Daily Birthdays and Events in Sci-Fi, Comics and related areas

October 17, 2010

Jerry Siegel, Superman, Deadpan, Rip Kirby, Lois Lane, Bruce Wayne, Cosmic Stories, Doctor Occult, The Spectre, Ka-Zar.

Jerry Siegel would have been 96 years old today but his memory lives on in his co-creation of Superman. At the same time there is the coincidence that Margot Kidder (Lois Lane) shares a birthday with him.


Enjoy !!!!



Birthdays

David Heatley 1974, cartoonist, illustrator, graphic designer and musician. Fantagraphics has published two issues of his solo comic book series, Deadpan, and Pantheon Books released his first full-length book, My Brain is Hanging Upside Down, in September 2008.
John Prentice 1920, cartoonist who took over the comic strip Rip Kirby upon the death of the strip's creator, Alex Raymond. Prentice drew the strip for the next 43 years.
Margot Kidder 1948, actress, Lois Lane - Superman (1978), Lois Lane - Superman II (1980), Lois Lane - Superman III (1983), Solitaire - GoBots: War of the Rock Lords (1986) (voice), Lois Lane - Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987), Gaia - Captain Planet and the Planeteers (2 episodes, 1994), Rebecca Madison - Phantom 2040 (1 episode, "The Whole Truth", 1996)(voice), Mistress Helga - Aaahh!!! Real Monsters (1 episode, "Episode dated 16 November 1997", 1997), Serena - The Outer Limits (1 episode, "Revival", 2000), Madame Soretski - The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne (1 episode, "The Eyes of Lazarus", 2000), Dr. Josephine Mataros - Earth: Final Conflict (1 episode, "Termination", 2001), Bridgette Crosby - Smallville (2 episodes, 2004).
Robert Lowery 1913, actor, Prince Selim - Tarzan's Desert Mystery (1943), Batman / Bruce Wayne - Batman and Robin (1949), Don Jackson - The Joe Palooka Story (1 episode, "A Date for Murder", 1954), Gary Allen - Adventures of Superman (1 episode, "The Deadly Rock", 1956).
Jerry Siegel 1914, comic book artist, co-creator of Superman (along with Joe Shuster), the first of the great comic book superheroes and one of the most recognizable of the 20th century. Siegel was a fan of movies, comic strips, and especially science fiction pulp magazines. He became active in what would become known as fandom, corresponding with other science fiction fans. In 1929, Siegel published what might have been the first SF fanzine, Cosmic Stories, which he produced with a manual typewriter and advertised in the classified section of Science Wonder Stories. He published several other booklets over the next few years. Jerry broke into comics with Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson's landmark New Fun, debuting with the musketeer swashbuckler "Henri Duval" and the supernatural-crimefighter strip Doctor Occult in issue #6 (Oct. 1935). Siegel and Shuster created a bald telepathic villain named "The Superman," bent on dominating the entire world. He appeared in the short story "The Reign of the Super-Man" from Science Fiction #3, a science fiction fanzine that Siegel published in 1933. Siegel and Shuster then began a six-year quest to find a publisher. Titling it The Superman, Siegel and Shuster offered it to Consolidated Book Publishing, who had published a 48-page black-and-white comic book entitled Detective Dan: Secret Operative No. 48. Although the duo received an encouraging letter, Consolidated never again published comic books. Shuster took this to heart and burned all pages of the story, the cover surviving only because Siegel rescued it from the fire. Siegel and Shuster each compared this character to Slam Bradley, an adventurer the pair had created for Detective Comics #1 (March 1937). In 1938, after that proposal had languished among others at More Fun Comics — published by National Allied Publications, the primary precursor of DC Comics — editor Vin Sullivan chose it as the cover feature for National's Action Comics #1 (June 1938). The following year, Siegel & Shuster initiated the syndicated Superman comic strip. Siegel also created the ghostly avenger The Spectre during this same period. In 1946, Siegel and Shuster, nearing the end of their 10-year contract to produce Superman stories, sued National over rights to the characters. In 1947, the team had rejoined editor Sullivan, by now the founder and publisher of the comic-book company Magazine Enterprises; there they created the short-lived comical crime-fighter Funnyman. Siegel went on to become comics art director for publisher Ziff-Davis in the early 1950s, and later returned to DC to write uncredited Superman stories in 1959 under the control of Silver Age Superman editor Mort Weisinger. When he sued DC over the Superman rights again in 1967, his relationship with the hero he had co-created was again severed. Siegel's later work would appear in Marvel Comics, where under the pseudonym "Joe Carter" he scripted the "Human Torch" feature in Strange Tales #112-113 (Sept.-Oct. 1963), introducing the teenaged Torch's high school girlfriend, Doris Evans; and, under his own name, a backup feature starring the X-Men member Angel, which ran in Marvel Tales and Ka-Zar. Siegel wrote as well during this time for Archie Comics, where he created campy versions of existing superheroes in Archie's Mighty Comics line; Charlton Comics, where he created a few superheroes; and even England's Lion, where he scripted The Spider. In 1968, he worked for Western Publishing, for which he wrote (along with Carl Barks) stories in the Junior Woodchucks comic book. In 1986, Siegel was invited by DC Comics' editor Julius Schwartz to write an "imaginary" final story for Superman, following Marv Wolfman's Crisis on Infinite Earths limited series and John Byrne's The Man of Steel miniseries, which reintroduced Superman. Siegel declined, and the story was instead given to another writer to complete.


Events

1993, Star Trek:DS9, "Invasive Procedures" airs.
1994, Star Trek:DS9, "Equilibrium" airs.
2001, Star Trek:Enterprise, "Unexpected" airs.

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