Anyone know anything about DC's founder Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson?

[BLBcomics-migration]

Hi Gary,

 

parts of the gospel i related was according to son Irwin Donenfeld, who brought out some hard copy data for me to inspect over the course of the couple years i interviewed him 2000-2001.

 

Post law suit, knocked out of their cushy Superman contract, not having known they needed to save up money, they slowly became destitute, well, at least Joe didm blind as he was by then - Jerry could still keep ekking out scripts.

 

To take your points:

 

1) yes, according to Irwin and other sources i have developed over the years, S&S were compensated VERY WELL for the first ten years of their relationship with Donenfeld. They each made half a million dollars over that ten years from National due to the revision to pull themin line with the Bob Kane contract on Batman - works out to 50 grand per year on average. PLUS the newspaper McClure Syndicate money PLUS Fleischer cartoon money

 

and they blew the bucks - being two poor kids from Cleveland (Joe by way of Toronto earlier) who did not know how to handle money kind of like some of the dot.com insufficiently_thoughtful_persons right before the crash not knowing how to handle their bucks either.

 

2) Harry D has humanitarian? i never meant to imply that total concept on the man - but he did take care of those taking care of him - i mean to say in that in teh world of publishing and distribution, there were those who made you money, and those who did not.

 

As long as S&S made money for Harry D, as long as they understood that to make the marketplace happen to milk the cash cow, all kinds of people needed to make parts of that cash flow. And harry D had put his hard earned money into Action #1, #2 #3 and then #4 before they even got final sales figures in on #1 - and Superman does not appear on a cover again until #7, then #10, and doesn't go full time cover feature until #15

 

they - no body - knew that it was Superman, nothing else, fueling the Action Comics rocket

 

And Irwin was adamant, to the point of being angry, when i examined the concept of his father paying for eye surgery operations for Joe Shuster - that is when we got into the law suits which began over Superboy appearing in More Fun beginning in #101

 

It was the lawyer hungry in the Stars & Stripes office out there in Honolulu who convinced Jerry that he could get 100% of Superman back as far as comic books were concerned. Never mind teh concept that Jerry & Joe were making 100% of the newspaper syndication money - and had been from day one - Irwin was quite clear on that concept.

 

See, when i hit speed bumps that went contrary to long held "popular knoweldge" inside fandom, I, too, sought to clarify my own mind. I came out of these multiple meetings with Irwin with my mind opened to three sides of the coin, so to speak.

 

3) yes, the anger over the filing of the lawsuits burned some anger into the minds of the ones being sued, that much for sure. By 1946, within a year after the lawsuits began, Mort Weisinger was getting articles placed already devaluing S&S contributions to the creation and ongoing creativity connected with Superman - a 1946 Coronet magazine article by Mort W i have comes to mind, barely mentining S&S

 

4) not numbered by you, but concerning your last paragraph - yes, S&S did initially sign away Superman for the page rates & cover rate totalling $130

 

and if that were the end of the story, yes, S&S got screwed royally

 

however

 

big however

 

the story takes a U-turn from conventional popular fandom myth when in late 1939, the S&S contract with Superman was altered to conform with the BobKane contract which brought Kane about a 10% royalty on all profits. He understood, evidently, that he was not entitled to ALL the profits. Jerry evidently did not, or at least was talked into the illfated lawsuits by that lawyer while they were stationed out in Honolulu during the war.

 

evidently the court figured out something - maybe harry D payed the judge, who knows

 

bottom line, if those lawsuits had not been filed, Jerry & Joe would have made a ton of money over the decades, lived a fine life like Bob Kane did, would have shared in the TV George Reeves thing, etc etc etc

 

does this make more sense yet?

 

i know, some of the myths in fandom are hard to shake loose

 

I know that one of the biggest for me about a decade ago now was the realization that Yellow Kid was NOT the first comic strip and Famous Funnies (Or Funnies On Parade) was not the first comic book/magazine

 

I stipulate Jerry Siegel shot his own foot, and also shot Joe's foot in the process, as Joe went along with Jerry, the dominent of that duo

 

robert beerbohm, now just an old dinosaur in the biz -

http://www.blbcomics.com

[lou_fine]

Bob;

 

Wow, some absolutely amazing stuff here today from you. Looks like we are all getting a course in advanced comics history here today on the GA boards. Guess all those newbies who spend all their time avoiding the GA boards don't know what they are missing here.

 

I've always wondered why Bob Kane was treated so differently from S&S, and now we know that was not DC's initial intention. Bob was able to live the life of a real life Bruce Wayne while S&S ending up throwing all their money away and living the life of a destitute.

