Stan, Jack, and Steve - The 1960's (1963) Butting Heads, Unexpected Success and Not Expected Failures! 3 3

[Steven Valdez]

On 7/29/2023 at 4:58 PM, The humble Watcher lurking said:

As a I talked with him he kept telling me he was going to go. It was smoking related. I loved the man   He gave me insight I would have never known. In the end I was a fan but  ended up loving Steve Gerber as a friend. Oh yeah he told me Stan Lee and Marvel screwed him over Howard the Duck.

 That's why I love this thread because @Prince Namor is exposing Stan Lee. Steve Gerber told me that Stan Lee is not what we thought he was. Steve Gerber became my friend. He told me about the real Stan Lee.

 

It's extremely sad how he was treated (and cheated) and left us way too early. Was wonderful of Kirby to illustrate his Destroyer Duck comic completely gratis. Any of his Stan Lee anecdotes you could share here?

 

Edited July 29, 2023 by Steven Valdez
extra bit

[Dr. Haydn]

On 7/29/2023 at 1:07 AM, Steven Valdez said:

I enjoyed his (Gerber's) work too. It was always really out there.

Me too--though it was a bit beyond me in the mid-70s. His Defenders run was top-notch, I think. He did a Sons of the Serpent story in 1975 (#22-25) that so accurately captured the white supremacist rhetoric and racial prejudice of its time that it's a terrifying read today.

[Steven Valdez]

On 7/30/2023 at 1:25 AM, Dr. Haydn said:

Me too--though it was a bit beyond me in the mid-70s. His Defenders run was top-notch, I think. He did a Sons of the Serpent story in 1975 (#22-25) that so accurately captured the white supremacist rhetoric and racial prejudice of its time that it's a terrifying read today.

I remember reading an issue of Howard the Duck in college and the teacher thinking I was a halfwit for doing so.

[Steven Valdez]

On 7/30/2023 at 9:55 PM, The humble Watcher lurking said:

I would love to tell more, but JC lawyers still out there. I be bankrupt. Maybe I outlive Stan Lee daughter I tell more. Sorry. I know she sue me. If I outlive JC Lee, than 100 percent. Right now too dangerous. Have a good day.Ron

Hey, no problem. But I'm intrigued now.

[Dr. Haydn]

On 7/29/2023 at 10:16 PM, Steven Valdez said:

I remember reading an issue of Howard the Duck in college and the teacher thinking I was a halfwit for doing so.

Funny how people's perceptions can be. Howard the Duck was one of the most literate, adult-oriented comics of its time. It was also side-splittingly funny!

[World Devourer]

Kudos to Prince Namor for the information. I read early Marvel much, much later but always wondered why some issues were so much better than others (eg. the difference between the debut of the "Carbon Copy Man" and the Absorbing Man in JIM is considerable). While a shame to learn as an adult that Marvel was not the magical Camelot you believed it was when first reading as a child, this fact does not undo the happy memories.

[Mmehdy]

On 7/31/2023 at 8:27 AM, World Devourer said:

Kudos to Prince Namor for the information. I read early Marvel much, much later but always wondered why some issues were so much better than others (eg. the difference between the debut of the "Carbon Copy Man" and the Absorbing Man in JIM is considerable). While a shame to learn as an adult that Marvel was not the magical Camelot you believed it was when first reading as a child, this fact does not undo the happy memories.

It was special...just a fight over who did what and where. I think what this thread boils down to is that EVERYONE from stan, jack, steve, letterer...everyone contributed to the greatest comic book comeback and creative explosion that in the history of comic books was ever created. It would be a tough choice and a close second  from 1961-1965 would be 1938-1941 with a distant third being 1966-1969. DC was doing great things also in 1961-65...Flash,GL, Adam Strange...what a great time to begin to collect. John Broome and Edmond Hamilton SF stuff was amazing, especially 1959, 60 were trend setters and ..I was super lucky

Edited July 31, 2023 by Mmehdy

[World Devourer]

On 8/1/2023 at 3:08 AM, Mmehdy said:

It was special...just a fight over who did what and where. I think what this thread boils down to is that EVERYONE from stan, jack, steve, letterer...everyone contributed to the greatest comic book comeback and creative explosion that in the history of comic books was ever created. It would be a tough choice and a close second  from 1961-1965 would be 1938-1941 with a distant third being 1966-1969. DC was doing great things also in 1961-65...Flash,GL, Adam Strange...what a great time to begin to collect. John Broome and Edmond Hamilton SF stuff was amazing, especially 1959, 60 were trend setters and ..I was super lucky

I'd give an honourable mention to the creators from the 70s, who gave us the likes of Doctor Strange, Howard the Duck, the reimagined Captain Marvel and Warlock.

