A Little Mystery and Uncertainty Surround Young Stan’s Job at Timely Comics

Many episodes in Stanley Lieber’s early life are shrouded in uncertainty. How the teenager bounded from Clinton High School to Joe Simon and Jack Kirby’s assistant at Timely Comics involves both a bit of mystery and a touch of mythmaking.

Courtesy of Stan Lee Papers, Collection Number 8302, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming.

There are several versions of his Timely Comics origin story. One account begins with his mother Celia. Clearly she put her hopes in her oldest son, particularly since her faith in her husband nearly led the family to ruin. Here we have Celia telling Stanley about a job opening at a publishing company where her brother Robbie worked. Without delay, the young high school grad shows up at the McGraw-Hill building on West 42nd Street, but knows little about the company or comic books.

With Robbie’s prodding, Simon explains the business and how comic books are made. He then offers the teen a job. Basically, he and Kirby are so frantic and overworked, particularly with their new hit Captain America, that they just need someone (anyone, really) to provide an extra set of hands.

Robbie Solomon is also at the center of a different account (here the main player), essentially a conduit between Simon and Timely owner Martin Goodman. In addition to being Celia Lieber’s brother, Robbie married the publisher’s sister Sylvia. Goodman surrounded himself with family members, despite the imperious tone he took with everyone who worked for him. Receiving Robbie’s stamp of approval (and the familial tie) made the boy’s hire fait accompli. Simon, then, despite what he may or may not have thought of the boy, basically had to take Leiber on. “His entire publishing empire was a family business,” explained historians Blake Bell and Michael J. Vassallo.[i] Solomon had a strange job – a kind of in-house spy who ratted out employees not working hard enough or playing fast and loose with company rules.

While the family connection tale is credible and plays into the general narrative of Goodman’s extensive nepotism, Lee offered a different perspective, making it more of a coincidence. “I was fresh out of high school,” he recalled, “I wanted to get into the publishing business, if I could.” Rather than being led by Robbie, Lee explained: “There was an ad in the paper that said, ‘Assistant Wanted in a Publishing House.’”[ii] This alternative version calls into question Lee’s early move into publishing – and throwing up for grabs the date as either 1940, which is usually listed as the year of his hiring, or 1939, as he later implied.[iii]

Lieber may have not known much about comic books, but he recognized publishing as a viable option for someone with his skills. He knew that he could write, but had no way of really gauging his creative talents. Although Goodman was a cousin by marriage, he did not have much interaction with his younger relative, so it wasn’t as if Goodman purposely brought Lieber into the firm. No one will ever really know how much of a wink and nod Solomon gave Simon or if Goodman even knew about the hiring, though the kid remembered the publisher being surprised the first time he saw him in the building.

The teen, though bright, talented, and hard working, needed a break. His early tenure at Timely Comics served as a kind of extended apprenticeship or on-the-job training at comic book university. Lieber was earnest in learning from Simon and Kirby as they scrambled to create content. Since they were known for working fast, the teen witnessed firsthand how two of the industry’s greatest talents functioned. The lessons he learned set the foundation for his own career as a writer and editor, as well as a manager of talented individuals.

NOTES
[i] Blake Bell and Michael J. Vassallo, The Secret History of Marvel Comics: Jack Kirby and the Moonlighting Artists at Martin Goodman’s Empire (Seattle: Fantagraphics, 2013), 98.

[ii] Stan Lee interview, “Interview with Stan Lee (Part 1 of 5),” IGN, June 26, 2000, http://www.ign.com/articles/2000/06/26/interview-with-stan-lee-part-1-of-5 (accessed June 1, 2016).

[iii] Lieber’s hiring date never been conclusive. In an unpublished draft of the history of Marvel, Lee wrote “early 1940,” but other publications and places he says or infers 1939. Lee, “History of Marvel (Chapters 1, 2, 3),” Unpublished, 1. Marvel Comics -- History (Draft of “History of Marvel Comics”) 1990 Box 5 Folder 7, Stan Lee Papers.

Stan Lee writes Captain America story, first publication for Marvel

Joe Simon needed copy and he needed it fast!

The Timely Comics editorial director and his coworker and friend Jack Kirby were hard at work on the hit they had recently launched – the red, white, and blue hero Captain America. Readers loved the character and Simon and Kirby scrambled to meet the demand.

The Captain America duo brought in some freelancers to keep up. Then they threw some odd copy-filler stories to their young apprentice/office boy Stanley Lieber as a kind of test run to see if the kid had any talent. He had been asking to write and the short story would be his on-the-job audition.

The throwaway story that Simon and Kirby had the teenager write for Captain America Comics #3 (May 1941) was titled: “Captain America Foils the Traitor’s Revenge.” The story also launched Lieber’s new identity as “Stan Lee,” the pseudonym he adopted in hopes of saving his real name for the future novel he might write.

Given the publication schedule, the latest the teen could have written the story is around February 1941, but he probably wrote it earlier. The date is important, because it speaks to Lieber’s career development. If he joined the company in late 1939, just after Kirby and Simon and when they were hard at work in developing Captain America, then there probably wasn’t much writing for him to do. However, if the more likely time frame of late 1940 is accepted, then Lieber was put to work as a writer fairly quickly, probably because of the chaos Simon and Kirby faced in prepping issues of Captain America and their other early creations, as well as editing and overseeing the Human Torch and Sub-Mariner efforts.

Lee later acknowledged in his autobiography that the two-page story was just a fill-in so that the comic book could “qualify for the post office’s cheap magazine rate.” He also admitted, “Nobody ever took the time to read them, but I didn’t care. I had become a published author. I was a pro!” Simon appreciated the teen’s enthusiasm and his diligence in attacking the assignment.

An action shot of Captain America knocking a man silly accompanied Lieber’s first publication for Simon and Kirby. The story – essentially two pages of solid text – arrived sandwiched between a Captain America tale about a demonic killer on the loose in Hollywood and another featuring a giant Nazi strongman and another murderer who kills people when dressed up in a butterfly costume. “It gave me a feeling of grandeur,” Lee recalled at the 1975 San Diego Comic-Con.

While many readers may have overlooked the text at the time, its cadence and style is a rough version of the mix of bravado, high-spirited language, and witty wordplay that marked the young man’s writing later in his career.

Lou Haines, the story’s villain, is sufficiently evil, although we never do find out what he did to earn the “traitor” moniker. In typical Lee fashion, the villain snarls at Colonel Stevens, the base commander: “But let me warn you now, you ain’t seen the last of me! I’ll get even somehow. Mark my words, you’ll pay for this!”

In hand-to-hand combat with the evildoer, Captain America lands a crippling blow, just as the reader thinks the hero may be doomed. “No human being could have stood that blow,” the teen wrote. “Haines instantly relaxed his grip and sank to the floor – unconscious!” (Captain America Comics #3, p. 37) The next day when the colonel asked Steve Rogers if he heard anything the night before, Rogers claims that he slept through the hullabaloo. Stevens, Rogers, and sidekick Bucky shared in a hearty laugh.

The “Traitor” story certainly doesn’t exude Lee’s later confidence and knowing wink at the reader, but it clearly demonstrates his blossoming understanding of audience, style, and pace.

Both “Stan Lee” and a career were launched!

Cover of Captain America #3, Stan Lee's first writing credit for Marvel in 1941