There is probably nobody in the comic book industry that I like
and respect more than Roy Thomas. The man is truly a Legend and if I
have to list his accomplishments for you...well, you are obviously reading the
wrong blog. It only adds to my appreciation of him that he has
occasionally published some of my articles in his essential ALTER EGO magazine. If it isn't on your must read list, it should be. Buy it. Now.
I also like and respect Sean Howe. Sean is a terrific
writer and editor who also happens to be a comic fan. His book of
collected essays, GIVE OUR REGARDS TO THE ATOMSMASHERS!, is one of the finest tomes ever written about comics. Buy it. Now.
Recently, Sean's latest book, MARVEL COMICS: THE UNTOLD STORY,
was released and not without controversy. Howe reportedly interviewed
more than 100 people in preparing his book. Not everyone agreed with all
of the details that came from these interviewees, including Roy Thomas.
Roy privately contacted Sean and gave him a detailed response to
what he perceives as misconceptions and errors. After an exchange of
emails among Roy, Sean and myself, it has been agreed to allow me to
publish Roy's thoughts here, on my blog. Sean has also said that Roy's comments will be considered for inclusion in an updated edition of his book.
As Roy notes, he didn't have time to type out the text from Sean's book
that he is referencing. That means you have to buy the book to get a
full appreciation of Roy's response. So buy it. Now.
-- Ken Quattro
__________________________________________________________
Re Marvel Comics: The Untold Story by Sean Howe
Notes by Roy Thomas
[SEAN: I haven’t always taken the time and space to type down the
precise text in the book to which the correction applies, assuming that
will be clear from context. If clarification is needed, please advise.]
P. 1: Not a big error, but by the time of Blushing Blurbs and Golfers
Anonymous, Stan’s name was long since legally Stan Lee, contrary to the
impression given in the first paragraph.
P. 11: To the best of my knowledge, there was never a Goodman magazine
called Timely. What Michael Feldman researched of late, and which is
covered in detail with illustrations in Alter Ego #114 (Dec. 2012), was
the 1939 Popular Digest magazine, whose subtitle was “Timely Topics
Condensed,” and for which he started Timely Publications. Chances are,
as Feldman surmises, he wanted to call the mag Timely, but figured Time
would sue.
P. 25: “Jap Buster Johnson” was just a feature, not a magazine, so shouldn’t be italicized.
P. 47: No big deal, but surprised you didn’t mention Mario Puzo’s
expressing, around 1966 or so, an interest in writing for Marvel while
finishing “his new book”—which would be The Godfather, of course. He
returned the comics Stan had me give him after a short time, saying
there was just too much to learn about all the characters… he was better
off continuing to write for Magazine Management. ’Course, in the early
’70s for the first big open-to-the-public meeting of ACBA, he did send
group a telegram Stan read there, thanking “Marvel Comic for teaching my
children to read when the public schools failed.” Of course, that’s
just my memory…Stan’s long since lost the telegram.
P. 59: Big error! When Stan looked out the window of his office and
asked (to correct the wording, which is not right for something in
quotation marks), “So—what do we have to do to hire you away from
National?” [not “DC,” in those days], he was standing, not swiveling in
his chair. We’ve got to get these important historical details
straight. If Stan stayed sitting, he couldn’t see the pretty girls
walking down Madison Avenue (like in that Sinatra song “It’s Nice to Go
Travelin’” from the “Come Fly with Me” album), and he liked to do that,
in a harmless, non-lecherous way.
Next paragraph: There was no comic, of course, called Millie and the
Model. The character was Mille the Model… and the actual title of the
comic I wrote that weekend was Modeling with Millie. I didn’t even get
to start off on the main Millie book!
No problem with your litany of the office interruptions that kept me
from being effective as a “staff writer,” but one of the main problems,
actually, was Stan himself, who was constantly asking me for bits of
information (“Where did Sandman first appear?” “When did Sandman last
appear?”—that kind of thing), and in addition I was almost immediately
given pages on which to do backup proofreading, seeing that Stan’s
corrections were done.
P. 79: Just for the record, I believe Jim Steranko’s always claimed he
did have an appointment in 1966 when he come up to the offices at the
time of the convention… but that’s simply not how I remember it. Or
maybe he had indeed wangled an appointment somehow, through Flo or
whoever or even Stan somehow… and it’s just that when the time came,
Stan wanted out of it because he was busy. But everything in this
section is as I recall it. I’ve said from time to time that I thought
he also came up to the Marvel offices with no success in 1965, but I
don’t really recall that now… and Jim denies it, and he may be right.
My memory’s much firmer on ’66.
P. 80: Not sure that I wore goatee, Russian hat, alligator shoes, and
Nehru jacket all at the same time… but I may have. The jacket and suit
were orange trimmed in white; I looked like an orange sherbert. When a
truck driver whistled at me as I walked up Second or Third Avenue one
day on my lunch hour (where I often browsed book stores), I gave up the
Nehru… and Jeanie married me in July 1968 on condition that I shave the
beard. Sol and I bought Russian hats together when it was a fad in New
York… and they did keep the head warm. And of course the gator shoes
were before they became part of the uniform of pimps. None of this
esp. belongs in the book, of course… just sayin’.
P. 93: No correction needed, but it wasn’t technically a “vacation” I
was on when Jeanie and I eloped. Rather, I’d gone to St. Louis for the
weekend to a Gateway comics convention. But the lecture you mention was
purely from Stan, not Sol… and actually wasn’t a lecture at all, just
one stern remark in the middle of a conference when I made a
light-hearted remark. This isn’t a complaint, though. Also in that
paragraph the impression is given perhaps that Archie had been “hired”
to replace me on Doctor Strange (italics needed; it was a full book
then)… actually, all they’d done was give him the original art for that
one issue to dialogue. As I was coming in from being away, I ran into
Archie by the elevator and, with no resistance from him, marched him
right back in to Sol and demanded that I dialogue the book I’d plotted.
Archie didn’t mind that, I don’t think, though he’d wasted a trip into
the office from the Upper West Side. More than you need to know, I
realize… but I need to make it clear so you can decide if you feel you
can change anything beyond removing the “and Brodsky” in the lecture
thing.
