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

[Zonker]

On 12/15/2022 at 10:48 AM, Prince Namor said:

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Rawhide Kid #26 - Kirby did the cover and THREE stories (all inked by D. Ayers), but signed as Stan Lee & J. Kirby. 

 

So now that we are in the "Stan Lee & J. Kirby" era, how do you suppose this worked with Dick Ayers?  We have seen that Ayers cared more about having the work signed than did Kirby.  Do you think that when Ayers saw the penciled artwork start to arrive with Kirby's name already on it, he was ok not to add his name (Ayers) to the list?  Or have you found evidence of Ayers' name whited out, leaving Kirby's behind?  Or was there now some new "arrangement" between Lee, Kirby, Ayers that this was how it was going to be from now on?  

[Prince Namor]

On 12/15/2022 at 1:39 PM, Zonker said:

So now that we are in the "Stan Lee & J. Kirby" era, how do you suppose this worked with Dick Ayers?  We have seen that Ayers cared more about having the work signed than did Kirby.  Do you think that when Ayers saw the penciled artwork start to arrive with Kirby's name already on it, he was ok not to add his name (Ayers) to the list?  Or have you found evidence of Ayers' name whited out, leaving Kirby's behind?  Or was there now some new "arrangement" between Lee, Kirby, Ayers that this was how it was going to be from now on?  

Lee would get even more open with white painting their names out. There are a bunch of examples coming up. 
 

One that recently surfaced is from Hulk #3, where Lee removed the Kirby/Ayers sig for publication. 
 

And Jack rarely signed his name (and not at all over the period with Marvel) and if he did it wasn't as 'J. Kirby' - that was Stan writing it in. We know what his goal was - to make himself look like the 'writer' and ringmaster of everything and Jack as just an artist. 
 

1962 will bring much of this to a head... some interesting stories and artifacts that afaik have never been posted here...

 

 

Edited December 16, 2022 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

On 12/15/2022 at 1:15 PM, Mmehdy said:

 As kids we were aware of price, that is why I and my other collectors stayed await higher price covers until the Strange Tales ANN1 came out, and we then saw that value....by the way the yearly Annuals, especially in year 1963...were a big hit and 5/10 to one trade at the time. It really helped that FF ANN#1 was one of the GREATEST marvel annuals every created...a real trend setter will all NEW material.

At first, before the competition it probably was a very cool thing - DC reprinting stories that, at the time had never been reprinted... but even after Marvel started with all new material In their Annuals, DC STILL never got it through their heads to change (someone could write a whole dissertation on the history of just the DC's Annuals). 
 

Marvel really DID set the trend with all new material in Superhero Annuals (Archie had from the beginning put out new material in their Annuals), and much of it, early on, was really outstanding material. 

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Amazing Adult Fantasy #9 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko had 5 stories again in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on all 5 splash pages. Ditko pencils and inks the cover and even THAT is signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko. The contents page shows the names of the 5 stories and that is signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko as well. By the final page, showing what is coming for the next issue... I guess they figured by now you'd have a pretty good idea who it was by...

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Amazing Adult Fantasy #9 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko had 5 stories again in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on all 5 splash pages. 

Story ONE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Amazing Adult Fantasy #9 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko had 5 stories again in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on all 5 splash pages. 

Story TWO:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Amazing Adult Fantasy #9 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko had 5 stories again in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on all 5 splash pages. There is an ad at the bottom of the last page for the Fantastic Four.

Story THREE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Amazing Adult Fantasy #9 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko had 5 stories again in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on all 5 splash pages. 

Story FOUR:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Amazing Adult Fantasy #9 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko had 5 stories again in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on all 5 splash pages. 

Story FIVE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

DC Comics gives Aquaman his own comic - featuring a 3 part, 25 page, Jack Miller story, with Nick Cards art.

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1961

For August, Marvel would release 12 titles to the newsstand, to end the year averaging 10.25 titles per month, more than 2 titles a month more than the 'only 8 titles a month' story that everyone has reported for the last couple of decades. 

Stan Lee would write 8 of the titles for the month.

 

Fantastic Four #3 - with art by Jack Kirby

Amazing Adult Fantasy #10 - 5 stories with Steve Ditko

Kathy #15  - with art by Stan Goldberg. 

Life With Millie #15  - with art by Stan Goldberg 

Patsy Walker #99  -  with Al Hartley art 

Kid Colt Outlaw #103  - 3 stories with Jack Keller and 1 with Don Heck

Millie the Model #107  - with art by Stan Goldberg 

Linda Carter, Student Nurse #4  -  with Al Hartley art 

 

The other 4 are:

Journey Into Mystery #77

Tales to Astonish #29

Tales of Suspense #27

Strange Tales #94   

 

Edited December 16, 2022 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1961

Despite repositioning his authority by eliminating one of Kirby's books (Amazing Adventures) and turning it into one that HE gets full writer pay for (Amazing Adult Fantasy), adding another unnecessary romance book that doesn't sell - but that he gets full writer pay for (Linda Carter, Student Nurse), talking Kirby into 'teaming up' to do Rawhide Kid - while taking him away from other solo Western work - to instead waste his time doing Romance work that Stan can get writer credit for... AND finally seeing some excitement for a superhero title that he's gotten Jack to share credit on (The FF).... Lee STILL goes on a passive aggressive attack of Kirby for the month...

