Golden Age Superman question

[Point Five]

Hi there, folks!

 

I've been reading and highly enjoying the discussions on these boards for a little while now, and just decided to make the leap into posting.

 

My question is this: does anyone know why, on the covers of Superman #4 & #5, a crudely-drawn version of the Superman logo was used instead of the original logo? (If you know those covers, you hopefully know what I'm talking about.) Just curious if there's some interesting historical reason or bit of trivia behind why the classic logo would have been dropped for a few issues.

 

All best!

 

Jon

[nearmint]

None of the following is based on any historical fact. Just speculation based on examinations of the covers of those issues...

 

Besides the logo difference, the only other difference between issues 3 & 4 is that with #4 they started putting the issue number in a circle. Perhaps they initially didn't want the logo to cover any part of the circle, so they created a new logo that didn't take up as much horizontal space on the cover.

 

With #5, they went ahead and covered part of the empty space in the circle with the logo. Then starting with #6, they returned to the old logo and continued covering part of the circle.

 

Like I said, this is all guessing. We're talking about early issues in the title, and they may have just been experimenting.

 

By the way, WELCOME TO THE BOARDS!

[jkrk]

 

 

 

[nearmint]

Nice books. I've complete from 10-20, but haven't dipped into the first ten issues yet.

[esquirecomics]

Although by #9 the circle was actually covering part of the name instead.

 

[Aman619]

looks to me like each Superman logo was drawn along with the cover artwork. They are all different from each other. Never noticed that before.

[Aman619]

and #6 LOOKS LIKE THE PROTOTYPE FOR THE REAL THING. Not knowing much about reproduction technology in the early 40s for companies on a shoestring, Id guess that photostats were too expensive or just not used widely in comics, as artists might have been expected to redraw the logos each issue along with the illustration. Except for the banner logos like Action, Detective etc which could have been lifted and placed on each successive issue's cover.

[Point Five]

Thanks a lot for the replies, and for the welcome to the board! The cover scans are great as well. I absolutely love those early covers, and hope to acquire some of these early issues myself. (I do have a #4 which is missing a centerfold, as are many of my most prized GA books...hence my "Point Five" screen name.)

 

Now that we're comparing them, aman619, you're right: each logo seems to be custom-drawn for each cover. Even #3 & #9 are quite different when you stop to compare them closely...which makes it all the more odd to me that #4 & #5 look so different. Even if the logo was redrawn each issue, why wouldn't the logos for #4 & #5 have been traced (at least) from previous covers, as some of the #6-#10 logos presumably were?

 

Nearmint's suggestion is a good one...that the changes to the price design on #4 made a "condensed" logo seem like a good idea. But when you look closely at #4, the redrawn logo seems to take up just as much space, no?

 

Anyway, maybe we'll never know, but I much enjoy the speculation. I've been reading the Men of Tomorrow book lately (anyone else?), and it reinforces the feeling I've always had that these early GA comics were pumped out at incredible speed, under some serious deadline pressures...which makes it all the more strange to me that someone (Shuster?) would spend time drawing a new Superman logo from scratch on issue #4. Any other thoughts?

[EC Star&Bar]

The mention of the price of photostats is relevant, I think, because of a comment Shelly Mayer once made. When editing the very earliest issues of All Star Comics, he claimed to have simply drew the cover logo himself -- fresh each time to avoid the price of a stat.

 

As far as the Superman cover logos, it's possible that different artists in the Shuster Studio drew the differing logos, which would help account for the various styles (the studio was already setting up, with Wayne Boring, Paul Cassidy, and others).

 

Perhaps when the higher-ups at DC wanted a definitive logo, the "best" one was chosen (the style appearing on Issue # 6). Just some thoughts on what might have been going on.