P. 94: Re that “All the Way with LBJ” button in Brand Echh #1 (“Not”
wasn’t part of the comic’s actual title then, though it did appear on
the cover): I didn’t tell Stan that button had been in the b&w
proofs, as you write… Stan didn’t regularly look at those, I don’t
think, leaving them to Sol… but the button had been in the original art,
which Stan had proofread, and he’d just overlooked it. Nor did I
really quit… I merely told him that if he was accusing me of lying, I
would quit, and with that I stormed back to my desk in the other
office. Stan came out to call me back into his office a few minutes
later to explain himself. A generally accurate portray, but I think I
covered the facts pretty clearly in AE #95. A painful experience, but
there were, I think, no residual hard feelings on either side.
P. 112: Surprised there’s no mention of the fact that I talked Stan out
of a comic called The Mark of Satan by suggesting we make it The Son of
Satan, instead. ‘Course, Satan was still a major character in it… but
at least he wasn’t the hero! And the first Marvel vampire, of course,
was Morbius in Amazing Spider-Man #101 by Gil and me, though he wasn’t a
real vampire, more of a science-fictional one. Not a request for
changes, though.
P. 116: Put me down as voting for “new levels of intertextual ectacy,”
not “fumes from an empty tank.” If the Marvel Universe was to be and
remain a believable universe, it needed that continuity and integrity,
and both Stan and I saw part of my job as being to oversee that.
P. 118: Maybe Vinnie brought Kirby Fourth World pages to Stan, but if
so, I don’t ever recall seeing them… and I sure don’t recall their being
hung up in the office, or else I would have seen them and looked
carefully at them and remember them, I’d think. Do you really have a
source for this, or is it mere scuttlebutt? I have real doubts about
that statement… and not because Vinnie wasn’t entirely capable of
exactly what’s claimed.
P. 120: With all that went wrong with the Carnegie Hall show in January
of ’72, our two rock numbers went over fairly well, esp. with the
dancing girls (Jeanie and two others—one may have been Mary McPherran)
in Marvel costumes left over from the same Macy’s parade as “my” Spidey
outfit… and despite the fact that the band’s mikes didn’t work so our
banter had to be cut out, since I was on the stage and they were up on a
pedestal 30 feet or so aawy. But there were no “Elvis songs”—there was
this one John Lennon song I hated (much as I love the Beatles and
Lennon) that Barry talked me into against my good judgment, and
“Be-Bop-a-Lula,” a song originally sung by Gene Vincent in, admittedly,
very much an Elvis vein. I think too much has been made of Gerry
Conway’s assessment as to the backstage mood… I didn’t see that kind of
thing, and I was around the whole evening. But there were a lot of
foul-ups and dissatisfactions. I’m proud of some parts of the evening…
but the slow parts and the non-comics-related parts really dragged us
down. High point for me personally, after the songs, was having Tom
Wolfe, one of my favorite writers, read my long paragraph on Captain
America. Compared to what I got out of that evening, the slings and
arrows of a few outrageous fans were nothing. I’ve forgotten their
names, but I still remember singing on the stage at Carnegie Hall… and
Tom Wolfe standing there in his white suit, reading something I’d
written.
P. 121: Apparently, Stan’s actual quote referring to me as the new
editor-in-chief, made (as you perhaps know) to Don Rico, was, according
to Don, “Oh, some guy out there.” Just one word difference, beause Stan
wouldn’t have said “back there” when referring to the other offices.
P. 123: Along with my sincere feeling that Conan the Barbarian deserved
rather more attention than it’s given in the book, for several good
reasons I won’t bother going into, I find the mention of “Goodman’s
cancellation of Savage Tales” potentially confusing to readers. The mag
is never previously referred to in the book, so there’s no context.
What was it? Why was it cancelled? When? (Savage Sword of Conan, also,
which isn’t even mentioned in the book, deserved a little attention as a
consistent moneymaker; it sold very well and had no color for its $1
price tag, as well as lasting more than 200 issues, Marvel’s only real
b&w comic success. The downplaying of Conan is, in terms of
history, a fault of the book, I very much feel.
P. 124: I wince at seeing a reference to “Roy Thomas, Gary Friedrich,
and artist Mike Ploog” in that order as originating Ghost Rider. Just a
minor point… you cover it better later. I feel I was far more of a
player than Gary was likely to have acknowledged in his lawsuit against
Marvel, but it was his idea, not mine.
P. 127: The paragraph about Don McGregor doesn’t make it clear he was
working for Marvel around that time. He was working as a security
guard, I believe, when I called to offer him a writing and
assistant-editing position at Marvel; but because of some obscure grudge
which he refuses to spell out, Don refuses to admit in print that I
hired him… nor do I care overmuch. I’ve always just felt it makes him
look small. Hey, do I deny the role that Mort Weisinger played in
getting me to New York? Don was and is a disappointment to me, because I
gave him real gainful employment for the first time and defended him
against his critics. But I have eight dogs, so I don’t need his
gratitude at this late stage.
P. 128: I never had any idea that Marvel president Al Landau, my
pre-Shooter nemesis, was a godson of Albert Einstein. It wouldn’t have
made me despise him any less… but it’s interesting.
P. 129: A bit awkward… discussing how I divvied up the writing of three
“women’s titles” between three women… before mentioning that all three
titles were Stan’s idea and names. Puts the cart before the horse.
Stan came up with the titles and concepts… and it was then my idea to
have women write them. That can be called a cynical ploy… but on the
other hand, I was well and instantly aware that if there were to be any
real other-media coverage of those titles, the fact that they were being
written by men would have been pointed out and held against them. It
was less cynicism than self-defense. Besides, we didn’t have a lot of
writers to spare. Jeanie had worked with me on a few plots and I knew
she could write in general… and Linda had written a bit before… and I
knew Carole was intelligent and a comics fan. They all three made
sense. When Linda asked me why it had to be a “Cat,” I should’ve just
told her, “Because Stan says so,” and let it go at that. Hey, you don’t
quite what I said to her… so maybe I did.
