The Comics Journal Library Volume 8:

THE EC ARTISTS
Part 1 of 2

Seattle, WA

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
Will Elder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
William M. Gaines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .63
Al Feldstein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .73
Johnny Craig . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .99
Frank Frazetta. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Joe Kubert . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Harvey Kurtzman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .125
George Evans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .133
Al Jaffee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .149
John Severin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .157

AN INTRODUCTION TO EC COMICS
by Ted White

M.C. Gaines was both a practical man (credited with

inventing the comic book as we know it although
comic strips had been reprinted in book form for at least
two decades prior to his 1933 Funnies on Parade) and
a visionary.
In the late 1930s, he formed a partnership with
the owners of Detective Comics, Inc. (subsequently best
known as DC Comics) and began publishing a series of
superhero titles: All-American Comics (which featured
the Green Lantern), Flash Comics (the Flash), Sensation
Comics (Wonder Woman), All-Star Comics (The Justice
Society of America) and Comic Cavalcade (a fatter 15
anthology of his superheroes).
But these were conventional commercial comic
books of their day and, in essence, copies of DCs Action
Comics (Superman), Detective Comics (Batman) and
Worlds Finest (15 anthology), identical in formatting.
Although successful, none (perhaps excepting Wonder
Womans titles) matched the success of DCs Superman
and Batman titles. All were published under the DC
imprint and the children who read them probably saw
little difference among them.
These comics were forthrightly aimed at kids theoretically an 8-year-old. Although comics were hugely
popular and widely read by World War II and Korean War
GIs, the fiction was maintained throughout the 50s that
the average comic-book reader was still only 8 years old.
From their inception, comic books were looked down
upon by much of American society. They cost only 10
and were often thrown away after reading. Many teachers regarded comic-book reading as a detriment to genuine literacy. The theory was that kids who read comic
books would never go on to read real literature they
would demand pictures with their prose.
Gaines thought that the comic-book medium could be
much more than just throwaway entertainment and he set
out to prove it, first with Picture Stories from the Bible. Its
first issue was published in September, 1942, and there
were four issues covering the Old Testament published
quarterly under the DC imprint in 1942 and 1943.

These were war years, with paper-rationing restrictions, and every published comic book was guaranteed to
sell out. But Picture Stories from the Bible was an anomaly. It was earnestly done and intended to be educational
rather than entertaining. Despite the best intentions of
Gaines, his editors, writers and artist (Don Cameron), it
was pretty dull going for a comic book, and it did not sell
out. But Gaines believed in it and pushed it.
Other matters were transpiring behind the scenes
and Gaines parted ways with DC in 1945, selling them
all his titles except Picture Stories from the Bible.
Gaines began a new publishing imprint for his
Picture Stories comics Educational Comics, or EC. In
addition to Picture Stories from the Bible, he published
Picture Stories from American History, Picture Stories
from Science, and Pictures Stories from World History.
And more were planned: Picture Stories from Geography,
Picture Stories from Mythology, Picture Stories from
Natural History and Picture Stories from Shakespeare.
These were clearly intended to be sold in or through
schools, and to be used with appropriate curricula. They
were an idealistic venture, akin to Classics Illustrated,
designed to prove that the lowly comic book could attain
loftier goals of enlightenment.
But, like Classics Illustrated, they made no dent
on academia. To teachers and other figures of authority over children, they were still just comic books, and
dismissed out of hand. And to the kids their putative
audience they were dull stuff, lacking the excitement
and panache of any superhero comic. They were not a
commercial success.
Gaines knew he had to broaden his new comics
line, so he also launched a line of wholesome, if
less educational, comics for younger kids: Tiny Tot
Comics, Land of the Lost Comics (based on a popular
Saturday-morning radio show), Animal Fables, Dandy
Comics, Animated Comics, Happy Houlihans and Fat
and Slat (Ed Wheelans Fat and Slat strips had a long
history of appearances in Gaines DC comics). There
was one anomalous title in 1947. Blackstone (The

Introduction

Magician Detective Fights Crime!), a suggestion of

what was to come.
When Gaines had left DC to found EC, he took one
DC employee with him to be his business manager:
Sol Cohen, whose first job as a teenager had been for
DC, checking Manhattan comic-book racks for sales
movement during Supermans launch in 1938. Cohen
had worked his way up through sales and distribution
(DC and Independent News, an increasingly important
distributor, had interlinking ownership) and he had a
promising career at DC. But when Gaines asked Cohen
to join him in his fledgling new company, Cohen accepted.
This proved to be a significant move for a reason
no one anticipated. Because in 1947 M.C. Gaines and a
friend, Sam Irwin, lost their lives in a boating accident
on Lake Placid in New York. Gaines final act was to save
the life of his friends 8-year-old son by throwing the boy
to safety.
Gaines son, William M. Gaines, inherited the company. But Bill was distant from his father, didnt care
for comics, and was attending New York University
with plans to become a chemistry teacher. Although
entreated by his mother to take over the reins at EC, Bill
was reluctant and for the first year did little but show up
at the office periodically to sign checks.
Into this vacuum stepped Sol Cohen, ECs business
manager. As he told me, years later, the company was
going down the toilet. The Picture Stories comics werent
selling and neither were the kiddy comics. I had to do
something just to save my job.
His first act was to change Educational Comics to
Entertaining Comics.
Educational was a word no comic-buying kid
wanted to see. It was a kiss of death on any comic book,
he told me.
His second act was to dump the Picture Stories titles
and change the kiddy titles to crime, romance, and Western
titles. (Due to postal regulations concerning second-class
mailing privileges crucial for distribution purposes it
was financially wiser to change titles, continuing the previous numbering, than to drop one title and start a new one.)
Thus Fat and Slat became Gunfighter (a Western), Happy
Houlihans became Saddle Justice (anotherWestern), which
in turn became Saddle Romances, while International
Comics (begun in 1947) became International Crime Patrol
and then just Crime Patrol.
1947 was a decisive turning point, although most of
Cohens changes occurred in 1948. In the late summer
of 1947, Moon Girl and the Prince was launched. Moon
Girl appears to have been a Wonder Woman copy. It went
through two title changes before becoming A Moon, A
Girl Romance.
In early 1948, EC launched War Against Crime! It
lasted 11 issues before becoming The Vault of Horror.
By 1949 Bill Gaines had become interested in comics. Sol Cohen moved on (to Avon Books) and Bill fully
took over the company. He began bringing in the artists

and editor/writers who would become known for their

subsequent EC work.
Al Feldstein was hired as a romance artist, although
his first work for EC was for the Western title, Saddle
Justice in 1948.
Johnny Craig may have preceded Feldstein with work
in the first Gunfighter, which also used Graham Ingels.
Harry Harrison and Wally Wood (as collaborators)
made their first appearance at EC in two Western titles
that appeared at the end of 1949, Gunfighter and Saddle
Romances (where Harrison, solo, had appeared in a previous issue).
The evolution of EC from 1947 to 1950 is one full
of hints of the forthcoming New Trend titles. But fans
of the latter titles may not find a lot to like in the earlier comics from EC. The quality was spotty and there
was not yet any focus on a unique style or approach to
comics. The EC comics of 1947-49 were not unlike their
contemporaries of that era, like Prize Western, where
other subsequent EC creators like Harvey Kurtzman,
Bill Elder and John Severin were then working. (Severin
continued to draw American Eagle for Prize Western
throughout his career at EC.)
1950 was the year it all came together for EC. That
spring saw the transformation of War Against Crime!
into The Vault of Horror, Crime Patrol into The Crypt of
Terror (and later, Tales from the Crypt), and Gunfighter
into The Haunt of Fear, thus successfully establishing
ECs horror-title trio.
The same month Haunt of Fear made its debut, so
did two science-fiction titles, Weird Science (with #12,
previously Saddle Romances), and Weird Fantasy (with
#13, previously A Moon, A Girl Romance).
In the fall of 1950, Two-Fisted Tales made its debut,
taking over the numbering of Haunt of Fear, so its first
issue was designated #18. This was done to satisfy or
dodge those postal regulations. Haunt of Fear itself
continued, renumbered, with #4. It confused the fans but
made the business office happy. Crime SuspenStories
made its premiere about the same time (starting with
#1), thus setting in place ECs basic New Trend stable
of titles.
Two-Fisted Tales was Harvey Kurtzmans first title,
and it brought a sense of realism, irony and anti-romance to war stories. Frontline Combat would join it half
a year later.
Crime SuspenStories was Johnny Craigs title (as
was, to a lesser degree, Vault of Horror; Al Feldstein was
the overall SF and horror editor).
By 1951, the classic EC lineup was almost in place,
lacking only Shock SuspenStories (1952) and Mad (1952).
The first half of the 50s was ECs glory time for
better and for worse. For us comics fans, it was the best
of times crowned by superlative art and provocative
stories while for those who watched sternly over us,
tut-tutting, it was the worst of times, a triumph of gore
and disgust.

