Bob Layton

Bob Layton
Bob Layton at the 2014 New York Comic Con
Born	1953
Nationality	American
Area(s)	Writer, Penciller, Inker, Editor
Notable works	Iron Man, Hercules, various Valiant Comics
http://www.boblayton.com

Bob Layton (born 1953) is an American comic book artist, writer, and editor, notable for his work on Marvel Comics titles such as Iron Man and Hercules, and for co-founding Valiant Comics with Jim Shooter.

Bob Layton was born on September 25, 1953. He learned to read comics from the age of four, explaining that his "older sister Sue became bored with reading the same comic to me about fifty times. (It was a Showcase featuring the Challengers of the Unknown.)"

After leaving high school, Layton began "playing comics dealer . . . selling them out of his apartment in Indianapolis," through which he met Roger Stern in 1973, while the latter was working for a radio station in Indianapolis.

Layton and Stern began publishing a fanzine called CPL (Contemporary Pictorial Literature) out of Layton's apartment.

Stern recalls that, "CPL started out as Bob's sale catalog. Bob was drawing the covers and including little reviews written by some of his customers. By issue #5, it turned into a small 'zine with a catalog insert, and I started writing short articles for it. I eventually became an editor of sorts."

CPL rapidly became a popular fan publication, and led to the two forming an alliance with Charlton Comics to produce and publish "the now-famous Charlton Bullseye magazine." During the mid-1970s, both Marvel and DC were publishing in-house "fan" publications (F.O.O.M. and The Amazing World of DC Comics respectively), and Charlton wished to make inroads into the superhero market, as well as "establish a fan presence", leading to the alliance with CPL to produce the Charlton Bullseye. This led to Charlton giving Layton and Stern "access to unpublished material from their vaults by the likes of Steve Ditko, Jeff Jones and a host of others." This association with Charlton (and Bill Pearson, production manager) in turn led to Layton becoming acquainted with the legendary Wally Wood, with whom he apprenticed. This apprenticeship led to work for Charlton on anthology titles, but not working from the Charlton offices, Marvel Comics and DC Comics, while still publishing fanzines.