Digital Comic Museum
General Category => Comic Related Discussion => Topic started by: Mr. Izaj on June 21, 2015, 05:26:44 PM
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Looking at the upload of Colossus Comics #1, it was quite an impressive read. I'm glad you were able to upload this rare book. It's a good thing sites like this give people like me a chance to read some very rare comic books that otherwise I wouldn't have been given the chance to read.
One should remember the fact that comic books were - and still are - normally cover dated two months in advance of their publishing dates. Thus Colossus Comics #1 cover dated March, 1940 actually hit the stands in January of that year. I should know because I always used to lremind the people who read the reviews I wrote for www.goldcomics.com - which I did under another name there - of that particular fact.
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Hi Mr I,
Very nice to hear you are enjoying the DCM collection. Finding and sharing books like these is a special pleasure for me. There is almost no chance an average comics fan would ever get to read such a rare and expensive book if it weren't for generous people like Rangerhouse in this case, scanning and sharing his precious books with everyone on DCM.
The cover dates are later than actual distribution sure. All the books mentioned in the description share the same March date. Did the all come out in January? That's a good question.
Enjoy the books!
-Yoc
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Yes, we are very fortunate to have some very generous members that have access to those rare books we have up here. I know when we first started I thought we would never see some of these books here. So thanks goes out to all those that have helped with scans, books, etc.
Geo
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Very likely, especially in the case of Prize Comics #1 and Adventure Comics #48. And that is due to the fact that Independent News was not only DC's newsstand distributor, it was Prize Publications distributor as well. And DC occasionally ran house ads for Prize Comics and Headline Comics - both published by Prize Publications - in their books.
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Sure, I had a laugh when I first saw a Prize ad in a DC book or I think it was a Novelty ad in a Timely book.
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Very likely the former, since I found an ad for Prize Comics in a reprint of Superman #12 in Superman Archives Vol. 3.
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Does anyone know the physical dimensions of this seminal tome?
10.25" high x 7.5"???
B.
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Note sure B.
You might ask Brian over on Facebook.
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Hi All,
I found Colossus Comics so charming and imaginative that I was inspired to do some digging to see if I could find more by, and about, Bernie Wiest, the artist who snuck his signature into a panel on the last page of that boldly drawn Colossus a.d. 2640 lead story. Those modulating panel sizes throughout the 13-page layout were quite unusual for the time, but still effective. (Wiest also signs an illustration that accompanies the two-page text story.)
I also thought that Wiest might have drawn two, perhaps three, of the issue's other stories: the Lum Sims "Ghost of Buzzard Mounting," where the artist ('Nard) has signed a panel of the last page;
the Ruggey story, the Hitler satire that closes the issue, which is signed "Lincoln Maher" in the first panel;
and the Tulpa of Tsang, which shows some similarities in the cartoony faces and hands, but is otherwise crudely or hastily done, though I found the Tulpa him(it?)self interesting and the story's mix of whimsy and the grotesque very entertaining and better than the issue's straightly drawn adventure stories.
duckduckgo helped me find a touching obituary for a grandmother, Sim Wiest, who was preceded in death by a husband Bernard (called Bernie), an artist in many media:
http://jmahorney.blogspot.com/2009/01/sim-wiest-1917-2009.html
I wrote this grandson, Jeff Mahorney, and he confirmed that Colossus Comics #1 did seem to contain stories drawn by his grandfather Bernie. Jeff put me in direct contact with his mother, Penny Wiest Augustine (), who kindly sent me the following biography and photos of her father:
"Bernie was my dad. He was born in 1919 (I think) and lived in Chicago. He graduated from the Chicago Art Institute then went into the Army and was stationed in Ft Custer in Michigan for the war...illustrating all kinds of posters (I'll attach a pix of him). I do remember him talking about illustrating a comic book and drawing a comic strip before the war.
