Martin Goodman (also Morris Goodman; born Moe Goodman; January 18, 1908 – June 6, 1992City of New York, Department of Health Certificate and Record of Birth, January 18, 1908, No. 3268, lists name as "Moe". Bell and Vassallo list his name as "Moses", citing U.S. Census records, Birth year given as 1910, Brooklyn, in Bell, Vassallo note (p. 290), "Daniels's book gets several facts [about Goodman] wrong, including Goodman's date of birth, the name of his very first pulp, and the name of his first publishing company." Birth year also appears as 1910 at Birthdate is given as January 8, likely a typographical error, at Martin Goodman , Social Security Number 087-07-1191, at the Social Security Death Index via GeanealogyBank.com.) was an American publisher of pulp magazines, digest sized magazines, paperback books, men's adventure magazines, and comic books, who founded the comics magazine company Timely Comics in 1939. Timely Comics would go on to become Marvel Comics, one of the United States' two largest comic book publishers along with rival DC Comics.
Biography Moe Goodman, who would later adopt the name Martin, was the oldest son of 13 recorded children of Isaac Goodman (b. 1872) and Anna Gleichenhaus (b. 1875). His parents were Jewish immigrants who had met in the United States after separately moving from their native Vilna, Lithuania, then part of the Russian Empire. The family lived at different homes in the New York City borough of Brooklyn.Bell, Vassallo, p. 290. As a young man, Moe traveled around the country during the Great Depression, living in hobo camps.Daniels, Marvel. p. 18Bell, Vassallo, p. 12
Pulp magazines and Timely Comics Circa late 1929, future Archie Comics co-founder Louis Silberkleit, then circulation manager at the magazine distribution company Eastern Distributing Corporation, hired Goodman for his department, assigning him clients that included publisher Hugo Gernsback. Goodman later became circulation manager himself, but the company went bankrupt in October 1932.Bell, Vassallo, p. 15. Goodman then joined Silberkleit and other investors as part owner of Mutual Magazine Distributors, and was named editor of Silberkleit's new sister company, the publisher Newsstand Publications Inc., at 53 Park Place, also known as 60 Murray Street, in Manhattan.Bell, Vassallo, p. 16. Ro, in his 2004 book, p. 7, states Goodman
Goodman's first publication was the Newsstand Publications pulp magazine Western Supernovel Magazine, premiering with cover-date May 1933.Bell, Vassallo, p. 17. After the first issue he renamed it Complete Western Book Magazine, beginning with cover-date July 1933. Goodman's pulp magazines included All Star Adventure Fiction, Complete Western Book, Mystery Tales, Real Sports, Star Detective, the science fiction magazine Marvel Science Stories and the jungle-adventure title Ka-Zar, starring its Tarzan-like namesake. These were published under a variety of names, all owned by Goodman and sometimes marked as "Red Circle".
In 1937, returning from his honeymoon in Europe, Goodman and his wife had tickets on the Hindenburg, but were unable to secure seats together, so they took alternative transportation instead, avoiding the Hindenburg disaster.
In 1939, with the emerging medium of comic books proving hugely popular, and the first superheroes setting the trend, Goodman contracted with newly formed comic book packager Funnies, Inc. to supply material for a test comic book, Marvel Comics #1, cover-dated October 1939 and published by his newly formed Timely Publications.Postal indicia in issue, per Marvel Comics #1 [1st printing] (October 1939) at the Grand Comics Database: "Vol.1, No.1, MARVEL COMICS, Oct., 1939 Published monthly by Timely Publications, ... Art and editorial by Funnies Incorporated ..." It featured the first appearances of the hit characters the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner,Writer-artist Bill Everett's Sub-Mariner had actually been created for an undistributed movie-theater giveaway comic, Motion Picture Funnies Weekly earlier that year, with the previously unseen, eight-page original story expanded by four pages for Marvel Comics #1. and quickly sold out 80,000 copies. Goodman produced a second printing, cover-dated November 1939, that then sold an approximate 800,000 copies.Both figures per researcher Keif Fromm, Alter Ego #49, p. 4 (caption) With a hit on his hands, Goodman began assembling an in-house staff, hiring Funnies, Inc. writer-artist Joe Simon as editor, and Timely's first official employee.David Saunders, Martin Goodman at PulpArtists.com Goodman then formed Timely Comics, Inc., beginning with comics cover-dated April 1941 or Spring 1941."Marvel : Timely Publications (Indicia Publisher)" at the Grand Comics Database. "This is the original business name under which Martin Goodman began publishing comics in 1939. It was used on all issues up to and including those cover-dated March 1941 or Winter 1940–1941, spanning the period from Marvel Comics #1 to Captain America Comics #1. It was replaced by Timely Comics, Inc. starting with all issues cover-dated April 1941 or Spring 1941." Timely Comics became the umbrella name for the several paper corporations that comprised Goodman's comic-book division, which in ensuing decades would evolve into Marvel Comics."Timely Publications became the name under which Goodman first published a comic book line. He eventually created a number of companies to publish comics ... but Timely was the name by which Goodman's Golden Age comics were known." "Marvel wasn't always Marvel; in the early 1940s the company was known as Timely Comics. ... "
In 1941, Timely published its third major character, the patriotic superhero Captain America by Simon and artist Jack Kirby. The success of Captain America #1 (March 1941) led to an expansion of staff, with Simon bringing freelancer Kirby on staff and subsequently hiring inker Syd Shores "to be Timely's third employee."Ro, p. ??? Simon and Kirby departed Timely after 10 issues of Captain America, and Goodman appointed his wife’s cousin, Stan Lee, already there as an editorial assistant, as Timely's editor, a position Lee would hold for decades.