P. 130: “Lee dangled the idea of a secretarial job [before RT’s wife
Jeanie upon her graduation from Hunter College in NYC] and then quickly
withdrew the offer.” Not really. Actually, Stan had made the offer at
least a year or so earlier (probably around 1969, actually), when Jeanie
left the same job, which she’d held for some months not long after Flo
Steinberg left. He said the job would be hers when she graduated. It
was a year or two later that it was withdrawn when Jeanie came to him to
take up the offer. As to who or how many folks in the office
“objected,” I never really tried to find out, as it would have severely
impacted my relations with them had I known. Stan told me that day that
I should acquiesce because “You have to get along with these people.” I
replied, “I think they should have to get along with me.” I should’ve
stuck by my guns… I’m pretty sure Stan would have back me, and Jeanie
would have done a good job in that position again. But you’re right
that it did color my view of Marvel. I remember that the Carnegie Hall
show was a few days later, and I seriously considered withdrawing from
it in protest. Glad I didn’t. But I still despise the attitudes of the
cowards in the office, who I’m sure were all smiles and friendliness to
Jeanie’s (and my) face while aiming their knifes for our backs.
P. 145: “Thomas, who’d secured the rights to Sax Rohmer’s pulp-novel Fu
Manchu character, suggested they incorporate martial arts into a Fu
Manchu comics.” Sideways, more inaccurate than accurate in this case.
I’m fairly certain that, when Starlin and Englehart came to me with the
Shang-Chi idea, I “suggested” (okay, insisted) that Fu Manchu be
incorporated into the comic… and it was only then that I went after and
acquired the rights to the character. I may have been toying with the
idea of a Fu Manchu comics before, but I mainly wanted to get the rights
because of DC editorial director Carmine Infantino’s alleged statement
to Denny O’Neil and others, when they told him that if DC didn’t publish
a comic about the Warner-owned TV series Kung Fu, Marvel might license
the rights. Carmine was alleged to have retorted, “If they do Kung Fu,
we’ll do Fu Manchu!” Whatever that may have meant, it thus struck me as
ironically amusing for Marvel to have a comic book called Master of
Kung Fu—with Fu Manchu, as well, in that very comic. It’s quite
possible that Steve and Jim already planned to have an evil father, and
that spurred me to “suggest” Fu Manchu to fill the roll. Even if Marvel
could never print that comic in France… and now can’t reprint it at
all. Pity.
P. 149: About how I “talked things over” with Seaboard/Atlas publisher
Chip Goodman to feel him out about a job, I don’t care if the info is
added in the book or not, but that dinner meeting was at Chip’s request,
not mine. I was not looking to leave Marvel, but I felt I might as
well talk to him, as long as he was paying for dinner. I was offered
the job of co-editor with Larry at equal status… same if any other
editor was in place at that time. That paragraph also makes it sound as
of my “beginning all-night writing sessions at ten or eleven at night”
was a result of problems in my marriage. Rather, it was probably more
of the cause… I’d been doing those all-night sessions since before
Jeanie and I were married in mid-1968, and I mostly kept at it. A
combination of deadlines and poor work habits.
I’ve no quarrel with John Romita’s quote re some people not “cottoning”
to me being in charge, but I can honestly say that any “disrespect” they
felt was generally hidden by them if so. Artists of the older
generation almost never challenged me or talked back or whatever form
“disrespect” should take, at least to my face… perhaps Sean means it was
all behind my back? I do recall that Frank Giacoia blamed me in late
1972 or so for his ceasing to be part of the triumvirate that Stan
briefly put in charge when he became president and publisher, though
again that got back to me through others; Frank merely complained to me
about Stan, claiming he (Frank) had “busted my ass” for the company and
the Stan had removed his as “associate art director” or whatever exactly
he was. Funny that older artists should think of me as a “kid”—since
in 1972, when I became editor-in-chief, I was 31… more than a decade
older than Stan had been when he’d become editor. But then, didn’t Al
Gabrielle get fired for complaining about Stan’s youth to Goodman, as
the story goes?
Also: Not exactly inaccurate, but I don’t feel it should be said that
Vinnie Colletta actually quite threatened to “throw [me] out a window.”
Of course, that’s my own fault, since I used that phrase, but
half-jokingly, in Alter Ego #70. What Vinnie said when he found out
(from Verpoorten) that he was being taken off Thor was, “I feel like you
got your hand in my pocket and I’m thinkin’ about throwin’ you out the
window.” A small but real distinction, perhaps… but the actual quote
would work better than treating it as a 100% bona fide threat… although I
won’t quarrel overly with the sentence as written. Of course, once I
explained to Vinnie that the work would be replaced, page for
page—something John V. knew but had neglected to tell him for some
reason—all was forgiven and we became buddies from then on.
No, I never “wanted to fly to the Philippines to recruit artists” for
cheaper rates or just because they were good artists. For the most
part, we already had the artists through the DeZunigas; I was just to
pep-talk to them, etc., and get the lay of the land. It was Stan’s idea
that I go (probably so that he wouldn’t have to)… I never wanted to go,
period, but was willing to be a good soldier about it. I was annoyed
at Landau for nixing the trip, because of what Stan told me he’d said
his reason was (which Sean quotes accurately), but otherwise I was quite
content to stay in the USA.
P. 150: Is there any reason why it isn’t mentioned that the
“freelancer” who became the final straw that led me to leave the
editor-in-chief job was Frank Robbins, who fibbed about his DC rates?
Not that it matters that much. By the way, for the record, it might be
mentioned that, as per an angry letter he wrote to Alter Ego, Carmine
Infantino vehemently denied ever agreeing to share rate info with
Marvel. He claimed he flatly refused to do so. Me, I only knew what
Stan told me… I wasn’t at the lunch, but Stan talked to me right after
it. Maybe Carmine heard what he wanted to hear and Stan heard what he
wanted to hear.
No quarrel with the basic bare-bones account of my half-resigning,
half-being-fired from the position of editor-in-chief, so I’ll pick up
with comments on chapter 6 at some near-future point… even if only
you’re interested.