After the war, he and my mom (she was in the WACS at Ft Custer) settled in New Orleans. He worked for two different ad agencies, then made schlock drive-in movies with a producer friend, then had a commercial animation studio in our home (and acted in little theater and he and my mom had their own Punch and Judy show) then was an animator for Boeing, then "retired" to painting (primarily miniatures). Unfortunately he died in 1999...just as he was getting very excited about computer animation.
I think that all of the things you found are his. Although the Wiest signature with the lines for E and S were not ones I've seen before, I know the signature on his work changed over the years. Anything with "Nard" is definitely his because he used that during the war. The last comic with the name Lincoln is the only one I'm not 100% sure about (neither Lincoln or Maher is a family name). However the hands on the guy with the green cap...especially in the second to last panel...are definitely Dad's style.
Thank you for finding his early artwork and sharing it with Jeff and me.
If you have any other questions or find anything else, please let us know."
I have since asked Penny to look at other stories and credits in Colossus and have also sent her the links to that earlier Sun Publications comic, Sun Fun Komiks, which apparently includes work by "Lincoln Maher," though scans of Maher's pages are unavailable.
I've further requested more details about Bernie's other works, comics and otherwise.
imdb.com has a "Bernard Weist" credit for a New Orleans-produced 1958 Shadow movie, The Invisible Avenger, a low-budget production that might have been a pilot for a proposed-but-never-realized Shadow TV series.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051783/?ref_=nm_flmg_set_1
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051783/fullcredits?ref_=tt_ov_st_sm
I do hope that we can learn more about this talented early comic book maker and his later works, but Penny has given me permission to post this info -- and her email address -- now.
Enjoy and thanks for all the free comics!
CB
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Great work on finding all of this Chris!
I've removed Penny's email address as this is a public forum and we wouldn't want her to be getting spam.
Congrats on your successful search.
:)
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This was fascinating information. Thank you for posting it.
I'm not sure The Tulpa is Weist's work, however. I've seen references crediting that strip to Norman Nodel. The info was attributed to Nodel family members. True, the byline says "Norman Modell" but that could be a lettering error. Or Nodel (birth name Nochem Yeshaya) might not yet have settled on his pen name. He would only have been 18 or 19 at the time. I suppose Nodel might have written the story for "Lionel March" to draw, but artist/writer credits were often reversed back in the day. Perhaps March wrote and Nodel drew?
Whatever the case, your post provides a wonderful glimpse of a bygone age.
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Wonderful information. Thanks for all your efforts!
As an aside, that pic of Bernie in uniform could well have been me in 1973 & '74. I was a Draftsman (read sign-painter) while the Army still wore khaki uniforms stateside in summer.
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I was wondering if Norman Nodell was any relation to Martin Nodell Who was best known for co-creating The Green Lantern for DC?
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Did Nodel live in Chicago at the time? The work of his that I found online since crashryan's observation seems more accomplished than the Tulpa effort, but Tulpa could've been among his earliest comics works.
Tulpa lacks the easy grace of Weist's other Colossus pages but working against a deadline or consciously trying to draw in another style (since Bernie was already doing 24 (or 28, with Ruggey) of the 66 pages with art), might've been to blame for the crudeness.
I read the credit on Tulpa as "Norman Modell" and one of the credits on the Blond Garth story is "Ramond Mellon," which is an anagram of Norman Modell.
Having a complete scan of Sun Fun Komiks might clarify some of these pseudonyms.
Just noticed that, except for its first page, the Lum Sims story by Bernie/'Nard can almost be read in 4-panel increments, so maybe it was repurposed from a comic-strip proposal?
My strong suspicion is that the comic was entirely produced in Chicago, since Bernie lived there at the time.
If Nodel was living in Chicago in 1939, he can/should have the Tulpa credit!
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Hi there all! There is no relation between Norman Nodel and Mart Nodell (my grandfather). Thanks to Jim Van Dore for letting me know about this very interesting conversation!
I was wondering if Norman Nodell was any relation to Martin Nodell Who was best known for co-creating The Green Lantern for DC?
