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Joe Sinnott and Walter Simonson Recall Their Memories of The Marvel Bullpen – Or Not

13th Dimension has run an extract from  Jon B. Cooke's Comic Book Creator magazine as published by TwoMorrows: talking to legendary comic book creator Joe Sinnott on working as part of the Marvel Bullpen during the sixties and the seventies. Or, as it happens, not.Joe Sinnott and Walter Simonson Recall Their Memories of The Marvel Bullpen – Or NotJoe Sinnott and Walter Simonson Recall Their Memories of The Marvel Bullpen – Or Not

Joe Sinnott told the magazine;

Most of the guys who did the books worked at home. The staff, of course, involved so many people. Proofreaders, people who did corrections, things like that. Well, (John) Romita, of course, worked there at the office, and there were a few others. Kirby, I worked with Jack, oh gee, must be 18 years, something like that, and I had never met him. Never talked to him on the phone, would you believe that? And so Marvel had a convention in '72, and I went down and I was introduced to Jack Kirby by Marie Severin. And I didn't see him again, I didn't talk to him again until 1975. They had another convention, and I went down and we got together. We had a great three days together. After that, I never spoke to him again. Would you believe that?

Joe Sinnott and Walter Simonson Recall Their Memories of The Marvel Bullpen – Or Not

Of course, Jack moved to California, and he dropped me a note once in a while if he wanted something. For example, if he wanted his characters inked, and he'd ask me that way if I could help him out, and of course, I always did. We never talked about the Fantastic Four. He never told me he liked the way I did this or didn't like the way I was doing that. We just never talked about what we were working on, which is amazing, I think.

Joe Sinnott and Walter Simonson Recall Their Memories of The Marvel Bullpen – Or Not

Walter Simonson, whose work is best known at Marvel from the eighties, had a different experience. Reacting to the extract above he wrote on Facebook,

 It may be that during Jack's time in NYC, the Bullpen was the 'mythological construct' that Bob suggests. I wasn't there and can't address that from personal knowledge. But during the time I worked for Marvel myself as a freelancer, it was a real place, buzzing with activity, and a hive of social interaction between editors, bullpenners, freelancers, and staff. Most of the older guys didn't come into the Marvel offices frequently. I saw John Buscema there rarely, Sal Buscema would travel up from home twice a year and at one point, hadn't been there in over a decade. As Bob says, freelancers do work from home mostly. Art corrections, paste-ups, lettering corrections, and so on, were done by a staff in the bullpen that probably had around a dozen people in it, not counting editors and administration.

Joe Sinnott and Walter Simonson Recall Their Memories of The Marvel Bullpen – Or Not

However, during the time I worked principally for Marvel – late 70s to early 90s, most of the younger generation of artists and writers started off in the beginning living in NYC and coming by the office fairly often. That was true at DC as well. As an artist, you had to bring your work into the office to turn in over to the editor and most of us did that physically, by showing up at the office in person. Eventually, with the advent of FedEx, the Internet, Fax machines, and scanners, I believe that personal visits by freelancers gradually diminished. I haven't visited either Marvel or DC in several years now myself, and there isn't generally any compelling reason to stop by any longer.

When I did visit during the salad days of my mainstream work, I would run into any number of other creators, many of whom I became friends with. We talked, hung out together, went to movies together, occasionally traded ideas, and the creatively bubbling bullpen of Stan's remarks was pretty much true, to me certainly. My Thor story of Balder losing his head to Loki was inspired by a conversation with Chris Claremont in the halls of Marvel; the Mutant Massacre grew out of a conversation between Chris and Weezie the same way. So while the Marvel Bullpen of Stan's depiction in the 60s might or might not have been accurate, the Bullpen of the 70s, 80s, and into the early 90s at least was pretty much as described. A great place to hang out, interact, learn new stuff, and meet people.

And one last note – it was also inspiring to go up to the offices, either Marvel or DC, precisely because you would run into other artists and have a chance to see their actual work. Occasionally, you'd be there at the right time when some older artist's work arrived by mail. I can still remember the thrill of seeing the Toth Burma Skies originals when they came in. Or having Berni show a bunch of us the interior splash page from Swamp Thing 4 (I think) with the werewolf. Hard to overestimate the inspirational qualities of those moments that would galvanize us all to go back home to our studios and try to do better work for our next visit. That hands on excitement is perhaps the thing I miss most about the old Bullpen days.

 

Anyone else have their own memories they'd like to share?

 


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Rich JohnstonAbout Rich Johnston

Founder of Bleeding Cool. The longest-serving digital news reporter in the world, since 1992. Author of The Flying Friar, Holed Up, The Avengefuls, Doctor Who: Room With A Deja Vu, The Many Murders Of Miss Cranbourne, Chase Variant. Lives in South-West London, works from Blacks on Dean Street, shops at Piranha Comics. Father of two. Political cartoonist.
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