Edited July 31, 2023 by World Devourer

[Larryw7]

On 7/28/2023 at 11:33 PM, Steven Valdez said:

Or Don McGregor's or Steve Gerber's.

I love all that stuff! And Englehart's Dr. Strange. Trippy!

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 7/27/2023 at 6:33 PM, Steven Valdez said:

I wonder what Goodman thought of the comics part of his operation? Just a bunch of trash that turned a profit?

There's no way I can justify the time to read  all the very voluminous posts here about Martin Goodman, but even in the context of this thread's unrelenting crusade to push a Stan-was-the-devil narrative, I would never have expected this ongoing attempt to divine what was going on in Goodman's mind, even though, as usual, the attempt starts with a Stan-bashing conclusion (that Goodman didn't have faith in him).  And, as usual, there's contradictions galore.  Like when posters declare "Facts are facts" and then make many declarations that rely entirely on reading Goodman's mind sixty years after the fact.  Even while deriding Goodman's creative perception as minimal.  Repeatedly Goodman's described as someone who was not a good judge of talent or material, even as the posts try so very hard to establish the narrative that Goodman didn't have faith in Lee's work or judgment.   Facts only matter if they Slam Satanic Stan.  Contradictions are fine if they say Kirby's Divine.      

Edited August 5, 2023 by BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES

[Mmehdy]

On 8/5/2023 at 11:44 AM, BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES said:

There's no way I can justify the time to read  all the very voluminous posts here about Martin Goodman, but even in the context of this thread's unrelenting crusade to push a Stan-was-the-devil narrative, I would never have expected this ongoing attempt to divine what was going on in Goodman's mind, even though, as usual, the attempt starts with a Stan-bashing conclusion (that Goodman didn't have faith in him).  And, as usual, there's contradictions galore.  Like when posters declare "Facts are facts" and then make many declarations that rely entirely on reading Goodman's mind sixty years after the fact.  Even while deriding Goodman's creative perception as minimal.  Repeatedly Goodman's described as someone who was not a good judge of talent or material, even as the posts try so very hard to establish the narrative that Goodman didn't have faith in Lee's work or judgment.   Facts only matter if they Slam Satanic Stan.  Contradictions are fine if they say Kirby's Divine.      

I disagree. As an original SA collector I came to this thead with an open mind. I would recommend you read the Greg's Pure Images issues on the birth of Spiderman and Marvel comics..two issues. He was in the know years before anyone had any idea to the true creative input and who did what and where. Despite those being way ahead of their time and my conversations with Stan and Jack several times, including Stan's comment on the SS graphic novel, that Kirby does not have it anymore(he rejected a number of pages on that historic graphic novel) this thead is worth reading line by line. It  takes careful disection issue by issue, month by month and year by year the evidence is overwhelming. We know Stan took the credit and writer money and I am not saying he did not play a significant  part in the whole deal....but what is unacceptable is Stan constant changing of the Story.

I suggest you give this thead a read and then make judgement

[Prince Namor]

These aren't ideas put together through nothing. It's research and what people say that add clues to the story that are then expounded upon. And I'm always happy to reinforce it through that research:

 

Artist Drew Friedman: "My dad actually worked at Magazine Management, which was the company that owned Marvel Comics in the fifties and sixties, so he knew Stan Lee pretty well. He knew him before the superhero revival in the early sixties, when Stan Lee had one office, one secretary and that was it. The story was that Martin Goodman who ran the company was trying to phase him out because the comics weren't selling too well."

 

I asked Drew about this when I did an e-mail interview with him earlier this year. This is my exact question and what he wrote in response:

 

6. Speaking of Bullpen’s, your dad shared an adjoining office with Stan between 1954-66. He would’ve seen it go from the old Bullpen days to mostly just Stan in a lone desk to right about the time it started to pick up again. What were his memories of Stan?