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Wow, this book has generated a lot of very interesting posts here.
Thanks gang! :)
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Norman Modell actually existed and was living in Chicago in 1940, where the census that year lists him as a radio scriptwriter.
(1913-1999) died in L.A. He was a staff writer for Billboard, Chicago division, in 1940, writing about the Chicago radio studios. Was in WW2,
In NY after the war, says he specialized in 'daytime radio scripts'. Hope this helps
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Hi Steven,
Great find about Norman Modell.
I didn't think that the earlier Nodel ID was on the right track, especially since the drawing styles didn't align very well and there was that anagrammed pseudonym on the Blond Garth story.
Hope Jim peeks in here again to further clarify the Colossus credit index at comics.org.
Norman Modell, script on Tulpa, and, as Ramond Mellon, script on Blond Garth...probably?
Radio is the great missing piece in our contemporary understanding of American popular culture. In 1940 and earlier, Chicago was second to New York as a national broadcaster and some of the best shows of the time were based there: Lum & Abner (which the Lum Sims story in Colossus swipes, and which 60s sitcoms like Beverly Hillbillies and Green Acres swiped more lucratively) and Vic & Sade.
Most comics critics ignore the influence of radio on the later horror comics (I think Max Collins gave due credit in one of the recent Dark Horse Archives of EC). Some doctoral candidate is going to write a lot of pages connecting 50s comics stories to the 30s and 40s radio shows that they swiped from.
Maybe other Colossus credits belong to other known radio people?
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When you think about it, Colossus Comics #1 was one of those books that catches the spirit of what was going on in the comic industry circa 1940. Every publisher who wanted to try publishing comic books were trying to find out what was going to work and/or get that hit character or combination of characters that would make their books best sellers. Everyone was hoping to emulate the success that DC was having with Superman and the two books he appeared in, Action Comics and Superman. But Colossus Comics sadly ended up as one of those books that didn't catch on with the reading public at large and ended up in the dustbin of history. That is until the advent of the internet and someone scanning this rare book to give us a glimpse of a book from a now forgotten publisher and a glimpse of the ground floor of the beginnings of the comic book industry.
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Looks like Steven already put in a note about the Modell confirmation. But I added him as likely behind the pseudonym on the other story.
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Well said.
I couldn't have said it better Mr I.
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Steve, thanks for setting straight my misconception about Norman Nodel and Norman Modell.
Chris, you're right about the influence of radio. Such a powerful popular medium inevitably would have affected the young men and women creating early comic books, just like the movies did. I would love to see someone with solid OTR credentials tackle the subject of the connection between comic books and radio programs.
It always seemed to me that Charles Biro's crime stories were influenced by radio storytelling. The way he set up scenes, covered scene shifts with dialogue rather than narration, and had characters name each other when they spoke seem right out of the radio-writing playbook.
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When you think about it, a lot of the writers and artists who were creating comic books during this period were much more in tune with the pop culture of the period than most of their young readers. Not only did they listen to the latest radio shows, they also read much of the latest pulp magazines and books and checked out the latest films for inspiration (movie going was at a major high during this period). The result was that the comic books of the period were much more in tune with the pop culture of the period.
The reason why people like us notice the influence of the pop culture of the period on the comic books created during the Golden Age is because a lot of us are either history buffs, old movie buffs, and/or old time radio fans. I would notice these things as well. When I was writing reviews Of various MLJ books for www.goldcomics.com - under my original screen name of Kelso - I noticed a lot of similarities between the stories and the movies and books of the period.
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There is no doubt that Old Time Radio did have a big influence on the comics and movies. Buxton and Owen's The Big Broadcast book published in 1966 and revised in 1972 is a good resource for researching the Pop Culture connections. I bought my copy in the early 1970s when stationed overseas and OTR was the only entertainment we had. The shows stirred childhood memories of listening to favorite shows and looking for comics such as Captain Midnight, The Shadow, Roy Rogers, Terry and the Pirates,Gene Autry etc. The Big Broadcast helped me appreciate the history of the shows and introduced me a lot of the history of those shows.
