| Wayne Boring | |
|---|---|
| Born | June 5, 1905 Minnesota |
| Died | February 1987 (aged 81) |
| Nationality | American |
| Area(s) | Penciller |
| Pseudonym(s) | Jack Harmon |
| Notable works | Superman |
| Awards | The Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame, 2007 |
| Official website | |
Wayne Boring (born June 5, 1905,[1] Minnesota; died February, 1987, Pompano Beach, Florida)[1] was an American comic book artist best known for his work on Superman from the late 1940s to 1950s. He occasionally used the pseudonym "Jack Harmon".
Contents |
Biography
Early life and career
Boring attended the Minnesota School of Art and the Chicago Art Institute. In 1937, he began "ghosting" (drawing for hire without credit) on such comic-book features as Slam Bradley and Doctor Occult for the Jerry Siegel-Joe Shuster studio. In 1938, Siegel and Shuster's character Superman was published in Action Comics #1, for the DC Comics predecessor National Allied Publications, and Boring became a ghost on the soon spun-off Superman comic strip, eventually becoming the credited artist.
Superman comic books
In 1942, the by-then-named National Comics hired Boring as a staff artist, teaming him as penciler the following year with inker Stan Kaye. The two would work together for nearly 20 years. In 1948, following Siegel and Shuster's departure from the company over a Superman rights lawsuit, Mort Weisinger, new editor of the Superman line, brought in Boring as well as Al Plastino and Curt Swan, with Win Mortimer taking over the newspaper comic strip.
Boring became the primary Superman comic-book penciller through the 1950s. Swan succeeded him the following decade, though Boring returned for sporadic guest appearances in the early '60s and then again in late 1966 and early 1967.
Boring was let go from DC in 1967,[2] along with other artists from the 1930s and 1940s period fans and historians call the Golden Age of comic books. From 1968 to 1972, Boring ghosted backgrounds for Hal Foster's Prince Valiant Sunday comic strip,[2] and took over the art on writer Sam Leff's 1961-71 United Feature Syndicate strip Davy Jones.[3] Afterward, Boring did a small amount of work on Marvel Comics' Captain Marvel, then left the field to semi-retire as a bank security guard. He briefly returned to DC to pencil some stories in Superman (vol. 1) #402 (1984), and Action Comics #561 and 572 (1984-85).
Boring died of a heart attack, following a brief comeback announced in his last published work, penciling a Golden Age Superman story written by Roy Thomas and inked by Jerry Ordway in Secret Origins #1 (April 1986).
Quotes
Michael Vance:
| “ | Comics legend Wayne Boring played a major role in visually defining the most well known super-hero in the world during the peak of Superman's popularity.[4] | ” |
Paul Gravett:
| “ | Boring's bravura brushwork defined many of its key elements and made Superman look more powerful and imposing, now standing a heroic nine heads tall, and brought a fresh realism, a sleek sci-fi vision and a greater seriousness of tone.[2] | ” |
Footnotes
- ^ a b While some sources give 1916 as a birth year, the official Boring family site and the Social Security Death Index give 1905.
- ^ a b c Gravett, Paul. "Curt Swan: A Superman Walked Among Us," Comic Book Marketplace (2002). Accessed Mar. 28, 2009.
- ^ Comic Strip Fan: Davy Jones
- ^ Starland.com: Suspended Animation (column of Dec. 13, 2000): "Comics Legend Wayne Boring", by Michael Vance
References
- Wayne Boring at the Comic Book DB
- Grand Comics Database
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