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Martin Goodman (publisher)
Encyclopedia
Martin Goodman born on was an American
publisher of pulp magazines, paperback books, men's adventure
magazines, and comic books, launching the company that would become Marvel Comics
.
After traveling around the country as a young man during the Great Depression
, living in hobo
camps, Goodman became a salesperson for New York City publisher Paul Sampliner's Independent News
, "alongside future comics publishers and rivals John Goldwater
and Louis Silberkleit," as well as "Frank Armer, who helped distribute Harry Donenfeld
's Detective Comics
." In 1931, Goodman, Silberkleit, and Maurice Coyne formed Columbia Publications, one of the earliest publishers of pulp magazine
s, which Goodman left in 1932, and (with borrowed money) found his own companies including Western Fiction Publishing.
Goodman's first publication was Western Supernovel Magazine, premiering May 1933. After the first issue he renamed it Complete Western Book Magazine, beginning with cover-date July 1933.
Goodman's business strategy involved using several corporate names for various publishing ventures, such as Red Circle
. Goodman's pulp magazines included All Star Adventure Fiction Complete Western Book, Mystery Tales, Real Sports, Star Detective, the science fiction
magazine Marvel Science Stories and the jungle-adventure title Ka-Zar, starring its Tarzan
-like namesake.
In 1939, with the emerging medium
of comic books proving hugely popular, and the first superhero
es setting the trend, Goodman contracted with newly formed comic-book "packager" Funnies, Inc. to supply material for a test comic book. Marvel Comics
#1, cover-dated October 1939 and featuring the first appearances of the hit characters the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner, quickly sold out 80,000 copies. Goodman produced a second printing, cover-dated November 1939, that then sold an approximate 800,000 copies. With a hit on his hands, Goodman began assembling an in-house staff, hiring Funnies, Inc. writer-artist Joe Simon
as editor
, and the first official employee of the new Timely Publications. Timely Comics
became the umbrella name for the several paper corporations that comprised Goodman's comic-book division, which would in ensuing decades evolve into Marvel Comics
.
In 1941, Timely published its third major character, the patriotic superhero Captain America
by Simon and future comics-artist legend Jack Kirby
. The success of Captain America #1 (March 1941) led to an expansion of staff, with Simon bringing freelancer Kirby on staff and subsequently hiring inker Syd Shores
"to be Timely's third employee." Simon & Kirby departed Timely after 10 issues of Captain America, and Goodman appointed Stan Lee
as Timely's editor, a position Lee would hold for decades.
With the post-war lessening of interest in superheroes, Goodman published a wider variety of genres including horror, Westerns
, teen humor, crime
and war comics.
The name "Timely Comics" went into disuse after Goodman began using the globe logo of the newsstand-distribution company he owned, Atlas, starting with the covers of comic books dated November 1951. This united a line put out by the same publisher and staff through 59 shell companies, from Animirth Comics to Zenith Publications. Throughout the 1950s, the company formerly known as Timely was called Atlas Comics
.
New American Library
bought Lion in 1957, and several Lion titles were reprinted under its Signet label. Authors that Lion published included such notables as Robert Bloch
, David Goodis
and Jim Thompson
.
' successful revival of superheroes a few years earlier, Goodman's comic-book editor and art director, Stan Lee
, and freelance artist Jack Kirby
created The Fantastic Four #1 (cover-dated Nov. 1961), the first hit of what would become Marvel Comics
. The newly naturalistic comics, in which superheroes bickered, worried about money and behaved more like everyday people than noble archetypes, changed the industry. Lee, Kirby, such artists as Steve Ditko
, Don Heck
, Dick Ayers
, John Romita Sr., Gene Colan
, and John Buscema
, and eventually writers including Roy Thomas
and Archie Goodwin
, ushered in a string of hit characters, including Spider-Man
, Iron Man
, the Hulk
, Daredevil
, and, in a 1970s revival of the unsuccessful 1960s team, the X-Men
.
In fall 1968, Goodman sold Magazine Management to the Perfect Film & Chemical Corporation
. Goodman remained as publisher until 1972. Two years later he founded a new comics company, Seaboard Periodicals
, which published under a new Atlas Comics imprint and is known to collectors as "Atlas/Seaboard Comics". It shut down the following year.
