Comic books
Pike quickly became a regular Atlas Comics contributor, drawing in a variety of genres for such titles as the Westerns Black Rider, Red Warrior, Texas Kid, and Wild Western;[2] such crime comics as All True Crime Cases Comics, Amazing Detective Cases, Crime Must Lose, and Justice;[3] romance comics, including Girl Confessions, Love Romances, Love Tales, My Own Romance, Secret Story Romance, and True Secrets;[3] war comics such as Battle, Battlefield, Battlefront, Combat Casey, Men's Adventures, Men in Action, and War Action;[2] and horror comics including Adventures into Weird Worlds, Journey into Mystery, Mystic, and Uncanny Tales;[2] and jungle adventure such as Jungle Tales and Lorna, the Jungle Girl,[2][3] among other comics. With writer Don Rico, he co-created the character Jann of the Jungle in Jungle Tales #1 (September 1954),[4] and drew her adventures in numerous issues of that title and her own series.
He recalled that soon after entering comics, the self-censorship Comics Code Authority impacted on his art. "I was drawing jungle girl comics: Jann of the Jungle and Lorna the Jungle Queen and it seems like another one, too, and I can remember I got a whole book back and had to make the bosoms smaller on the jungle girl, whichever one it was, and when she was flying through the trees on a vine or something her skirt couldn't go above her knees. I can remember having to go over the whole book and having to fix those things."[1]
His final Atlas/Marvel works were the six-page story "When a Romance Ends" in Love Romances #87 (May 1960), and the five-page "Love or Infatuation?", written by Stan Lee,[5] years later in issue #105 (May 1963).[2] Many of Pike's 1950s Atlas stories were reprinted by Marvel Comics in the 1970s.[2]
Pike began drawing for rival DC Comics in the mid-1960s, beginning with the 12-page story "In the Name of Love", starring Wendy Winthrop, Television Model, by an unknown writer, in Girls' Romances #99 (March 1964). He primarily drew for the publisher's romance comics, including Heart Throbs, Our Love Story, Secret Hearts, and Young Love.[2] For Heart Throbs, Pike and inker Russ Jones illustrated the feature "3 Girls—Their Lives—Their Loves," which ran from 1966 to 1970.
In addition to his DC romance work, Pike as both writer and artist created the undersea superheroine Dolphin in Showcase #79 (December 1968).[6] His stories continued to appear in DC Comics through Girls' Love Stories #180 (December 1973).[2]
