I talked to Joe last night and he told me that Titan’s sold all their advance copies of “Simon and Kirby Superheroes” at San Diego. Friday was the first day of the convention so it seems the book was well received. Sounds to me that the Superhero book will be an even bigger success than “The Best of Simon and Kirby“. I guess this also means that there is now a select group of fortunate individuals that will be able lord it over the rest who have to wait for the official release in a few months. I keep hearing that will be October 12 (groan).

(May – December 1957: Young Romance #88 – #91, All For Love #2 – #5, Personal Love #1 – #2)

This serial post has now entered the period after the crash and near collapse of the comic book industry. Prize Comics was never a big publisher but these must have been particularly difficult times. At the start of this period Prize was only publishing three bi-monthly titles Justice Traps the Guilty, Young Romance and the new released All For Love. In September they would also release another new romance title, Personal Love. Like All For Love, Personal Love was not produced by Simon and Kirby. The annual postal statements list Joe Genalo as the editor and the contents seem somewhat different from that found in Young Romance. The artists used also seemed to be different as well, at least during this period. Jack Kirby appeared in three of the four issues of Young Romance covered by this post but did no work for All For Love or Personal Love. Lou Cameron played an important part in Young Romance #89 and #90 but he does not appear in the other Prize romance titles. On the other hand Ted Galindo appears frequently in All For Love and Personal Love but he does not show up in these issue of Young Romance.

Since at this time Kirby was freelancing for DC and Atlas, it is clear that he and Joe were no longer running their old studio. So the question becomes how Young Romance was actually produced. While previously there can be found examples of Jack in his roll as an art editor stepping in to fix up some parts of stories supplied by other artists or provide a splash page, I have seen no examples of that practice in the period from 1957 to 1960. On the other hand the annual postal statements still listed both Simon and Kirby as editors up to 1960. My suspicion is that Jack really was not involved in the editorial work for Young Romance and it was Joe who was really producing the title. Not that I believe this effort took much of Joe’s time; it was only a single bi-monthly title.

Young Romance #91 (December 1957) “The Waiting Game”, pencils by Jack Kirby, inks by Marvin Stein

Jack Kirby provided art for three of the four issues of Young Romance during this period. However all were rather short pieces (1, 4 and 5 pages) and only one of them was the lead feature (a position often reserved for Jack in the past). All were nicely done but hardly very remarkable (for Kirby). Jack did not inked any of the pieces but one of them “The Waiting Game” looks very much like it was inked by Marvin Stein. Not the blunt but still subtle handling of the face of the man in the background of the splash. Of particular significance is the handling of the lady in the first story panel. She share a rather distorted perspective that I find hard to describe but is so often seen in Stein’s own work when a head is viewed from above and to the side. I am not as confident that Stein inked the other two Kirby stories but he could have.

Young Romance #91 (December 1957) “Live Alone and Love It”, art by Marvin Stein

Marvin Stein not only inked a work for Jack Kirby but he penciled and inked his own story for Young Romance. I have remarked before how I find Stein’s style more appropriate for the crime genre than it was for romance. His “Live Alone and Love It” seems done in a particularly blunt manner even for Stein. Note the simplified eyebrows of the lady on this page, very reminiscent of the inking found in some of the Kirby pieces, another reason to possibly attribute to Marvin some of the more recent inking of Kirby’s art. Stein was an exception in that he appeared not only in Young Romance but also All For Love and Personal Love as well. However prior to this he also was one of the very few artists that worked on both Simon and Kirby productions along with the titles not produced by that pair.

Young Romance #89 (August 1957) “Pal Joannie”, art by Lou Cameron

Lou Cameron, an artist new for Young Romance, played an important part in issues #89 and #90 supplying 5 stories. His work was really excellent; great graphic story telling and beautifully drawn women. Like some of the other younger artists new to the title, Lou drew in what I would describe as a more modern style. I am not that familiar with Cameron’s art but he also work for Atlas, DC and St. John Publishing. I am not sure what to attribute his sudden abundant appearance and just as quick disappearance in Young Romance but he is one of the artists that I wish had made a longer contribution to the title.