Perfect Film & Chemical renamed itself Cadence Industries in 1973, the first of many post-Goodman changes, mergers, and acquisitions that led to what became the 21st-century corporation Marvel Entertainment Group.
magazines as For Men Only, Male and Stag
, edited during the 1950s by Noah Sarlat. As well, there was such ephemera as a one-shot black-and-white "nudie cutie" comic, The Adventures of Pussycat
(Oct. 1968), that reprinted some stories of the sexy, tongue-in-cheek secret-agent strip that ran in some of his men's magazines. Marvel/Atlas writers Stan Lee
, Larry Lieber
and Ernie Hart
and artists Wally Wood
, Al Hartley
, Jim Mooney
and Bill Everett
and "good girl art
" cartoonist
Bill Ward
contributed.
By the late 1960s, these titles had begun evolving into erotic magazines, with pictorials about dancers and swimsuit models replaced by bikini
s and discreet nude shots, with gradually fewer fiction stories.
Another division, Humorama
, published digest-sized magazines of girlie cartoons by Ward, Bill Wenzel
and Archie Comics
great Dan De Carlo, as well as black-and-white photos of pin-up models
including Bettie Page
, Eve Meyer
, stripper
Lili St. Cyr
and actresses Joi Lansing
, Tina Louise
, Irish McCalla
, Julie Newmar
and others. Abe Goodman, a relative, headed this division. Titles included Breezy, Gaze, Gee-Whiz, Joker, Stare, and Snappy. They were published from at least the mid-1950s to mid-1960s.
In addition to men's adventure magazines and Humorama, Goodman also published many other magazines covering a plethora of topics including several male-oriented glossy 5" x 7" digests in the early-to-mid 1950s (e.g. Focus, Photo, and Eye) prior to the development of Humorama, as well as many romance, film and television, sports and other general interest magazines spanning several decades.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
publisher of pulp magazines, paperback books, men's adventure
Men's adventure
Men's adventure is a genre of magazines that had its heyday in the 1950s and 1960s. Catering to a male audience, these magazines featured glamour photography and lurid tales of adventure that typically featured wartime feats of daring, exotic travel or conflict with wild animals.These magazines are...
magazines, and comic books, launching the company that would become Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
.
Pulps and the Golden Age of Comics
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
, living in hobo
Hobo
A hobo is a term which is often applied to a migratory worker or homeless vagabond, often penniless. The term originated in the Western—probably Northwestern—United States during the last decade of the 19th century. Unlike 'tramps', who work only when they are forced to, and 'bums', who do not...
camps, Goodman became a salesperson for New York City publisher Paul Sampliner's Independent News
Independent News
Independent News Co. was a magazine and comic book distribution business owned by National Periodical Publications, the parent company of DC Comics. Independent News distributed all DC publications, as well as those of a few rival publishers, in addition to pulp and popular magazines. The company...
, "alongside future comics publishers and rivals John Goldwater
John L. Goldwater
John L. Goldwater founded MLJ Comics , and served as editor and co-publisher for many years. In the mid-1950s he was a key proponent and custodian of the comic book censorship guidelines known as the Comics Code Authority.-Early life and career:John L...
and Louis Silberkleit," as well as "Frank Armer, who helped distribute Harry Donenfeld
Harry Donenfeld
Harry Donenfeld was an American publisher who is known primarily for being the owner of National Allied Publications, which distributed Detective Comics and Action Comics, the originator publications for the superhero characters Batman and Superman...
's Detective Comics
Detective Comics
Detective Comics is an American comic book series published monthly by DC Comics since 1937, best known for introducing the iconic superhero Batman in Detective Comics #27 . It is, along with Action Comics, the book that launched with the debut of Superman, one of the medium's signature series, and...
." In 1931, Goodman, Silberkleit, and Maurice Coyne formed Columbia Publications, one of the earliest publishers of pulp magazine
Pulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
s, which Goodman left in 1932, and (with borrowed money) found his own companies including Western Fiction Publishing.
