Jerry Bails - Media beginnings

In the New York Times today in 1965, there is an article about the new phenomena of escalating prices of old comic books. 

New York Times, January 30, 1965 pg 31

It was a sequel of sorts to an earlier New York Times article from Dec. 1964.

New York Times, December 6, 1965 pg 141

The first story above is one of the earliest media mentions Dr. Jerry Bails, who of course, is one of the founders of modern comic book fandom.  Soon after this article, Jerry Bails is in the Newsweek of Feb. 15 article about fandom titled "Superfans and Batmaniacs".  The media starts to notice comic books in a different light than as a problem to be solved.

Bill Schelly, in his excellent Golden Age of Comic Fandom book, says that this New York Times article "was reprinted in scores of newspapers across the country".  Unfortunately I couldn't find any other papers that carried the article in Google News Archives or the the online database of New York state newspapers.  I did find other articles later in 1965 and 1966  where you could see how Jerry became a spokesman for fandom.  His professorship at Detroit's Wayne State University made him the voice of authority.

He again was the voice of authority in the newspaper in March.  (Sorry the bottom line is missing)

Watertown NY Daily News, March 24 1965 pg 33

And again in June from an article reprinted from the Los Angeles Times.

Watertown NY Daily News, June 10 1965 pg 4 & 6

Then again in a UPI syndicated story a year later in July of 1966.

News And Courier, July 3 1966 pg 8B (Charleston SC)

At the end of 1966, he was even mentioned in an article about Golden Age artist Jack Binder in the Warrensburg-Lake George News.

Warrensburg-Lake George News, December 8 1966 (New York)

Jerry was a voice of reason and knew how to deal with the media.  He appeared in countless other articles and gave a mature, professional face for comic books.  His stature helped turn around the negative impression of comic books.  He has been missed.

Fandom's Forgotten Founder: Richard Hughes

Unknown Worlds #6 (March 1961) [American Comics Group (ACG)]

Today is an important day in comic book fandom, though not normally recognized as such.  Today, this issue of Unknown Worlds was on the newsstands.  Note the date stamped on the cover.

Most histories of comic book fandom accord Julie Schwartz and Stan Lee with most of the credit for helping modern fandom get started in the early 1960s.  They each played a big role in creating a comic book community and the impression that the companies cared about their fans.  This was done in many ways including fan letter pages, clubs, giving out original art and prizes, responding and following fan suggestions, and sending post cards in response to letters.   All of those engendered fan appreciation and loyalty to the editors and comics of Marvel and DC.  Schwartz and Lee could have stopped there. 

But, they went farther.  They helped the fans communicate with each other and form their own communities not tied to a specific company, editor or title.  Julie Schwartz gave names and addresses of fans who had written him to Jerry Bails.  Both Lee and Schwartz also started attaching the full name and address to the fan letters they printed in the comics. 

This is a key factor in why fandom was able to form.  All the other increased communication efforts helped the fan interact with the company, but giving the fan the means to talk among themselves sparked the foundation of comic book fandom as we know it.  Without a means to communicate between themselves, neither fanzines nor conventions would have ever been formed.  Since at the time, comic books were so looked down upon, thought of as so much trash, most fans didn't know other fans.  For fandom to get started, you first have to know that you are not alone.  With today's internet, everyone forgets how hard it used to be to find others who have your same interests.  Not living in a big city, it wasn't until I was 17 that I actually met another comic book fan.

Now letters pages were not rare before the 1960s, and even letters pages with full addresses (name, street, city, state) were published in comic books back in the 1930s.  And there were fans clubs, even if they were mostly company run.   But something changed with comic book fans in the early 1960s.  There were many factors, but one key was the older, activist fan like Jerry Bails, Roy Thomas, and Don & Maggie Thompson.  They enjoyed comic books and wanted to tell others about it.  And they had the life experience and knowledge to act on that desire.  That made all the difference.  They and other fanzine publishers used the contacts they had and the addresses found in comic books to promote their fanzines.  They could reach a market that wanted their product.   And every new comic book published added new potential customers to their list.

Julie Schwartz is often credited with founding this practice of including the full address on his letters pages, at least in the early 1960s.  He drew on his experiences with science fiction fandom.   His efforts, letters, and encouragement to Bails and Thomas in Brave & Bold have cemented that thought in the minds of fans.  Stan Lee came along a little later and joined those practices of encouragement and printing the full address of fan letters.  His fun, irreverent, huckster style caught on with teens of that time.  For more on the founding fans activities and their interactions with Marvel and DC, you need to read Bill Schelly's fantastic book: The Golden Age of Comic Fandom.

So why is Unknown Worlds #6 important?   Well, with all the rightly deserved celebration of Schwartz and Lee, there is another important figure ignored, left out of this group of people responsible for the founding of modern comic book fandom. 