Best wishes,
Roy Thomas
Showing posts with label Stan Lee. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stan Lee. Show all posts
Friday, December 7, 2012
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Hank Chapman
(I am very pleased today to present a special guest blogger. He is Ger Apeldoorn, who in addition to be the top television writer in the Netherlands, is also a comic fan and historian. Ger most recently wrote a two-part article for ALTER EGO magazine about the 1950s MAD imitators and he has his own terrific blog, The Fabulous Fifties, which showcases his amazing knowledge of the sequential art. Apeldoorn's current quest is for information about the wonderfully talented and underrated comic writer, Hank Chapman.
If you can help Ger with his Chapman quest, you can either post here or contact him through his own blog.)
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I wish I knew more about Hank Chapman. One of the most fascinating writers in comics from the early Fifties to the mid-Sixties, I would like to write an article about him. But I just don't know enough about the man to make it more than an appreciation piece.
And since I am not from the U.S., but from the Netherlands, Europe, I am cut off from all sorts of actual research facilities. I have to make do with what I can find on the Internet and the wonderful interviews with oldtimers such as by Jim Amash, Doc Vassallo and others. So I am glad Ken has offered up his blog for comic book researchers who have reached the end of their possibilities, where they can write down what they know and possibly get some help from others to fill in the gaps.
Hank Chapman started out at Stan Lee and Martin Goodman's Marvel comics. Okay, it was not called Marvel comics at the time, or maybe it was and Stan Lee was only the editor and not even the only one at that, but this is not about that mess. Some records show that Chapman did some writing in the earliest superhero books from the Goodman family company. I don't have those particular books, so I couldn't comment on that. One day, even these books will be reprinted or be available in scans, so I can read them and see if Chapman's peculiarities as a writer were even visible then. But more importantly, it means that Chapman was writing comics before he was in the army. If he was even in the army, because that is one of the more frustrating gaps in my knowledge.
After the war, Hank Chapman's name turns up again in the first horror comics brought out by Marvel/Timely/Atlas. There are tons of suggestions that he may also have written some western books before that, but unfortunately I have never been able to find one. Chapman was one of a few writers at Stan Lee's outfit who got to sign his name (or at least at some point and on some books). Others include editor Don Rico, writer/artist Norman Steinberg and of course head honcho, Stan Lee, himself.
Chapman's horror stories are nothing special, but they do all have a sort of weird, dreamy quality. When I finally do the article, I will have to go into that a bit deeper, with some samples. But for here that statement will have to do. It is important to note, because the only story we have about Hank Chapman privately is about those horror stories. It is by Stan Lee and as such, we can't be entirely sure of it's truth. Stan Lee is one of a few living people from the industry who knew Chapman and I would love to ask him about his old colleague. His memory is a bit poor about most events, but he seems to remember people better than anything else. Especially when his memory is jogged by a photograph. I think it is Doc V. who tells the story of showing Stan a photo of an office gathering in the forties or fifties and he could pick out most people from that. Anyway, what he would tell about Chapman, would probably be the same story he has told a couple of times. It seems that Chapman didn't like writing the horror stories. As Lee tells it, at some point he came to him and asked to be given other work. He said he was using his dreams as a basis of his horror stories and since he had started doing that, his dreams had started to haunt him. And he hoped that by stopping writing those stories, the dreams would go away.
"The Nightmare"
ASTONISHING #4 (June 1951)
(image courtesy of Atlas Tales website)
There are two things wrong with that story. Chapman did indeed suddenly stop writing horror stories in the early Fifties. He was shifted to the war books, where he did the best work of his career all through the Korean war and beyond. But the war books didn't start until the Korean war was in it's first year. It seems more likely that Chapman was shifted from the horror books to the war books simply because from late 1951 onward there was much more work there. And secondly, the story Stan Lee tells is almost exactly the same as one of the later horror stories Chapman wrote (and Wayne Boring drew),"The Nightmare" from ASTONISHING #4 (June 1951). Did Chapman use his own situation as the basis for this story or did Stan Lee use the story as the basis of his memory?
This is an important question (within the scheme of things) because if Stan Lee story is true, it is more than likely that Chapman did not serve in the army during the war or at least did not see battle. If he had asked to be removed from the horror books, because his stories were giving him nightmares, his far more horrifying war stories would certainly have given him a hard time had he actually seen some hardship during the war. And so we come to the most important unanswered question of my research. Did Hank Chapman serve in the army of navy or anywhere during WW II?
Starting from late 1951, Chapman wrote nothing but war stories. First he wrote some of the most horrifying stories of the period. Harvey Kurtzman is known for writing some great war stories for EC, illustrating the futility of war. Chapman's early war stories are from the opposite side of the spectrum. They illustrate the cruelty of war, but take the necessity of it as a given. So in Chapman's stories we have a lot of soldiers dying for their country heroically or just as often needlessly, parents getting letters about their sons dying, soldiers killing each other of small pieces of rock and ships going down due to mis-communication of stupidity. Chapman seems to have known the reality of war, but he also hated the sacrifices it took and in many of his stories he questions out loud if those sacrifices are worth it. Nowhere more than in one of his masterpieces, “Atrocity Story“, beautifully illustrated by Paul Reinman. “Atrocity Story” is written in a documentary style, a trick Chapman used more often. In those stories the writer often is a presence himself and the story is less about the events than what they mean. In “Atrocity Story” Chapman uses reports of cruelties by the communists to wonder if it wouldn't be better to drop another atom bomb on the enemy this time. But he can't really bring himself to advocate that, because he is aware of the huge human cost that would have.
"Atrocity Story"
BATTLEFIELD #2, pg.1 (June 1952)
pg. 2
pg. 3
pg. 4
pg. 5
pg. 6
pg. 7
Another particularly horrific war tale (also drawn by Reinman) was the story of a young soldier who gets trapped on his own bayonet.
