Ghosts of Comics’ Past: 1972

Multiversity’s history column returns with coverage on 1972. If you want some additional context for the events detailed below, you can get caught up by re-reading the articles for 1970 and 1971.

The comic industry was reaching a new level of maturity in 1972. In January, Carnegie Hall hosted “A Night with Stan Lee,” which was an expanded version of the talks Lee had been giving at colleges for years and put on at the behest of promoter Steve Lemburg, who wanted to drum up interest in Marvel licenses. In July, Chicago welcomed its first comic convention, “Nostalgia ’72: Chicago Comic Con.” In the Fall, the University of Berkeley followed in Michael Uslan and Indiana University’s footsteps by offering its own course on comic books taught by Professor Donald Auft. DC granted Metropolis, Illinois its petition to be the official home of Superman and began an annual summer celebration in the character’s honor. Amateur comic fanzines, which had filled a niche providing comic news to fans for the last 12 years or so, found themselves being rapidly displaced by professional products. The long-running “The Buyer’s Guide to Comics Fandom” switched to a paid-subscription model, moved to twice-monthly publication, and increased its editorial content.

Meanwhile, the newsstand distribution system was shrinking and the most popular comic title, “Amazing Spider-Man,” was selling about 288,000 copies per month. Many industry professionals felt their days were numbered, as they saw no way the business could remain solvent in the face of shrinking sales outlets. Fortunately for everyone, former teacher turned full-time comic dealer Phil Seuling saw the nascent network of specialty stores that prioritized back issues and recognized an opportunity. He and Jonni Levas opened Seagate Distribution, created the direct sales market, and facilitated the growth of comic stores nationwide over the next eight years.

In April, comic boogeyman Frederic Wertham wrote a letter to the magazine “Monster Times” in which he denied ever disparaging EC comics after it ran an article critical of his work from the 1950s. While Wertham was technically correct that he never identified EC as a publisher, he unintentionally revealed that his research had been so shoddy that he hadn’t realized Bill Gaines published comics using the EC logo under several firm names. He probably came across this article while doing research for his 1973 book on fanzines, which was significantly more positive than his 1954 book “Seduction of the Innocent.”

1972 was also the year that Will Eisner sold his interest in his struggling educational comics company. Encouraged by his wife, he began work on a comic book aimed at adults. It took several years for the finished work, “A Contract with God,” to be published. The delay was partly the result of Eisner wanting to release it through a real book publisher and distributed to the book market.

When feminist activist Gloria Steinhem cofounded “Ms.” magazine in July 1972, she wanted Wonder Woman as their first cover feature. Later, she talked DC into letting “Ms.” release a collection some golden age Wonder Woman reprints. DC liked the attention and tried to capitalize on it by labeling “Wonder Woman” #203 as a special Women’s Lib issue. Ironically, the cover featured good girl artwork. The interior content was equally tone deaf.

DC had better luck in other areas, however. John Stewart debuted as the substitute Green Lantern and the company’s first black superhero. The publisher also updated its production process to use a new binding system and began using recycled paper. These changes reduced costs by $2,000 per issue, for a total savings of $700,000 per year. Some of that extra money went toward the purchase of Fawcett’s Captain Marvel characters, leading to “Shazam” #1 the next year.

Marvel was also trying to remain socially relevant in 1972. They targeted new female readers with “Night Nurse”, “Claws of The Cat”, and “Shanna the She-Devil”. Effort was put into finding women creators for the titles, but pickings were slim and men like Win Mortimer and Wally Wood got tapped to help. All three series failed within nine months. Luke Cage became the first black character to headline a mainstream comic in “Power Man” #1.

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Internally, Marvel saw some major changes in 1972. Founder Martin Goodman retired, making room for Stan Lee to be promoted to both Publisher and President of the company. Marvel’s owners wanted to maintain the Stan Lee brand that had helped make Marvel so strong, so one of Roy Thomas’ first actions after fill Lee’s old role as Editor-in-Chief was to add “Stan Lee Presents” to the opening of every issue. It first appeared in comics cover dated August. Inflation prompted Marvel to raise prices from 15 to 20 cents early in the year, but President Nixon’s Wage-Price Control Board ordered them to reverse it on 14 of its books.

Comics outside the mainstream were maturing in 1972 as well. Justin Green’s “Binky Brown meets the Holy Virgin Mary” was the first autobiographical comic and a step away from the shock inducing material of the Underground Comix movement. It was followed soon after by Art Spiegelman’s “Prisoner on Hell Planet,” which recounted the details of Spiegelman’s mother’s suicide.

Another underground cartoonist, Dan O’Neill, appeared in court for the first of many hearings on March 10, 1972. He and his studio mates, who styled themselves as the Air Pirates, had made a raunchy comic book starring Mickey Mouse and his pals, then gone out of their way to provoke a lawsuit from Disney. Arguing his material was fair use for satire because of the way Disney’s material pervaded American life, O’Neill eventually lost and ordered to pay Disney $200,000 plus fees and costs. O’Neill didn’t have that money, and didn’t care. He appealed, lost, then appealed and lost again, costing Disney $2 million dollars in attorney fees by 1979. All they received in return was a written promise not to create material like that again – which he violated.