With the post-war lessening of interest in superheroes, Goodman established a pattern of directing Lee to follow a variety of genres as the market seemed to trend, such as romance in 1948, horror in 1951, Westerns in 1955 and Kaiju monsters in 1958. He could be highly derivative In this regard, such as ordering the title character of Patsy Walker, America's #1 Teenager to have similar crosshatching in her hair as that of Archie Comics' popular Archie Andrews.
The name "Timely Comics" went into disuse after Goodman began using the globe logo of the newsstand-distribution company he owned, Atlas, starting with the covers of comic books dated November 1951. This united a line put out by the same publisher, staff and freelancers through 59 shell companies, from Animirth Comics to Zenith Publications.Marvel Indicia Publishers at the Grand Comics Database Throughout the 1950s, the company formerly known as Timely was called Atlas Comics.
Red Circle
Goodman, whose business strategy involved using several corporate names for various publishing ventures, sometimes attempted branding his line with the logo "Red Circle," which comics historian Les Daniels calls "a halfhearted attempt to establish an identity for what was usually described loosely as 'the Goodman group' ... 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.Daniels, Marvel: Five Fabulous Decades of the World's Greatest Comics, p. 21 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. ... " The Grand Comics Database identifies 21 Goodman comic books from 1944 to 1959 with Red Circle, Inc. branding,Marvel : Red Circle Magazines, Inc. (Indicia / Colophon Publisher) at the Grand Comics Database. and one 1948 comic under Red Circle Magazines Corp.Marvel : Red Circle Magazines Corp. (Indicia / Colophon Publisher) t the Grand Comics Database.
Magazine Management and Lion Books As the market for pulp magazines waned, Goodman, in addition to comic books, transitioned to conventional magazines—published through a concern dubbed Magazine Management Company at least as far back as 1947Bell, Vassallo, p. 39—and in 1949 founded Lion Books, a paperback line. Goodman used the name Red Circle Books for the first seven titles plus an additional two later. Most were novels, but there was a smattering of mostly sports-oriented nonfiction. Goodman eventually developed two lines, the 25¢ Lion and the 35¢ Lion Library.
The August 5, 1957 issue of Publishers Weekly contained a notice on page 32 of the proposed sale of Lion Books to New American Library, but the sale was never completed. The "Summer 1957 Book Index" in the May 27, 1957 issue included 30 titles to be published by Lion between May and September of 1957, but Goodman ceased publication with the April 1957 titles. Most of the forecast titles eventually appeared between 1957 and 1959 as paperbacks from other publishers, including Signet, Pyramid Books, and Zenith Books.
Authors that Lion published included such notables as Robert Bloch, David Goodis and Jim Thompson. The first Lion editor was Arnold Hano.Hano in
Marvel Comics
In mid-1961, following rival DC Comics's successful revival of superheroes a few years earlier, Goodman assigned his comics editor, Stan Lee, to follow the trend again. He said, "Stan, we gotta put out a bunch of heroes. You know, there's a market for it." Lee's wife suggested that Lee experiment with stories he preferred, since he was planning on changing careers and had nothing to lose. In response, Lee and artist Jack Kirby created The Fantastic Four #1 (cover-dated Nov. 1961), giving their superheroes a flawed humanity in which they bickered, worried about money and behaved more like everyday people than noble archetypes. That series became the first major success of what would become Marvel Comics. The newly naturalistic comics changed the industry. Lee, Kirby, such artists as Steve Ditko, Don Heck, Dick Ayers, John Romita Sr., Gene Colan, and John Buscema, and eventually writers including Roy Thomas and Archie Goodwin, ushered in a string of hit characters, including Spider-Man, Iron Man, the Hulk, Daredevil, and the X-Men.
In fall 1968, Goodman sold Magazine Management to the Perfect Film & Chemical Corporation. Goodman remained as publisherDaniels, Marvel. p. 139 until 1972, which included supporting Lee's decision to disregard the Comics Code Authority's disallowance of an anti-drug themed story-arc featured in The Amazing Spider-Man requested by the US Department of Health, Education and Welfare, which discredited the censor.Cronin, pp. 110–111. Two years later he founded a new comics company, Seaboard Periodicals, which published under a new Atlas Comics imprint and is known to collectors as "Atlas/Seaboard Comics".Jeff Rovin interview in It shut down the following year.
Perfect Film & Chemical renamed itself Cadence Industries in 1973, the first of many post-Goodman changes, mergers, and acquisitions that led to what became the 21st-century corporation Marvel Entertainment Group.
Men's magazines