There are a lot of books and websites dedicated to radio and I'm sure there are many connections that can be made. It would be a great topic for DCM to follow.
Ed
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Did a quick check of my on-hand radio book, John Dunning's On the Air, the Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio, for the other credited names from Colossus. Nothing turned up, despite my high hopes of finding Reinsberg, the writer (?) on the Colossus feature.
archive.org hosts lots of great old-time radio for anyone who's interested. The OTRR sets, which can be downloaded with extras in CD-sized bites or streamed from single-episode pages, are pretty great: the scifi/horror series available FOR FREE include The Whistler (Biro, Gaines and Feldstein listened to this one for sure!), Arch Oboler, Inner Sanctum, Suspense, Escape, the later Dimension X/X-Minus One...Theater Five (from the still-later early 60s).
Mysterious Traveler, better known to comics folks because of its Ditko print incarnation, began on the radio.
Dragnet and Gunsmoke, from the 50s, are far superior to the better-known TV versions and among the best OTR.
The OTRR group has yet to tackle some classics (or have had their efforts copyright-challenged dubiously by commercial repackagers): the previously recommended Vic & Sade and Lum & Abner (also search the Pine Ridge Project for more eps), Fibber McGee & Molly and Jack Benny (more a show about nothing -- or itself -- than Seinfeld ever was) require some acceptance of loud studio audiences and weekly musical numbers but are still hilarious, Bob & Ray, and the odd works of Ernest Chappell (Quiet Please), Jack Webb as Pat Novak (Webb's first success was a very sly parody of the hardboiled genre), and Carlton E. Morse, whose great I Love A Mystery is only available in pieces (or in its Morse-scripted imitation, Adventures by Morse -- those 60s audio satirists, the Firesign Theatre, had to be Morse fans).
Internet radio station Antioch ABN Old-Time Radio at http://radio.macinmind.com/ streams an interesting sampling of many of these recommendations and seems to be available through some of the specialty streaming apps on wireless devices.
Enjoy!
Chris B.
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Thanks for the suggestions Chris!
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Let us not forget what I consider to be the best radio detective shows ever.
Yours Truly Johnny Dollar, The man with the action packed expense account, (especially the five part, fifteen minute episode years)
And
Richard Diamond, Private Detective, played by the great Dick Powell (at the top of his form) and his girlfriend Helen, played by Virginia Gregg, also a wonderful cast of characters.
This series was created and written, for the most part by BLAKE EDWARDS, later of The Pink Panther.
Go on over the www.archive.org and download these they are fantastic!!!
B.
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I agree about Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar --the Bob Bailey years of five 15-minute episodes per week are great! (And, not coincidentally, are a more mature work of the writer of the Superman radio serial, Jack Johnstone.)
YTJD was next on my list of recommendations, which was painful to keep so short!
The Adventures of Sam Spade (a name-only relation to Hammett's hero) with Gerald Mohr and the great Lurene Tuttle is as breezy as Richard Diamond, as is the earliest set of Boston Blackie, who's wise-crackin' ease should remind comics fans of Eisner's Spirit. Rocky Jordan is a Casablanca caricature that can be quite entertaining.
Nat Hiken was an auteur of early TV (Bilko and Car 54) and his Magnificent Montague is inimitable and overlooked. (Bonus: These 1950 recordings feature early work by announcer Don Pardo, better known as the announcer for Saturday Night Live.)
We've strayed a bit far from Sun Publications' Colossus....
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You could also add Gerald Mohr's work on the Philip Marlowe series as well.
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I would really love to write an introduction to this book. This is one of those comic books that gives us a glimpse of what was going on in the highly competitive world of comic book publishing during this period. And it's one of those books that act as a time capsule of pop culture circa 1940.
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I know and love most of these OTR and transferred that to my son. I have not heard the Magnificent Montague so I need to look that one up. I love the Jack Benny/Seinfeld analogy. Although I love Benny but find Seinfeld boring.
