Stan, Jack, and Steve - The 1960's (1961) The Castaway Strikes Back 1 1

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Rawhide Kid #25 - Kirby is still writing dialogue in the story, meaning he's still dialoguing the story and its altered by Stan.

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Rawhide Kid #25, Stan Lee 'writes' and Jack Kirby pencils with D. Ayers inks, but Stan is the only one who signs the story. It's one of three Kirby does for the issue. 

Story TWO:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Rawhide Kid #25, Stan Lee 'writes' and Jack Kirby pencils with D. Ayers inks, but Stan is the only one who signs the story. It's one of three Kirby does for the issue. 

Story THREE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Journey Into Mystery #75, Jack Kirby does the cover, then writes and pencils with D. Ayers inks, but the signature is mysteriously missing....

Story ONE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

Journey Into Mystery #75 - a number of Marvel's books this month would feature an ad for FF#1 at the end of the story...

Story ONE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Journey Into Mystery #75, Jack Kirby does a second story, writing and penciling with D. Ayers inks, but again the signature is mysteriously missing....

Story TWO:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Journey Into Mystery #75, Steve Ditko would also do a story, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko, that is 5 pages long, one of which is a splash page that isn't part of the story.

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

At the end of Lee and Ditko's story in Journey Into Mystery #75, Stan Lee promotes the Lee and Ditko title Amazing Adult Fantasy... 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Strange Tales #91, Jack Kirby would do the cover (inked by George Klein) and write and pencil just one story (inked by D. Ayers). Even now, when you read these Kirby monster stories, they read more like Marvel Comic than the others...

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Strange Tales #91, Steve Ditko would also do a story, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko, that is 5 pages long, one of which is a splash page that isn't part of the story.

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Strange Tales #91, Jack Kirby is still writing the dialogue right onto the page...

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Tales of Suspense #24 - Kirby did the cover (inked by D. Ayers) and wrote and penciled two stories. Kirby's natural progression from monsters into superheroes again has a link here, as this story COULD have gone either way and is just a small edit from turning into his NEXT hero...

Story ONE (inked by D. Ayers)

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Tales of Suspense #24 - Kirby did the cover (inked by D. Ayers) and wrote and penciled two stories. The ad for the Fantastic Four is at the bottom of the last page.

Story TWO (inked by George Klein)

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Tales of Suspense #24 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko also have a story (signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko) The ad for the Amazing Adult Fantasy is at the bottom of the last page.

 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Tales to Astonish #26 - Kirby did the cover and wrote and penciled two stories (all inked by D. Ayers and thus, missing a signature). The ad for the Fantastic Four is at the bottom of the last page of the first story.

Story ONE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Tales to Astonish #26 - Kirby did the cover and wrote and penciled two stories (all inked by D. Ayers and thus, missing a signature). 

Story TWO:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For Tales to Astonish #26 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko would also have a story in this issue, signed as Stan Lee & S. Ditko. The ad for the Amazing Adult Fantasy is at the bottom of the last page of the story.

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

Tales to Astonish #26 - Stan also adds an Editor's note at the start of the story: 

A couple of interesting notes about this 'Editor's note'...

1) Stan claims in Origins of Marvel Comics, that before FF #1, none of their comics hardly ever got any mail except to complain.

2) Stan never really ever spoke about the 'success' of him and Ditko doing these stories. He DID, in Origins, claim that he and Jack were having a 'ball doing these monster stories', but he only spoke of the Ditko stories as 'we had done a ton of them together' before AAF - which of course is false... they began doing them 'together', based on signatures, at the same time.

3) After 3 years and rising sales of the monster books, including the return of some of those monsters... surely at SOME point he would've mentioned readers demanding more, or liking the stories, etc. etc. But no, he saves this for the story with HIS name on it, most likely as a way and a hope to increase its visibility.

WHO was he trying to raise his visibility with?

Alter Ego and the fanzines.

It's very likely... that it's the fanzines and the hobbyists that helped grow Marvel, NOT vice versa, as the Marvel Zombies believed.

Stan was trying to raise HIS visibility... 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

Also for 09/05/1961, we'd see Patsy & Hedy #79 and Patsy Walker #98 with art (and signatures) from Al Hartley.

Journey Into Mystery #75 would be released on 09/26/1961... I jumped the gun, and already showed those stories...

Edited December 8, 2022 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS SEPTEMBER 1961

For 09/26/1961, we'd get Journey Into Mystery #75 (which we've already seen), Life with Millie #14 (with a Kathy team-up!) and Kathy #14 (both with Stan Goldberg art and signatures), and one other...