Young Romance #91 (December 1957) “That Certain Something”, art by Vince Colletta

Young Romance #91 included the only appearance of Vince Colletta in a Simon and Kirby production. Colletta did a lot of work for Atlas, much of it romance art. However he is most famous as the inker that Kirby fans love to hate. Mostly this is due to his habit of erasing some of Kirby’s pencils to speed up the inking. Oddly Colletta has a small but very vocal group of supporters who I refer to as Colletta apologists. According to the Colletta apologists, Vince was the greatest romance artist who worked in a realistic style. While I admire Colletta’s romance art, neither of these assertions are true. I have never heard anyone other than a Colletta apologists claim Vince as their favorite romance artist and as far as I can tell Colletta apologists otherwise have no interest in romance art. And while his woman are beautiful they are not truly realistic. This is fortunate because I do not believe true realism would be appropriate for comic books. For my part, while I find Colletta’s women beautiful, I also find them to lack any individuality. The only distinction found between individual examples are the hair styles and clothes. Still he is another of those artists that I wish provided more work for Young Romance.

Young Romance #89 (August 1957) “Rock-A-Bye To Love”, art by unidentified artist

In these last few chapters of the Art of Romance, I do not plan to discuss all the artists that appear in the Prize titles. Frankly most of them are not that great and I am so far unable to identify them. That is not to say that they are totally uninteresting. This is a period of transition for Young Romance as the title tries to maintain its appeal with a more modern audience. Hence the inclusion of rock-and-roll in some of the stories. However there is a tendency for rock music to be judged somewhat negatively.

All For Love #2 (June 1957) “My Destiny”, art by Mort Meskin

Mort Meskin provides two stories for All For Love #2 (June 1957). Both works appear to have been inked by Mort as well. As far as the art is concerned the work is nicely done but does not differ much, if at all, from the romance work that Mort did up until the end of 1955. It is not the art that is a cause for a surprise but his appearance in a Prize comic. As I wrote, his romance work was about a year and a half prior to this but his art appeared in the Prize crime titles for a few months further (March 1956). His last work for Prize Comics Western was for the July 1956 issue. Then suddenly these two stories in All For Love and then Meskin disappears from further Prize comics. I suspect that Prize offered much lower page rates than what DC did which is where Meskin was doing most of his work at this time. But it is suggestive that it was in All For Love that Meskin appeared and not Young Romance which was still being produced by Simon and Kirby. In any case I believe this was the last romance comic book art that Mort Meskin would ever create.

All For Love #3 (August 1957) “The Voice of Love”, art by Marvin Stein

As mentioned above, Marvin Stein was one of the few artists appearing in Young Romance as well as All For Love or Personal Love. If anything, the art for “The Voice of Love” shown above is more carefully drawn than that from Young Romance #91.

All For Love #3 (August 1957) “The Match”, art by Ted Galindo

Ted Galindo provided work for all the Prize titles at this time except for Young Romance. Ted had previously drawn a story for Foxhole which, to be frank, was really not that well done. His romance work was much better, most likely because he now was a more experienced comic book artist. I feel the best work he was doing at this time appeared in Justice Traps the Guilty which will be the subject of a future chapter to Criminal Artists.

All For Love #2 (June 1957), art by J.O.

Some of the Prize titles during this period had cover art signed only as JO. No interior stories bear that signature and as far as I can seen none of the unsigned pieces were by this artist. The covers are very well done and indicate that this is a talented artist. I have only begun investigating whom this might be and have not reached any but the most tenuous conclusions. Although I have as yet no good evidence to back it up, I wonder if this might be by Joe Orlando.

Personal Love #1 (September 1957), “The Truth About Love”, art by unidentified artist

I could not resist including another romance story from this period with a rock-n-roll reference. In the background of the splash can be seen a singer playing an acoustic guitar. That, plus the lyrics he sings, clearly were meant to be a reference to Elvis Presley who was very popular at that time (and since).