Goodman's first publication was Western Supernovel Magazine, premiering May 1933. After the first issue he renamed it Complete Western Book Magazine, beginning with cover-date July 1933.
Goodman's business strategy involved using several corporate names for various publishing ventures, such as Red Circle
Red Circle (publishing)
Red Circle is the name used to refer to American publisher Martin Goodman's group of book and pulp magazine publishing corporations. Some of this group of corporations continued into Goodman's comic-book publishing arm, Timely Comics, which would evolve by the 1960s into Marvel Comics.Official...
. Goodman's pulp magazines included All Star Adventure Fiction Complete Western Book, Mystery Tales, Real Sports, Star Detective, the science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
magazine Marvel Science Stories and the jungle-adventure title Ka-Zar, starring its Tarzan
Tarzan
Tarzan is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungles by the Mangani "great apes"; he later experiences civilization only to largely reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adventurer...
-like namesake.
In 1939, with the emerging medium
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...
of comic books proving hugely popular, and the first superhero
Superhero
A superhero is a type of stock character, possessing "extraordinary or superhuman powers", dedicated to protecting the public. Since the debut of the prototypical superhero Superman in 1938, stories of superheroes — ranging from brief episodic adventures to continuing years-long sagas —...
es setting the trend, Goodman contracted with newly formed comic-book "packager" Funnies, Inc. to supply material for a test comic book. Marvel Comics
Marvel Mystery Comics
Marvel Mystery Comics is an American comic book series published during the 1930s-1940s period known to fans and historians as the Golden Age of Comic Books...
#1, cover-dated October 1939 and featuring the first appearances of the hit characters the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner, quickly sold out 80,000 copies. Goodman produced a second printing, cover-dated November 1939, that then sold an approximate 800,000 copies. With a hit on his hands, Goodman began assembling an in-house staff, hiring Funnies, Inc. writer-artist Joe Simon
Joe Simon
Joseph Henry "Joe" Simon is an American comic book writer, artist, editor, and publisher. Simon created or co-created many important characters in the 1930s-1940s Golden Age of Comic Books and served as the first editor of Timely Comics, the company that would evolve into Marvel Comics.With his...
as editor
Editing
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...
, and the first official employee of the new Timely Publications. Timely Comics
Timely Comics
Timely Comics, an imprint of Timely Publications, was the earliest comic book arm of American publisher Martin Goodman, and the entity that would evolve by the 1960s to become Marvel Comics....
became the umbrella name for the several paper corporations that comprised Goodman's comic-book division, which would in ensuing decades evolve into Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
.
Captain America
Captain America is a fictional character, a superhero that appears in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character first appeared in Captain America Comics #1 , from Marvel Comics' 1940s predecessor, Timely Comics, and was created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby...
by Simon and future comics-artist legend Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby , born Jacob Kurtzberg, was an American comic book artist, writer and editor regarded by historians and fans as one of the major innovators and most influential creators in the comic book medium....
. The success of Captain America #1 (March 1941) led to an expansion of staff, with Simon bringing freelancer Kirby on staff and subsequently hiring inker Syd Shores
Syd Shores
Sydney Shores was an American comic book artist known for his work on Captain America both during the 1940s, in what fans and historians call the Golden Age of comic books, and during the 1960s Silver Age of comic books....
"to be Timely's third employee." Simon & Kirby departed Timely after 10 issues of Captain America, and Goodman appointed Stan Lee
Stan Lee
Stan Lee is an American comic book writer, editor, actor, producer, publisher, television personality, and the former president and chairman of Marvel Comics....
as Timely's editor, a position Lee would hold for decades.
With the post-war lessening of interest in superheroes, Goodman published a wider variety of genres including horror, Westerns
Western (genre)
The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...
, teen humor, crime
Crime fiction
Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
and war comics.