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I would really love to write an introduction to this book. This is one of those comic books that gives us a glimpse of what was going on in the highly competitive world of comic book publishing during this period. And it's one of those books that act as a time capsule of pop culture circa 1940.
Feel free to write one Mr I. It can be added to the file for anyone who downloads the file.
-Yoc
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Greeting, Colossal Comics fans! Check this out:
http://boards.collectors-society.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=5100784&fpart=2
This Colossus Comics #1 signed by all of the artists/writers as a gift to the publisher's son
[Arthur J. Gontier III ???]. Pretty much a Chicago area publication, as many of you surmised.
Berris Kregman (W: Lucky Lucifer, Flyer Of Fortune)
Gene Rowls (W/A: Mory Marine)
Bernie Wiest (A: Colossus A.D. 2640)
Jan Janelei (A: Educational Adventures Of Panda-Lin)
Lew Segron (A: Lucky Lucifer, Flyer Of Fortune)
Mark Reinsberg (W: Colossus A.D. 2640)
Jay Jackson (A: Blond Garth, King Of The Isles)
’Nard (Bernie Wiest) (A: Lum Sims)
Lincoln Maher (W/A: Ruggey)
Lionel N. March (A: The Tulpa Of Tsang)
Norman Modell (W: The Tulpa Of Tsang)
The Lincoln Maher and Lionel N. March signatures appear (to me) to be by the same hand.
Bill O'Donnell was the editor. From Ancestry.com, I think this may be him:
William O'Donnell in the 1940 Census. Age 46, born abt 1894. Birthplace: Pennsylvania. Gender:
Male. Race: White. Home in 1940: 1619 E 84th Street. Chicago, Cook, Illinois. Household
Members: Head: William O'Donnell, 46. Wife Anna O'Donnell, 50.
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Here’s some info on Guy Murchie Jr. (and others) gleaned from the Internet:
Guy Murchie Jr. (25 January 1907 – 8 July 1997) was the writer of the 2-page how-to text article
“Boomerang!” in Colossus Comics #1 (Mar 1940, Sun Publications). The son of Ethel A. and Guy
Murchie Sr., he was a Chicago Tribune photographer, staff artist and reporter, who had served as a
war correspondent in England and Iceland from 1940 to 1942. He was briefly married to Barbara
Cooney. >>He was a flight instructor and a practicing member of the Bahá'í Faith [which
originated in modern Persia]. His books included Men on the Horizon (1932), Song of the Sky
(1954), Music of the Spheres (1961) and The Seven Mysteries of Life (1978). Murchie also
illustrated his books with etchings and woodcuts of his own making. The American Museum of
Natural History awarded him the John Burroughs Medal in 1956 for Song of the Sky.
MAHER, LINCOLN E was born 15 February 1918; received Social Security number 326-xx-7395,
which corresponds to Illinois; and died 2 May 2000. (Very likely, but not 100% sure on this one.)
REINSBERG, MARK was born 06 August 1923; received Social Security number 336-xx-6350,
which corresponds to Illinois; and died August 1981.
Gene Rowls (b. 1900?) was a gag cartoonist who (so I’ve been told) drew a daily syndicated strip
named "Algy" in 1936.
WIEST, BERNARD was born 09 December 1919, received Social Security number 321-xx-4205
(indicating Illinois) and, Death Master File says, died 01 September 1999.
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Jay Jackson, who drew “Blond Garth” in Colossus Comics #1 (Mar 1940) also drew “Speed
Jackson” in Black newspapers like the Chicago Defender (WW2-era).
Jay Jackson in the 1940 Census. Age: 34, born abt 1906. Birthplace: Illinois. Gender: Male. Race:
Negro. Home in 1940: 6011 South May Street, Chicago, Cook, Illinois. Household Members:
Head: Jay Jackson, 34. Wife: Elenore Jackson, 26. Daughter: Carrie Jackson, 13.