"Guard Duty"
MEN'S ADVENTURES #11, pg.1 (Dec. 1951)
Rather than being taken prisoner by the Communists and running the risk of folding under torture and revealing something that may harm his comrades, he shoots the rifle with the bayonet into his own stomach.
pg. 6
All in all, I don't think Chapman served in the war, or at least not in any significant way. He may have had a brother or a relative die, though. His personal connection to these tragic stories suggest at least something that would give him the need to examine the nature and need of sacrifice in a wartime situation. It is that palpable anguish that makes his stories from 1952 to 1954 so unique. It would be great to know what his personal connection to that material was.
Not all his stories from that period were like that. He also wrote a lot of gung-ho stories, about brave soldiers fighting the Communists and winning in the most remarkable way. Two of the heroes he created in that vein were Combat Kelly and Combat Casey.
COMBAT KELLY #5, pg.1 (July 1952)
art by Joe Maneely
(image courtesy of Atlas Tales website)
Both titles were continued beyond the actual boundaries of the Korean war and their deed got more heroic and fantastical as the years went on. Chapman also seems to have written more of these heroic adventure stories in a WW II setting for the other war titles of Timely/Atlas, when the war in Korea ended and a new arena for the still popular war books had to be found. He kept on writing these kind of stories when he jumped ship to Timely/Atlas main rival DC. There he didn't sign his work, but the Grand Comic Book Database has the records of many of the DC editors and that why we have quite an extensive list of his work for DC's war editor Bob Kanigher. I don't find his work for DC as interesting as that which he did I those first years with Stan Lee, but I will have to delve into it a bit more if I want to do a further appreciation of his career.
And that's it. That's his whole career. Chapman stayed with DC from the mid-fifties until somewhere in the sixties and all he did was write war stories for and probably with Bob Kanigher. After that he dropped of the radar ad nothing was ever heard from him again. He doesn't seem to have looked for other work, although I have found two written stores by him in two 1961 and 1965 issues of the Boy Scouts monthly magazine BOY’S LIFE (one of which was illustrated by artist Jerry Robinson).
BOY'S LIFE (July 1962)
Both of those stories were about Indian tribes, which gives some credence to the idea he may have written western stories at some point of his career. Since we do not know Chapman's year of birth, we don't know if he stopped writing war stories for DC because he tired of it and looked for another job, retired or maybe if Kanigher just got tired of him and let him go. All I have is a note from another fan, who told me Chapman had written a travel book later in his career, but I have never been able to find it.
And that's it for me. I wish I had more. And I hope there is someone out there who can help me. I know there are some fans who are good at finding birth records. I'd love to know when Chapman was born, when he died, where he lived, anything. I'd love to get in touch with his offspring, if he had any. The travel book he was supposed to have written, was apparently done with his wife, so maybe there were children. I'd love to write to the US government and ask for his service records, but apparently you have to be from the US to be able to do that. I would like to talk to anyone who still remembers him. Maybe John Romita Sr. ran across him in his early years. Maybe Joe Kubert knows how and why he left DC. Maybe Jerry Robinson knows how he came to write something for BOY‘S LIFE. Maybe Stan Lee remembers where he lived. Anything would be a clue at this point. So at the very least I am asking anyone who interviews one of the older artists to ad a note to their list of questions to ask about Chapman as well. He may not have been the greatest or the most influential writer in comics, but he did make a living from it for more than 15 years and for some of those he certainly was one of the most interesting ones.
If you can help Ger with his Chapman quest, you can either post here or contact him through his own blog.)
__________________________________________________________
I wish I knew more about Hank Chapman. One of the most fascinating writers in comics from the early Fifties to the mid-Sixties, I would like to write an article about him. But I just don't know enough about the man to make it more than an appreciation piece.
And since I am not from the U.S., but from the Netherlands, Europe, I am cut off from all sorts of actual research facilities. I have to make do with what I can find on the Internet and the wonderful interviews with oldtimers such as by Jim Amash, Doc Vassallo and others. So I am glad Ken has offered up his blog for comic book researchers who have reached the end of their possibilities, where they can write down what they know and possibly get some help from others to fill in the gaps.
Hank Chapman started out at Stan Lee and Martin Goodman's Marvel comics. Okay, it was not called Marvel comics at the time, or maybe it was and Stan Lee was only the editor and not even the only one at that, but this is not about that mess. Some records show that Chapman did some writing in the earliest superhero books from the Goodman family company. I don't have those particular books, so I couldn't comment on that. One day, even these books will be reprinted or be available in scans, so I can read them and see if Chapman's peculiarities as a writer were even visible then. But more importantly, it means that Chapman was writing comics before he was in the army. If he was even in the army, because that is one of the more frustrating gaps in my knowledge.
After the war, Hank Chapman's name turns up again in the first horror comics brought out by Marvel/Timely/Atlas. There are tons of suggestions that he may also have written some western books before that, but unfortunately I have never been able to find one. Chapman was one of a few writers at Stan Lee's outfit who got to sign his name (or at least at some point and on some books). Others include editor Don Rico, writer/artist Norman Steinberg and of course head honcho, Stan Lee, himself.
Chapman's horror stories are nothing special, but they do all have a sort of weird, dreamy quality. When I finally do the article, I will have to go into that a bit deeper, with some samples. But for here that statement will have to do. It is important to note, because the only story we have about Hank Chapman privately is about those horror stories. It is by Stan Lee and as such, we can't be entirely sure of it's truth. Stan Lee is one of a few living people from the industry who knew Chapman and I would love to ask him about his old colleague. His memory is a bit poor about most events, but he seems to remember people better than anything else. Especially when his memory is jogged by a photograph. I think it is Doc V. who tells the story of showing Stan a photo of an office gathering in the forties or fifties and he could pick out most people from that. Anyway, what he would tell about Chapman, would probably be the same story he has told a couple of times. It seems that Chapman didn't like writing the horror stories. As Lee tells it, at some point he came to him and asked to be given other work. He said he was using his dreams as a basis of his horror stories and since he had started doing that, his dreams had started to haunt him. And he hoped that by stopping writing those stories, the dreams would go away.