The name "Timely Comics" went into disuse after Goodman began using the globe logo of the newsstand-distribution company he owned, Atlas, starting with the covers of comic books dated November 1951. This united a line put out by the same publisher and staff through 59 shell companies, from Animirth Comics to Zenith Publications. Throughout the 1950s, the company formerly known as Timely was called Atlas Comics
Atlas Comics (1950s)
Atlas Comics is the term used to describe the 1950s comic book publishing company that would evolve into Marvel Comics. Magazine and paperback novel publisher Martin Goodman, whose business strategy involved having a multitude of corporate entities, used Atlas as the umbrella name for his comic...
.
Magazines and paperback books
As the market for pulp magazines waned, Goodman, in addition to comic books, transitioned to conventional magazines — published through a concern dubbed Magazine Management Company at least as far back as 1953 — and in 1949 founded Lion Books, a paperback line. Goodman used the name Red Circle Books for the first seven titles plus an additional two later. Most were novels, but there was a smattering of mostly sports-oriented nonfiction. Goodman eventually developed two lines, the 25¢ Lion and the 35¢ Lion Library.New American Library
New American Library
New American Library is an American publisher based in New York, founded in 1948; it produced affordable paperback reprints of classics and scholarly works, as well as popular, pulp, and "hard-boiled" fiction. Non-fiction, original, and hardcopy issues were also produced.Victor Weybright and Kurt...
bought Lion in 1957, and several Lion titles were reprinted under its Signet label. Authors that Lion published included such notables as Robert Bloch
Robert Bloch
Robert Albert Bloch was a prolific American writer, primarily of crime, horror and science fiction. He is best known as the writer of Psycho, the basis for the film of the same name by Alfred Hitchcock...
, David Goodis
David Goodis
David Loeb Goodis was an American noir fiction writer.Born to a respectable Jewish family in Philadelphia, Goodis had two younger brothers, but one died of meningitis at the age of three...
and Jim Thompson
Jim Thompson (writer)
James Myers Thompson was an American author and screenwriter, known for his pulp crime fiction....
.
Marvel Comics
In mid-1961, following rival DC ComicsDC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
' successful revival of superheroes a few years earlier, Goodman's comic-book editor and art director, Stan Lee
Stan Lee
Stan Lee is an American comic book writer, editor, actor, producer, publisher, television personality, and the former president and chairman of Marvel Comics....
, and freelance artist Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby , born Jacob Kurtzberg, was an American comic book artist, writer and editor regarded by historians and fans as one of the major innovators and most influential creators in the comic book medium....
created The Fantastic Four #1 (cover-dated Nov. 1961), the first hit of what would become Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
. The newly naturalistic comics, in which superheroes bickered, worried about money and behaved more like everyday people than noble archetypes, changed the industry. Lee, Kirby, such artists as Steve Ditko
Steve Ditko
Stephen J. "Steve" Ditko is an American comic book artist and writer best known as the artist co-creator, with Stan Lee, of the Marvel Comics heroes Spider-Man and Doctor Strange....
, Don Heck
Don Heck
Don Heck was an American comic book artist best known for co-creating the Marvel Comics character Iron Man, and for his long run penciling the Marvel superhero-team series The Avengers during the 1960s Silver Age of comic books.-Early life and career:Born in the Jamaica neighborhood of Queens, New...
, Dick Ayers
Dick Ayers
Richard "Dick" Ayers is an American comic book artist and cartoonist best known for his work as one of Jack Kirby's inkers during the late-1950s and 1960s period known as the Silver Age of Comics, including on some of the earliest issues of Marvel Comics' The Fantastic Four, and as the signature...
, John Romita Sr., Gene Colan
Gene Colan
Eugene Jules "Gene" Colan was an American comic book artist best known for his work for Marvel Comics, where his signature titles include the superhero series, Daredevil, the cult-hit satiric series Howard the Duck, and The Tomb of Dracula, considered one of comics' classic horror series...
, and John Buscema
John Buscema
John Buscema, born Giovanni Natale Buscema , was an American comic-book artist and one of the mainstays of Marvel Comics during its 1960s and 1970s ascendancy into an industry leader and its subsequent expansion to a major pop culture conglomerate...