Curious that they chose a Black artist to draw a strip about a blond white man!?!
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Wow!
Way to make an already interesting topic that much better mopee!
:)
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YOW! And double wow, mopee167!
I've sent Bernie's daughter Penny a copy of the autographed cover pic to see what she thinks.
I agree that the Lincoln Maher and Lionel March signatures appear to have the same author, but I haven't given up on them being connected to Bernie/'Nard.
Those four signatures are the only ones in black india ink, after all, but having census/birth info for Lincoln Maher is a strong challenge to my pseudonym hypothesis.
Certainly, the cover -- and what we're uncovering about these one-shot artists -- could be added to the present Colossus file, but I'm holding out for a complete scan of Sun Fun Komiks and then a complete Sun Publications comics archive! All this background info would make such a 2-comic collection extra special and perhaps more attractive to a publisher who might reprint the whole thing. Komiks' numerous pre-Mad firsts are impressive.
mopee167, did you email O'Donnell's son for more info?
Chris
p.s. the Guy Murchie name is one that rang a bell, but I neglected to search for his name online. That Music of the Spheres science book he wrote and illustrated was a childhood favorite and though the science presented there is outdated, his mixing of pictures and words still seems like avant garde comics.
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Thanks to everyone who decided to hit the research trail. 'S amazing what has tumbled out.
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Chris:
No, I didn't email Bill O'Donnell's son.
I didn't even know he had a son!!
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Hi mopee,
I misunderstood the poster at the forum where you found the autographed cover.
When archiefan wrote that the book used to be his and that the book was autographed for the publisher's son, I made a mistaken leap: that archiefan was the publisher's son.
(My two cents on that discussion of oldest signed book: since Colossus was signed in 1940, it'd trump the #6 Detective which was signed much, much later by Flessel.... Perhaps another first for the Sun Publications company?)
I also think that the Panda Lin's artist's sig is Jan Janacek, which is a Czech surname that's probably as common as Smith is among American surnames. (And Jan is the Czech version of John, so John Smith Czech-ified?) Chicago is still home to many Czech immigrants, I believe, and was a destination for many young Czechs heading to America when I lived there for a few years in the '90s.
Maybe you can research that name on ancestry too, though it can have special accented characters, which may make the search more complicated.
cb
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All this research is going to help me a great deal in writing an introduction to this book.
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I agree, this topic has made the scan so much more fun.
-Yoc
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You know, all this information should be attached somehow to the download page for this issue! It is truly historical...
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Good idea!
Will do that.
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Well here's my introduction to Colossus Comics #1
Although comic books have been around since 1934, it wasn't until 1939 - due to the phenomenal success of Superman and the title he appeared in, Action Comics - that publishers really began to see that there could be money made publishing comic books and creating superheroes for them. And between 1939-1941, many publishers began to publish comic books in the hopes of having a character becoming the next Superman or at least having a best selling title to grab a share of what was rapidly becoming a lucrative field. With hundreds of thousands of young readers plunking down their Mercury Dimes for the latest issues, there was money to be made and everyone wanted a piece of the pie.
Pulp publisher Fiction House was the first to jump on the comics bandwagon with Jumbo Comics in late 1938 and eventually followed up with Jungle Comics, Planet Comics, Fight Comics, and Wings Comics (all titles based on their popular pulps) around early 1940. The heads of Columbia Publications (Maurice Coyne, Louis Silberkleit, and John Goldwater) launched four anthology titles; Blue Ribbon Comics, Top-Notch Comics, Pep Comics, and Zip Comics under the MLJ Magazines banner; within months of each other. Martin Goodman - under the Timely Publications banner - would launch Marvel Comics(eventually retitled Marvel Mystery Comics) which introduced the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner to the comics world. and such established publishers as Fawcett, Better Publications, Street and Smith, and Curtis Publications (through their Novelty Press imprint) soon followed.
