Marvel Comics: The End Years of Timely Comics

The Origins of the Industry’s Leading Comic Book Publisher

Aug 23, 2008

Marvel Comics, the home of such legendary characters as Spider-Man, Captain America, and the X-Men, has a long and storied past.

Success for Timely

In 1941, Timely Comics was having a run of success from its Marvel Mystery Comics and Captain America Comics titles. Following in their good fortune, publisher Martin Goodman green lit several other titles and by the end of 1941 the fast growing Timely Comics empire included, along with the aforementioned books, The Human Torch, The Sub-Mariner, USA Comics, All Winners Squad, Young Allies Comics, and Mystic Comics.

Some books, like All Winners Squad, did well while others, think USA Comics, floundered, but all in all Timely’s stable was growing fast and strong

Around this point, Timely Comics took on a new employee, a seventeen year-old kid by the name of Stanley Lieber. Lieber was the cousin of Martin Goodman’s wife and his first job was as gopher and assistant to Joe Simon and Jack Kirby.

Lieber did anything that needed done around the Timely offices. He’d get coffee, proofread pages; even erase pencil lines on inked pages. With demand for Timely books high but staff members low, it wasn’t long before Lieber was given his first writing task, a two page text only story in Captain America Comics #3.

Lieber had plans of being a great American novelist one day, and comic books were seen as the lowest level of writing at that time; so, rather than sign his real name to the story he used the pen name “Stan Lee”.

Stan Lee continued to turn out comic book stories for Timely Comics with his characters displaying a somewhat different view than others had. He showed a somewhat open disdain for sidekick characters. Lee, then a teenager himself, thought that the characters could be heroes in their own right and not have to hook themselves to an adult hero. It was an idea that would stay with him for twenty years before surfacing fully.

Simon and Kirby Leave

By late 1941 tensions between Martin Goodman and Joe Simon were starting to build. Goodman fired Simon, claiming that since he continued to work for other publishers at the same time as Timely Comics there was a conflict of interests. Simon didn’t dispute that, but claimed the real reason for his firing lay in Goodman’s refusal to pay the royalty share on Captain America Comics that they, along with Jack Kirby, had verbally agreed upon.

Regardless of the reason behind it, Simon was gone from Timely Comics and Kirby followed shortly after. Stan Lee moved into Simon’s position as editor and the company continued along, although many would argue at a lower level of quality.

Racism, the Draft, and Funny Animals

With the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and America entering the war, Timely Comic’s characters took on a slight change. Germans weren’t the villains as often as before, instead the Japanese moved into the forefront. The public anger over Pearl Harbor, mixed with the climate of racial prejudice that was common in those days, led to the Japanese being depicted grotesquely and inhuman or monsters.

Many of the most famous comic book writers of the day ended up serving in the military during the war. Some, such as Bill Everett (creator of the Sub-Mariner) and Carl Burgos (creator of the Human Torch), were drafted while some, like the patriotic, young Stan Lee, enlisted. This drain of talent was readily apparent, and Timely Comics began to seriously change.

By mid 1942 Timely Comics had shifted its focus away from superheroes and on to funny animals, in an attempt to cash in on Disney’s success. This was in line with Martin Goodman’s habit of spotting trends and focusing on them. At the same time, a comic heroine named Miss America inadvertently caught the fancy of so many teenage girls that Goodman began a flurry of romance and teen targeted publications.

Superheroes completely vanished from the Timely Comics roster as Goodman continued to glut the market with books on whatever trend he saw as marketable. The company went on to publish many true crime comics, keeping the crime fighter but losing the superhero flavor. By the end of the decade Timely was back to Goodman’s pulp roots focusing mainly on western books. It was the end of an era.

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