, and eventually writers including Roy Thomas
Roy Thomas
Roy William Thomas, Jr. is an American comic book writer and editor, and Stan Lee's first successor as editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics. He is possibly best known for introducing the pulp magazine hero Conan the Barbarian to American comics, with a series that added to the storyline of Robert E...
and Archie Goodwin
Archie Goodwin (comics)
Archie Goodwin was an American comic book writer, editor, and artist. He worked on a number of comic strips in addition to comic books, and is best known for his Warren and Marvel Comics work...
, ushered in a string of hit characters, including Spider-Man
Spider-Man
Spider-Man is a fictional Marvel Comics superhero. The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee and writer-artist Steve Ditko. He first appeared in Amazing Fantasy #15...
, Iron Man
Iron Man
Iron Man is a fictional character, a superhero in the . The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee, developed by scripter Larry Lieber, and designed by artists Don Heck and Jack Kirby, first appearing in Tales of Suspense #39 .A billionaire playboy, industrialist and ingenious engineer,...
, the Hulk
Hulk (comics)
The Hulk is a fictional character, a superhero in the . Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, the character first appeared in The Incredible Hulk #1 ....
, Daredevil
Daredevil (Marvel Comics)
Daredevil is a fictional character, a superhero in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee and artist Bill Everett, with an unspecified amount of input from Jack Kirby, and first appeared in Daredevil #1 .Living in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood...
, and, in a 1970s revival of the unsuccessful 1960s team, the X-Men
X-Men
The X-Men are a superhero team in the . They were created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby, and first appeared in The X-Men #1...
.
In fall 1968, Goodman sold Magazine Management to the Perfect Film & Chemical Corporation
Cadence Industries
Cadence Industries Corporation, formerly Perfect Film & Chemical Corporation, was an American conglomerate owned by Martin "Marty" S. Ackerman. From 1968 through 1986, Perfect/Cadence was the parent company of the publisher of Marvel Comics....
. Goodman remained as publisher until 1972. Two years later he founded a new comics company, Seaboard Periodicals
Atlas/Seaboard Comics
Atlas/Seaboard is the term comic-book historians and collectors use to refer to the 1970s line of comics published as Atlas Comics by the American company Seaboard Periodicals, to differentiate from the 1950s' Atlas Comics, a predecessor of Marvel Comics...
, which published under a new Atlas Comics imprint and is known to collectors as "Atlas/Seaboard Comics". It shut down the following year.
Perfect Film & Chemical renamed itself Cadence Industries in 1973, the first of many post-Goodman changes, mergers, and acquisitions that led to what became the 21st-century corporation Marvel Entertainment Group.
Men's magazines
Goodman's Magazine Management Company also published such men's adventureMen's adventure
Men's adventure is a genre of magazines that had its heyday in the 1950s and 1960s. Catering to a male audience, these magazines featured glamour photography and lurid tales of adventure that typically featured wartime feats of daring, exotic travel or conflict with wild animals.These magazines are...
magazines as For Men Only, Male and Stag
Stag (magazine)
Stag was the name of various American men's magazines published from the 1930s through at least the 1990s.-Publication history:The first, published by Leeds Publishing Corp., beginning with vol...
, edited during the 1950s by Noah Sarlat. As well, there was such ephemera as a one-shot black-and-white "nudie cutie" comic, The Adventures of Pussycat
The Adventures of Pussycat
The Adventures of Pussycat was a risqué, black-and-white comics feature that ran throughout various men's adventure magazines published by Martin Goodman's Magazine Management Company in the 1960s...
(Oct. 1968), that reprinted some stories of the sexy, tongue-in-cheek secret-agent strip that ran in some of his men's magazines. Marvel/Atlas writers Stan Lee
Stan Lee
Stan Lee is an American comic book writer, editor, actor, producer, publisher, television personality, and the former president and chairman of Marvel Comics....
, Larry Lieber
Larry Lieber
Lawrence D. "Larry" Lieber is an American comic book artist and writer, and the younger brother of Marvel Comics' writer, editor and publisher Stan Lee....
and Ernie Hart
Ernie Hart
-Early life and career:Ernie Hart was part of the Timely Comics "animator" bullpen, separate from the superhero group producing comics featuring the Human Torch, the Sub-Mariner and Captain America...
and artists Wally Wood
Wally Wood
Wallace Allan Wood was an American comic book writer, artist and independent publisher, best known for his work in EC Comics and Mad. He was one of Mads founding cartoonists in 1952. Although much of his early professional artwork is signed Wallace Wood, he became known as Wally Wood, a name he...
