Thanks to a Tumblr post, I was reminded of a Marvel Bullpen moment I’d completely forgotten. The following response apparently appeared in answer to a reader’s letter about Wolverine’s height, and was published in X-Men #103 (cover dated February 1977).

Did we really say those things? I’m no longer sure.

If we didn’t say those things, then who put those words in our mouths? I’m no longer sure of that either.

It was probably Chris Claremont, as he was writing X-Men at the time, and the writer of a book always got first shot at putting together that title’s letters column unless there was a compelling reason against it. But all this time later, I don’t feel comfortable guaranteeing it was him and not one of the Assistant Editors.

I guess I could always track down Chris and see whether his memory is any better than mine …

Roger Stern—longtime comics editor and writer, known for his scripting on Spider-Man, Doctor Strange, and The Avengers, as well as for helping create the “Death of Superman” storyline.

Ralph Macchio—comics writer turned editor who was in charge of Daredevil for more than a decade and who most recently oversaw the transformation of Stephen King’s Dark Tower novels into a comics.

But once … once they were fans.

I was remembering that thanks to the issues of FOOM, Marvel’s fan magazine, that I dug up last week.

Here’s the editorial I wrote for FOOM #9, the March 1975 issue, in which I mentioned them both. None of us had any idea of what was to come.

As you can see, back in those days, Sterno worked for WXLW Radio in Indianapolis and published the fanzine C.P.L., while Ralph was a letterhack who won a contest judged by Don McGregor. Their comics futures still lay ahead.

Hey, we all have to start somewhere, right?