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

As Gaines put it, discussing sales, It fell just about

the way you could predict: The most shocking books sold
the best, and then the next most shocking book sold the
next best, and so on. Really, what we considered our
class act, the science fiction, sold the worst. Then Mad
came along, and Mad had its peak as a comic [that was]
better than the horror comics.
ECs basic crime was that its comics were not
edited for that 8-year-old kid. They aimed higher, at a
somewhat older, more mature audience. I was 13 when
I discovered ECs and I had by then mostly given up on
other comics.)
The naysayers won, in the short-term. There
were state and federal inquiries (inquisitions?), local
comic-book bonfires, and ultimately Seduction of the
Innocent and the Comics Code. The New Trend comics
were shelved in favor of a New Direction and new titles
horror and crime conspicuous by their absence.
But the tide had turned against EC. Its competitors wanted it put out of business (and many claim the
Comics Code Authority was formed for that purpose).
In 1956 Bill Gaines gave up a losing fight and folded
all his titles except Mad which outlived him and survives wrapped in its decades-old formula to this day.
However, in the long term, EC has survived. There
have been countless reprints of the comics themselves,
as both comic books and as hardcover books. There have
been TV shows and movies based on Tales from the Crypt.
And now there are new collections from Fantagraphics,
showcasing for the first time the individual artists whose
works personified EC.
Theirs was a magical time a time when young
ambitious artists decided for themselves to take comic-book art to heights never previously dreamed of,
heights that equaled the best work of the greatest of the
newspaper strip artists of the 20th century.
As John Severin put it, I think that every kind of
work that was being done up at EC was done with a lot
more thought and care. They were all interested in getting a good job done, whether it was the lettering, the art,
the layout, whatever. It was done with thought and care.
It started with Bill Gaines, who read prodigiously,
and who fed plot ideas to his writer-editors. He was a
friendly, gregarious man, who set the tone for those who
worked at EC. He collaborated closely with Al Feldstein,
batting story ideas back and forth. (But Feldstein insists
that Gaines only suggested plot ideas, and never actually did any of the writing.)
Al was ECs first real editor, writing nearly all the
stories in the titles he edited the horror, crime and science-fiction comics. He worked closely with the artists,
being originally an artist himself. His own art was, he
admitted, a bit stiff, but he excelled as a writer-editor.
And he treasured the individuality of the artists.
He told Gaines, Bill, we dont want any artists to be

imitating other artists. Just because Simon and Kirby

are doing well doesnt mean we should have everybody
drawing like Kirby, or we should not have everybody
drawing like X or Y or Z. We should have each guy doing
his own signature [style].
Harvey Kurtzman was ECs second editor, originally of only two titles, Two-Fisted Tales and Frontline
Combat, war and adventure comics. He too wrote virtually all the stories in the titles he edited but he
went a step further, actually breaking them down into
page layouts, with stick-figures correctly positioned in
each panel. Some artists had a problem with this but
others, like Severin, appreciated it. All acknowledged
that Kurtzman was a master story-teller and his layouts
were hard, if not impossible, to improve upon.
Both Feldstein and Kurtzman brought to their
comics a level of dedication and professionalism rarely
found in the field, then or now. Kurtzman was famous for
researching military history and details, both in libraries
and in the field, once sending an assistant on a submarine. Feldstein wrote Bradbury adaptations with sensitivity to the originals, winning Bradburys appreciation.
I visited the EC offices in late 1955, met both Bill
and Al, and enjoyed several long conversations with each
(transcribed in Tales of Terror!). I found both men friendly
and outgoing, an experience I believe I shared with most
of the EC fans of that era who visited the EC offices.
As a high-school student and EC enthusiast I was
impressed by ECs willingness to interact with its fans,
to send us acknowledgments of our letters, to print
excerpts of those letters in their comics (at a time when
no other comics were running letters pages) and, ultimately, to start an official fan club, the EC Fan-Addicts.
And every once in a while a story in one of Als comics
would include appearances by both Bill and Al, usually
in humorous counterpoint to the main story.
The overall feeling was that EC comics were created
by real people, who took pride in their work and had fun
doing it.
Some of them went on to major successes in commercial art book covers, movie posters, TV Guide covers while others lived and eventually died in poverty.
No one told them then that what they were doing
was a waste of time and ambition. We are all better off
for their accomplishments and we celebrate their work.

Ted White has been a comics fan for most of his life and,
with Larry Stark, Bhob Stewart and Fred von Bernewitz,
was a seminal EC fan in the early 50s. He has been a
(still-quoted) jazz critic, a science-fiction writer and editor, and a radio DJ. He wrote the Captain America novel,
The Great Gold Steal, in 1966 and edited Heavy Metal
in 1980.

Introduction

WILL ELDER
Conducted in 2002 by Gary Groth
First published TCJ #254

ill Elder was born in the Bronx in 1921. As a

child, he was known as a comic, a prankster, a
class clown. He loved physical humor and imitated exemplars of the genre such as the Marx Brothers
and Buster Keaton well into adulthood. (I once viewed
a sketch he and Kurtzman did, circa the late 1950s, in
which they both demonstrated remarkable physical
comedic skills more Jonathan Winters or Red Skelton
than Keaton or Chaplin, demonstrating a subtle, antic
elegance that would have been perfect for TV at the
time.) But he was also a skillful artist and, after graduating from the famous High School of Music and Art, he
segued into commercial art and comics.
He learned the ropes by inking his pal Johnny
Severin on Western material for Prize Comics in the late
40s, continued inking Severins war stories (written by
Kurtzman) at EC and, as we all know now, came full
circle, finding his mtier illustrating stories for Mad and
Panic from 1952 to 1956 four years of some of the most
inspired work in the history of comics.
When Kurtzman left Mad, Elder left with
him and followed him into three noble failures:
Trump, Humbug and Help!. Trump was the realization of Kurtzmans dream to produce a slick, upscale
humor magazine and Elders contributions show a
quantum leap forward into breathtakingly detailed
painting and intricate black-and-white line work that
even surpasses the advertising parodies he had done
for Mad (themselves a huge leap in technique from
his earlier comics). After Trump folded with its second
issue publisher Hugh Hefner had to pull the plug
due to his bank calling in loans unexpectedly one
of the contributors, Arnold Roth, cheered everyone
up and suggested that they try again. So, they did.
Roth, Kurtzman, Elder, Al Jaffee and production man
Harry Chester all ponied up some money and started
Humbug, which they owned equally (along with Jack
Davis, who ponied up art instead of money). The idea
behind the magazine was that each artist would own
his own work as well as a stake in the magazine, and
that each artist would benefit if the magazine took off.
This lasted 11 glorious issues and failed for numerous reasons, most of which boil down to the fact that
they were great artists and lousy businessmen. The
artists lost their shirts. (Some of them even lost their
art.) Elder continued to refine his technique, which he
applied to television and movie parodies and the occasional illustration.
After Humbug, there was a lull, during which
Elder drew illustrations for a variety of magazines,
such as Pageant. Although many of these are stunning,
most of them werent of a humorous nature, and you can
tell that his technique was in it but his heart wasnt.
In the early 60s, Kurtzman started yet another humor
magazine, Help!, that Jim Warren published. Kurtzman
and Elder once again collaborated on a series of strips
starring the Candide-like hero, Goodman Beaver, which

represented some of Elders best work to date. In 1962,

Kurtzman and Elder began a 26-year collaboration for
Playboy: Little Annie Fanny which was entirely painted
in watercolor and tempera the first and surely the
most virtuosic of its kind.
Will Elder is most widely known as Harvey
Kurtzmans lifelong collaborator. True enough. But he
was, in his own way, an autonomous artist not unlike
Jack Kirby during his most creatively fecund collaborations with Stan Lee. Elders parodic work for EC holds
up almost irrespective of the writing, which would fluctuate wildly. For example, Kurtzman, who wrote the Mad
stories, was far more sensitive to the graphic rhythms of
visual storytelling than Al Feldstein or Jack Mendelsohn,
who wrote the Panic stories, but its a testament to the
immanent hilarity of Elders drawings that theres so
little qualitative difference between the stories in the
two comics. Elder obviously reveled in the outrageous
and added immeasurably to the stories proper with jokes,
gags, signs, all imbedded in the background, as well as
just plain drawing funny. While researching Elders work,
I paged through the Russ Cochran reprints flagging
Elders stories and I discovered that the quickest way to
spot an Elder story was by what I would call an absence
of style. Wally Woods, Jack Davis and John Severins
work could be spotted a mile away Woods lush, sensual
brushwork, Davis angular figures and flailing limbs,
Severins rangy figure drawing but Elders work was
characterized by an imitative approach in which what few
stylistic mannerisms there are (exaggerated lips on the
female characters, for example) were subsumed into the
unique approach each strip required and hidden beneath
a meticulous, almost anonymous graphic approach.

The WILL ELDER Interview

11

Will Elders origins

depicted in Mad #22s Will
Elder tribute/roast.

