With Simon and Kirby in charge of his comics division, Goodman continued his focus on the pulp side of the operation, which consisted of more than two-dozen titles, such as Gayety, Amazing Detective Cases, and Uncanny Stories. Yet, at the same time, his intrusion into comics immediately struck gold with the Human Torch and Sub-Mariner. Then, Simon and Kirby’s Captain America #1 appeared on newsstands on December 20, 1940 (the cover date for comic books always ran three months ahead, so the official date is March 1941). The comic book, according to one writer, “sold a near-Superman number of one million copies.”12 Suddenly, Timely transformed into a hot comic book publisher. Together, Simon and Kirby shot to fame after creating Captain America, one of the first really successful superheroes not being published by DC Comics, which put out the industry’s two hottest commodities, Superman and Batman.
Simon hired Lieber and found a place for him. A little older and more experienced, the twenty-three-year-old Kirby and twenty-seven-year-old Simon were on hand when the modern comic book industry began. Simon had worked in newspapers in Syracuse and knew the rough-and-tumble publishing industry inside and out. Though he did not consider himself a great businessman, Simon saw the power content creators possessed and negotiated deals for Kirby and himself that no one else received at the time—even the Superman wonder team of Siegel and Shuster.
The two men grew accustomed to keeping the Timely operation afloat, despite being understaffed and somewhat underappreciated by Goodman and his executive team. A frenetic energy built, though, as Human Torch, Sub-Mariner, and Captain America grew into major superheroes and wild popularity among readers.
Lieber, the young, handsome teenager, with a shock of dark hair and constant smile, joined his new bosses in the cramped offices. In contrast, they were gruff men, almost constantly puffing away on cigars and filling the space with smoke.
At first, Simon kept the new employee busy with menial tasks. “I’d fill the ink wells. I’d run down and get them sandwiches at the drug store, and I’d proofread the pages,” Lee recalled. “Sometimes in proofreading I’d say, ‘You know, this sentence doesn’t sound right. It ought to be written like this.’ ‘Well, go ahead and change it!’ They didn’t care!”13
Lieber also agitated Kirby by playing a small flute in the office, always yearning for ways to make himself the center of attention. Kirby would throw things at his young protégé and Simon would laugh as his partner’s agitation grew. Kirby, the quintessential artist, had a manic—almost obsessive—need to draw, and draw fast.
Simon and Goodman rode the wave of Captain America’s popularity, devising more titles that were related to expand the superhero lineup. They created teenage sidekicks for the main stars, Bucky for Captain America, who got to kick Hitler in the stomach in the second issue, and Toro for the Human Torch, a fire-eating circus performer who could also burst into flames and fight bad guys. DC’s Batman had Robin, a young sidekick that comic book creators believed would help the superhero appeal to younger readers. Batman’s success launched a wave of teen partners. But new titles generated additional work. Kirby and Simon had to bring in some free-lancers to keep up, then they threw some odd copy-filler stories to Lieber as a kind of test run to see if the kid had any talent.
The throwaway story that Simon and Kirby had the teenager write for Captain America Comics #3 (May 1941), was titled “Captain America Foils the Traitor’s Revenge.” The story also launched Lieber’s new identity as “Stan Lee,” the pseudonym he adopted in hopes of saving his real name for the future novel he might write. Given the publication schedule, the latest the teen could have written the story is February 1941, but he probably wrote it earlier. The date is important, because it speaks to Lieber’s career development. If he joined the company in late 1939, just after Kirby and Simon and when they were hard at work in developing Captain America, then there probably wasn’t much writing for him to do. However, if the more likely time frame of late 1940 is accepted, then Lieber was put to work as a writer fairly quickly, probably because of the chaos Simon and Kirby faced in prepping issues of Captain America and their other early creations, as well as editing and overseeing the Human Torch and Sub-Mariner efforts.
Lee later acknowledged that the two-page story was just a fill-in so that the comic book could “qualify for the post office’s cheap magazine rate.” He also admitted, “Nobody ever took the time to read them, but I didn’t care. I had become a published author. I was a pro!”14 Simon appreciated the teen’s enthusiasm and his diligence in attacking the assignment.
