031_04 - A Thank You Note from DC Comics...
When I first started getting "serious" about comic books, I thought about a possible career. My drawing skills seemed weak, but I found tracing rewarding so considered being an inker. I also enjoyed writing and telling tales, so writing seemed a possibility.

For sure, I was in a heavy correspondence mode. I had numerous friends around the country and wrote regularly. In fact, I developed a number of strong friendships with folks I never met, or wouldn't meet for years to come. I also wrote to publications.

My first letter to DC Comics was written for the Secret Six comic book back in 1968. Not a successful comic, it only ran 7 issues, it was a variation on the (then) popular MISSION IMPOSSIBLE TV series. The sight of seeing my name in print was truly exciting.

I began to write at least a letter a month to the comics I was reading. These would have been SUPERMAN, BATMAN, WORLD'S FINEST COMICS, DETECTIVE COMICS, ACTION COMICS, THE CREEPER (another short lived entry), THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD, SUPERMAN'S PAL JIMMY OLSEN, SUPERMAN'S GAL LOIS LANE, GREEN LANTERN and even SECRET SIX. Yes, they are all DC comics. At the time I bought just about every DC superhero comic. I found no interest in the Marvel line, though I think the first 21 issues of THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN are some of the best-written and drawn comics of all time.

None of my letters ever saw print. But I did receive this nifty jumbo postcard, measuring a whopping 5x7 inches. I may have actually received more than one, but one is all that remains in my "keep" boxes. The card stated they got so much mail; they could not always answer them individually. It also said that my letter was read and was important. (Sounds like what big corporation answer machines say about my call to them!)

After about a year, I gave up writing letters to DC. I also stopped tracing art. My new focus became writing stories, scripts, columns, books, histories and such.