All-American Publications
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All-American Publications, Inc..
Publishing history
Harry had agreed on one condition: that [Gaines] take [Detective Comics partner] Jack Liebowitz on as his partner. ... Jack would be tempted to leave and form a competing company if there was nothing to hold him. And it may well have been a way for Harry to keep Gaines under control; since Jack was still drawing a salary and significant bonuses from Detective Comics and [self-distributorship] Independent News, he wouldn't let Gaines take off on his own or act against the interests of the other companies. ... Gaines became the principal and Jack Liebowitz the minority owner of All-American [Publications].[1]: 164
While All-American, at 225 Lafayette Street in Manhattan, was physically separated from DC's office space uptown at 480 Lexington Avenue, it used the informal "DC" logo on most of its covers for distribution and marketing reasons. In 1944,[1]: 223 [2] Gaines sold his share of the company to Liebowitz, keeping only Picture Stories from the Bible as the foundation of his own new company, EC. As Jones describes,
Gaines saw the end of the superhero fad coming and wanted to get into something more durable, like children's books and magazines. ... In 1944, he decided he'd had enough. He let Jack Liebowitz buy him out with a loan from Harry.... Liebowitz promptly orchestra the merger of All American Comics and Detective Comics into National Comics, of which he was the junior partner, vice president, and publisher. Next he took charge of organizing National Comics, Independent News, and their affiliated firms into a single corporate entity, National Periodical Publications".[1]: 223
Before the merger, Gaines first rebranded All-American with its own logo, beginning with books cover-dated February 1945:
Creative legacy
During All-American's existence, much cross-promotion took place between the two editorially independent companies, so much so that the first appearance of the
with characters from different companies interacting — although National's Sandman, Spectre and Hour-Man had previously appeared in solo adventures in All Star Comics #1 (Summer 1940).With Gaines as editor, assisted by
Also debuting that month was Movie Comics ("A full movie show for 10 cents"), featuring simple adaptations of movies using painted movie stills, as well as cartoonist Ed Wheelan's popular Minute Movies comics. The first of its six issues through Aug. 1939 adapted no fewer than five films: Son of Frankenstein, Gunga Din, The Great Man Votes, Fisherman's Wharf, and Scouts to the Rescue.
The next two comics were Mutt & Jeff,[note 2] which ran 103 issues from Summer 1939 - June 1958; and the company's superhero debut, Flash Comics #1 (Jan. 1940), which introduced the super-speedster title character, created by writer Gardner Fox and artist Harry Lampert, as well as the Golden Age Hawkman and future Hawkgirl, by Fox and artist Dennis Neville, and Johnny Thunder, by scripter John Wentworth and artist Stan Aschmeier, among other features.
The Golden Age Green Lantern, from Batman writer
Titles
- All-American Comics (began April 1939)
- All-Flash (began Summer 1941)
- All Star Comics (began Summer 1940; co-publication with Detective Comics, Inc.)
- Comic Cavalcade (began Winter 1942-1943)
- Flash Comics (began January 1940)
- Funny Stuff (began Summer 1944)
- Green Lantern (began Fall 1941)
- Leading Comics (began Winter 1941; co-publication with Detective Comics, Inc.)
- Mutt and Jeff (began September 1939)
- Picture Stories From The Bible - New Testament (1944-1945)
- Picture Stories From The Bible - Old Testament (1942 - Fall 1943)
- Sensation Comics (began January 1942)
- The Big All-American Comic Book (1944, one-shot)
- Wonder Woman (began Summer 1942)
All-American characters
Superhero / masked crimefighter
- The Atom
- Black Canary
- Doctor Mid-Nite
- The Flash
- The Gay Ghost
- Green Lantern
- Hawkman and Hawkgirl
- Hop Harrigan
- The King
- Little Boy Blue and the Blue Boys
- Mr. Terrific
- Sargon the Sorcerer
- Johnny Thunder
- Gary Concord, the Ultra-Man
- The Whip
- Wildcat
- Wonder Woman
Adventurer/war
- The Black Pirate
- Cliff Cornwall
- Gunner Godbee
- Red, White and Blue (Red Dugan, Whitey Smith, Blooey Blue)
Funny-animal / other humor
- Bulldog Drumhead
- The Red Tornado
- Scribbly the Boy Cartoonist
Notes
- ^ The name is spelled with a hyphen per its logo (pictured) and sources including All-American Publications at Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on April 15, 2012.
- ^ a b c The comic book, unlike the comic strip, spelled its title with an ampersand. See: Mutt & Jeff at the Grand Comics Database.
- ^ National's top stars, Batman and Superman, had first crossed over as "honorary" Justice Society members in All Star Comics #7 (Dec. 1941), making cameo appearances in the three-page introduction and four-page conclusion of the story "$1,000,000 for War Orphans". See: All-Star Comics #7 at the Grand Comics Database.
References
- ^ ISBN 9780465036561.
- ISBN 0821220764.
It was perhaps inevitable that the two firms would merge, and it happened in 1944 when Liebowitz bought out Gaines' share.
- ^ Cronin, Brian (2005-06-30). "Comic Book Urban Legends Revealed #5!". Comics Should Be Good. Wayback Machine. Archived from the original on August 18, 2006. Retrieved 2017-02-11.
External links
- DC Comics, and The Justice Society of America at Don Markstein's Toonopedia
- DC Comics Timeline, SupermanArtists.comics.org