An action shot of Captain America knocking a man silly accompanied Lieber’s first publication for Simon and Kirby. The story—essentially two pages of solid text—arrived sandwiched between a Captain America tale about a demonic killer on the loose in Hollywood and another featuring a giant Nazi strongman and another murderer who kills people when dressed up in a butterfly costume. “It gave me a feeling of grandeur,” Lee recalled.15 While many readers may have overlooked the text at the time, its cadence and style is a rough version of the mix of bravado, high-spirited language, and witty wordplay that marked the young man’s writing later in his career.
Lou Haines, the villain, is sufficiently evil, although we never do find out what he did to earn the “traitor” moniker. In typical Lee fashion, the villain snarls at Colonel Stevens, the base commander: “But let me warn you now, you ain’t seen the last of me! I’ll get even somehow. Mark my words, you’ll pay for this!” In hand-to-hand combat with the evildoer, Captain America lands a crippling blow, just as the reader thinks the hero may be doomed. “No human being could have stood that blow,” the teen wrote. “Haines instantly relaxed his grip and sank to the floor—unconscious!”16 The next day when the colonel asks Steve Rogers if he heard anything the night before, Rogers claims that he slept through the hullabaloo. Stevens, Rogers, and sidekick Bucky shared in a hearty laugh. The “Traitor” story certainly doesn’t exude Lee’s later confidence and knowing wink at the reader, but it demonstrates his blossoming understanding of audience, style, and pace.
By Captain America #5 (August 1941), Lee scored his first “true” comics story, the five-page filler in traditional comic book form, not simply a text piece, titled “Headline Hunter, Foreign Correspondent.” Jerry Hunter is a newspaper reporter searching for a scoop in war-torn London. The journalist isn’t really a superhero, but displays super strength and cunning, all in a snazzy blue suit and red tie, looking a little like Captain America.
In the end, Hunter foils the Nazi plan to steal Navy cargo route maps between the United States and Great Britain and even blows up a German munitions plant in the effort. “Oh, gosh, it wasn’t anything! And besides, boy! Look at the swell scoop I got,” Hunter tells the American ambassador at the end of the story. The teen language and golly-gee tone reveal Lee’s budding comic book voice. Hunter could be an early incarnation of Peter Parker in the way he carries himself and speaks. The story is decent, given that it is just a filler within the wildly popular Captain America comic, but it is leagues better than “Tuk: Cave Boy,” an odd rip-off of Tarzan with an exaggerated caveman, that appears in the same issue. At the time, the comics consisted of sixty-plus pages, so the Captain America pieces would take up two-thirds of the space, while filler stories increased the page count, which enabled the reduced postal rate.
Lee could not rest on the laurels of his first superhero publication. His move from office boy to burgeoning writer and editor occurred quickly, basically due to the tremendous growth in popularity of comic books and Timely’s need to keep up with demand on limited resources. Timely had a small crew, which essentially necessitated that Lee, even though still a teenager, start producing content and new characters.
The combination of Lee’s momentum as a writer, the demand for content, and the frantic pace of the publication schedule led the young man to create his first hero. The same month that his first superhero story appeared in Captain America Comics #5, he also introduced the character of Jack
Frost in U.S.A. Comics #1 (August 1941).
Although one of Lee’s first solo efforts, the Jack Frost story brims with Lee’s dialogue and verve. When “the king of the cold” finds a dying man in his “eternal deathly quiet” kingdom, he vows to bring the murderer to justice, exclaiming: “Dead! I have heard that crime flourishes throughout the world, but it has now reached my land. . . . I will avenge this deed and prevent more like it!” Jack Frost is even a kind of antihero, misunderstood by the New York City police chief he offers to help and made fun of by the chief of detectives. Eventually, Jack Frost rescues the damsel in distress and wipes out a gang of “puny evil-doers.” When the police try to arrest him, the story ends with Frost turning against the police, saying, “After this sort of reception I’ve changed my mind—if I can’t work with you, I’ll work against you—the next time we meet beware!” The idea that a superhero could be both good and bad, or at least conflicted, had already occurred to Lee.