Elder continued to refine his inking technique

throughout his collaborative work in Trump, Humbug
and the Goodman Beaver strips in Help! even as the
intrinsic humor of the drawing continued unabated. I
have to admit that slogging through 26 years of Little
Annie Fanny became a chore the satirical quality is
intermittent at best but interest was maintained
mostly due to the lushness of the painting and what
Kurtzman called Elders eye-pops, the details, nuances
and gags hidden in the backgrounds of the panels.
Remarkable too is how Elder is able to maintain the
essentially exaggerated cartoony quality of the drawing
with his meticulous, painterly technique.
Elder, at 83, is mentally alert, although somewhat physically frail; he underwent triple bypass surgery
in 1999. Journal interview introductions always refer
to the interview subjects modesty, generosity, decency,
charm and hospitality. This one wont be any different
except that in this case it happens to be true (my first
and last attempt at Elderesque humor). This interview
was conducted over the course of two months in late 2002.
The first interview was conducted in Elders home in
New Jersey, the four subsequent sessions over the phone.
We have tried to retain as much of Elders spontaneous
and absurdist sense of humor as we could on the printed
page. It was a real privilege to get to know and talk to
Will, one I hope will continue for quite some time to come.
GARY GROTH
GARY GROTH: The Bronx in the 1920s must have been
pretty rural.
WILL ELDER: Yeah, Id say. It was the slums, but we
never knew it. We never knew there was anything outside of the slums. It kept us from doing wrong at

12

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

least, what we thought was wrong. We had our own set

of rules that we lived by. Apparently it worked for all of
us. There werent too many criminals, if thats how you
gauge a neighborhood. There was nothing to steal. The
people who had garbage were rich; they had something
to throw out.
GROTH: So you grew up, obviously, during the Great
Depression.
ELDER: Yeah. We moved from address to address to
avoid the landlord. He went crazy looking for us. We
lived with family, in-laws, that sort of thing, till my
father got a steady job. And the work brought us back to
one whole family again.
GROTH: What did your father do?
ELDER: He worked in a big clothing factory, pressing the
suits, that sort of thing. It was the only type of work he
could get through the department stores.
GROTH: Were your parents immigrants?
ELDER: They were immigrants, yeah. They were born in
Poland. They came here through the Canadian border,
down through Canada. My brother and my sister were
born in England. And I and my other brother were born
in the United States.
GROTH: Your mother was a homekeeper?
ELDER: She was, but she never showed any affection
toward me, because I was always wasting my time. I
was a little nutty. I would make my own toys. I couldnt
buy any, so Id buy the cheapest thing possible, and
that was a clay set, and I could mold it into any shape
I wished, and bang it and destroy it. I used to sculpt a
menagerie of animals and figures out of kids clay. We
didnt have all the things kids have today, there were
no video games or Gameboys or DVDs or videotapes, so
you had to use your imagination. I was lucky; I always
had a good imagination. But when you have nothing
you can make a lump of clay go a long way! That was
the beginning of being curious how to do things with
your hands, working with your hands.
GROTH: You made your own toys?
ELDER: Yeah, Id make a sculpture of an animal, any
animal. A deer. Speaking of deer: I used to paint a deer
on a canvas board. The boards not the plain canvas
that you roll up. This was in the summertime, and the
weather was hot outside; I figured it was better to stay
indoors in the shade and paint this deer. The forest
looked very cool. So I carried that a little further. I began
to see into the fall, autumn, and the leaves began to fall
and turn colors, so I had to erase all the green leaves I
had drawn before and replace them with the red- and
orange-colored trees. Al Jaffee thought that was funny.
Well, thats nothing. Wait until winter comes. I never
touched the deer, except in wintertime. There was snow
all around. Snow on his antlers; snow on his back. He
said, What are you doing here? Al would come over
to my house and always correct me and criticize me.
He said, This deer hasnt moved. He must be dead.
Then comes the spring, and I start making green leaves

again. The deer, I hadnt touched too much. So the deer

was actually flat with the canvas, and the scenery
around was about an inch high, built up over the seasons. He thought it was crazy. I said, Al, the reason Im
doing it is because I cant afford a new board with every
season. I have to make one board work for me, because
thats all we could afford.
GROTH: How old would you have been?
ELDER: About 13, 14, junior high. My early boyhood was
made up of Al and my friends. I hardly was at home; we
had nothing to be at home for. I think my dad figured
I was the only hope, if not money-wise, then showing
some kind of talent. And he promoted me wherever he
went: My son could do that with no sweat, hed say
when hed see something in a window that was painted
by someone else. Hes very good at it, and I try to
encourage him to do that. Maybe hell work for Walter
Disney. Hed never say Walt Disney. Always Walter
Disney. Very proper, my dad. And lo and behold, I wrote
to Disney and I got a nice rejection note. It says, Please
get a little older and well try to understand your
request. Why do you want to work for Disney? Because
I love cartoons. Thats good. You and a few thousands
of kids would love to be Walt Disney. So nothing ever
came of it.
I started doing work for my school, and luckily
Mayor Laguardia had promoted this ordinary system
of uncovering talent through the city. He said, I think
we need a special high school for that, and perhaps we
can do that. Lo and behold, the High School of Music
and Art was born. And that culled from the city all the
people who were talented in music and in art, plus the
regular curriculum. And it seemed to work, because
I met some very interesting people and they inspired
me. Theres also a tremendous feeling of competition.
Competition was good in a case like that. You want to
be better than your friends, show them that you can
do as good or better than they. It worked. It made
me stand out in class. I was drawing cartoons on the
blackboard, and the teacher would see my work and
she thought I would be a good example for some of the
other kids who refused to draw. She would display my
work for the rest of the class to see. It was ego-building in the most positive way.
GROTH: You had siblings.
ELDER: I had a two brothers and a sister.
GROTH: Where did you fit into the hierarchy?
ELDER: No place. My nearest older brother, who was
nine years older than me, was my friend. Hed put me
on his shoulders and wed go to a movie. Hed come out
of the movie and he says, Id like to see this picture
with the Marx Brothers. They were a big influence.
And hed say, Lets go again! Same day, hed take me
to the movies twice. Six hours of the day at the movie
house. I came out, I thought I was blind.
GROTH: Which brother was this?
ELDER: Irving. He just lost his wife last week. My

oldest brother, Sam, was out of the house before I knew

him. He got married and lived apart from all of us.
Sam died young of a heart attack. And of course, my
sister got married very young, so I didnt see much of
her growing up except when she would watch me,
but she couldnt take that! Shes in her 90s now, living
in Florida. My friends saw more of me than my family.
Lucky for me, I got along with them.
We would play stickball. My career would start
with stickball. I was kind of a runty kid. I wasnt tall or
heavy or muscular. I was simply a smallish kid with a
big fat mouth. And they would never put me on their
roster to play stickball, and I really wanted to play. I
said, Why not me? I know something about stickball.
Im pretty good, I think, Im pretty good. You should
give me a tryout.
They said, Well, well do something else.
Well let you score. So I kept score and my chalk was
mightier than their sticks because before you knew it,
they would gather around me like chickens at feeding
time because I drew their caricatures as they played.
I would get bored between innings and start to draw.
I made guys score 14 runs in one inning. [Laughter.]
On the other team, they got back with 20 runs in the
next inning. Of course, Im exaggerating. Its actually
15 runs. And in between innings when they came to
see what the score was, one guy would say, Hey, thats
Philip! Howd you do that? I had a lot of power. I didnt
think I had so much power. And influence. The guys
were thrilled. And I made my overnight friendship right
there and then. Thats pretty much how it all started.
They encouraged me to do more.
GROTH: So, drawing with chalk on the blacktop and
having that effect fueled your motivation?
ELDER: Yeah, only because I kept score. I was bored and
I thought that didnt give me any kind of out for feeling

The WILL ELDER Interview

13

Elders illustration for A Night

at the Castle (with Groucho
as DIsraeli) in Humbug #2
(collected in Humbug Book One
2009 Fantagraphics Books).

good or doing something worthwhile. In this case I kind

of put it on myself to go one step further. You got chalk?
Do it like they do in school. Draw a diagram, but in
this case make a caricature so these kids can recognize
what you can do. So I did that.
GROTH: How old would you have been during the time
youre describing?
ELDER: I would say around 9 or 10.
GROTH: Stickball is essentially baseball with a stick
played in the street, right?
ELDER: A broomstick, without the bristles at the other
end. It was about six feet in length.
GROTH: Let me skip back a little bit. You were the last of
the four children?
ELDER: Yeah.
GROTH: And your father was proud of your skill?
ELDER: I was my fathers wunderkind. He would brag
about me to his buddies, he was so proud of what I
could do with a pencil or chalk or anything that was
handy, actually, that he would go on about me. If he was
at work and one of the workers would show someone
a print or a sketch he
would chime in, Oh my
boy could do that ... only
better! He was very
proud of me.
GROTH: Your siblings
werent like that?
ELDER: Well, I never
had a chance to find out
because they left the
house pretty much before
I was growing up.
GROTH: You said that
your mother didnt give
you much affection. Were
you kidding?
ELDER: No. She loved me, I dont want to give you the
wrong impression, but she was just a little cool and
distant. She never showed me that much affection. I
mean she was a typical mother: When I got hurt, she
tended to me. She loved me too, but dont forget that
her youngest before me was nine years older than me. I
think she was tired.
GROTH: Did that bother you?
ELDER: It affected me, only because she wasnt like my
father.
GROTH: Who was more affectionate, in his way.
ELDER: I think my father was a man I couldnt disappoint because he had all this faith in me.
GROTH: You sort of indicated that you were poor, but
your father had a full-time job.
ELDER: When he finally got one. Yes, he had a full-time
job. It didnt pay much, but it kept the wolves at bay, so
to speak. And I had a good time because of him.
GROTH: Did the crash in 29 affect your family?
ELDER: We were just as poor, before, during and after.