Not long ago I posted that “The Best of Simon and Kirby” had been nominated for a Eisner award http://kirbymuseum.org/blogs/simonandkirby/archives/2689. Now I am thrilled to be able to write that the book has now been nominated for two Harvey awards:

BEST DOMESTIC REPRINT PROJECT

• “THE BEST OF SIMON AND KIRBY”, by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby; edited by Steve Saffel, Titan Books
• “HUMBUG”, conceived and edited by Harvey Kurtzman and created by Harvey Kurtzman, Jack Davis, Will Elder, Al Jaffee and Arnold Roth; edited by Gary Groth, Fantagraphics Books
• “RIP KIRBY”, by Alex Raymond; edited by Dean Mullaney, IDW
• “THE ROCKETEER: THE COMPLETE ADVENTURES”, by Dave Stevens; edited by Scott Dunbier, IDW
• “THE TOON TREASURY OF CLASSIC CHILDREN’S COMICS”, edited by Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly, Abrams ComicsArt

BEST BIOGRAPHICAL, HISTORICAL OR JOURNALISTIC PRESENTATION

• “ALTER-EGO”, edited by Roy Thomas, TwoMorrows
• “ART OF HARVEY KURTZMAN: THE MAD GENIUS OF COMICS”, by Denis Kitchen and Paul Buhle, Abrams ComicArts
• “THE BEST OF SIMON AND KIRBY”, by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby; edited by Steve Saffel, Titan Books
• “THE COMICS JOURNAL”, edited by Gary Groth, Michael Dean and Kristy Valenti, Fantagraphics Books
• “UNDERGROUND CLASSICS”, by James Danky and Denis Kitchen, Abrams ComicArts

You can see the complete list in Newsarama. As was the case with the Eisner nomination, the BoSK faces strong competition. “The Rocketeer” is just an amazing book. I am currently reading the second volume of IDW’s “Rip Kirby”. Although Alex Raymond is usually remembered for his Flash Gordon, I believe his Rip Kirby was much better and more important. Some of the other books I have not had the chance to examine closely but who could question the importance of Harvey Kurtzman? “Alter Ego” is the magazine to go for anyone interested in the silver and golden age comic book artists. So once again I am not holding to much hope of “The Best of Simon and Kirby” actually winning one of these awards. However I am quite pleased to have been part of a project that is has received the recognition that these nominations bring.

Fighting American #5 (December 1954) “Invisible Irving”

In a previous serial post on Fighting American (Fighting American, Chapter 3, Jumping the Shark) I discussed the story “Deadly Doolittle” (Fighting American #6, February 1955). That story was a rewrite of a Manhunter story from Adventure Comics #75 (June 1945). In the comments Ger Apeldoorn remarked that the “Invisible Irving” from the previous issue looked like it was reused art as well. Sometime later Lucas pointed out that “Invisible Irving” was based of the Starman story from Adventure Comics #77.

Adventure #77 (August 1942) Starman, art by Jack Burnley

A quick check of the Jack Kirby Checklist showed this fact was reported there as well. It was, however, news to me so I thought a comparison of the two stories might be of interest. The first thing that can be noticed right from the splash pages is that the text “Invisible Irving”  was not lifted from the Starman story. The text was re-written for the Simon and Kirby piece. While what was said by the characters may be very similar the actual words were by no means identical.

However the plots were pretty much the same. Both start with a prison break aided by the use of invisible paint. The escape villain starts up a criminal gang that uses use planted valuables that unsuspecting passersby find and keep. T “lost” valuables then hypnotize the victims into committing crimes for the gang. The gang attacks one lady who instead of keeping the “lost” object intends to take it to the police. Fortunately she is rescued by the hero who removes the effect of the invisible paint the gang was using. However the main villain escapes only to be pursued by the hero. The hero catches up to the criminal mastermind at a windmill. Initially the villain captures the hero only to have the table turned on him in the end. The only reason I have summarized the plot here is to show how similar the two stories are. This summary applies equally well to either story.

