Creation
In 1939, with the emerging medium of comic books proving hugely popular, and the first superheroes setting the trend, pulp-magazine publisher Martin Goodman founded Timely Publications, basing it at his existing company in the McGraw-Hill Building at 330 West 42nd Street in New York City. Goodman – whose official titles were editor, managing editor, and business manager, with Abraham Goodman officially listed as publisher[3] – contracted with the newly formed comic book packager Funnies, Inc. to supply material.[2]
His first effort, Marvel Comics #1 (Oct. 1939), featured the first appearances of writer-artist Carl Burgos' android superhero, the Human Torch, and Paul Gustavson's costumed detective the Angel. It also contained the first published appearance of Bill Everett's anti-hero Namor the Sub-Mariner, created for the unpublished movie-theater giveaway comic Motion Picture Funnies Weekly earlier that year, with the eight-page original story now expanded by four pages.
Also included were Al Anders' Western hero the Masked Raider; the jungle lord Ka-Zar the Great,[4] with Ben Thompson beginning a five-issue adaptation of the story "King of Fang and Claw" by Bob Byrd in Goodman's pulp magazine Ka-Zar #1 (Oct. 1936);[5] the non-continuing-character story "Jungle Terror", featuring adventurer Ken Masters, drawn and possibly written by Art Pinajian under the quirky pseudonym "Tohm Dixon" or "Tomm Dixon" (with the published signature smudged); "Now I'll Tell One", five single-panel, black-and-white gag cartoons by Fred Schwab, on the inside front cover; and a two-page prose story by Ray Gill, "Burning Rubber", about auto racing. A painted cover by veteran science-fiction pulp artist Frank R. Paul featured the Human Torch, looking much different from the interior story.[6][7]
That initial comic, cover-dated October 1939, quickly sold out 80,000 copies, prompting Goodman to produce a second printing, cover-dated November 1939. The latter is identical except for a black bar over the October date in the inside-front-cover indicia, and the November date added at the end.[6] That sold approximately 800,000 copies.[8] With newfound success, Goodman began assembling an in-house staff, hiring Funnies, Inc. writer-artist Joe Simon as editor. Simon brought along his collaborator, artist Jack Kirby, followed by artist Syd Shores.[9] Goodman then formed Timely Comics, Inc., beginning with comics cover-dated April 1941 or Spring 1941.[10]
There is evidence that "Red Circle Comics", a name that would be used for an unrelated imprint of Archie Comics in the 1970s and 1980s – may have been a term in use as Goodman prepared to publish his first comic book. Historian Les Daniels, referring to Goodman's pulp-magazine line, describes the name Red Circle as "a halfhearted attempt to establish an identity for what was usually described loosely as 'the Goodman group' [made] when a new logo was adopted: a red disk surrounded by a black ring that bore the phrase 'A Red Circle Magazine.' But it appeared only intermittently, when someone remembered to put it on [a pulp magazine's] cover.[11] Historian Jess Nevins, conversely, writes that, "Timely Publications [was how] Goodman's group [of companies] had become known; before this, it was known as 'Red Circle' because of the logo that Goodman had put on his pulp magazines...."[12] The Grand Comics Database identifies 23 issues of Goodman comic books from 1944 to 1959 with Red Circle, Inc. branding,[13] and a single 1948 issue under Red Circle Magazines Corp.[14]
Golden Age of Comic Books
Marvel Comics was rechristened Marvel Mystery Comics with issue #2 (Dec. 1939); the magazine would continue under that title through #92 (June 1949) before becoming Marvel Tales through #159 (Aug. 1957). Timely began publishing additional series, beginning with Daring Mystery Comics #1 (Jan. 1940), Mystic Comics #1 (March 1940), Red Raven Comics #1 (Aug. 1940), The Human Torch #2 (premiering Fall 1940 with no cover date and having taken over the numbering from the unsuccessful Red Raven), and Captain America Comics #1 (March 1941). Going on sale in December 1940, a year before the bombing of Pearl Harbor and already showing the hero punching Hitler, that first issue sold nearly one million copies.[8]
With the hit characters Human Torch and Sub-Mariner now joined by Simon and Kirby's seminal patriotic hero Captain America, Timely had its "big three" stars of the era fans and historians call the Golden Age of Comic Books. Rival publishers National Comics Publications / All-American Comics, the sister companies that would evolve into DC Comics, likewise had their own "big three": Superman and Batman
Funny animals, and people
The superheroes were the products of what Timely referred to as the "adventure" bullpen. The company also developed an "animator" bullpen creating such movie tie-in and original talking animal comics as Terrytoons Comics, Mighty Mouse, All Surprise Comics, Super Rabbit Comics, Funny Frolics, and Funny Tunes, renamed Animated Funny Comic-Tunes. Former Fleischer Studios animator Fago, who joined Timely in 1942, headed this group, which consisted through the years of such writer/artists as Hart, Gantz, Klein, Platt, Rule, Sekowsky, Frank Carin (né Carino), Bob Deschamps, Chad Grothkopf, Pauline Loth, Jim Mooney, Moss Worthman a.k.a. Moe Worth, and future Mad magazine cartoonists Dave Berg and Al Jaffee.
Features from this department include "Dinky" and "Frenchy Rabbit" in Terrytoons Comics; "Floop and Skilly Boo" in Comedy Comics; "Posty the Pelican Postman" in Krazy Komics and other titles; "Krazy Krow" in that character's eponymous comic; "Tubby an' Tack", in various comics; and the most popular of these features, Jaffee's "Ziggy Pig and Silly Seal" and Hart's "Super Rabbit", the cover stars of many different titles. Timely also published one of humor cartoonist Basil Wolverton
Time after Timely
The precise end-point of the Golden Age of comics is vague, but for Timely, at least, it appears to have ended with the cancellation of Captain America Comics at issue #75 (Feb. 1950) – by which time the series had already been Captain America's Weird Tales for two issues, with the finale featuring merely anthological horror/suspense tales and no superheroes. Sub-Mariner Comics and Human Torch Comics had already ended with #32 (June 1949) and #35 (March 1949) respectively, and the company's flagship title, Marvel Mystery Comics, starring the Angel, ended that same month with #92, becoming the horror anthology Marvel Tales beginning with issue #93 (Aug. 1949). Goodman began using the globe logo of the Atlas News Company,[23] the newsstand-distribution company he owned, on comics cover-dated Nov. 1951.[24] In 2015, Marvel registered the trademark "Timely Comics".[25] The following year, Marvel announced that Timely Comics would be the name of a new imprint of low-priced reprint comics.[26]
Marvel branding
Publisher Martin Goodman's business strategy involved having his various magazines and comic books published by a number of companies all operating out of the same office and with the same staff.[1] One of these shell companies under which Timely Comics was published was named Marvel Comics by at least Marvel Mystery Comics #55 (May 1944). As well, some comics' covers, such as All Surprise Comics #12 (Winter 1946–47), were labeled "A Marvel Magazine" many years before Goodman would formally adopt the name in 1961.[27] This brand extended to the company's short-lived editorial advisory board in 1948 in an effort to compete with other publishers like DC Comics and Fawcett Comics, and used the moniker Marvel Comic Group in its editorials.[28][29][30]