[Laughter.] No change.
GROTH: You couldnt go down any more ...
ELDER: No, I was down. My only way was up.
GROTH: So, the High School of Music and Art: you
would have started there when you were 14 or 15.
ELDER: Correct. That was a unique high school. I didnt
know it at the time. When its happening, theres very
little you know about anything. Its only after I graduated and I did graduate; thats the miracle it
would show that you really accomplished something.
Its a wonderful feeling, especially in the field of education. It was hard for me because I never had books or
libraries. Now I had libraries whether I needed them or
not; they just have them around. If I wanted something,
I could look it up.
GROTH: What was your childhood like before the High
School of Music and Art?
ELDER: At public school, I used to have fights in the
school yard nothing dangerous, just kids pushing
each other around. I couldnt keep my mouth shut. If
someone irritated me, I let them know. That caused
me some problems early
on. The school was about
a block and a half from
where I lived. It was very
convenient. But then,
when we moved, and I
went to another school,
that was a pain.
GROTH: Do you remember what schools you
went to?
ELDER: Not really. I
remember the neighborhood; I can almost see it
in my minds eye.
GROTH: What did it look like?
ELDER: Well, it was next to a church, and the schoolyard
was adjoined to the churchyard, and when Id pick a
fight, Id make sure I wasnt in the churchyard. Id make
sure that somebody was on my side. But anyway, it was
just a matter of egos pushing each other around.
GROTH: Did you have a lot of friends?
ELDER: Yeah, I did because I could make people laugh.
When the bullies came after me I could usually stop
them with a quip or a crazy face or some crazy thing
that I would think up on the spot. I just knew I could
make the bad guys laugh and the other kids, who were
more like me, appreciated that and were drawn to me
because of it, I think.
Once I got into Music and Art we played
association football touch football. Al would throw
me passes Al Jaffee. He had a very good arm. Hed
throw very high and far, and Id go catch em. He used
to scratch his head: How does a skinny lump like me
catch those passes? Well, it was coming at me; what am
I going to do? It was so easy. Just stick my hands out

When the bullies came

after me I could usually
stop them with a quip or a
crazy face or some crazy
thing that I would think up
on the spot.

14

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

and grab it. We played in a lot, and on one side of the lot
there was a pile of junk: old tires and car tires, steering
wheels, wagon wheels, cans of soup empty, of course.
Jaffee would throw a pass to me, and point to where it
was going to go. I was going to go to the junk pile. No one
would go there to chase me, to follow me. And Id dive
into the junk pile and catch the football. He was amazed
because, he said, Youd risk your life to catch a pass?
Youre crazy! I know. Thats what makes me go.
GROTH: Were you a gregarious kid?
ELDER: Yeah, I used to go to parties, and Id always be
invited. I would turn them down, and of course they
would say Youre a snob! Turn me down? Id say, Well,
if you were invited to five parties in one night youd also
be a snob.
GROTH: At least four times over.

From Mad #20 ( 2013

DC Comics).

T H E F UN NY PAP E R S
GROTH: What were you interested in as a child?
ELDER: I was captivated by the Saturday matinees and
the funny papers. I would try to copy the things I was
attracted to and my father always made a big deal. He
would pick up the comics. He didnt read English too
well.
GROTH: What were your favorites growing up in the late
20s, early 30s?
ELDER: Katzenjammer Kids. I loved them because they
were so mischievous. I saw myself in that damn strip.
What else? Smokey Stover was one of my favorites,
Wash Tubbs...
GROTH: You had an affinity for the newspaper strips?
ELDER: Yeah, because during the week, they were black
and white, and in the Sunday paper, it would be color.
And the colors were beautiful. It was beautiful! It was
like a hand-painted film. Its like the colorful scene in
Phantom of the Opera with Lon Chaney. Theres the
scene at the ball, did you ever see that? The Phantom
comes down dressed as Death in a red robe. That was
a hand-tinted scene. And what was the other one? I
think, the pirate with Douglas Fairbanks The Black
Pirate. Anyway, the insertion of color added so much to
the strip; it was like a blind man seeing for the first
time. Thats the feeling I got.
GROTH: There was much less media available back then
to compete for your attention.
ELDER: I didnt know it, but now that I look back, youre
right.
GROTH: So, you had radio?
ELDER: Radio was my life. I used to come home every
day just to listen to my programs, The Witchs Tale
and Chandu the Magician. I used to sing the introductory music that goes with those episodes. Like
Chandu the Magician: How does it go? I forgot. It was
a lot of fun, and a few chapters of Sherlock Holmes
was one of my favorites.

GROTH: Dramatized on the radio?

ELDER: Yeah. And then I Love a Mystery. The author of
I Love a Mystery lived outside of San Francisco. When
[Elders wife] Jean and I went to San Francisco a number of years ago we passed his house on a tour, I was
impressed. The bus driver thought he was funny, but he
wasnt. That was a great trip, very picturesque. I painted
Jean near a tree in Carmel by the sea. It was fun.

S C HO O L DAYS
GROTH: You told me youd go on trips sponsored by the
school.
ELDER: Yeah, wed go to Westchester, and wed sort of
stand in line and shake hands with Eleanor Roosevelt.
That was the highlight of my life. I thought she was
somebody special.
GROTH: So you entered the High School of Music and
Art, and was it there that you developed your passion
for ...
ELDER: The High School for Music and Art at one time
was called the Wadleigh Junior College for Women
where they had a two-year course for teachers. We were
the first graduating class in Music and Art if you
stuck it out, of course, or werent thrown out, like some
friends I know. If I mention his name, Im afraid you
might repeat it, so I wont say anything.
GROTH: You know I would.
ELDER: I was thrilled to be in that school and had so
much mischievous fun that I nearly didnt make it
through myself. But it was a real turning point in my
life, that school. My life and many other kids too. If you
look at the people who have graduated from that school
it reads like a Whos Who of American cultural icons,
musicians, artists, amazing people. Anyway, it was a
junior high school and it was in a park. It was a lovely
location. They had to destroy a baseball field to put the

The WILL ELDER Interview

15

school there. I thought that was a mockery of education.

But it wasnt. It was a good thing it happened, because
I wouldnt have gone there and been entitled to a scholarship in music and art. So, little things, little nuances
of society kind of change your life. You dont know when
its happening, but when it does, you appreciate it.
GROTH: How long was Music and Arts program?
ELDER: Four years. And the teachers were special too.
They were culled from the neighborhood and they showed
their talent. They were very good; they made you feel like
you were part of a big, very important movement.
GROTH: Is it at the School of Music and Art that you
developed your passion for drawing?
ELDER: Yeah, Id say so. We had the typical live models
and still lifes. It was the place where I found myself. It
was the first time I visited a museum and was exposed
to the art of the masters and that really opened my eyes.
GROTH: Tell me about the curriculum and the
atmosphere.
ELDER: We had a long, long, long day in school because
we had both music and
art. If you were an art
student, youd have a
course in music and viseversa, or versa-vise. You
had five hours of regular
studies and you had
the rest, three hours or
so of music and art. An
hour and a half of music
and an hour and a half
of art. Both areas were
covered pretty well. The
only thing that I missed was in music; they didnt have
enough opera singing and I thought I wanted to cover
the field entirely. But otherwise it was an inspiration.
GROTH: What were the music courses like?
ELDER: Well, the lighter classical stuff: Music by
Mendelssohn, the Spring Song. [Sings Spring Song.]
Very appealing. In fact, we were bathed, so to speak, in
classical music. We had no chance to listen to jazz; only
when you went home and did it on your own. At least I
have the taste of having both possible worlds flung at
me. I learned to play the mandolin there.
GROTH: Did this open up a world of art for you?
ELDER: Yeah. I didnt think these things existed. I came
from a poor neighborhood and the only thing we played
on the block was stickball, and it doesnt take much
brains to do that. This was a way of telling me theres
more to the world than appears on the surface.
GROTH: Was it exhilarating?
ELDER: Oh, sure. I enjoyed it. It was one of those things
that everybodys not going to feel the same. Were all
made of different stuff.
GROTH: Now, at some point during those four years, you
obviously moved more passionately in the direction of
visual art than music.