 

The only other question is why was Bill Finger never given proper credit for his work on Batman? Somehow I also don't think this was DC's fault, and was probably more the case of poor Bill being royally screwed over by Bob Kane.

 

Great stuff, Bob. Keep on posting here.

[FFB]

Guess all those newbies who spend all their time avoiding the GA boards don't know what they are missing here.

 

You can say that again!

[esquirecomics]

Bob, fantastic info!!!! You are an amazing wealth of comic book history and I applaud you for it!

 

This is fascinating information. I have been slowly researching the lawsuits that erupted in the early days of comics and will hopefully one day write about what I found.

 

Keep the info coming Bob!

 

[mattbird_home]

Nothing to add myself, apart from this being an awesome thread. I finished reading Men of Tommorrow a few weeks back, so alot of this stuff is still fresh in my head.

[Timulty]

Thanks Bob. Reading your posts have made being a board member well worth it!!

[Norrin_Radd]

I've always wondered and now I know...

 

Actress Dana Wheeler-Nicholson is the granddaughter of Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, who started DC Comics (home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman). Unfortunately the Major was financially squeezed out of the company so the family has no connection with DC today.

 

 

 

 

And here's a bio on the Major via Wikipedia.

[Norrin_Radd]

[*]Book: Wheeler-Nicholson, Maj. Malcolm, Are We Winning the Hard Way? (Crowell Publishing, 1934)

 

Wonder what that book is about?

[BLBcomics-migration]

I've always wondered and now I know...

 

Actress Dana Wheeler-Nicholson is the granddaughter of Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, who started DC Comics (home of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman). Unfortunately the Major was financially squeezed out of the company so the family has no connection with DC today.

 

 

 

 

And here's a bio on the Major via Wikipedia.

 

Earlier this year I have been contacted by Wheeler-Nicholson family members, but not this lovely lady.

 

Howvever, I found an error from the get-go in this bio URL of the Major

 

New Fun was not the "first" original news stand publication in the USA devoted to original comics material

 

That honor goes to George Delacorte's THE FUNNIES whose first issue came out in 1929 - it was ALL original comic strip material, sold for a dime initially, then dropped to a nickel per.

 

George went on to become a partner in the earliest FAMOUS FUNNIES issues and then come out with all those wonderful Dell Comics. So, Dell published comic book magazines from 1929 thru the 1970s, for over 50 years. Dell was the largest publisher of comic books - Irwin Donenfeld said to me Dell was over half the sold marketplace and was always their main competitor up until the American News imbroglio, then Dell was forced, like Martin Goodman, to come over to Independent News, owned by the Donenfelds.

 

I tell the story in the Origin of the Modern Comic Book history essay in the small size Overstreet #35 - a story i have been expanding and fine tuning there for a decade now. Page One of this essay starts showing THE FUNNIES #1 1929 and particulars of how it came about.

 

These guys need to read what i have there, and make corrections

 

Robert Beerbohm

http://www.BLBComics.com

[BLBcomics-migration]

Bob;

 

Wow, some absolutely amazing stuff here today from you. Looks like we are all getting a course in advanced comics history here today on the GA boards. Guess all those newbies who spend all their time avoiding the GA boards don't know what they are missing here.

 

I've always wondered why Bob Kane was treated so differently from S&S, and now we know that was not DC's initial intention. Bob was able to live the life of a real life Bruce Wayne while S&S ending up throwing all their money away and living the life of a destitute.

 

The only other question is why was Bill Finger never given proper credit for his work on Batman? Somehow I also don't think this was DC's fault, and was probably more the case of poor Bill being royally screwed over by Bob Kane.

 

Great stuff, Bob. Keep on posting here.

 

My understanding is Bob Kane's father worked out the Batman contract. Bill Finger was left out from the get-go. Siegel & Shuster had a contract drawn up that mirrored the Kane contract.

 

I have almost zero respect for Bob Kane regarding his handling of Bill Finger, Sheldon Moldoff, etc who labored for years in obscurity as we all well know.

 

I quizzed Irwin about Bob Kane and Bill Finger. He said that the higher ups at DC always dealt with Bob Kane, so did not know for many years that Kane was not actually producing the strip.

 

Irwin also thought that Bill Finger got screwed.

 

Robert Beerbohm

http://www.BLBComics.com

[Theagenes]

As a historian, I have to say that I find all of this absolutely fascinating. Like several of you I just finished reading Men of Tomorrow as well and I just couldn't put it down. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to have a better understanding of the context in which these GA books were invented and the men who created them. One criticism, however - I was left with the feeling that the author accepted the S&S side of the story perhaps a bit too uncritically and so it's great to read Bob's posts with Irwin's version of events. The truth is, no doubt, somewhere in the middle as it usually is in cases like this.