I can’t really speak for my dad who died two years ago, but he always told me he liked Stan very much, Stan’s office was right next to my dads so they saw each other all day, and he did feel bad for him during those lean years for Atlas comics because he felt the company’s owner Martin Goodman was trying his best to humiliate Stan by constantly downsizing his office and his assistants, attempting to phase out the comics line altogether without actually going as far as firing him, probably because he was the cousin of Goodman’s wife. My dad said he really admired how Stan held on, held his ground, even when he was down to the lone desk in a cubicle, one secretary, and hardly anyone else around him. Of course Stan would later have the last laugh when Marvel exploded in the sixties.

I don’t think my dad and Stan socialized out of the office but they might have gone out for drinks a few times after office hours.

 

(Drew LIKED Stan Lee, and made sure in this interview that I was aware of that. As he put it, as a young boy when he'd go in to see his dad, Stan was always nice to him and handed out comics to him and his brother like candy.)

 

And then, artist Dick Ayers who, like Drew Friedman's father Bruce Jay Friedman, was actually THERE:

"Things started to get really bad in 1958. One day when I went in Stan looked at me and said, 'Gee whiz, my uncle goes by and he doesn't even say hello to me.' He meant Martin Goodman. And he proceeds to tell me, 'You know, it's like a sinking ship and we're the rats, and we've got to get off.' "

 

Considering there were very few people there at the time, and of those who were, we have very little information from on, the two who were there and actually speak about it, presented it pretty much the same... it paints a certain picture. 

Goodman during this time didn't seem to have much faith in Stan.

 

What else can we go by? Well there's ZERO proof that DC ever put a restriction on Marvel as to what they could publish, and as it's been proven wrong and the lie has been changed again and again to try and make it seem like it wasn't a lie, we can instead presume that either it was...

1. GOODMAN who chose to limit Stan on the amount of titles that he could publish, or

2. That due to a lack of staff (again Goodman choosing not to hire anyone) that they just COULDN'T produce more titles.

 

Stan had never been a creative force or a big writer for Timely/Atlas/Marvel through the pre-Silver Age era. That's a FACT.

He sort of oversaw the editors, who oversaw each genre, who oversaw the creative people underneath them. When all of those editors and writers moved on or weren't brought back, it left Stan to see it on his own after the implosion, and Goodman just didn't think Stan had the means to do more than he did.

It was KIRBY who pumped up the new titles Tales to Astonish and Tales of Suspense, writing and drawing his own material for them. 

[Prince Namor]

People are so used to hearing Stan's 'aw shucks' version of things and his boot lickers that write those horrible biographies that they get blinded by anything but that. Read quotes from others and you see a different story...

Another of Todd Klein's outstanding Lettering History  posts.

Sourced from Sean Howe's book Todd's post does repeat Stan Lee's claims concerning Martin Goodman's decision to eliminate most of Timely's employee staff of writers, artists and letterers in favor of buying most material on a freelance basis.

Stan Lee claimed Goodman made the move because in being generous with  Goodman's money Lee had paid for a great deal of artwork which was stored in a closet and unlikely to be published.  Lee's claim isn't accurate.  The staff wasn't paid by the page they were paid a salary so any "extra" pages they turned out would have been of no concern to Goodman.  Just the opposite in fact as it's known Goodman at one point issued an order that staff had to meet a quota. That strategy worked to the advantage of fast artists like Mike Sekowsky who began producing fewer pages because the quota was less than what he was capable of producing.

According to Al Jaffee the real reason Goodman eliminated most of the staff of pencilers, inkers, letterers was because Goodman no longer wanted to pay for Blue Cross Blue Shield health insurance which was being paid to veterans of WWII as mandated by the G.I. Bill following the war.

Another aspect of Stan Lee's version of events is Lee's claim Lee had to fire the staff while Goodman left on vacation to Miami.  Lee claims this cause him great anguish.  In fact based on comments by Rudy Lapick  the staff reduction was done in stages and Lee seemed to take an almost fiendish delight in teasing Lapick and others by telling them as a joke "You're fired."

Of course they were eventually fired but teasing people by telling them they were fired when the person saw others being let go all around them strikes me as more sadistic than anguished. According to Lapick, Lee felt this all was a big joke.