ELDER: Yeah. Anything thats creative was something I

envied very much.
GROTH: How did it happen that you focused more on art
and drawing?
ELDER: Because I would go to the museum, more often
than most of the other kids. That surprises people. But
I found something that really resonated in me and I felt
that I could paint and draw, so here I saw that there
might be something I could do with this ability I had.
I think that I had been drawing for a long time, but I
never thought much about it. You know, drawing caricatures on the street never struck me as a real talent! But,
I always knew I had this ability talent I guess you
would call it but I never had the idea that it meant
anything or I could really make something of myself
by using that ability, until I got to Music and Art and
was exposed to all these people throughout history who
really made a mark. Plus all the other kids there could
draw, paint or play instruments incredibly well and I
thought, maybe in a small way I could do something
with my art. And thats
how I got my first feelings
for music and art. It was
a great move for me. It
really was. Turned my
whole life around.
GROTH: Now, you referred
to the Museum of Natural
History. That wasnt in the
Bronx, was it?
ELDER: Manhattan. It was
off of one of the wings of
Central Park. There were
stuffed animals, like bears. They looked very real to me.
Id never seen a bear before in my life.
GROTH: Can you tell me a little about the curriculum?
They taught you drawing and painting techniques?
ELDER: Yeah, they gave you a variety of media to work
with. You pick your own. Choose whatever comes easy
to you, whatever seems to be effective. A lot of simple
freedom. If you start piling things on a kid and hes
trying to prove he can do things, theyre under some
kind of pressure. It doesnt work. They rebel against
such stuff. It should be fun. Thats the way I started out.
GROTH: At the time you were drawing and learning
how to draw, did you know that you wanted to become a
professional artist?
ELDER: After a while I did. After a while the drawing
became, not an obsession, but a very strong desire to do
something further. I took out my sketchpad and started
sketching bears, the stuffed bears, on a mountain. Or a
fox in the woods. These things remain in my memory.
Its a backlog of things that youve seen and digested
intellectually. It works for me.
GROTH: Now, you must have graduated from high
school in 38
ELDER: No, 40. A long time ago. We had a 50th

Yes, she was a Miss

America and she got in
a lot of trouble, which I
cant go into because it
wouldnt be etiquette.

16

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

anniversary 10 years ago, I think. We got some of the

teachers. Some of them in wheel chairs. Theyre still
around.
GROTH: Did you have any other notable classmates?
ELDER: Yeah, but they are gone. Thats notable. Well,
there was Jaffee, and Jaffees brother went to the same
school. He died rather young. Al and I and another
friend, whos no longer with us, also gone. There was
one or two of Als friends at his birthday party, at the
Society of Illustrators.
Bess Meyerson graduated the same year as me.
After the war I was back in New York with some of my
buddies, and Bess Meyerson was at Radio City Music
Hall for some event or something tied in with being Miss
America. We went past there and I said to my friends,
Oh Bess Meyerson, I went to school with her. None of
them believed me, so I had to prove it to them: I went to
the stage door and whispered into the guards ear Tell
Bess that Wolf Eisenberg is here. We stood there for a
few minutes and the guys really thought I was up to my
old stuff, so they said Cmon, lets go, when Bess came
running to the door yelling at the top of her lungs Wolfie,
Wolfie, Wolfie Eisenberg! She threw herself onto me giving me a big hug you know it had been a while. The
guys mouths dropped open, I think they were saying,
Whos Wolfie? But they got a big kick out of that. They
couldnt believe it. But, yes, she was a Miss America and
she got in a lot of trouble, which I cant go into because it
wouldnt be etiquette.

P RA NKS
GROTH: You shouldnt be a Miss America unless you get
into trouble. [Laughter.] Werent you a real wiseacre in
high school?
ELDER: I was a likeable guy.
GROTH: A practical joker?
ELDER: Yeah, Im telling you, the only way to equalize
the pressures on a young kid like me was to make them
laugh. And that was the great equalizer. They enjoyed
it; so did I. It saved my life.
GROTH: So you were theatrically funny in high school.
ELDER: If you can call it that. I tried to be pleasant
all the time. It didnt always work out, but it was my
intention.
GROTH: I have a great story here that I
ELDER: Is it related to what Im talking about?
GROTH: Yes.
ELDER: Tear it up, quick!
GROTH: I understand you had a penchant for zany
stunts, one of which was that ...
ELDER: I was a practical joker. I didnt walk around
with a pistol on my hip or a knife in my belt. I wasnt
a deadly person. I loved to have fun, at someone elses
expense. But not to harm anybody. I wasnt a criminally
minded person.

GROTH: No. But one of your stunts was that you dressed
up some raw meat in old clothes and slung them around
the railroad tracks. After a train had gone through, you
would start screaming at the top of your lungs that
someone had been run over by the train.
ELDER: Thats the gist of it, yeah. Screaming for this boy
who I thought had been cut into mincemeat, and I had
all this stuff put into a shirt that was hanging from a
clothesline drying. The shirt was dripping blood and
broken bones sticking out of the sleeve, and it looked
like a massacre had happened recently. And I kept
yelling and screaming, Oh, he shouldnt have gone on
that track! He didnt listen to me! Hes dead now! And
suddenly the windows would open up and the womens
heads would peek out. Is my Frankie there? Wheres
my Frankie? Theyd all start getting hysterical.
GROTH: And these horrified teachers walked by.
ELDER: Not teachers. They were the neighborhood
people that lived there. Theyd look in everyones back
yard. Everything was accessible in those days: the fire
escapes, the rear windows, the roofs. How do you pronounce that? Roofs or rooves?
GROTH: Roofs, I think. So where do you think this
prankish nature of yours came from?
ELDER: Well, it was like a living cartoon. Cartoons walk
off a cliff and they never get killed. I thought that would
be the same with me. But of course I knew better than
that. I just loved to see embarrassment on the other
persons face. It gave me some kind of pleasure. It gave
me a sadistic pleasure, but it was fun.
GROTH: Were you inspired by the Marx Brothers?
ELDER: Partially. But, I later learned that Hollywood
movies are all pre-fab, and its all figured out beforehand, so I stopped doing them. The lesson I learned.
GROTH: You stopped doing
ELDER: Pranks that would hurt somebody. I would put
it on paper. Years later, Harvey [Kurtzman] came to
me and said, Howd you like to put all your crazies on
paper? I think we would be able to start a comic book
thats funny like you, Will. Harvey knew of all my
antics from Music and Art and I think he thought it
would be very advantageous to him to have me doing
some work on Mad. You know, I was just starting to
draw a little more at EC; most of the guys there knew
me as Severins inker, but I was starting to draw some
more in a couple of the other EC crime and horror
books. Harvey knew I could take on the funny stuff, so I
think thats where all my pranks went into the work.

GO IN G TO WO RK
GROTH: What did you do after graduating?
ELDER: I went to work. I had a couple of strange jobs,
like dressing windows with a very strange guy in one of
the department stores. Then I went on to the Academy
of Design in Manhattan. I was there for about a year,

The WILL ELDER Interview

17

maybe a little less, I dont remember, but then Uncle

Sam called. I just collected my 52-20. For 52 weeks I got
$20 a week.
GROTH: You went in the Army. How soon after graduating were you drafted?
ELDER: About a year and a half later. I was in the
National Academy of Design for almost a year. It was a
private school, but you have to pass some kind of a test.
GROTH: How could you afford that?
ELDER: Little by little. It wasnt so bad. Part of it was on
money I had saved. I always tried to save some money.
I did some work for somebody. I didnt do very much.
My folks would supply most of the money. The Academy
taught me how to provide composition correctly.
Perspectives. The intricacies of art. Without them, it
didnt look like much, unless youre an abstract painter.
GROTH: Was that an industrial orientation?
ELDER: No. It was a fine art and model painting.
GROTH: I see. In 1941, you evidently worked for a place
called the Decal Company doing design and cartoons?
ELDER: Thats correct.
GROTH: And you would have been approximately 19
when you worked for them?
ELDER: Yeah. I was out of school for about a year before.
GROTH: Tell me what that place was like and how you
got a job there and what you did.
ELDER: Well, they liked some of my cartoons and they
thought that I could apply my skill to some of their stickers you put on the back of cars and plates and whatnot.
Their mascots were once the Dartmouth Indians. Id
make a decal about an Indian with Dartmouth written
all over its chest. I would start doing a lot of college
insignias. It was NYU and four of those universities.
GROTH: How long did you work there?
ELDER: Oh, roughly, I would say about three months. I
wanted to find something better. I thought Id be getting something better.
GROTH: So mostly what you did was hand-drawn?
ELDER: Yeah. And they turned these things out. It was
sort of a light, supple plastic.

18

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

GROTH: I assume you were pretty happy to get a job

there during the Depression?
ELDER: Yeah. It was something I always liked. I love cartooning and drawing in general, so this was a job that
gave me some kind of pleasure. Not much money, but it
was fun working at it.
GROTH: Was that in Manhattan?
ELDER: That was in Manhattan.
GROTH: Would you have gotten into making the rounds
of the comic publishers right after that?
ELDER: I went into some of the agencies, the big advertising agencies. They promised me the moon, but I
never heard from them.