Given his experience writing for the Captain America line, it is no surprise that Lee used a similar origin point for a highly successful character he also cocreated (with artist Jack Binder) called Destroyer. Appearing on the cover of Mystic Comics #6 (October 1941), the superhero is reporter Kevin Marlow, accused of being a spy in Hitler’s Nazi Germany and thrown into a concentration camp (before that term was associated with the Holocaust). The tie to Captain America occurs when Marlow is given a super serum that gives him otherworldly strength, turning him into Destroyer, complete with a skull for an emblem. Like Cap, the superhero battles the Nazis, wreaking havoc on Hitler’s inhuman forces.
The Destroyer never became a household name, like Captain America, but sales increased as the character fought in war-torn Europe against Nazi forces that were diabolical, gruesome, and drawn as inhuman and animalistic. To mask his identity, Destroyer donned a costume that featured blood-red striped pants and long crimson gloves. The costume made Destroyer appear just as inhuman as the villains he battled.
In some respects, the early comic book era could be defined by the battle for talent. When Simon and Kirby emerged as the hottest creative duo in comics, they found themselves courted by other publishers. The offers were too tempting, particularly for the perpetually money-nervous Kirby. The two had rented a hotel room near the Timely headquarters to use as a studio and spent lunch hours and time after work on freelance projects. At the time the whole comic book business seemed reliant on these kinds of backdoor deals and content creators playing one publisher (or many) off another to get the best rates. Most simply worked for page rates, but Simon negotiated much better deals for himself and Kirby.
According to Simon, Lee often followed the two older men around when they ventured out of the office. One time, he chased after them as the artist and editor snuck off to their hotel studio. Not able to shake their young protégé, they allowed him in. At that point, Lee finally realized that they were working on comic book characters for DC. Simon says he then “swore him to secrecy,” despite “my theory that in comics, everybody knew everything. . . . There were no secrets there.”17
Given Simon’s ominous thought and the jealousy in the comic book industry based on who made what amount per page and for which publisher, it could not have been a surprise when they were inevitably found out and fired. In his memoir, Simon remembers working on Captain America #10 when several of the Goodman clan who worked for Martin—Abe, Dave, and Robbie—crammed into the Timely office to confront Simon and Kirby.
“You guys are working for DC,” Abe accused the duo. “You haven’t been true to us. You haven’t been loyal to us. You should be ashamed of yourselves,” Simon recalled.18
Then, Abe delivered the final blow: Once they finished that issue of Captain America, they were fired. One quasi-member of the Goodman clan was not there, Simon explained. “Stan was nowhere to be seen.”19
Although Simon thought the firing was “very humiliating,” it enraged Kirby. The artist pinned the firing on Lee, since the timing just seemed too coincidental and the Goodman clan’s ties too strong. “Jack always thought Stan had told his uncle that we were working for DC,” Simon remembers. “He never gave up on that idea, and hated him for the rest of his life—to the day he died.” Simon was not willing to go that far and later, in his memoir, questioned Kirby’s implication.20
The suggestion that Kirby never got over the firing and hated his counterpart for the rest of his life, however, adds a new twist to the relationship between the creative duo that would later revolutionize comic books. First, they had to get past (or bury) this episode to work together. Then, they needed to find a way to work side-by-side during Marvel’s heyday, relentlessly churning out issue after issue, month after month. The animosity that later spilled out as they tangled over who deserved credit for creating the famous Marvel superheroes must have brought Kirby’s “hatred” back to the surface with newfound ferocity.
