13. Marvel & DC's Very First Comics Were Produced By The Same Man!
Eighty years ago, National Comics (later to become DC) published the first issue of its first comic, New Fun. New Fun Comics was cover-dated February 1935, and enjoyed the distinction of being the first comic book to feature all new material, unlike the handful of other magazines which mostly reprinted newspaper comic strips. There were no costumed superheroes in New Fun - until issue #52, when the Spectre debuted. (By then, the name of the magazine had been changed to More Fun. Aquaman and the Green Arrow both debuted in issue #72). But of more interest, the contents of New Fun Comics were put together and edited by Lloyd Jacquet, who worked for National's first publisher, Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson. After editing four issues of New Fun, Jacquet left National to start his own company, Funnies, Inc., which employed several soon-to-be famous comics writers and illustrators. Funnies, Inc. was a freelance comic book shop that "packaged" complete issues of comics for other publishers who wished to test the market in this new and still primitive medium - without having to hire a staff of creators. Martin Goodman was one such publisher. Goodman owned Magazine Management, and wanted to launch Timely Comics - which would morph into Atlas Comics during the 1950s, and Marvel Comics in 1960. Timely's first comic book was Marvel Comics #1, which introduced the first 3 "Marvel" superheroes: the original Human Torch, the Submariner, and a caped crime-fighter called the Angel. These three characters, along with the entire contents of Marvel Comics #1, were created by the free-lance writers and artists at Funnies, Inc., under the supervision and editorship of its owner, Lloyd Jacquet. The fact that the same editor was present at the births of both DC and Marvel Comics - and that he delivered the first comic book "babies" of these rival publishers - is indeed ironic. But still stranger things await us....