WA R T I M E
GROTH: Shortly thereafter, in 1942, you were drafted
into the Army.
ELDER: Pretty good. In the Army. Yeah. And we went out
to Governors Island. That was your admission into the
army. Theyd give you your uniform, that sort of thing.
GROTH: Did you get out of the Army immediately after
the war?
ELDER: Yeah, and I started looking for work.
GROTH: What was your experience in the Army like?
ELDER: Well, I was a young little hero. I saved a mans life.
I was proud of that. I came home two hours late from a
pass. I think it was two oclock in the morning. Midnight
was the deadline. And I saw smoke coming out of this
tent, which suddenly ignited into flame. I reacted out of
instinct, not even thinking whether Id get hurt or not; I
dashed into the tent, took the guy and threw his cot and
him out, right through the flames. We both dived through
it. I started pounding on him. He was drunk. He was a
chef and he must have drank. And I kept beating the
flames out, and he says, What are you hitting me for?
You could have let me fry instead. Im hitting you to put
the fire out, you idiot. And then the next day he found
out what I did, he gave me extra potatoes. [Laughter.] Got
more spinach. Hed take another pork chop, Go ahead,
Will. Its on me. I never forgot that. Its a great feeling.
GROTH: Its good you didnt rescue somebody who
cleaned out the latrines.
ELDER: Its a good thing it was in the United States. If it
was in Europe, Id be dead by now.
GROTH: So, what did you train as? Did they give you a
specialty of some sort?
ELDER: Yeah, I used to do VD posters. I would draw some
of them, showing a G.I. that looks like hes going to fall
apart. I did a few propaganda posters for the Army:
Loose Lips Sink Ships, a couple of patriotic type of
posters but that was just the beginning. I was actually
put into the photo-mapping section of my platoon, and
we did maps of the Normandy beachhead. And, what was
it now, from the neck of the attack? One of the beaches...
GROTH: Omaha?

ELDER: Omaha. Thats good. Omaha beach. There were

several others, but that one I remember. I remember
that one. We came in D-Day plus six, so it wasnt that
terrible.
GROTH: So you actually landed at Normandy after it
had been secured?
ELDER: Yeah. The Germans were on the run. Of course
they gave us a good pasting, and then they went on the
run. It was the beginning of the end for the Germans. I
got caught up in the Battle of the Bulge and I went in
with the shock troops that stormed Cologne. We were
some of the first American troops that crossed the Rhine.
GROTH: So, you saw some fighting over there?
ELDER: Oh, yeah. Theres no way out. You had to fight for
your life. Im trying to think of the name of the place... It
took place during the snow and the foggy weather. And
they couldnt drop any food and rations for us from the
air because you were blinded to everything out there.
Anyway, thats when they demanded we surrender and
the American General told them Nuts!
GROTH: Oh! Sure, sure. That was Bastogne.
ELDER: Yeah, well, I was in part of it. I didnt pick up a
rifle. I just was standing around and didnt know which
door to go through. It was chaotic.
GROTH: How long were you in the European Theater?
ELDER: About a year, a year and a half, something like
that.
GROTH: You were in France?
ELDER: I was there three and a half years, in France,
Cherbourg, Paris ... Didnt get into Germany. Got into
Czechoslovakia, which is close by. Pilsen thats where
the little underground barrels of beer, pilsner beer
nothing like it, coming out of big barrels. We were stationed there for about a month.
GROTH: What is photo-mapping?
ELDER: Its taking aerial photos of the area thats about
to be attacked. It worked very well, because there was
60 percent overlap stereo, so it looked like the real
thing. You started seeing it in three dimensions. It was
just a wonderful experience, as long as you came out of
it alive. Luckily, we did a major job in keeping back the
enemy. A lot of its faith. A lot of it is faith.
GROTH: How much did you know about what was going
on over there?
ELDER: I knew quite a bit, because I was in photo-mapping and the engineering department, 668 Engineer
Corps, and we saw the big wigs. Not staying for a minute, but just walk right through.
GROTH: Were you aware of the concentration camps?
ELDER: Oh, yeah. Id been to one or two of them. One of
them was a sorry sight. The other was paperwork. But
the sorry sight is pretty much what you see on TV. You
dont want to bring that up all the time. People would
always ask me what it was like. I mean, they know
already, but they want to get a fresh take.
GROTH: Did you spend your entire stint in the Army in
Europe?

ELDER: Id say most of it. Most of my army days were

in the European theater. And I was just hoping they
werent sending us over to Japan.
GROTH: No one wanted to go to Japan. So, you werent
sent to the Pacific theater?
ELDER: No. No Pacific theater.
GROTH: So you got back to the States, and you got out of
the Army in 45 or 46?
ELDER: The end of 45. Levittown was in full bloom. I
thought perhaps someday I could move there, but Im
glad I didnt.

RUFU S D E BREE
GROTH: In 46 you started writing and drawing a
backup feature in Toy Town called Rufus De Bree. Can
you tell me how that came about?
ELDER: Well, I had a cartoon that I was fooling with,
and this friend of mine who lived down in St. Lawrence,
Richard Bruskin, who now, as I said to you earlier, has
his own ad agency in Florida. Rufus De Bree was a play
on words: refuse and debris, Rufus De Bree. He was a
garbage man. One day he was walking the street and
he bent down and then back up again and got smacked
in the head by one of those wooden arms that sticks out
giving you directions. And the drunk driver was a little
short guy like Sancho Panza. This old gentleman, he
was a little decrepit looking, and he gets smacked in the
head by this truck that was driven by Sancho, and he
wakes up the next day in a strange land. Theres a guy
in an armored suit looking at him as he wakes up. The
guy in the armored suit is a Don Quixote type, Rufus De
Bree. And he says, Come with me. Were surrounded
by a bunch of crazy armored people. Were living in a
strange age. So the idea was to have a story written
like King Arthurs Court. It was a direct swipe from
that just changed the characters around. I thought
that would be good for a young reader. And being it was
a comic book, I had to make sure it was tasteful, something they would learn by.
GROTH: I know you read comic strips, but had you at
one point started reading comic books?
ELDER: Yeah, I started reading comic books when Walt
Kelly drew comics. He had a great technique. I loved his
technique. It was very attractive to me.
GROTH: Did you read comics before you went into the
Army or during your stint?
ELDER: It was after.
GROTH: Well, it couldnt have been much after, because
if you were working on a strip for comic books, you must
have been aware of comic books at the time.
ELDER: I was aware of the comic books produced by Max
Gaines. And I had read those when they first came out,
I guess in the mid to late 1930s. You know, the first ones
that were just reprints of the Sunday comics. I remember that. Im not sure what came next, but I was always

The WILL ELDER Interview

19

From Elders Rufus De Bree

strip in Toytown Comics #4

20

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

drawn theres a pun to them. I was ... attracted

is that better? to any kind of illustrated strip
whether it was a comic book or a strip or whatever. So I
knew about them, but I always liked Walt Kellys work
and when his stuff was put out I remember seeing that.
GROTH: What prompted you to try to draw comic books?
ELDER: I thought it would be an easy way to make a
living. It was simple drawing. It was for children. They
dont get technical about how this or that should be.
And they were pretty good on deciding whats wrong
and whats right.
GROTH: So, how did you go about trying to sell Rufus
De Bree?
ELDER: I heard through a friend of mine Ive forgotten who now, honestly that there was a woman publisher, one of the very first. What was her name again?
Rae Herman. She was open for a lot of these fairy-tale
types of things.
GROTH: What company
was this?
ELDER: She had her own
publishing company. [Toy
Town Publications.] The
strips kind of awkward
and not done very well. I
can look back and see the
things I used to do.
GROTH: Did you go to her
office?
ELDER: Yeah. She looked
at it, and she held it for
a day or two, then she
called me and said shed
like to go ahead and
publish the story. But,
she wanted to change
it, put him on a horse,
something
decorative.
I go, What in Sam Hill? I dont know whats in Sam
Hill. Her office was not too far from Columbus Circle
a few companies were around there. Might have been
Broadway, Im not sure. My affiliation with her was
limited.
GROTH: How old was she?
ELDER: I have no idea. Might have been in her 40s. She
wasnt a young whippersnapper. She said, Work up
something for me and bring it in. Well see what we can
do. I did three stories for her, until I did some freelance
outside of that place for Simon and Kirby. I was doing
some love stories, that sort of thing.
GROTH: First time in Kirbys shop?
ELDER: Yeah. And then Johnny Severin came around
and got jobs for the two of us. Severin could draw very
well. He had a good memory for mechanical things. And
I could ink really well. I could ink fast; he drew fast. We
were both the opposites of each other. I couldnt draw
as fast as him. To make money in that business, you