He also deserves some recognition for helping fandom get started.  He was the editor of this comic, Richard Hughes.  Hughes real name is thought to be Leo Rosenbaum according to Michael Vance.  He wrote the excellent history of ACG: Forbidden Adventures.

This issue of Unknown Worlds is important because it has letters pages and Richard Hughes prints the complete address of the letter writers.  "So What" you say, "Schwartz started that in Brave & Bold #35 (May 1961, cover date) when he printed letters from Bails and Thomas".  That's true, but that issue made it onto the newsstand in February of 1961 (Shelly pg 31).  This issue of Unknown Worlds was on the newsstands as of today, Jan. 18, 1961, and had 5 letters with their complete address (name, street, City state).   More significantly, this is the third consecutive issue of Unknown Worlds' letter pages with complete addresses.  So Hughes has already established a consistent pattern of printing complete addresses in ACG comic books.

Unknown Worlds #6  Letters Pages

Only a year before, a fan letter in Superman #135 (Feb 1960 cover date) asked the editor to print his address so he can swap books with other fans.  The printed reply was: "Sorry, but old issues of used magazines are known disease-carriers, so we can't encourage such swapping. - Ed." 

Julie wasn't the first to start printing the addresses in the silver age and he wasn't always consistent.  Sometimes he put in the entire address, sometimes not.   Did he see that Hughes had already started including full addresses on his letters pages a few months earlier and then follow suit?  Probably not, considering his background in science fiction and the long lead times of comic book publishing.

Adventures Into The Unknown #123 (Mar. 1961) also has complete addresses for fan letters.  Hughes followed this practice with all the titles ACG published by the middle of the year and continued on until to the end in 1967.  (except maybe My Romantic Adventures?) He even made it a point to chide letter writers who didn't provide their street address. 

So here is a steady source of addresses for fanzine publishers at the beginning of fandom that never gets more than a fleeting mention, if mentioned at all, in most histories of fandom.  Why is that?  Well, most fandom histories are written by superhero fans, so its not surprising that is where the focus would be.  Also, superhero fans didn't collect ACG comics, so they are hard to find.  In addition, the ACG titles generally had lower circulation numbers than either DC or Marvel.

Adventures Into The Unknown #123 (March 1961) [American Comics Group]

Future historians need to give Richard Hughes more respect for his role in the foundation of comic book fandom.  His role wasn't equal to Schwartz and Lee, but never the less, a lot more significant than usually given credit.

Unknown Worlds #4 (December 1960/January 1961) [American Comics Group]

Unknown Worlds #4  Letters Page

The Comic Reader #81 and Comic Professionals

Etcetera & The Comic Reader #81 (January 1972) Paul Levitz

Yesterday in 1972, you probably would have received this issue of The Comic Reader (TCR) in the mail had you been a subscriber.  The scan I have is postmarked the 15th.  You couldn't have received it today, as the 16th was a Sunday.

The Comic Reader was the oldest, longest running comic book news fanzine of the Golden Age of comic book fandom.  Started by Jerry Bails in 1961 as On The Drawing Board until the eighth issue before becoming TCR, it lasted until #219 in 1984.  It was one of the earliest fanzines to provide information about comic books yet to be published.  Most other fanzine publications looked back or created new stories by fans.  Jerry Bails' contacts with Marvel & DC made it unique.  Later editors continued those and expanded their reporting to cover as many publishers as possible.

This issue was pretty typical of the fanzine at this point in its history.  It was 16 photocopied pages with limited art.  It included news on upcoming comics including personnel and character changes, as well as expected on sale dates for DC & Marvel issues.  Articles included an opinion piece about fandom needing a press agent by Byron Preiss, a Paul Levitz editorial, fanzine and comic book reviews, an article on SF fandom by Tom Greeniones, and a Creation Convention 1971 report by Neal Pozner.

The Knowledgeable Ones among you will recognize many of those names as future comics professionals.  Neal Pozner's first credited pro work seems to be The Amazing World of DC Comics #9 in 1975, but is probably best known for his 1986 Aquaman four issue mini-series with Craig Hamilton.

Aquaman (February 1986) DC Comics Inc.

Byron Preiss was only a few years away from publishing his experimental Weird Heroes paperback series in 1975 and beautiful Fiction Illustrated series of illustrated novels.  Both of which were ground breaking for comic book fans.  He of course went on to do much more in the publishing field.  This Alex Nino illustrated Weird Heroes paperback was one of my favorites

Weird Heroes #3 (1976) Byron Preiss Visual Publications

Paul Levitz, of course, is the most well known of these soon to be pros.  By the end of the year, he would be freelancing for DC Comics (according to Wikipedia).  The GCD has his first work as an assistant editor of All-Star Western #11 (April-May 1972), but I believe this is an error.  He's not credited in the comic book itself, though that isn't unusual for the time.  Levitz went on to write thousands of comics, including the fondly remembered Legion of Superheroes, and even becoming President of DC.  Probably one of the highest corporate levels any former fan ever achieved.  Besides that, he's a great guy who never forgot his fandom roots.

