If things go as I plan, next week I will have a post on a silver age Captain America cover. I will be tracing the influences on this cover back to the early days of the golden age of comics, before Captain America was even created. Also discussed will be the various artists that were involved in the creation and/or destruction of the final cover. Included will be some images of some rough work that I do not believe has ever been published. So see stay tuned.

Well I did not get much response from Delurker Week. Unfortunately there are a number of projects that I want to do with not enough time to do them all. With such a small readership it is hard for me to justify spending as much time on this blog as I have in the past. So I will be posting on a less frequent schedule. I believe my next post will be sometime next weekend.

I would like to thank those who did leave a comment for Delurker Week. Frankly your kind words are the main reason I am continuing this blog at all.

David suggested posting on how I do my comic art restorations. I do all my work in Photoshop. But I do not want to get more detailed then that here. Not because I want to keep my technique secret but because I know from previous experience that there really is not much interest in such technical information. If anyone really does want to know more I suggest joining the Digitizing Comic Books group. It is pretty much an inactive group but I posted there on the basics of my color adjustment method. So you can go through the archives and check the photo section for images that were attached to my posts (Yahoo does not archive images). If you have further questions you can ask them there (I am the moderator).

It has taken me by surprise. I have read on some of the blogs I visit that it is Delurking Week. But boy is it welcome news.

Seriously I know that the Simon and Kirby Blog has a narrow focus. I never expected it to be a popular blog. Nor have I ever thought I would get many comments. Frankly I do not leave comments on most of the blogs I read. But still there are times that I wonder if anyone out there really cares.

So this is your chance to step up and provide me with some encouragement. To all readers, please leave a comment to this post. I really don’t care what you say. Just say “hello” if you cannot think of anything else. But please, please, please leave a comment here. Then if you like, return to your lurking.

P.S. Don’t be surprise if your post does not appear right away. It quite likely will get caught by my Spam filter. You would probably be amazed about how much Spam this site gets. But I go through it all daily to accept valid comments. Generally once a commenter gets accepted they never get stopped by the filter again.

ADDITIONAL NOTE:

Since most of the blogs that I read have not picked up on Delurking Week I just want to make sure no one makes the mistake of thinking that I am just kidding. Two blogs that I read that have joined this movement are Pharyngula and Afarensis. If you go through their comments you will find I stopped lurking long enough to say I enjoyed their blog. As can be expected, not all bloggers are looking to Delurking Week to provide the same thing but I am sure we are all looking for some sort of approval. What I want to do is take this opportunity to see how many people care about my blog. Frankly if a reader does not care enough about the Simon and Kirby Blog to to say “Hello” then as far as I am concern they simply do not care. After all it does not cost anything, I do not believe you have to leave your real name, your email address will not get published or put on any lists and I would prefer if you do not put anything in the “Website” entry (so I do not mistake you for spam).

I was checking out some of my favorite science blogs when in Paleoblog I came across a post titled “Origin of Homo mermanus”. Palaeoblog subtitle is “Evolution, extinction, fossilization”. But don’t let that fool you, Palaeoblog is not just informative but it is also a lot of fun. Serious posts on science news are often accompanied with images from comic books. In fact Dr. Michael Ryan will even post on comic art even without the science. Unless you are a stout anti-evolutionist you might want to check it out.

Well I did not have to be a scientist to know that Paleoblog was just having a little fun with the Homo mermanus post. Hey I know enough about human evolution to say there are no mermaids! But the part that struck me, and the reason for my own posting, was the image of two comic book panels. Actually one of the panels in particular. Just a man holding a skull and a another looking on. Nothing special except even with that I immediately recognized it as the work of Jack Kirby. Because my main interest is the Simon and Kirby period I was not sure what comic book the panels were taken from.

Well the Paleoblog post did not give either the artist or the source (shame on you Dr. Ryan!). But he did provide a link to another blog where he got it from, Atomic Surgery. Well I have to admit I was not at all familiar with this blog, but with a subtitle like “Scrambling the molecules of science and pop culture” it is a blog that I am going to start looking at.