have to be pretty fast and turn out a lot of material. We

turned out the best we could at that stage of the game.
We hit it off with the few samples that we showed
Simon and Kirby.
GROTH: How did you get hooked up with Joe Simons
shop?
ELDER: Through Kirby, because Kirby was the artist
and Simon was the businessman.
GROTH: How did you know Kirby?
ELDER: Well, through some of the artists. We came up to
his office and we saw some of the work that was being
done, and I said, We can do it. John Severin was the
same way.
GROTH: Well, how did you discover the Simon/Kirby
shop?
ELDER: Its hard to put my finger on. I cant know exactly
when that happened.
GROTH: And you went up to Simons shop, and he gave
you some work...
ELDER: He gave us some
work. It worked out
pretty well. We werent
getting paid very much,
but that was the reason
we got the work.
GROTH: Who did you deal
with, Simon or Kirby?
ELDER: Simon. No, no, no,
no, Kirby. Kirby was the
shorter one. There was a
guy in the office who was
very funny. I wonder if
you know who Im talking
about if I mention what
happened. This guy would
follow us down the stairs,
get out in the middle of the
street and start directing
traffic. Severin and I looked at each other: See any cops
around? I look at this guy, directing traffic. I think he had
a nervous breakdown; I found out later. Couldnt stand
the traffic. I couldnt blame him for that. But to direct it?
GROTH: Probably just some poor cartoonist. So, when
they gave you work, what does that mean? They gave
you scripts that you illustrated?
ELDER: No, he said, If you have any ideas, let me know.
Then we got the scripts because we pretty much relied
upon scripts. We were doing well enough to follow a
script.
GROTH: I see. How much work were you doing for Simon
and Kirby?
ELDER: Not much. Id say about maybe a half a years
worth. Then we did it for another outfit a guy who
lived up in Westchester. I forgot his name. Typical Irish
name: McSomething. McDormott? But this guy liked
our work. He said, We have some material that you can
give me a finished product. And Johnny, this is Johnny

This is Johnny Severins

greatest skill, to draw
these mechanical devices:
railroad trains, airplanes,
tanks in war, the GIs out
there. He knew it all. I was
just a sidekick, inking as
well as I could. I tried to
dramatize the picture.

The WILL ELDER Interview

21

Severins greatest skill, to draw these mechanical

devices: railroad trains, airplanes, tanks in war, the GIs
out there. He knew it all. I was just a sidekick, inking
as well as I could. I tried to dramatize the picture, you
know the black-and-white content.
GROTH: Tell me how you met Severin.
ELDER: Well, I knew him from school; he was in my class.
I didnt know him that well, but Id see him occasionally,
and wed talk about what we would do when we got out.
GROTH: So, how did you hook back up with him when
you got out of the Army?
ELDER: I really couldnt tell you.

C H ARL E S WI LLI A M H ARV EY

GROTH: Well, in 1946 or 1947 you started the Charles
William Harvey Studio. How did that come about?
ELDER: Harry Jaffee and I were walking down the street,
as usual, and I see a friend of mine who I recognize was
Charlie Stern. Charlie and I knew each other. I used to go
over to their house. Along with Charlie Stern was a fellow
by the name of Harvey Kurtzman. I knew that later. Id
seen him around, but I didnt know his name was Harvey
Kurtzman. And he would laugh at some of my jokes and I
said, This guy is for me! He says, You looking for work?
He says, Yeah, we are, too. Harvey had just finished with
Scientific American, something like that, and he had a
friend who gave Harvey work. He was coming from that
[Scientific American] building, or going toward it, I dont
know which way. We met, and he and I got together and
he said, Lets draw up some things.
GROTH: But that was a little bit later. You started the
Charles William Harvey Studio prior to that.
ELDER: Thats right. It was a little later.
GROTH: So the first time you met Harvey was in 1947.
ELDER: Yeah. I was on the street in New York, minding
my own business. That worked out well for us.
GROTH: Did Harvey know John Severin?
ELDER: Oh, yeah. We all knew Johnny. Harvey didnt
get along with Johnny. There were conflicts. Not for me
to go into. He may see this and come after me with a
shotgun. [Laughter.]
GROTH: And who could blame him? You knew Harry
Jaffee. What was he like?
ELDER: Als brother was doing very well. He was doing
airplanes and knocking them out maybe a dozen at a
time; these Kitty Hawks or whatever they were called.
Hed put them in the window of Brentanos in New York,
a very popular and famous souvenir store or bookstore.
I think it was selling something like that.
GROTH: These were replicas of the Wright Bros.
airplane?
ELDER: No. They were later than that. I would say that
they were like Piper Cubs. They were about a foot in
diameter. He handmade them by the dozen. He had a
system. I would help him. I would do the tracings on the

22

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

illustration board. He would dip his brush into some

kind of egg tempera paint. Hed go over it as if he were
some kind of machine or something. He had some kind
of a system that worked really well, and he made a lot
of money doing it.
GROTH: And then he sold them directly to stores?
ELDER: Well, he worked through Brentanos. Theyd pay
him per job and theyd sell them. And then hed pay me.
He paid me very little.
GROTH: And that would have been in the early 40s,
before you
ELDER: I think it was somewhere in 1938.
GROTH: Is Jaffee older than you are?
ELDER: Als about a year older and Harry was a little
younger than I was. Harry died a number of years ago.
GROTH: You started the Charles William Harvey Studio
I think in 1947?
ELDER: Yeah. That was Fiasco Incorporated.
GROTH: [Joking.] Well, Im sure you had nothing to do
with that part of it.
ELDER: Well, I was part of it. Thats the idea. We were
on the second or third floor. Im not quite sure. But
Id make paper airplanes and throw them out of the
window into the street. And of course on the paper airplanes was written in beautiful block letters, Charles
William Harvey Studio is now open.
GROTH: Did you get arrested for doing that?
ELDER: No. It was just people picking up papers and
throwing them into the gutter.
Of course, we experienced a fire. Somebody was fooling
around on some other floor and there was a fire. Smoke
was billowing into the rest of the hallway and we had to
evacuate the building.
GROTH: Let me back up a little bit. Who was Charlie
Stern, the Charles of Charles William Harvey?
ELDER: Charlie was another Music and Art-er. We had
that in common. We had a few laughs when we met
in the streets of New York retelling the stories about
Music and Art, talking about teachers and episodes
with some of our classmates who were kind of freakish.
We thought it was fun and that we ought to get together
more often and maybe as a team we could pick up some
work and the public wont know the difference.
GROTH: So you guys just eventually got together and
decided that you could do better as a studio than you
could individually?
ELDER: Thats right. I knew somebody in the movie
business. Her father worked as an executive for 20th
Century Foxs Manhattan branch. She also was a Music
and Art-er. That school turned out some very interesting people and some well-dressed people.
GROTH: Didnt you do work for a movie featuring Ernie
Tubbs and the Singing Cowboys?
ELDER: Thats right. Your memory is very good. That
was one of those grade B-movies.
GROTH: What would you have done on it? A movie
poster or something like that?

ELDER: It was a press book. The kind of thing that was

sent around to theater owners, I guess, advertising
this new movie coming out. I would try to capture the
expression on his face. He would sing with a guitar in
his hands, I think. There was a montage of other people
in the background, riding horses. It was just chock full
of photos and lettering. I think Charlie would letter. We
all would undertake various jobs doing it and turning
it out.
GROTH: You were essentially doing commercial work?
ELDER: Yeah, cause thats where we could pay the rent.
GROTH: Did you work together or was it always
individually?
ELDER: If there was enough work wed work individually. [Telephone beep.] Hello? I must have pressed the
wrong button here or something.

The teacher opened this

closet door, and there I
was hanging from one of
the hooks, my face pale as
a ghost. Id rubbed some
chalk on my face. And the
teacher screamed and ran
down the hall. Before he
could come back I was
all cleaned up and sitting
in my desk like it never
happened.
GROTH: No button pressing.
ELDER: Only pants pressed.
GROTH: Right. So did you ever work together on a project where you would all draw on the same project?
ELDER: Well, if we had enough work wed work individually. Somehow we were kind of confused in who was
running the show, who was president of the agency.
Heres a classic example of what happened. And Harvey
and I would always retell this at conventions. Being a
business without a president doesnt work too well.
Someone has to be in charge. So we took a vote, but
everyone voted for himself. Thats what we wanted to
avoid. The idea was to put these tabs in a hat, pick it out
and thats how we finally got ourselves straightened out
as to whose name is first mentioned in the organization.

GROTH: So thats how you decided that? I was wondering how you chose the order of the names.
ELDER: It could have been something out of a hat or a
bowl or something like that.
GROTH: How long was the studio in business?
ELDER: Id say six or seven months, maybe eight months.
I think it was less than a year.
GROTH: Wasnt John Severin involved in it for a while?
ELDER: Hed come up and visit. We had other guys in
the business who would come up and visit. Theyd shoot
the breeze, sit around. Theyd bring up some lunch once
in a while a sandwich, a Coke. I would fool around
and they would kibbitz around. We had a lot of guys ...
One fellow Jahorson? Leon Gehorsin? Ive never
gotten the spelling of his name but he was the architect
that designed some of the main buildings at Farleigh
Dickensen University, he was an architect, also a Music
and Art-er. We were all from Music and Art. We had
that in common. We could relate stories and get a lot of
chuckles and laughs as if we were old schoolmates.