 

And Bob, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading your posts over the last couple of days, maybe even more than reading your articles in Overstreet. Thank you very much for contributing here and sharing your vast knowledge and experiences with some of us newbies.

[Moondog]

Bob:

 

Thanks again for adding more info to this discussion. I must say that you are very perceptive to my feelings regarding "fandom's popular conceptions". I've always thought that S&S got royally screwed, but now I'm not so sure.

 

Did they get taken advantage of? Yes.

 

Were they guilty of being greedy? Probably.

 

Were they given bad advice? Obviously.

 

But at the end of the day, it seems they were just as responsible for their problems as others were of trying to screw them.

 

Still, it's a black mark on DC that's still there after all these years...

 

--Gary

[BLBcomics-migration]

Bob:

 

Thanks again for adding more info to this discussion. I must say that you are very perceptive to my feelings regarding "fandom's popular conceptions". I've always thought that S&S got royally screwed, but now I'm not so sure.

 

Did they get taken advantage of? Yes.

 

Were they guilty of being greedy? Probably.

 

Were they given bad advice? Obviously.

 

But at the end of the day, it seems they were just as responsible for their problems as others were of trying to screw them.

 

Still, it's a black mark on DC that's still there after all these years...

 

--Gary

 

Hi Gary

 

and i agree with what you stipulate here. For years i was in the forefront of the concept that S&S had been raked over the coals shamelessly, hung out and left to dry them own selves off.

 

Five years ago when I began interviewing Irwin D, i slowly began to alter my door of perception into what happened to the creators of Superman back beginning in the mid 1940s once Jerry was discharged from the US Army following World War Two.

 

A read an inflation stat recently in a Comics Journal article from about a year ago on the recent Siegel and Shuster legal path the heirs are going thru which said that $75,000 in early 1940s money is equal to a million dollars buying power in today's money.

 

So, taken another way, they had the then-equalivant of millions of dollars come thru their hands.

 

I put much of the blame game on the lawyer who talked Jerry into destroying his life - (and the life of Joe Shuster in the process) -

 

Thru it all, it appears they had no friends actually trying to look out for them - and greed overtook better judgment on their part - at least Jerry's - as i think Joe just went along with whatever Jerry said - or others for that matter - as it was Joe who gave DC permission to first issue Superboy in More Fun - Jerry was mad because no one asked him first

 

bob beerbohm

http://www.BLBComics.com

[BLBcomics-migration]

As a historian, I have to say that I find all of this absolutely fascinating. Like several of you I just finished reading Men of Tomorrow as well and I just couldn't put it down. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to have a better understanding of the context in which these GA books were invented and the men who created them. One criticism, however - I was left with the feeling that the author accepted the S&S side of the story perhaps a bit too uncritically and so it's great to read Bob's posts with Irwin's version of events. The truth is, no doubt, somewhere in the middle as it usually is in cases like this.

 

And Bob, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading your posts over the last couple of days, maybe even more than reading your articles in Overstreet. Thank you very much for contributing here and sharing your vast knowledge and experiences with some of us newbies.

 

Hello

 

And thanks to you also for the kind words. This comics hobby got way out of hand for me many moons ago

 

- now it is a way of life exploring the American comic book going back almost 200 years as i strive to uncover that which i do not already know. I no longer believe much of what i have read in previous comics history books, especially those whose research consisted mainly of reading other comics history books in the main.

 

After 37 years at this, a huge jigsaw puzzle has taken shape in my mind and i will try from time to time to share parts of this mental roladex with other people interested in truth.

 

Yes, the author of Men of Tomorrow did slant his story mostly in favor of Jerry and Joe - and i do not for a minute wish to imply that Donenfeld, Liebowitz et al were any kind of saints.

 

Jacobs did use my earlier research and i am credited in his acknowledgments.

 

By the time i was given an advance proof, and then found the time ot wade thru it, and got him back what i thought was in error, and he submitted it, the final hard cover gallies were going to press.

 

He said he was going to fix what i told him was wrong in the next edition, which evidently will be the soft cover - we'll see what actually happens.

 

bob beerbohm

http://www.BLBComics.com

[Scrooge]

He said he was going to fix what i told him was wrong in the next edition, which evidently will be the soft cover - we'll see what actually happens.

 

Bob and all, the paperback is already out. I saw it last week in store. Here's the Amazon Link.