Lee’s recollection of the incident is strikingly different. He recalled Goodman personally showing Simon and Kirby the door after discovering that they were moonlighting for the enemy. Lee said, “Unexpectedly, Joe and Jack left Timely Comics! Supposedly it was because they were working on the side for National Periodicals.” He then added, “Truth is, I never knew exactly why they left. I only knew this: it was suddenly my job to be in charge of the comics.”21 Earlier, Lee called their ouster “a surprisingly unexpected development” when “Joe and Jack left Timely in 1941.” He also chalked it up to the “luck” that “seems to deal most of the cards in the game of life.”22
Simon and Kirby’s abrupt dismissal is yet another enigmatic episode in Lee’s career. Although it would have been completely underhanded for the young assistant to rat out his mentors to his uncle or any of the Goodman crew, the memories of financial struggle just a few years earlier may have fueled a possible betrayal. Or it could be, as Simon suggests, an open secret that Martin Goodman had to challenge. The publishing executive did not abide disloyalty, but the Kirby/Simon team was making him money with the high-flying and bestselling Captain America series. Perhaps Goodman determined that Lee or some other creative team could take over the franchise, thus minimizing the loss.
Speculation enables any number of views to emerge, but the evidence demonstrates the high level of duplicity on all sides. First, Goodman and his accountants were ripping the artistic team off, reporting lower sales figures to reduce the share of profits they were supposed to receive. On the other hand, Simon and Kirby secretly did work for DC and other publishers on Timely’s dime. They secretly negotiated a $500-a-week combined salary with DC to join the industry’s leading firm, but still drew Timely paychecks as they attempted to figure out the transition and continue to make money from both entities.
Even a teenager with Lee’s advanced imagination could have never dreamed that he would take over the comic book division at such a young age. Beyond being a teen, what hindered him most was his utter lack of experience managing anything at all. Luckily, the comic division, with Lee as a virtual one-man show, was small, and Goodman did not seem to worry or attempt to micromanage his young relative. Artists Al Avison and Syd Shores continued to draw the red, white, and blue hero, and Lee took over the writing duties.23
The success of Captain America, though, did exert some extra pressure on Lee to continue producing. But, he had no time to contemplate what it all meant—the publication calendar slowed for no one. The Captain America duo were working on #10, dated January 1942, when they were forced out, so they left Timely sometime in the late fall.
Thrust into a leadership role that he hadn’t planned, Lee did the smart thing—he mimicked Kirby and Simon—working himself to the bone on a variety of projects, a nearly relentless pace. He recalled, “I was responsible for all the stories, either writing them myself or buying them from other people.” The range of work expanded too. “Always when I was there—being the editor meant being the art director too, because you can’t just edit the stories without making sure the artwork is done
the right way so it enhances the stories . . . and the stories have to enhance the artwork. They have to go hand in hand.”24 Suddenly, when his older, more experienced mentors left for DC, the teen became head writer, editor-in-chief, and art director. All the pieces had to come together and his job focused on managing the overall process.
The teen editor had to produce. Rather than give off the vibe that he served as an exaggerated one-man show, he created thinly veiled pseudonyms, thus authoring comic book pieces as “Stan Martin,” “Neel Nats,” or other plays on his real name. According to Stan Goldberg, who managed Timely’s coloring department, Lee served as “the only editor.” He had an assistant named Al Sulman, whom Goldberg remembers not doing much work, and two female administrative aides.25 On the art side, Lee worked with freelancers to pick up the slack from Kirby’s departure. Luckily, he had talented artists and writers around, including Alex Schomburg and Burgos and Everett, each a constant presence on their popular comics.
Under intense pressure to write, the teen produced more than anyone else—and faster—perhaps the writing version of Kirby. The quality of the work is debatable.
“Lee’s early comic book work was hardly groundbreaking,” explains comic book writer and historian Arie Kaplan. “His 1940s-era superhero comics were written just as well as anyone else’s, but there was little room for innovation or complex characterization under the watchful eye of Martin Goodman.”26 However, artist Dave Gantz exclaimed: “I thought he was the Orson Welles of the comic book business.”27
Goodman may have wanted the kid to just keep the seat warm until he could find someone else to run the comic book division, but Lee caught steam and demonstrated that he could handle the task. Plus, as luck would have it, Lee was really the only one left capable of running the division. “I assume he wanted to find someone who wasn’t just out of his teens,” Lee recalled. “But apparently he had a short interest span and eventually stopped looking.” The teen editor thought up a new moniker for himself: “Mr. Timely Comics.”28 Lee began honing his craft as primary writer, editing the work of freelancers, and overseeing the art. He grew up, and into the job.
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