, Al Hartley
Al Hartley
Henry Allan Hartley , known professionally as Al Hartley, was an American comic book writer-artist known for his work on Archie Comics, Atlas Comics , and many Christian comics...
, Jim Mooney
Jim Mooney
James Noel "Jim" Mooney was an American comic book artist best known as a Marvel Comics inker and Spider-Man artist, and as the signature artist of DC Comics' Supergirl, both during what comics historians and fans call the Silver Age of comic books...
and Bill Everett
Bill Everett
William Blake "Bill" Everett, also known as William Blake and Everett Blake was a comic book writer-artist best known for creating Namor the Sub-Mariner and co-creating Daredevil for Marvel Comics...
and "good girl art
Good girl art
Good girl art is found in drawings or paintings which feature a strong emphasis on attractive women no matter what the subject or situation. GGA was most commonly featured in comic books, pulp magazines and crime fiction...
" cartoonist
Cartoonist
A cartoonist is a person who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is usually humorous, mainly created for entertainment, political commentary or advertising...
Bill Ward
Bill Ward (comics)
William Hess Ward , known as Bill Ward, was an American cartoonist notable as a good girl artist and creator of the risqué comics character Torchy.-Early life and career:...
contributed.
By the late 1960s, these titles had begun evolving into erotic magazines, with pictorials about dancers and swimsuit models replaced by bikini
Bikini
The bikini is typically a women's two-piece swimsuit. One part of the attire covers the breasts and the other part covers the crotch and part of or the entire buttocks, leaving an uncovered area between the two. Merriam–Webster describes the bikini as "a woman's scanty two-piece bathing suit" or "a...
s and discreet nude shots, with gradually fewer fiction stories.
Another division, Humorama
Humorama
Humorama, a division of Martin Goodman's publishing firm, was a line of digest-sized magazines featuring girlie cartoons by Bill Ward, Bill Wenzel, Dan DeCarlo, Jack Cole and many others....
, published digest-sized magazines of girlie cartoons by Ward, Bill Wenzel
Bill Wenzel
William Michael Wenzel was an American cartoonist best known as a widely published good girl artist for men's magazines.-Biography:Bill Wenzel was born in Irvington, New Jersey His parents were from Hungary...
and Archie Comics
Archie Comics
Archie Comics is an American comic book publisher headquartered in the Village of Mamaroneck, Town of Mamaroneck, New York, known for its many series featuring the fictional teenagers Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Reggie Mantle and Jughead Jones. The characters were created by...
great Dan De Carlo, as well as black-and-white photos of pin-up models
Pin-up girl
A pin-up girl, also known as a pin-up model, is a model whose mass-produced pictures see wide appeal as popular culture. Pin-ups are intended for informal display, e.g. meant to be "pinned-up" on a wall...
including Bettie Page
Bettie Page
Bettie Mae Page was an American model who became famous in the 1950s for her fetish modeling and pin-up photos. She has often been called the "Queen of Pinups"...
, Eve Meyer
Eve Meyer
Eve Meyer was an American pin-up model, motion picture actress, and later, film producer...
, stripper
Stripper
A stripper is a professional erotic dancer who performs a contemporary form of striptease at strip club establishments, public exhibitions, and private engagements. Unlike in burlesque, the performer in the modern Americanized form of stripping minimizes the interaction of customer and dancer,...
Lili St. Cyr
Lili St. Cyr
Lili St. Cyr , was a prominent American burlesque stripper.- Early years :She was born as Willis Marie Van Schaack in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1918. She had a sister, Rosemary Van Schaack Minsky...
and actresses Joi Lansing
Joi Lansing
Joi Lansing was an American model, film and television actress, as well as a nightclub singer. She was most noted for her pin-up photos, and for her minor roles in B-movies...