And those who were established in comics weren't idle either. Industry leader DC simply added superheroes to their existing anthology titles. Thus, the Crimson Avenger (in #20) and the Batman (in #27) were introduced in the pages of Detective Comics; the Sandman (in #40) and the Hour-Man (in #48) began in Adventure Comics; the Spectre (in #52) and Doctor Fate (in#55) started in More Fun Comics; All-American Comics, a title DC launched in 1939, introduced the Green Lantern (in #16) and the Atom (in #19) the next year; and DC would launch Flash Comics with the Flash and Hawkman in the very first issue as well. Superman and Batman would get their own books and such titles as All-Star Comics, World's Finest Comics, Star-Spangled Comics, and Sensation Comics would come later. Comic Magazines, Inc. a/k/a Quality would launch the Doll Man in issue #27 of Feature Comics, and launched Smash Comics, Crack Comics, National Comics, and Hit Comics within months of each other. And Centaur Publications and Dell Publications would follow suit by adding superheroes to their existing titles.
What does this have to do with Colossus Comics #1? I'll get to that! I'm establishing a timeline here.
One of those publishers that hoped to jump on the comic magazine bandwagon was Sun Publications of Chicago, Illinois. Sun Publications was a pulp publisher established in 1912 by Arthur J. Gontier, Sr. (1864-1942) who earlier publications included the pulp 10-Story Book which helped launch the career of author Louis L'Amour. But it was the magazine's interiors - which featured pin-up girls and some nudes - that got Gontier's company in Dutch with the law. On May 7, 1938, the offices of Sun Publishing was raided by members of the Chicago Police Department and Arthur Gontier and his son Robert were arrested for possession and distribution of obscene literature. To keep out of trouble with the law, Gontier, Sr. decided to launch a magazine of historical fiction entitled Golden Fleece in late 1938. And in 1939 Sun Publications tried to get in on the ground floor of the emerging comic magazine boom by launching a humor title called Sun Fun Komiks which went over like a lead balloon and died after one issue. Undaunted, the Gontiers tried again to launch a comic book. The result is the title you are about to read.
Chicago, Illinois was one of the last places one would expect to find a comic book publisher (many comic publishers were New York based), but it was a hotbed for creativity during that time. As home to one of America's leading newspaper syndicates (The Chicago Tribune/New York News Syndicate, the distributor of more than quite a few significant newspaper strips) and - after New York - a national force in radio broacasting, you could expect to see a lot of creative talent that could help create a comic book. Taking advantage of that talent pool, the Gontiers set out to create a comic magazine that they hoped would be lucrative.
From this talent pool came writer Guy Murchie, Jr. - who wrote the article "How to Boomerang"- a reporter, photographer, and staff artist for the Chicago Tribune who went on to write such books as Song of the Sky, and Music of the Spheres (which he also illustrated) among others. Norman Modell - the writer of "Tulpa of Tsang" - was a noted radio writer in Chicago .And Berris Kregman, Mark Reisberg, and Lincoln Maher had some writing credits in the field.
Artwise, the Gontiers were able to get some experienced talent. Artist Jay Jackson - who drew the "Blond Garth" feature - was noted for drawing the Speed Jackson feature in the pages of such black owned newspapers as the Chicago Defender. Gene Rowls ("Mory Marine") earlier worked on a short lived strip called Algy in 1936. Artist Bernie Wiest - who drew "Colossus AD 2640" and "Lum Sims" - went on to a career as an army illustrator and an animator. And the other artists had some credentials working in cartooning for various Chicago publications during the period.
Strip-wise, Colossus Comics comes off as a typical anthology comic circa 1940. It featured a typical array of strips that covered the gamut of comic characters of the period. Berris Kregman and Lewis Segron's "Lucky Lucifer, Flyer of Fortune" was very much a typical aviation feature. Norman Modell and Lionel March "Tulpa of Tsang" was an interesting magic based hero. Jay Jackson's "Blonde Garth" was a white god of the jungle in the Tarzan mold made more significant by the fact that is was drawn by a black artist. Bernie Wiest's "Lum Sims" was a takeoff on Al Capp's Lil' Abner. "Mory Marine", "The Educational Adventures of Panda Lin", and "Ruggey" rounded out the book.
