William M. Gaines
| William Gaines | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born | William Maxwell Gaines March 1, 1922 Brooklyn, New York |
| Died | June 3, 1992 (aged 70) |
| Nationality | US |
| Area(s) | Writer, Editor, Publisher |
|
Notable works
|
Mad EC Comics |
William Maxwell "Bill" Gaines (March 1, 1922 – June 3, 1992), was an American publisher and co-editor of EC Comics. Following a shift in EC's direction in 1950, Gaines presided over what became an artistically influential and historically important line of mature-audience comics. He published the popular satirical magazine Mad for over 40 years.
He was posthumously inducted into the comic book industry's Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame (1993) and the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame (1997). In 2012, he was inducted into the Ghastly Awards' Hall of Fame.
Gaines was the son of Max Gaines, who as publisher of the All-American Comics division of DC Comics was also an influential figure in the history of comics. The elder Gaines tested the idea of packaging and selling comics on newsstands in 1933. In 1941, Max Gaines accepted William Moulton Marston's proposal for the first successful female superhero, Wonder Woman.
As World War II began, Bill Gaines was rejected by the United States Army, United States Coast Guard and United States Navy, so he went to his draft board and requested to be drafted. He trained as an Army Air Corps photographer at Lowry Field in Denver. However, when he was assigned to an Oklahoma City field which did not have a photographic facility, he wound up on permanent KP duty. As he explained in 1976 to Bill Craig of Stars and Stripes, "Being an eater, this assignment was a real pleasure for me. There were four of us, and we always found all the choice bits the cooks had hidden away. We'd be frying up filet mignon and ham steaks every night. The hours were great, too. I think it was eight hours on and 40 off."
...
Wikipedia