HI GH S C HOOL PRA NK S
GROTH: My impression is that you didnt really know
Kurtzman in high school even though you both went to
the same school.
ELDER: But hed seen me many times. I was oblivious to
a lot of people because I was only interested in making
them laugh and getting along with my fellow students.
GROTH: It sounds like he was aware of you because you
were quite a prankster.
ELDER: A prankster and a class clown looking for popularity of some sort. Yeah.
GROTH: But you werent aware of him?
ELDER: No. Id seen him. I saw him but I never even
spoke to him. He was an underclassmate of mine by one
year.
GROTH: So you really met him for the first time on the
street eventually and shortly thereafter ...
ELDER: He brought up the fact that he saw me in the
telephone booth the other week and he thought I was
very funny. He had a remarkable memory.
GROTH: Do you want to tell me what the telephone booth
prank was?
ELDER: Well, I would try to capture the attention of my
classmates, who would sit at this one favorite table of
ours. I would fool around, make some strange things
with my food. Ive forgotten at this point what it was
but it had them laughing. Then I sneaked into this telephone booth at the end of the lunchroom. Id take this
hat. It was in the winter. There was cold weather like
it is around here now. Id take this cap, button it on the
bottom. It was like the old-fashioned Fokker German
Ace, Baron Von Richthofen type of German Ace. Id button it on the bottom of my chin, and I had this dribble
of catsup dribbling from the corner of my mouth. And

The WILL ELDER Interview

23

Id take a pack of cigarettes, light a few, and drop them

on the floor of the phone booth and then stomp on them
so the smoke would rise and that was the plane going
down in flames. And I would be hanging out crawling
on the floor and taking some of the forks and knives
and making a clatter of some sort. And they looked and
theyd say, My God, it looks like a Grade-B movie.
GROTH: Im collecting these anecdotes about the crazy
stunts you would pull.
ELDER: Well, another one was about the closet.
GROTH: Yes. The closet in the schoolroom.
ELDER: I never showed up to class on time and the teacher
would ask where I was. And one day someone said they
saw me in the building. They knew that I was in school.
And the teacher says, Where did you see him last? And
he says, pretty much on this floor, somewhere down the
hall. And the period was over. The teacher opened this
closet door, and there I was hanging from one of the
hooks, my face pale as a ghost. Id rubbed some chalk
on my face. And the teacher screamed and ran down the
hall. Before he could come back I was all cleaned up and
sitting in my desk like it never happened.
GROTH: What prompted you to go to such lengths?
ELDER: Well, I was supposed to hand something in and
I didnt have it. I didnt have my assignment and I
thought it would be better putting it off a day or two
rather than getting a zero.
GROTH: But I mean in general. You did a lot of these
intricate stunts. What prompted them?

From Ganefs! in Mad #1

( 2013 DC Comics).

24

The Comics Journal Library Volume 8: THE EC ARTISTS

ELDER: It was attention-getting, to be very honest with

you. And having fun doing it and making friends who
admired that sort of thing because I had the guts to go
ahead and do those kinds of things.
GROTH: Harvey Kurtzman said once, Many years later
Willy told me he resented his clown period because
he realized, as many clowns do, that they are clowns
because they want desperately to be loved.
ELDER: Yeah. I think thats the dilemma of most clowns.
They want your sympathy. And they do it by painstaking moves, by sacrificing their own health and happiness so that others can be happy and healthy. Thats the
way most clowns work.
GROTH: Do you regret having done all of that?
ELDER: No, because it gave me a background of how
it felt to be liked and admired and simpatico. Harvey
analyzed it quite correctly when he said that I should
put that stuff on paper. That I should put it down, write
it down. All the exploits that Id gone through should
be written on paper. If not written, at least drawn in a
cartoon style. Which I eventually did.
GROTH: Now, back then, that would have been mid to
late 30s when you were probably doing a lot of that stuff
in high school. Were there comedians you liked? You
mentioned the Marx Brothers.
ELDER: The Marx Brothers, of course. They were the
wackos of the day. Laurel and Hardy very subtle but
two beautifully committed guys who I loved very much.
Harold Lloyd this goes way back. I would go to these

film festivals. Not that I was there when it first played.

Id go to a film festival and see all of the Harold Lloyd
films. Chaplin. Buster Keaton. All of these classic comedians. They wrote their own material and did their own
stunts. It never ceases to amaze me.
GROTH: So you had a real affinity with those physical
comedians.
ELDER: Yeah, physical and it was mentally done on the
screen, too. The ideas were put there, too. I thought it
was all the physical myself, but eventually I found out
that they thought of these things. They were their own
producers, writers, directors all in one man.
GROTH: It also occurs to me that a lot of their humor
Keaton, Chaplin, the Marx Brothers was very
intricately thought through. It occurs to me that a lot of
your humor drawing is very intricately thought through
as well.
ELDER: Thats true. I would apply these characters to
a situation. The situation had to absorb these people
and become something like a fiasco. They fail at what
they do, and thats very human. If you fail at what
youre doing after thinking about making some creative
beauty out of anything, and you fail at it, whatever it
is, you gain the sympathy of many people. You find out
that you certainly have a lot of friends.
GROTH: This is getting ahead of myself, but let me just
ask you this question because it seems appropriate: A lot
of your humor work has a spontaneous quality to it, but
its also obviously very calculated, very thought through.
ELDER: Well, I use a mirror and I use myself as a model.
And I get that feeling. The trick is to feel like the character might feel in any situation. If something saddens
me, I will let you know by giving the classic expression
of a person who is sad: mouth turned down, the eye
sloping downwards toward a point, eyes half open, half
closed. Whatever. The clown. The clown is always looking
sad. Either sad or extremely happy. Both extremes are
exposed by a clown.
GROTH: And I guess thats the reason for his profundity.
ELDER: Thats true.

BAC K TO TH E CWH S T UD I O
GROTH: Let me get back to my chronology. The Charles
William Harvey Studio lasted six months or so
ELDER: We moved to another building that was over
a restaurant. I think the proprietor, the owner of the
restaurant, resented the fact that we had friends coming up there at will. There was like all of these people,
potential customers, but theyre not going to my shop,
theyre going upstairs. It was all of the fellows from
Music and Art that I mentioned earlier.
GROTH: Not clients.
ELDER: Not clients. No. People like Dave Berg, Leon
Georhsin, Jules Feiffer, Ren Goscinny and other neer
do wells!

GROTH: I assume both of these locations were in

Manhattan?
ELDER: Yeah.
GROTH: I assume it didnt last longer because you
werent successful?
ELDER: Correct.
GROTH: Thats why I am where I am today. So you just
werent getting the work?
ELDER: Thats exactly right. Any work at all would interest me. I felt anything I did added to the experience of
just getting around and proving my way.
GROTH: Learning the ropes.
ELDER: Learning the ropes is right.
GROTH: You dont strike me as a real hustler type.
ELDER: Well, I was too busy. I would never brag. I was
rather timid. I felt my work should do the speaking for
me.
GROTH: I was going to say, by temperament you dont
strike me as being a hustler. Was there a hustler in the
studio who could go out and try to get work?
ELDER: Stern. And Harvey more so than me but not
too much more. We were too busy knocking out some
stories and we thought that we had no time or place for
feeling sorry for ourselves.
GROTH: So after the Charles William Harvey Studio
ended, which would have been in 48, did you start
working at EC, inking John Severins work?
ELDER: Yeah. Well, John Severin was tied up with
Simon and Kirby. It was through the organization
of Charles William Harvey that it came to fruition.
Harvey had worked for Stan Lee at Marvel. And
hed always do his work at the Charles William
Harvey Studio. I saw the work that he did. I said,
Is there any chance that I can find some work up
there myself? Harvey says, Yeah. Go up. Call Stan
Lee or go up and see somebody there and see what
they have, which I did. And I got something. I dont
remember what it was, but it was something. And
through that, people began to know me, and vice
versa. I think its who you know in this business as
well as what you know.
GROTH: Now you started off inking Severins work at
EC? The war books?
ELDER: Yeah. I felt that I could work on a finished product much better than if I was working at it day to day.
GROTH: Do you mean better or faster?
ELDER: Faster and better. For some reason or other I
had the ability to do that. I couldnt explain it, but perhaps its because the pencils gave me all the guidance
I needed. The inking came very natural. I started with
American Eagle. I think it was about an Indian who
was very loyal to our country.
GROTH: And you inked that?
ELDER: I inked it.
GROTH: And Severin penciled. Then, you went on to ink
the war stories at EC that Harvey wrote?
ELDER: Yeah. Correct. Two-Fisted Tales. That sort of thing.

The WILL ELDER Interview

25