"The Nightmare"
ASTONISHING #4 (June 1951)
(image courtesy of Atlas Tales website)
There are two things wrong with that story. Chapman did indeed suddenly stop writing horror stories in the early Fifties. He was shifted to the war books, where he did the best work of his career all through the Korean war and beyond. But the war books didn't start until the Korean war was in it's first year. It seems more likely that Chapman was shifted from the horror books to the war books simply because from late 1951 onward there was much more work there. And secondly, the story Stan Lee tells is almost exactly the same as one of the later horror stories Chapman wrote (and Wayne Boring drew),"The Nightmare" from ASTONISHING #4 (June 1951). Did Chapman use his own situation as the basis for this story or did Stan Lee use the story as the basis of his memory?
This is an important question (within the scheme of things) because if Stan Lee story is true, it is more than likely that Chapman did not serve in the army during the war or at least did not see battle. If he had asked to be removed from the horror books, because his stories were giving him nightmares, his far more horrifying war stories would certainly have given him a hard time had he actually seen some hardship during the war. And so we come to the most important unanswered question of my research. Did Hank Chapman serve in the army of navy or anywhere during WW II?
Starting from late 1951, Chapman wrote nothing but war stories. First he wrote some of the most horrifying stories of the period. Harvey Kurtzman is known for writing some great war stories for EC, illustrating the futility of war. Chapman's early war stories are from the opposite side of the spectrum. They illustrate the cruelty of war, but take the necessity of it as a given. So in Chapman's stories we have a lot of soldiers dying for their country heroically or just as often needlessly, parents getting letters about their sons dying, soldiers killing each other of small pieces of rock and ships going down due to mis-communication of stupidity. Chapman seems to have known the reality of war, but he also hated the sacrifices it took and in many of his stories he questions out loud if those sacrifices are worth it. Nowhere more than in one of his masterpieces, “Atrocity Story“, beautifully illustrated by Paul Reinman. “Atrocity Story” is written in a documentary style, a trick Chapman used more often. In those stories the writer often is a presence himself and the story is less about the events than what they mean. In “Atrocity Story” Chapman uses reports of cruelties by the communists to wonder if it wouldn't be better to drop another atom bomb on the enemy this time. But he can't really bring himself to advocate that, because he is aware of the huge human cost that would have.
"Atrocity Story"
BATTLEFIELD #2, pg.1 (June 1952)
pg. 2
pg. 3
pg. 4
pg. 5
pg. 6
pg. 7
Another particularly horrific war tale (also drawn by Reinman) was the story of a young soldier who gets trapped on his own bayonet.
"Guard Duty"
MEN'S ADVENTURES #11, pg.1 (Dec. 1951)
Rather than being taken prisoner by the Communists and running the risk of folding under torture and revealing something that may harm his comrades, he shoots the rifle with the bayonet into his own stomach.
pg. 6
All in all, I don't think Chapman served in the war, or at least not in any significant way. He may have had a brother or a relative die, though. His personal connection to these tragic stories suggest at least something that would give him the need to examine the nature and need of sacrifice in a wartime situation. It is that palpable anguish that makes his stories from 1952 to 1954 so unique. It would be great to know what his personal connection to that material was.
Not all his stories from that period were like that. He also wrote a lot of gung-ho stories, about brave soldiers fighting the Communists and winning in the most remarkable way. Two of the heroes he created in that vein were Combat Kelly and Combat Casey.
COMBAT KELLY #5, pg.1 (July 1952)
art by Joe Maneely
(image courtesy of Atlas Tales website)
Both titles were continued beyond the actual boundaries of the Korean war and their deed got more heroic and fantastical as the years went on. Chapman also seems to have written more of these heroic adventure stories in a WW II setting for the other war titles of Timely/Atlas, when the war in Korea ended and a new arena for the still popular war books had to be found. He kept on writing these kind of stories when he jumped ship to Timely/Atlas main rival DC. There he didn't sign his work, but the Grand Comic Book Database has the records of many of the DC editors and that why we have quite an extensive list of his work for DC's war editor Bob Kanigher. I don't find his work for DC as interesting as that which he did I those first years with Stan Lee, but I will have to delve into it a bit more if I want to do a further appreciation of his career.
And that's it. That's his whole career. Chapman stayed with DC from the mid-fifties until somewhere in the sixties and all he did was write war stories for and probably with Bob Kanigher. After that he dropped of the radar ad nothing was ever heard from him again. He doesn't seem to have looked for other work, although I have found two written stores by him in two 1961 and 1965 issues of the Boy Scouts monthly magazine BOY’S LIFE (one of which was illustrated by artist Jerry Robinson).
BOY'S LIFE (July 1962)
Both of those stories were about Indian tribes, which gives some credence to the idea he may have written western stories at some point of his career. Since we do not know Chapman's year of birth, we don't know if he stopped writing war stories for DC because he tired of it and looked for another job, retired or maybe if Kanigher just got tired of him and let him go. All I have is a note from another fan, who told me Chapman had written a travel book later in his career, but I have never been able to find it.
And that's it for me. I wish I had more. And I hope there is someone out there who can help me. I know there are some fans who are good at finding birth records. I'd love to know when Chapman was born, when he died, where he lived, anything. I'd love to get in touch with his offspring, if he had any. The travel book he was supposed to have written, was apparently done with his wife, so maybe there were children. I'd love to write to the US government and ask for his service records, but apparently you have to be from the US to be able to do that. I would like to talk to anyone who still remembers him. Maybe John Romita Sr. ran across him in his early years. Maybe Joe Kubert knows how and why he left DC. Maybe Jerry Robinson knows how he came to write something for BOY‘S LIFE. Maybe Stan Lee remembers where he lived. Anything would be a clue at this point. So at the very least I am asking anyone who interviews one of the older artists to ad a note to their list of questions to ask about Chapman as well. He may not have been the greatest or the most influential writer in comics, but he did make a living from it for more than 15 years and for some of those he certainly was one of the most interesting ones.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Origin of the Origin of the Fantastic Four?
How do you determine the germ of an idea?
There has been much gnashing of teeth, vituperative prose and verbal bloodshed over who should get credit for the creation of the Fantastic Four.