The first letters page for the Fantastic Four - in the very FIRST letter - Stan makes a comment about how 'our artist signs the name JACK KIRBY on everything he can get his greedy little fingers on'...

Jack of course, is the one artist who hasn't signed ANYTHING since coming back to Marvel over 3 years ago. Stan is making an attempt to play this up as humorous here, so he can always deny any wrong doing, and be able to take a shot at Jack as a 'glory hog' (taking the spotlight off his own HOGGING), while establishing Jack's place as just the ARTIST. 

This is all just the begging of what would be DECADES of Lee and Marvel Comics trying to position Jack as JUST an artist and Stan as the 'writer'.

Edited December 17, 2022 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1961

Jack Kirby appears in Millie the Model, which of course IS promoting him... as JUST an artist. Again it's a somewhat passive aggressive way for Stan to be able to say, "Look, I'm giving Jack credit...", but the underlying manipulation here is that he's JUST an artist... that name on the door, 'Jack Kirby - Artist' is shown 3 times in successive panels to get the point across...

The idea, the story, the execution of it - it all comes across as good fun, and humorous... that's kinda evil genius of it... but knowing what we know... it's very clear what Stan's intent was here...

[Zonker]

On 12/16/2022 at 8:16 AM, Prince Namor said:

Stan makes a comment about how 'our artist signs the name JACK KIRBY on everything he can get his greedy little fingers on'...

 

That really is a terrible look for Stan, given everything else you're showing us is going on around this time.

It also prompts the question:  How is "Millie" supposed to know about Jack Kirby as the artist on Strange Tales, when the artist credits are missing on that book? 

[shadroch]

On 12/15/2022 at 10:03 PM, Prince Namor said:

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

For Amazing Adult Fantasy #9 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko had 5 stories again in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on all 5 splash pages. 

Story ONE:

The irony.

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1961

For Journey Into Mystery #77 - Kirby did the cover and wrote and penciled TWO stories (all inked by D. Ayers and thus, missing a signature). 

Story ONE:

Edited December 17, 2022 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1961

For Journey Into Mystery #77 - Kirby did the cover and wrote and penciled TWO stories (all inked by D. Ayers and thus, missing a signature). There is an ad at the bottom of the last page for the Fantastic Four.

Story TWO:

Edited December 17, 2022 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1961

For Journey Into Mystery #77 - Stan Lee and Steve Ditko also had a story in this issue, signed Stan Lee & S. Ditko on the splash page. There is an ad at the bottom of the last page for Amazing Adult Fantasy. 

Edited December 17, 2022 by Prince Namor

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1961

For Strange Tales #94 - Kirby did the cover (inked by D. Ayers) and wrote and penciled TWO stories. The first story is inked by Joe Sinnott, who we'd come to know in time as the definitive Kirby FF inker. Interestingly, the splash page has a signature... 'Kirby & Sinnott'...

Story ONE:

[Prince Namor]

ON NEWSSTANDS NOVEMBER 1961

In the midst of research, I was looking at Strange Tales #94, the lead story, signed as ‘Kirby & Sinnott’. Because Kirby never signed any of his work during this period, and only shows up because of MR. Ayers signing their names, it was assumed this was the case of Sinnott also signing their names. But I was wondering…

For Strange Tales #94 - Was THIS an example of KIRBY signing the artwork... as a test of LEE, to see if he'd have the nerve to white paint KIRBY's DIRECT signing of the page? There are a few examples of Kirby non-cursive writing of his name, and it looks pretty similar... (I’ve also included Joe’s printed writing of his name)

ALSO, even though the job number is painted over (for some reason), the rest of the issue is V-524 thru V-526. Fantastic Four #3 is later down the line V-563... the issue where Stan, in the letters page, makes his comment about how 'our artist signs the name JACK KIRBY on everything he can get his greedy little fingers on'...

Was Strange Tales #94 - Kirby DARING Lee to white paint his signature - after most likely hearing from D. Ayers about how Stan had been doing it when Ayers signed it for him and Kirby... and FF #3 was Stan's way of, again, passive-aggressively striking back?

Kirby didn't sign any of his stories throughout this entire period, but I think this may be an instance where he DID, just to see if Stan had the nerve to white paint it. And Lee backed down. But then made his comment in FF#3.

Remember, this is also the month they did a Jack Kirby appearance in Millie the Model, where they made a point to refer to Jack numerous times as 'artist' (thus downplaying his writing). The job number on that story? It's also strangely missing, but in the rest of the issue, the earliest job number is V-578. 

Edited December 18, 2022 by Prince Namor