How many comics was Jack Kirby drawing simultaneously in the 60s? 3 3

[William-James88]

We all know he was the King but after years of collecting I am still amazed that my Marvel Silver Age collection is 75% Kirby art. I don't collect everything though so I just wanted to check, were these all the books being simultaneously released on a monthly basis containing his art?

Fantastic Four

Journey into Mystery

Tales of Suspense

X-Men

Avengers

Strange Tales

 

Edited July 6, 2020 by William-James88

[FoggyNelson]

He was cranking them out at that time an they were all top notch‼️‼️😷😷😷😷

[bc]

paging @KirbyJack   

[KirbyJack]

It’s a layered question: give me a month and year, maybe? No question that Kirby was prolific!

[William-James88]

31 minutes ago, KirbyJack said:

It’s a layered question: give me a month and year, maybe? No question that Kirby was prolific!

I am wondering the most at the same time. Were all the ones I mentioned drawn by him and released the same month at one point ? Or the same year at some point? I know he could finish a monthly book in a week but that still only means he could produce at most 4 books a month. And yet it seems like the monthly output was higher than that. Like those 6 books I mention seem to come out within the same timeframe, no?

Edited July 6, 2020 by William-James88

[KirbyJack]

I'll look into it.

Kinda hip-deep in domestic stuff for a while!

[Dave2739]

@KirbyJack correct me if I'm wrong, but to my recollection at one point he was regularly doing FF, JIM/Thor, the Cap strip in TOS, plus odds and ends. But FF and Thor were consistent for several years.

[KirbyJack]

3 minutes ago, Dave2739 said:

@KirbyJack correct me if I'm wrong, but to my recollection at one point he was regularly doing FF, JIM/Thor, the Cap strip in TOS, plus odds and ends. But FF and Thor were consistent for several years.

That was his LIGHT workload. I've got data I'll look up, but circa 1964, The King went to WORK.

[The Lions Den]

The first few issues of Sgt. Fury come to mind...and he was doing a lot of covers as well.  

[KirbyJack]

In November of 1963, he drew 139 pages and 7 covers. By 1964 and 65, he was doing more than 100 issues each year. Here are typical titles.

[KirbyJack]

Later issues of Avengers, X-Men, Astonish and Suspense were lay outs, but he was still plotting those stories. He wasn’t getting paid for plotting the layout books, of course...

Edited July 7, 2020 by KirbyJack

[William-James88]

33 minutes ago, KirbyJack said:

In November of 1963, he drew 139 pages and 7 covers. By 1964 and 65, he was doing more than 100 issues each year. Here are typical titles.

Thanks but I still dont know the answer, since I see covers there as well.

What is the highest amount of concurrently released comic titles that had Kirby interiors? 

We can look at dates if it easier. So in 64, how many different titles had interiors by Kirby. Is the answer higher for 65? 

[Ken Aldred]

1 hour ago, KirbyJack said:

Later issues of Avengers, X-Men, Astonish and Suspense were lay outs, but he was still plotting those stories. He wasn’t getting paid for those, of course...

The style he shifted to in the mid-60s, the looser, more exaggerated style, might have been done to make the workload a bit easier?

Compare the later Captain America stories in Tales of Suspense to the more detailed art and more realistic figure work in the earlier issues.

Just a thought.

Edited July 7, 2020 by Ken Aldred

[shadroch]

As many pages of art Kirby was doing in the 60s,  Marvel published even more in the 1970s. 

In 1974/75, Marvel was reprinting the FF, the Avengers, Sgt Fury, TOS, Thor, and a half-dozen Pre-Hero books. When Jack jumped to DC, it seemed like Marvel flooded the stands with Kirby books, for which he he got nothing.

[thehumantorch]

7 hours ago, KirbyJack said:

In November of 1963, he drew 139 pages and 7 covers. By 1964 and 65, he was doing more than 100 issues each year. Here are typical titles.

139 pages and 7 covers in a month is an insane output

[Mr bla bla]

41 minutes ago, shadroch said:

As many pages of art Kirby was doing in the 60s,  Marvel published even more in the 1970s. 

In 1974/75, Marvel was reprinting the FF, the Avengers, Sgt Fury, TOS, Thor, and a half-dozen Pre-Hero books. When Jack jumped to DC, it seemed like Marvel flooded the stands with Kirby books, for which he he got nothing.

The suits at marvel really knew how to wage a war against the man who virtually created marvel (ie. Its content). Heck they even stole his OA. And when they were ordered by law to return it, mysteriously large parts went missing the night before it was to be returned. mess happens right?

[KirbyJack]

10 hours ago, William-James88 said:

Thanks but I still dont know the answer, since I see covers there as well.

What is the highest amount of concurrently released comic titles that had Kirby interiors? 

We can look at dates if it easier. So in 64, how many different titles had interiors by Kirby. Is the answer higher for 65? 

Yeah, still not a definitive answer. I can dive deeper tomorrow, but you get a sense of it; Kirby did almost all the covers for the company, and penciled and plotted the majority of the interiors. 

Most contained multiple stories, so there are many comics with 5-10 page Kirby contributions. Factor in the layout books, and you can have up to 9 issues in one month. 

I'm interested myself, so I'll get an answer!

[William-James88]

30 minutes ago, KirbyJack said:

I'm interested myself, so I'll get an answer!

Nice, thanks! Honestly, I thought it would be something I could easily find on google, with him being such a prominent figure in the genre populating mainstream media the most at the moment. And yet I just couldn't find an answer.

[telerites]

Not sure if this is helpful but doing a search on GCD using the criteria below (which excludes covers), the total was 61.  The link to the search results is lengthy but it is below.  If that is the right track and someone wants to continue the research for other years, it would be easy to do.

https://www.comics.org/search/advanced/process/?target=sequence&method=icontains&logic=False&keywords=&title=&feature=&job_number=&pages=&pages_uncertain=&type=19&-script=&pencils=jack+kirby&inks=&colors=&letters=&story_editing=&first_line=&characters=&synopsis=&reprint_notes=&story_reprinted=&notes=&issues=&volume=&issue_title=&variant_name=&is_variant=&issue_date=&indicia_frequency=&price=&issue_pages=&issue_pages_uncertain=&issue_editing=&isbn=&barcode=&rating=&issue_notes=&issue_reprinted=&is_indexed=&order1=series&order2=date&order3=&start_date=1964-01-01&end_date=1964-12-31&updated_since=&pub_name=marvel&pub_notes=&brand_group=&brand_emblem=&brand_notes=&indicia_publisher=&is_surrogate=&ind_pub_notes=&series=&series_year_began=&series_notes=&tracking_notes=&issue_count=&is_comics=&color=&dimensions=&paper_stock=&binding=&publishing_format=

Advanced search for Stories with search method 'Contains', behavior 'AND all fields' and the search terms:
type: comic story	pub_name: marvel
end_date: 1964-12-31	pencils: jack kirby
start_date: 1964-01-01

[01TheDude]

I'd be interested in the amount of art he was doing during those 1970s years at DC too. The Fourth World  books seemed like they were also churned out at amazing speed.