Jack Kirby fans are steadfast in their belief that their man brought the concept to Stan. Kirby had, after all, just finished a run on the CHALLENGERS OF THE UNKNOWN for DC. In their eyes, Ace, Prof, Rocky and Red had just been reimagined as Ben, Reed, Johnny and Sue.
Stan Lee, however, saw it differently. The story goes that publisher Martin Goodman had noticed that National's (DC) JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA comic was selling particularly well. He then ordered Stan to create a super team to headline a new comic for their company.
"I would create a team of superheroes if that was what the marketplace required," Lee wrote in ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS,"But it would be a team such as comicdom had never known. For just this once, I would do the type of story I myself would enjoy reading if I were a comic-book reader."*
Lee's words are red meat to Kirby fans. Personal biases aside, perhaps there is some truth to both versions.
And perhaps there is a third person deserving of credit as well.
John L. Chapman.
"If momentary exposure to the cosmic rays beyond the Heaviside Layer made a super-man of an ordinary mortal--what fabulous titan of strength and intelligence might the human become who'd spend hours under such forces!"
So reads the blurb accompanying the short story, "Cycle", by the above mentioned Mr. Chapman in MARVEL STORIES vol. 2 #2 dated Nov. 1940.
MARVEL STORIES vol. 2 #2 (Nov. 1940)
Chapman was an early science fiction fan from Minneapolis who had made it into the professional ranks by the Forties. His rather unremarkable career as a writer likely wouldn't even be under consideration if it were not for this barely six-page effort that bears some interesting similarities to the origin of an iconic comic book team some 20 years hence.
"Cycle" was the story of a man named Drake, who had been sent in a rocket on a trip to the moon, the "first man to leave the earth's atmosphere." Suddenly,the "jets" on his ship misfired, "in the vicinity of the Heaviside Layer," and he began plummeting back toward the ground. (note: the Heaviside Layer is one of several layers making up the ionosphere.)
Apparently, upon reaching this point, Drake was exposed to cosmic radiation.
"At first he thought it was the weightlessness of deceleration. But as the minutes fled by, and the ship's velocity decreased steadily, the certainty of a change became more prominent in Drake's mind."
Drake survives the crash and is subsequently brought to the World Tower (!) and into the presence of the Western Hemisphere's dictator (!!), Michael Gurth.
"The body and build was (sic) perfect. A wide chest tapered from broad shoulders. The hands were huge and strong. The legs were long and muscular. The hair looked as though it might have been dark at one time. Now it possessed a golden luster, matching the slitted gray eyes whose piercing gaze sent a chill down Tinsley's spine. Never before had the little scientist seen such masculine beauty."
Overlooking the homoerotic and Master Race implications (and poor writing), what Chapman was describing was Drake's transformation into a super human.
"Cycle" illustration
by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby
"Drake was the first man to pass the Heaviside Layer, the first human being to meet with the utter unknown. He was exposed to the natural cosmic ray forces,the same forces that the Heaviside Layer prevents from reaching the earth. You recall, Dr. Tinsley, an age-old theory of evolution concerning cosmic rays? The life forces they were called, the origin of the animate impulses. Yes--you begin to comprehend, don't you? You understand now what has happened to Drake.He was been exposed to naked cosmic rays, and as a result he was super-evolved."
This long-winded and scientifically goofy explanation** sets the stage for the dictator's own trip into space to be exposed to the cosmic radiation himself in order to, "...be gifted with unlimited power and military prowess that would enable me to dwarf the Eastern Hemisphere in a matter of weeks!"
I won't spoil the ending in case you wish to seek out this story, but needless to say, it doesn't work out as the dictator Gurth imagines.
So how does this all tie into the Fantastic Four's origin?
If somehow you don't know the story, Dr. Reed Richards is planning a rocket trip into space, but his pal, pilot Ben Grimm, angrily confronts Reed with his concerns about space travel:
FANTASTIC FOUR #1 (Nov. 1961), pg. 9
(as reprinted in ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS)
Nothing like the girl you have a crush on shaming you into doing something you know is dangerous!
FANTASTIC FOUR #1 (Nov. 1961), pg. 10
(as reprinted in ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS)
Coincidence? Maybe, but consider this: Both creators of the Fantastic Four were around and likely aware of Chapman's "Cycle" story.
Stanley Lieber (Lee) was on the premises at Timely in 1940, "assisting". It is a fair assumption that he read that issue of MARVEL STORIES when it came out and perhaps it was a latent memory of it that he grafted onto Kirby's Challengers concept. It's even possible that Lee pulled copies of the Goodman pulps upon occasion for "inspiration".
And Kirby? Just look to the bottom of the MARVEL STORIES contents page: "INSIDE STORY ILLUSTRATIONS...by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby"
Although the illustration looks more Simon than Kirby, he probably had a hand in it. And though the "cosmic radiation" twist was probably Lee's contribution (consider the role of radiation in other Marvel heroes origins--be it cosmic, gamma or spider-borne), Kirby may have read "Cycle", too.
All that I've proposed is conjecture, obviously. What Kirby and Lee were creating in 1961 was "just" a comic book--not a cultural icon. They were looking at producing a saleable comic and the hook they came up with--cosmic radiation created superheroes--may have just been plucked from out of thin air.
Then again, they had the means, motive and opportunity, and that usually is enough to convict.
BONUS!
Among comic book fans, this issue of MARVEL STORIES is known (if they know it at all) for having an early house ad for MARVEL (MYSTERY) COMICS featuring the Human Torch. Though it's been reprinted elsewhere, here it is for your viewing:
Human Torch house ad
________________________________________________________
* ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS, pg. 17
**Perhaps not so goofy according to the science of the era! In an article entitled, "Secret of Life Sought" that appeared in the Oct. 1930 issue of POPULAR MECHANICS, "...as the evidence piles up, the daring theory is being advanced that X-rays, radium rays and cosmic rays are among the primary causes of evolution--if they do not happen to be the sole cause."