, Tina Louise
Tina Louise
Tina Louise is an American actress, singer, and author. She is best known for her role as the "movie star" Ginger Grant on the television situation comedy Gilligan's Island .-Early life:...
, Irish McCalla
Irish McCalla
Nellie Elizabeth "Irish" McCalla was an American actress and artist best known as the title star of the 1950s television series Sheena, Queen of the Jungle. Sheena co-starred actor Chris Drake...
, Julie Newmar
Julie Newmar
Julie Newmar is an American actress, dancer and singer. Her most famous role is Catwoman in the Batman television series.-Early life:...
and others. Abe Goodman, a relative, headed this division. Titles included Breezy, Gaze, Gee-Whiz, Joker, Stare, and Snappy. They were published from at least the mid-1950s to mid-1960s.
In addition to men's adventure magazines and Humorama, Goodman also published many other magazines covering a plethora of topics including several male-oriented glossy 5" x 7" digests in the early-to-mid 1950s (e.g. Focus, Photo, and Eye) prior to the development of Humorama, as well as many romance, film and television, sports and other general interest magazines spanning several decades.
Romance and true crime magazines
- My Confession
- My Romance
- True Secrets
Humor magazines
- Best Cartoons from the Editors of Male & Stag, Magazine Management — published at least from 1973-1975)
- Breezy
- Cartoon Capers — published at least from vol. 4, #2 (1969) - vol. 10, #3 (1975)
- Cartoon Laughs — confirmed extant: vol 12, #3 (1973)
- Comedy — published at least January, 1942, a digest sized publication
- Cupid
- Gayety — published at least September, 1941
- Gaze
- Gee-Whiz
- Joker — published at least Spring, 1941
- Stare
- Snap — published at least October, 1940
- Snappy
- Zippy — published at least May, 1941
Launched pre-1970
- Action Life Magazine — published at least volume 4, #4 (Nov. 1954), Atlas Magazine Pub.
- Complete Man Magazine — published at least between Sept. 1965 and April 1967, Atlas Magazines
- For Men Only — confirmed at least from vol. 4, #11 (Dec. 1957) through at least vol. 26, #3 (March 1976)
-
- Published by Canam Publishers at least 1957), Newsstand Publications Inc. (at least 1966-1967), Perfect Film Inc. (at least 1968), Magazine Management Co. Inc. (at least 1970)
- Male — published at least vol. 1, #2 (July 1950) through 1977
- Male Home Companion
- Stag — at least 314 issues published February 1942 - Feb. 1976
- Published by Official Communications Inc. (1951), Official Magazines (Feb. 1952 - March 1958), Atlas (July 1958 - Oct. 1968), Magazine Management (Dec. 1970 to end)
- Stag Annual — at least 18 issues published 1964-1975
- Published by Atlas (1964–1968), Magazine Management (1970 – 1975)
- Published by Canam Publishers at least 1957), Newsstand Publications Inc. (at least 1966-1967), Perfect Film Inc. (at least 1968), Magazine Management Co. Inc. (at least 1970)
True crime magazines
- Action Life Magazine — published at least volume 4, #4 (Nov. 1954), Atlas Magazine Pub.
- Complete Detective Cases — published at least between March 1941 and Fall 1954, Postal Pub. Inc.
- Leading Detective Cases — published at least May 1947, Zenith Pub. Corp.
- National Detective Cases — published at least March 1941.
Other magazines
- Celebrity — extant in at least 1977
- It's Amazing — issue #1 dated only 1949, published by Stadium Publishing.
- Movie World
- Popular Digest — volume 1 #1, September 1939.
- Sex Health — issue #1 dated August 1937.
External links
- Nevins, JessJess NevinsJohn J. Nevins, MA/MS, is an American author and librarian, born 30 July 1966 and raised in Boston, Massachusetts. He is the author of the World Fantasy Award-nominated Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana , and other works on Victoriana and pulp fiction...
. "The Timely Comics Story". WebCitation archive. - A List of Pre-Golden Age Marvel Magazines (dead link)
- "Louis Silberkleit, Co-Founder of Archie Comics, Dies at 81", The New York TimesThe New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
February 25, 1986, with correction published February 27, 1986