Congratulations to Joe Simon, born 95 years ago today.

As usual for all your Joe Simon needs I refer you to Harry Mendryk’s S&K Blog, and look out for several books by Simon in the next year.

Daniel Best has an excerpt from an interview with Mike Esposito where he talks about Jack Kirby’s artwork and the points where their careers intersected. Give it a read.

September 8, 1958, Jack Kirby launched his syndicated daily comic strip Sky Masters, with Dick and Dave Wood helping out on the writing end and Wallace Wood on the inks. The strip lasted a little over two years (including a year of Sunday pages).

Courtesy of Thomas Ward, here’s a gallery of Sky Masters originals.

Lots of big Kirby books this year shouldn’t overshadow what would be the Kirby publishing event of the year most years, the newly updated JACK KIRBY CHECKLIST GOLD EDITION, shipping in mere weeks from TwoMorrows (early August, after they get back from San Diego), and if you order direct from them including download of a searchable PDF file version of the book (PDF also available separately). And if you’re at the San Diego Con next week drop by the TwoMorrows booth and see what they have going on, check here for their panels and books that debut at the show.

Halfway through, 2008 is shaping up to be a pretty stunningly prolific year for Kirby publications, with 29 already out (a few of them fairly trivial, like some cover reprints in AVENGERS CLASSIC, but that balances with some major releases like KING OF COMICS, KIRBY FIVE-OH, COMPLETE KIRBY v5 and FOURTH WORLD OMNIBUS v4), and 10 more already solicited for release by year’s end (and more to come), a few of them major all-Kirby books, including several interesting things from TwoMorrows, Greg Theakston’s bio of Kirby and many all-Kirby hardcovers covering several eras (1940s Captain America, 1960s Thor, 1970s Demon).

Highlight of the year so far, KING OF COMICS (though I’m still waiting for a copy of COMPLETE v5). Highlight of the upcoming stuff, well, I always like a good checklist, so there’s that, plus the Demon book should be good.

And then 2009 has the potential to be even bigger.

Let me know what you think about what came out, what you’re looking forward to and what books you think should come out (I’m hoping DC finally gets to the 1940 S&K material soon, maybe working with Simon to match the format to his upcoming S&K books from Titan). And remember, part of purchases from Amazon and Tales of Wonder from the links on the New Kirby page or the due-for-an-update Kirby In Print page go to the Museum.