My old pal Sam Maronie, who took so many wonderful convention photos during the mid-’70s, many of which included me, just surprised me with yet another taken at the 1975 Mighty Marvel Comic Convention.

You’ve already seen the one of me and Moon Knight co-creator Don Perlin snapped during that same weekend. I don’t know whether this one was taken before or after that one over the March 22-24 1975 weekend, but it’s definitely a different day, because I’m wearing a different shirt and yet another hat loathed by my wife.

That’s bearded me in the back, looking down.

All of those around me — the ones I recognize, anyway — are long gone. That’s Len Wein to the far left, and Duffy Vohland looking back and up at him. On the far right are Michelle Brand and Marty Greim.

That long-haired guy with his thumb to his lips might be Doug Moench — but it might also just be yet another long-haired guy. There were a lot of us back then. I reached out to old friends who might remember young Doug better, and will update this post once I hear back.

I don’t recognize any of the others in the room. If you do, let me know.

Thanks, Sam, for letting me do some more time traveling!

I’m working on an essay for Marvel Comics which will appear in a volume about the Fear Lords, one which will reprint my stories of the Scarecrow, who is these days more commonly known as the Straw Man. And as I thought back on my few years at Marvel so long ago, I suddenly remembered that before there was the Scarecrow, there was almost … the Grim Reaper.

Had that pulp-era vigilante ever made it to the pages of the Marvel B&W magazine for which it was intended, I might never have gone on to create the Scarecrow. No evidence exists today of the Grim Reaper save this one image from 1974, pencilled by P. Craig Russell and inked by Duffy Vohland.

I don’t even own the original, merely a photostat, and one so large I was unable to properly scan it, but instead only photograph it. I’m guessing no original exists. Still, I wanted to share with you another fragment of the secret history behind my first comic book creation.

Of such are alternate universes made.

Way back in 2008, I shared with you some Scarecrow artwork which had never been seen in U.S., since it had been created specifically for Marvel’s mid-70s’ British reprint books. But it turns out there was another piece I didn’t know about. Or rather, according to the artist, I’d known about it but had forgotten.

Andrew John Standish uploaded this post to Facebook yesterday, created by penciller Howard Bender and inker Duffy Vohland.

This originally appeared in Super Spider-Man and the Titans #216 (cover-dated March 30, 1977). As to why I have no memory of this, I imagine it’s because there was no actual Scarecrow story published in that issue, only the poster, so I never received a contributor copy.

Howard was surprised I didn’t remember it, though, because he tells me that he and Duffy showed it to me before it was published.

To which I say—hey, that was 37 years ago!

Thanks for digging this up, Andrew!

I’ve already told you how the only reason I got my job at Marvel Comics in the ’70s was because of a serendipitous encounter with the late Duffy Vohland. But in a way, I almost lost that job because of Duffy, too. Or at least … I thought I was going to.

Before Duffy pulled me into comics as a professional, he pulled me into his corner of comics fandom. Oh, I’d already been going to cons, buying fanzines, and getting involved in lots of other fanac, but he hooked me up with a bunch of guys who published and/or wrote and/or drew for a fanzine titled CPL—that is, Contemporary Pictorial Literature. If you know anything about comics, you’ve heard of some of those guys, because Bob Layton, Roger Stern, John Byrne, and Roger Slifer all went on to professional comics careers of their own.

Duffy wrote a column known as “Duffy’s Tavern” for that (and other) fanzines, and asked me to fill in for an issue, which I did, writing an essay that appeared in the CPL #8, which featured this spiffy cover penciled by John and inked by Duffy.

My essay, titled “Comic Art: Fact or Fiction?” was written when I was still a fan, and took a very jaundiced view of the creative state of the field. I wrote, among other things, that “There are very few comic books which even come close to what a comic should be.” I sent the piece off, and forgot all about it, until it was published … by which time I was working on staff at Marvel. And upon rereading it, I thought—What have I done? Once Roy Thomas reads this, he’s going to can me for sure!

I trembled for several weeks waiting for the axe to fall, or at the very least for the two us to have an extremely uncomfortable conversation due to my having written an essay which basically maligned most of Marvel’s output. As far as I recall, though, nothing was ever said, either because Roy never read it or had read it but just thought it was too silly to even comment on.

Rereading it now, it occurs to me that though It doesn’t quite express my feelings today, it does basically explain why I don’t like those recently announced Watchmen prequels and why I have no plans to read them. So some feelings never change.

But enough about me. Whatever you think of my essay, I’m sure you’ll find it far more entertaining to look at some of the great art from that issue, including a naked Ben Grimm.

That’s right. A named Ben Grimm.

By none other than the legendary Joe Sinnott! (more…)

Today’s my birthday, as hundreds of you reminded me with your wishes on Twitter and Facebook. And as people tend to do on birthdays (and New Year’s Eve, too), I’ve been thinking a bit about how the heck I got here.

And one of the reasons I did get here, got my wife, got my life, is a guy named Duffy Vohland, who’s sort of a forgotten figure in comics. So it’s appropriate that I share today a birthday card I received from him that featured a caricature he had Paty Cockrum (then still Patry Greer, I believe) draw for the occasion.

Here’s the image that was on the front of the card, and as anyone who knew him will tell you … yeah, that was Duffy.

I say that was Duffy because he died in 1982, one of the earliest vicims of AIDS. I wish he was still around so I could thank him today for what I’ve got, but he’s gone, so I’ll tell you instead. (more…)

Last week, while digging out a Marie Severin illustration with which to wish Chris Claremont a happy 58th birthday, I came across another drawing which brought back the old days, and a photo, too, all three from the pages of the June 1975 issue of Marvel Comics’ own fan magazine, FOOM.

I was the editor of FOOM back then, and issue #10 was an X-Men special, in honor of the relaunch which had occurred just a few months earlier in the pages of Giant-Sized X-Men #1. I filled that issue of FOOM with many articles and drawings about the mutant supergroup, including this Paty Cockrum illustration of Marvel Bullpenners as members of the original X-Men.

The piece, which appeared on one of the issue’s two editorial pages, shows Duffy Vohland as The Angel, me as the Beast (and yes, that’s an accurate depiction of my coiffure back then), Stan Lee as Professor X, Marv Wolfman as Iceman, Len Wein as Cyclops, and Paty as Marvel Girl.

You’re probably familiar with all of us in the artwork above save for Duffy Vohland, who isn’t much remembered by many outside of the industry these days, but without whom I’d never have gotten a job at Marvel in the first place. Though I’d been a convention-attending fan for years before I was hired by Marvel Comics, Duffy was the one who urged me to apply for an open position editing the company’s British line, when I’d previously avoided trying to make a living at something I loved, not wanting to mix business and pleasure. (I’ll leave further details of that ambivalence for some other time.) (more…)