Fighting American #5 (December 1954) “Invisible Irving” page 4 panel 6

There are some small differences between the two stories. Many of the differences are due disparity between the lengths of the two pieces. Much had to be eliminated to bring the 11 page Starman story down to 6 page length for use in Fighting American. Other changes had to be made because while Starman could fly, that ability was not possessed by Fighting American. Starman also had a star-ray that could remove the effects of the invisibility solution while Fighting American had to rely on paint remover instead. Other differences have to do with the use of humor by Simon and Kirby. After the initial issues of Fighting American, Joe and Jack began to poke fun at their own creation. Scenes like the one above showing Fighting American being kicked in the seat of his pants are absent from the Starman story (or as far as I know of, from any other superhero comic book).

Adventure #77 (August 1942) Starman page 2 panel 1, art by Jack Burnley
Fighting American #5 (December 1954) “Invisible Irving” page 2 panel 1

Could the writer have been responsible for swiping the plot from the Starman story? After all one of the writers that Simon and Kirby used was Jack Oleck and he was known to do that sort of thing. However some of the art is so similar between the two stories that there can be no doubt that the artist was swiping from the Starman story.

Adventure #77 (August 1942) Starman page 3 panel 7, art by Jack Burnley
Fighting American #5 (December 1954) “Invisible Irving” page 3 panel 6

While the artist for Fighting American was clearly swiping from the Starman he was not drawing close copies. None of the figures would be mistaken for tracings. Poses were often adjusted and while the panels might portray the same events they are completely redrawn. It is the story that the artist is interested in, not help in drawing the figures.

Adventure #77 (August 1942) Starman page 10 panels 3 and 4, art by Jack Burnley
Fighting American #5 (December 1954) “Invisible Irving” page 5 panels 4 and 5

Readers may have noted that I have not said who the artist was that provided the “Invisible Irving” story. I do not remember anyone that previously credited this story to an artist other than Jack Kirby. However prior experience indicates that once it has been shown that some Simon and Kirby piece was swiped it will then be attributed to Joe Simon (Jack Kirby, Fanboy). There are many who just do not like to admit that Jack Kirby would sometimes swipe, despite all the contrary evidence that have been unearthed. If the reader chooses to now attribute “Invisible Irving” to Joe Simon, he must also credit Joe for being extremely adept at mimicking Kirby. So good that he has fooled the experts. But then again, Simon and done that before.

Joe Simon has a very rare book. It is the only copy of the “Simon and Kirby Superheroes” in the Western Hemisphere. So it was my great pleasure to have a chance to leisurely examine it during my visit with Joe today. My impression can be summed up in one word.

WOW!

Okay, perhaps I should expand a little on that. Beautiful printing, beautiful colors, beautiful layouts, beautiful binding, beautiful cover… it is just beautiful. If you have seen the “Best of Simon and Kirby” you know what to expect in terms of paper, printing and colors. The book uses the same high quality flat paper stock. The printing is good and clean with nice bright colors and rich blacks. In my completely biased opinion the restoration is even better than that for BoSK. BoSK is still special because of its size (and of course the wide range of genre) but “Simon and Kirby Superheroes” is no small book in either page count (480 pages) or size. I have heard a lot of complaints about the reduced size of some recent reprints but that is not a problem here. All the art is reproduced in its original dimensions. And it makes a world of difference.

This is the book I could only dream of ten years ago. This is the book all Simon and Kirby fans will want to have. More importantly this is the book that people who have not previously considered themselves Simon and Kirby fans will want. Wait until you see this book.

Fortunately Joe’s volume will not be rare for very long. Those lucky enough to go to San Diego will have a chance to buy a copy. Joe Simon will not be traveling out west to the convention but the books sold there will come with a bookplate signed by Joe with a surprise accompanying autograph. Regrettably the rest of us who cannot go will have to wait for October 12. (Okay I am hoping to get my copy before that).