Finally, since I am art inclined, is Rich Buckler.  One of my favorite artists of the time.  He drew this and several other covers of TCR even though he'd already broken into the professional ranks earlier with Warren Publishing.  In fact, his first DC work (House of Secrets #90) was on the newsstands the almost exactly a year before this issue of TCR hit fan's mailboxes. 

House of Secrets #90 (February-March 1971) National Periodical Publications, Inc.

Behind this Neal Adams cover, was a Marv Wolfman written, Rich Buckler drawn story: The Symbionts.  A metafiction favorite of mine since it aims at fandom.  The lead character, a prisoner, was named Lawrence Herndon.

House of Secrets #90, pg 15

Wolfman and Buckler, who came up through comics fandom, of course knew Big Name Fan Larry Herndon of Star-Studded Comics and of Texas Trio fame.  In fact, Buckler had drawn a Larry Herndon story in Star-Studded Comics #13 (1968).

Larry Herndon (1960s)

This older picture of Larry from Bill Schelly's Founders of Comic Fandom book was all I could find, but the heroic profile of Larry in House of Secrets may not have fit his outer self, but sure did show his inner spirit.

The nice Neal Adams quality of the art in this story really comes out (Adams inked it and Buckler drew in his popular style).  This was reinforced as one of the police was named Adams.

My bet is that the other named characters in the story, Laura and Janet Welch were real people too.  Hopefully someone can enlighten me.

A nice piece of metafiction showing fandom's growing influence on the comic book publishers, all connected to one of the top fanzines of the era.

Marvel Zombie Society

One of the best things about the Golden Age of comic book fandom (1960s) was the fanzines.  They now fetch hundreds of dollars on EBay because of their low print runs and nostalgia factor.

But print fanzines didn't end with the 1960s.  In fact, there were probably more printed in the 1970s than in the 60s and there were of a much higher quality than those ditto zines.  Even with the Internet, there are still printed fanzines.  Ditkomania is one I still get.

In that era just before the World Wide Web, I belonged to one which was one of the better ones, The Marvel Zombie Society.

 Marvel Zombie Monthly #18 (December 1989) [Marvel Zombie Society]

The monthly newsletter was a little different than most as it was a cross between a typical fanzine and an (Amateur Press Association) APA.  It had an extensive feedback (or comment) section.

The more than 6 pages of comments on previous articles, reviews, and previous comments was almost half this 15 page issue.  That was pretty typical.  If you added Readers Replies to the monthly poll, this was a chatty group.

 There wasn't much art in the issues, as this issue only had a graph I included in an article I wrote for the issue.

But that chattiness is what made this group of fans special.  It became a tight group that even went to the San Diego Comicon together a few years latter.  Not surprisingly, there were several well known letterhacks and a few others who became industry professionals like myself and Charles Novinskie.

By this time a year later, it had become the MZS-APA and that is when it really became a tight group.  That's when we went to San Diego Comicon and had a lot of fun.  The membership remained at 30 people even though members came and went.  We even had some artists who went on to do some work for Marvel & DC.

Doing a little Internet search, I discovered it is still hanging on, but there was something about a farewell issue.  So it may be on its last legs.  Something like 270 issues or so.  Has a Facebook page if you are interested.  Not bad for a zine that started in 1988.   No DC Deviants need apply.

Cartoonist Showcase #5

This month in 1968, you could have received in the mail Cartoonist Showcase #5, dated November.  It contained comic strip reprints of Modesty Blaise, Secret Agent X-9, Tarzan, and James Bond.  84 pages of great action comic strips with a Mike Royer cover in magazine format. 

Published by Ed Aprill, this was one of the classic fanzines of the 1960s that were professionally produced.  Edwin M. Aprill Jr. was one of those forgotten founders of comic fandom.  He was a fan, a con dealer, original art collector, publisher, and one of the co-founders of the Detroit Triple Fan Fair in 1965.   As a "big-name" fan, he tried to expand fandom beyond its focus on superheroes by publishing a slick, professional magazine that re-packaged old newspaper strips. He demonstrated that there was a market for them in fandom and that one could make a profit from selling them.

Cartoonist Showcase ran 12 issues from 1968 to 1972, but ended when Ed died after his car skidded off an icy road and into a tree in southeast Michigan on Feb. 3, 1972.  He also published 10 issues of Great Classic Newspaper Comic Strips from 1964-1969.