Anyway the post in Atomic Surgery was even more interesting. It not only confirmed that the art was by Jack Kirby but that the source was the Fantastic Four. Better yet it provides 4 pages of the original art and of the corresponding comic book pages. I should have guess that it had to do with an origin story for the Sub-Mariner. It does not say, but a quick check of the Kirby Museum Catalogue Raisonne indicates that it must by from “Sub-Mariner Versus the Human Race” in the first FF Annual. (The Catalogue is free but you should be a member of the Kirby Museum anyway!)

I got a kick out of seeing Jack Kirby in unexpected places in the Internet. But I also liked the fact that even with just the one small piece of art you still could detect Jack’s hand at work.

I have already emailed congratulations to the winners of my Featured Cover Contest. Not all the prizes were claimed, but hey that means nobody was disappointed. It was an interesting assortment of favorite covers and all were excellent choices (although there was one that surprised me). Only one of the winning covers has been used in my blog in the past. I think I will skip listing the covers here and instead do individual posts on each in the coming weeks.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, is the last day for the Simon and Kirby Cover Contest. Remember, it costs you nothing to possibly win a print of a restored Simon and Kirby cover (or Simon solo cover). For details see this post.

Imagine throwing a party and no one came. That is sort of how my Simon and Kirby Cover Contest is progressing. Very few people have entered their favorite Simon and Kirby cover to try to win a color printed signed by Joe Simon. Although I am a bit surprise at the underwhelming response it really does not bother me. I am used to a rather small audience. And I am sure those who have entered will be pleased. Unless there is a flood of late entries (you have until Wednesday to enter) the odds of winning approach near certainty. If you are interested in entering, see my previous post to learn what you have to do, it will cost you nothing.

I spent so much time thinking about how I was going to run my Simon and Kirby Cover Contest, that I neglected to help my readers in their selection. Fortunately Bob at the Jack Kirby Blog and has posted on my contest and has already provided a chronological listing It is an excellent list of work by Jack Kirby. However it goes well beyond the Simon and Kirby period. You can use it up to and including Warfront #30 (1957).

I really should get my act together and get more organized like Bob. For now here is a list of covers that I have provided images for in my various posts.

I plan to continue to do Featured Cover posts for a while. Hopefully I will do one every week or two. It occurred to me that perhaps some of my readers would be willing to say what their favorite Simon and Kirby cover is. I know that might be a hard decision, but if I can do it so can you. As a reward for letting me know your cover choice I will enter you into a contest. The prize will be a full color print of your favorite cover, fully restored free of any charge. If you like any of the restorations I posted in this blog I think you will love a full size print much more. Joe Simon has agreed to sign them.

It has to be a Simon and Kirby cover. Not that Jack did not do some great covers later in his career. But I do not have access to many silver age covers. Early Joe Simon covers (Centaur and Fox, before teaming up with Jack) are also acceptable. It does not matter whether the cover has appeared before in the Simon and Kirby Blog. Just one choice of a S&K cover, hey after all that is what favorite means! Also this is limited to one entry for each contestant.

I will accept contest entries for a week, November 22 will be the last day of the contest. After that I will randomly select 10 winners. Because I may not have restored all the winning covers, some winners may have to wait a few weeks until I am able to do the restoration.

So here is what you have to do:

1. Email me at: hmendryk at yahoo dot com. (You know the drill, replace “at” and “dot” with the proper characters).
2. Include “Featured Cover Contest in the email heading. (So I will know it is for the contest and is not spam).
3. In the email state your favorite Simon and Kirby cover (Remember select only one S&K cover!).
4. In the email include you home address. (This must be the address I will mail the print of the restored cover).

Don’t worry I will not be using this information for any lists, it will be used for the contest only and no other purpose.

Good luck.

I received an email from the owners of web page that had made an unauthorized copy of the Furnished Room image in my Bill Draut post. I fully accept their explanation that this was due to over enthusiasm and not to a deliberate attempt to ignore my copyrights. They have removed the image in question from the Draut biography. I therefore have deleted my post complaining about this use. I see no use for it remaining now that this issue has been resolved.

As for the posts with Joe Simon images that I removed, I do plan to restore them. But I am busy getting ready for my next post (a real dream) so I will not get to it until this weekend.