 

WOW....

 

Or:

"Despite his young age, or perhaps as an over compensation for it, Stan Lee ran the Timely shop, with an iron hand. At 9:00 sharp a whistle was blown, and everyone was expected to jump into their respective tasks. One morning when Frank Giacoia was puffing a cigar and lingering over the morning paper Stan spotted him moments after the whistle. Giacoia was summarily sent home, and his pay docked for the day as an example. Stan might be perched cross-legged on a file cabinet, and employees were expected to bow to him as they entered, partly out of genuine arrogance." - Adel Kurtzman, Harvey Kurtzman's wife who worked at Timely at the time. 

Or:

In 1948, Harvey Kurtzman asks Editor Stan Lee if he can have some of the originals of his one page ‘Hey Look!’ feature. Despite knowing these will be shredded and discarded, Lee draws a giant X with a grease pencil over them and tells Kurtzman “…to prevent them from being re-used by other companies."

(From Bill Schelly's Kurtzman bio, Harvey Kurtzman: The Man Who Created Mad and Revolutionized Humor in America, p 115. And Paul Wardle in "The Two Faces of Stan Lee," TCJ 181.)

Or:

John Buscema: "I worked in the Timely bullpen in 1948. The thing that annoyed me was Stan Lee would walk into the room with a whip and beat the hell out of us. I just couldn't take that. He'd walk around with a beanie on his head with a propeller. I kid you not. Stan could be a real id-iot at times."

 

Again... my perspective is based upon what I hear others say about the era. NOT about how Stan presents it. We KNOW his motivations and reasons behind why he does that. I want to uncover the reality. 

 

Edited August 6, 2023 by Prince Namor

[Steven Valdez]

On 8/6/2023 at 4:44 AM, BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES said:

There's no way I can justify the time to read  all the very voluminous posts here

I can see how it would be a lot easier to just accept Stan's narrative on how great he was without going to the trouble of actually looking into it.

Edited August 6, 2023 by Steven Valdez

[Steven Valdez]

On 8/6/2023 at 10:05 AM, Prince Namor said:

John Buscema: "I worked in the Timely bullpen in 1948. The thing that annoyed me was Stan Lee would walk into the room with a whip and beat the hell out of us. I just couldn't take that. He'd walk around with a beanie on his head with a propeller. I kid you not. Stan could be a real id-iot at times."

Seriously, WTF??

Kirby said when he was at Timely with Joe Simon, Stan Lee used to annoy the hell out them by running around playing a flute in the office all day.

Stan was a classic nepo-baby.

[Zonker]

On 8/5/2023 at 8:05 PM, Prince Namor said:

 

  The staff wasn't paid by the page they were paid a salary so any "extra" pages they turned out would have been of no concern to Goodman. 

 

 

 

This is surprising to me.  Up until now, I had thought that the concept of a page-rate (perhaps different for every creator) was fundamental to comic book production back in the day, whether the creator was on staff or freelance.  

Doesn't this undercut one of the arguments often made here, that Stan was padding his income and taking money away from the artists by getting paid for not only editing, but also for writing each issue, despite not producing full scripts?  If Stan is strictly on salary, then Goodman is paying him for doing whatever it is that Goodman and Stan Lee agree needs doing, and it doesn't really matter monetarily to Stan what the individual credits say, does it?

[Steven Valdez]

On 8/6/2023 at 11:37 PM, Zonker said:

This is surprising to me.  Up until now, I had thought that the concept of a page-rate (perhaps different for every creator) was fundamental to comic book production back in the day, whether the creator was on staff or freelance.  

Doesn't this undercut one of the arguments often made here, that Stan was padding his income and taking money away from the artists by getting paid for not only editing, but also for writing each issue, despite not producing full scripts?  If Stan is strictly on salary, then Goodman is paying him for doing whatever it is that Goodman and Stan Lee agree needs doing, and it doesn't really matter monetarily to Stan what the individual credits say, does it?

I'm under the impression that Timely had artists and writers on staff who were paid by the hour, not by the page, while still having quotas to fill. This changed in the late '50s, as I understand it. It's only freelancers who get paid a page rate.

