a mind and a love to match. I did not know just how he and Bob and perhaps others had put it all together in brief ad hoc fashion, but one thing was certain—Shel was the first among equals. And there was Howard DeVore, mailman and noted science-fiction collector and a friend of writers in that field—whose roots in that genre I

In The Beginning Was The Logo The tripartite logo for the Triple Fan Fair, seen above, was designed by Shel Dorf (seen above left in a grainy 1965 photo)— while the program book for the ’65 con was designed by Carl Lundgren. [©2009 the respective copyright holders.] In his article Marvin gives Shel Dorf full credit for christening “The Detroit Triple Fan Fair.” Roy Thomas notes that, back in the day, fellow Detroiter Jerry Bails told him he believed he himself had coined that term… but Jerry was reluctant to contradict others in print, since he didn’t feel proprietary about it. Well, whoever came up it with—it was a great name!

do believe stretch back to what is lovingly remembered as “First Fandom.” And also Eugene Seger, who has sometimes been referred to by the appellation “Mr. Buck Rogers” for his love and knowledge of that early comic strip adventurer into the known and unknown. And there were about one hundred others, and we were seated, and I was giving my talk and trying to configure Tarzan in their minds as he was in mine with his wild ululation in dark jungle, and a beautiful young woman sat their amidst the listeners, her eyes locked intensely upon mine, and I spoke with her briefly afterwards and learned her name—Ramona Much; and years later, when I joined the Burroughs Bibliophiles, I learned that she was a great Burroughs fan. And Shel named our con “The Detroit Triple Fan Fair” and designed its logo, which expressed our love of comics, science-fantasy, and movies. And the day was over, and it seemed that money had not been lost in the undertaking, and another gathering would come. And between times, on a winter day with snow blowing, Shel and Eugene Seger and Carl Lundgren and I (and there might have been another one or two) gathered at the home of Prof. Jerry Bails to be interviewed by a reporter from (was it Newsweek magazine?). He recorded our words about comics, and I tried to be philosophical about it all—but no dice; such was not deemed interesting to national readers. And the hours deepened into cold gloom outside, and Jerry was kind enough to lend me several items from his valuable collection for private and pleasurable reading in my home. He was already clothed in a kind of fame strange to those who do not know its beauty—and now Jerry’s son, Kirk, is a good and generous friend to us.

Hey, Who Took That!

Dangerous Adventurers (Far left:) During her stay at Charlton—in both her own title and in Zoo Funnies—former Fawcett jungle girl Nyoka eventually morphed into a blonde on covers and in newly-produced stories (Zoo Funnies #9, 1955 cover by Dick Giordano). (Near left:) Charlton’s onetime publishing of an “Ibis the Invincible” story (“The Viking Horde” in Danger and Adventure #22, Feb. 1955). Charlton turned the splash page into the issue’s cover, but, as detailed in the article, he never reappeared in a Charlton mag. P.C. Hamerlinck suspects “the story just got accidentally mixed in with the Fawcett material Charlton obtained.” [Ibis the Invincible ©2009 DC Comics; Jungle Girl TM & ©2009 AC Comics.]

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The Half-Life And Times Of Mr. Atom Captain Marvel’s NuclearPowered Foe by John Pierce Edited by P.C. Hamerlinck

or those of us now living, the world changed on September 11, 2001. However, those of an earlier generation will remember another such day when the world underwent a change—one that was perhaps even greater than that engendered by 9-11.

I speak of August 6, 1945, when a US B-29 Superfortress, the Enola Gay, dropped the first atomic bomb, nicknamed “Little Boy,” on Hiroshima, Japan. A subsequent A-bomb targeted on Nagasaki, Japan,

soon led to the country’s surrender and to the end of World War II (itself a momentous, world-changing event). But, more than that, the dropping of these two bombs ushered in the Atomic Age, an era characterized by great scientific progress accompanied by tremendous paranoia and fear. Before the development and unveiling of the atomic bomb, the word “atom” (derived from the Greek word “atomos,” referring to something so small it cannot be divided) was rarely used in speech. But confining our consideration to its usage in the comics, we find that there were at least two characters who had been utilizing the word in their names for several years. One, of course, was “The Atom,” who debuted in All-American Comics #19 (Oct. 1940) and was essentially a short-stature strongman. Another that same year was Fawcett Publications’ own “Atom Blake,” who premiered in Wow Comics #1. After 1945, however, characters with atomic names, and powers, would become far more numerous. To cite a few: Spark Publications’ 1946debuting Atoman; Regor’s 1946 Atomic Thunderbolt; Prize’s 1945 “Atomic Man”; and, among others, a 1948 French hero, “Atomas.” Oh, and we shouldn’t forget Lex Luthor’s adoption of an alter ego in the 1950 Columbia serial, Atom-Man vs. Superman (the name “Atom-Man” had been picked up from a circa-1946 story on the Adventures of Superman radio series). The list keeps going. And even the original Atom at DC underwent a change in 1947, with a re-designed costume, the addition of the now-familiar atomic emblem, and an increase from weightlifter strength to super-strength (excuse me—“atomic” strength); some years

Upping The Atom (Top:) The cover to Captain Marvel Adventures #78 (Nov. 1947). The issue marked one of three Mr. Atom adventures from the Fawcett era. Art by C.C. Beck. (Left:) Opening page of the first Mr. Atom story, from CMA #78, which the villain himself narrates. Script by William Woolfolk; art By C.C. Beck, with an assist by Pete Costanza. Mr. Atom is featured in gigantic proportions in the splash panel for visual effect only; he was actually just an 8-to-10-foot tall robot ... but modern-age writers have made him skyscraper height. [©2009 DC Comics.]