(SPOILER ALERT!) The most interesting feature was Bernie Wiest's "Colossus AD 2640", a character who had the potential to become an anti-hero in the mold of the Sub-Mariner. After he gets injected with a serum that causes him to grow to extreme gigantic height, Richard Zenith becomes a power mad giant who wants to take over Earth. Although he fights off an alien invasion, he is still viewed as a menace to Earth. (END SPOILER!).
Although the stories and artwork seem crude by today's standards, one has to remember these a group of people who were just glad to get work and found themselves unintentionally on the ground floor of the birth of an art form.
There were plans to introduce a new character called Icharion in the next issue, but there wouldn't be a next issue as Colossus Comics died after that one issue cover dated March, 1940. And Sun Publications practically died with it. A victim of the high mortality rate of early comic books and the cut-throat competition for the Mercury Dimes of the average young comic book reader. And Colossus Comics #1 entered the dustbin of history.
That is until the advent of the internet and people willing to scan such rare comics to help preserve them for later historians to be able to read this rare book. As a result, we readers can now read this rare book and judge it for ourselves . But it's best to read it with the mindset of someone who just bought a copy of this book in early 1940.
So here -rescued from the dustbin of history - is Colossus Comics #1.
Mr. Kelly "Kelso" Izaj of Pittsburgh, Pa.
7/18/2015
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If nobody objects to something in it I will add this as a txt file within the cbz file later this week.
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Hi Chris:
Per your suggestion I searched for Jan Janecek without any luck.
There were several listings for John Janecek, but too many to narrow it down.
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Found this on Ancestry.com:
John Janecek in the 1940 Census. Age: 62, born abt 1878. Birthplace: Illinois. Gender: Male.
Race: White. Home in 1940: River Forest Twp, Cook County, Illinois. Household Members.
Head: Floyd Strickland, 49. Wife: Mildred Strickland, 45. Daughter: Ruth Strickland, 10. Son:
Judson Strickland, 5. Brother: John Janecek, 62.
Can't say if this is the Jan Janáček we are looking for, but it occurs to me that Judson Strickland
may still be among the living and may be able to shed some light on this. Or maybe not.
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Makes me wonder what everyone here thought of my introduction?
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Hi Izaj,
Your intro is a lively read that covered a lot of ground. I just corrected a couple typos on Wiest's name for you.
Darwination has some more info on Sun Pubs he said he would add here once he had a chance to find his copy of another girlie pulp Sun published called 'LuLu'.
Thanks for all your work on this and thank-you to everyone who has dug into the history of this book. I could only hope for such a positive reaction to such an obscure comic. There's another surprise coming down the road that I'm equally, if not more, exited about eventually debuting on DCM. That's all I'm going to say for now.
-Yoc
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Hi all,
I thought Mr. I's intro was a pretty concise consolidation of this forum's findings about Colossus and its creators, though I thought his timeline was a little DC/Marvel heavy and Centaur/Fox light.
If not for Bernie Wiest's bold storytelling on the Colossus story, I might not have been curious about him. The way he uses the panels to dramatize the giant's expansion and size is really great: a natural, intuitive exploitation of this medium's capabilities.
That Colossus seems to be his only comic book credit is a shame.
But most of the other contributors to Colossus seem to count this comic (and Sun's Sun Fun Komiks?) as their only comic book work.
Anyway, I poked through some postings on DCM's faceb**k page (it IS a dirty word!) to confirm for myself that Colossus was a standard-sized Golden Age comic, since that tidbit hadn't been explicitly shared here, and I think I saw a preview for the upcoming scan that has Yoc so excited....
It will be cool, but I'm a little disappointed that a copy of Sun Fun Komiks hasn't shaken out of the ether yet...
Thanks for the free comics,
Chris