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 8/5/2023 at 9:09 PM, Steven Valdez said:

I can see how it would be a lot easier to just accept Stan's narrative on how great he was without going to the trouble of actually looking into it.

I read very quickly and I have scanned the posts out of curiosity but they get very extremely repetitive and as I noted, they accept any quote or factoid which can be used to say that Stan is the Devil even when the quote or factoid contradicts other quotes and factoids. 

There's a vast difference between

1) blindly accepting an easy narrative (which you allege) and

2) being willing to spend the time required to counter somebody who's clearly willing to devote a very large portion of their life to repeating the same arguments endlessly in the hopes of overwhelming any information that goes against their narrative.   

If somebody wants to use up that much of their life on some Ahab-like quest, so be it.  

And if you want to characterize my desire not to waste as much as my life as he's wasting of his as if it's tantamount to accepting an easy narrative, that's unfortunate.  But I know that even if I were to do what you imply I should do that I would end up spending some equal amount of time refuting Ahab's endless efforts, locked in an endless battle of the keyboards, while life passed me by. 

I have some interest in the way people latch onto hate-filled narratives, seeing how it permeates the internet.  And I look for patterns.  One that I've observed is what you just did, which is to imply that anyone who wants to be taken seriously must be willing to engage in the argument endlessly.  I was curious to see when that notion would be raised.

 

 

 

 

Edited August 6, 2023 by BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES

[BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES]

On 8/5/2023 at 2:38 PM, Mmehdy said:

I disagree. As an original SA collector I came to this thead with an open mind. I would recommend you read the Greg's Pure Images issues on the birth of Spiderman and Marvel comics..two issues. He was in the know years before anyone had any idea to the true creative input and who did what and where. Despite those being way ahead of their time and my conversations with Stan and Jack several times, including Stan's comment on the SS graphic novel, that Kirby does not have it anymore(he rejected a number of pages on that historic graphic novel) this thead is worth reading line by line. It  takes careful disection issue by issue, month by month and year by year the evidence is overwhelming. We know Stan took the credit and writer money and I am not saying he did not play a significant  part in the whole deal....but what is unacceptable is Stan constant changing of the Story.

I suggest you give this thead a read and then make judgement

I'm not really sure what it is you "disagree" with, because the post was not about whether you have an "open mind" but about whether other people don't.  I believe you and I could have a conversation regarding Stan and writing credits and we'd both come away feeling the other was reasonable.  But there are people here whose agenda is so bare and so filled with vitriol that they can't abide the slightest indication that Stan Lee did any writing at all or that he even "read books".  There's some reasonable discussion here but  the main drivers behind this thread have about the same objectivity as Ahab talking about the White Whale

Edited August 6, 2023 by BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES

[Mmehdy]

On 8/6/2023 at 11:57 AM, BLUECHIPCOLLECTIBLES said:

I'm not really sure what it is you "disagree" with, because the post was not about whether you have an "open mind" but about whether other people don't.  I believe you and I could have a conversation regarding Stan and writing credits and we'd both come away feeling the other was reasonable.  But there are people here whose agenda is so bare and so filled with vitriol that they can't abide the slightest indication that Stan Lee did any writing at all or that he even "read books".  There's some reasonable discussion here but  the main drivers behind this thread have about the same objectivity as Ahab talking about the White Whale

My response to you is if you had read this thead for its highlights , on one of times I was with Stan, a page from FF12 was presented from his signature and his reaction and comments his writing contribution and writing on  the side etc . I am not saying nor do I believe anyone on this thead is saying Stan did not write some or edit-writing which would be a more correct term. I was there and saw what he claimed to be his work...Nuff said. In my study of this subject, I would say Stan as editor and co-contributor writer was much greater early on say 62/63. This is not going to change my overall opinion in reading from other sources, but did open my eyes to the increased contribution of Jack and Steve. It was great stuff when I bought it from the drugstore and it is great stuff today......One indication I would check was when Jack took over with Cap on tales of suspense...especially from issue 63 on...it  is Kirby all the way. Issue 59 was dated Nov 1964...which probably means early summer 64 this took place. I await SM disection of #59 up especially 63 and up....just look at that writing style on that run.....FYI at SDCC I just bought the Cap omnibus with 59-113 and am in the middle of reading it....a great book

Edited August 6, 2023 by Mmehdy