There has been much gnashing of teeth, vituperative prose and verbal bloodshed over who should get credit for the creation of the Fantastic Four.
Jack Kirby fans are steadfast in their belief that their man brought the concept to Stan. Kirby had, after all, just finished a run on the CHALLENGERS OF THE UNKNOWN for DC. In their eyes, Ace, Prof, Rocky and Red had just been reimagined as Ben, Reed, Johnny and Sue.
Stan Lee, however, saw it differently. The story goes that publisher Martin Goodman had noticed that National's (DC) JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA comic was selling particularly well. He then ordered Stan to create a super team to headline a new comic for their company.
"I would create a team of superheroes if that was what the marketplace required," Lee wrote in ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS,"But it would be a team such as comicdom had never known. For just this once, I would do the type of story I myself would enjoy reading if I were a comic-book reader."*
Lee's words are red meat to Kirby fans. Personal biases aside, perhaps there is some truth to both versions.
And perhaps there is a third person deserving of credit as well.
John L. Chapman.
"If momentary exposure to the cosmic rays beyond the Heaviside Layer made a super-man of an ordinary mortal--what fabulous titan of strength and intelligence might the human become who'd spend hours under such forces!"
So reads the blurb accompanying the short story, "Cycle", by the above mentioned Mr. Chapman in MARVEL STORIES vol. 2 #2 dated Nov. 1940.
MARVEL STORIES vol. 2 #2 (Nov. 1940)
Chapman was an early science fiction fan from Minneapolis who had made it into the professional ranks by the Forties. His rather unremarkable career as a writer likely wouldn't even be under consideration if it were not for this barely six-page effort that bears some interesting similarities to the origin of an iconic comic book team some 20 years hence.
"Cycle" was the story of a man named Drake, who had been sent in a rocket on a trip to the moon, the "first man to leave the earth's atmosphere." Suddenly,the "jets" on his ship misfired, "in the vicinity of the Heaviside Layer," and he began plummeting back toward the ground. (note: the Heaviside Layer is one of several layers making up the ionosphere.)
Apparently, upon reaching this point, Drake was exposed to cosmic radiation.
"At first he thought it was the weightlessness of deceleration. But as the minutes fled by, and the ship's velocity decreased steadily, the certainty of a change became more prominent in Drake's mind."
Drake survives the crash and is subsequently brought to the World Tower (!) and into the presence of the Western Hemisphere's dictator (!!), Michael Gurth.
"The body and build was (sic) perfect. A wide chest tapered from broad shoulders. The hands were huge and strong. The legs were long and muscular. The hair looked as though it might have been dark at one time. Now it possessed a golden luster, matching the slitted gray eyes whose piercing gaze sent a chill down Tinsley's spine. Never before had the little scientist seen such masculine beauty."
Overlooking the homoerotic and Master Race implications (and poor writing), what Chapman was describing was Drake's transformation into a super human.
"Cycle" illustration
by Joe Simon & Jack Kirby
"Drake was the first man to pass the Heaviside Layer, the first human being to meet with the utter unknown. He was exposed to the natural cosmic ray forces,the same forces that the Heaviside Layer prevents from reaching the earth. You recall, Dr. Tinsley, an age-old theory of evolution concerning cosmic rays? The life forces they were called, the origin of the animate impulses. Yes--you begin to comprehend, don't you? You understand now what has happened to Drake.He was been exposed to naked cosmic rays, and as a result he was super-evolved."
This long-winded and scientifically goofy explanation** sets the stage for the dictator's own trip into space to be exposed to the cosmic radiation himself in order to, "...be gifted with unlimited power and military prowess that would enable me to dwarf the Eastern Hemisphere in a matter of weeks!"
I won't spoil the ending in case you wish to seek out this story, but needless to say, it doesn't work out as the dictator Gurth imagines.
So how does this all tie into the Fantastic Four's origin?
If somehow you don't know the story, Dr. Reed Richards is planning a rocket trip into space, but his pal, pilot Ben Grimm, angrily confronts Reed with his concerns about space travel:
FANTASTIC FOUR #1 (Nov. 1961), pg. 9
(as reprinted in ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS)
Nothing like the girl you have a crush on shaming you into doing something you know is dangerous!
FANTASTIC FOUR #1 (Nov. 1961), pg. 10
(as reprinted in ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS)
Coincidence? Maybe, but consider this: Both creators of the Fantastic Four were around and likely aware of Chapman's "Cycle" story.
Stanley Lieber (Lee) was on the premises at Timely in 1940, "assisting". It is a fair assumption that he read that issue of MARVEL STORIES when it came out and perhaps it was a latent memory of it that he grafted onto Kirby's Challengers concept. It's even possible that Lee pulled copies of the Goodman pulps upon occasion for "inspiration".
And Kirby? Just look to the bottom of the MARVEL STORIES contents page: "INSIDE STORY ILLUSTRATIONS...by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby"
Although the illustration looks more Simon than Kirby, he probably had a hand in it. And though the "cosmic radiation" twist was probably Lee's contribution (consider the role of radiation in other Marvel heroes origins--be it cosmic, gamma or spider-borne), Kirby may have read "Cycle", too.
All that I've proposed is conjecture, obviously. What Kirby and Lee were creating in 1961 was "just" a comic book--not a cultural icon. They were looking at producing a saleable comic and the hook they came up with--cosmic radiation created superheroes--may have just been plucked from out of thin air.
Then again, they had the means, motive and opportunity, and that usually is enough to convict.
BONUS!
Among comic book fans, this issue of MARVEL STORIES is known (if they know it at all) for having an early house ad for MARVEL (MYSTERY) COMICS featuring the Human Torch. Though it's been reprinted elsewhere, here it is for your viewing:
Human Torch house ad
________________________________________________________
* ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS, pg. 17
**Perhaps not so goofy according to the science of the era! In an article entitled, "Secret of Life Sought" that appeared in the Oct. 1930 issue of POPULAR MECHANICS, "...as the evidence piles up, the daring theory is being advanced that X-rays, radium rays and cosmic rays are among the primary causes of evolution--if they do not happen to be the sole cause."
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