A BIRTHDAY SALUTE: The celebrated Mr. K crosses universes with a DC workhorse… — UPDATED 12/17/25: The late Dick Dillin was born 97 years ago! Perfect time to reprint this piece from 2020. Dig it. — Dan — By PAUL KUPPERBERG In 1968, Dick Dillin (December 17, 1928 – March 1, 1980), the penciller of DC Comics’ Blackhawk, hovered on the periphery of my comic fan awareness. I was a superhero fan first and foremost, and titles in other genres had to work very hard to get my attention. Blackhawk was somewhere in between superhero and not; created in 1941 for Quality Comics by Chuck Cuidera, Bob Powell and Will Eisner, it was originally a World War II military aviation feature that evolved postwar into an adventure strip. When DC acquired the Quality catalogue in 1956, Dillin, who had been penciling the book, came along for the ride. And what a deal! With a solid style and sense of storytelling, Dillin easily accommodated stories crammed with seven regular characters and their Grumman XF5F Skyrocket airplanes without dropping a layout. Dillin clocked an amazing 177 issues of Blackhawk between 1951 and 1968, when the title’s new editor, Dick Giordano, changed up the creative team. You’d think after his 17-year marathon, anyone would have wanted to take a little break. But not Dick Dillin. Blackhawk #241 was cover-dated June/July 1968; the first issue of his next regular gig, Justice League of America #64 was August 1968. He didn’t even take a month off before diving into what was to become his next long haul; 119 issues over the next dozen years. Oh, and to make it even crazier, Dillin’s very first issue was Part 1 of the annual JLA/Justice Society of America crossover event, doubling the number of heroes featured in the story! And, as many memorable Dillin-drawn issues as there were, it’s his work on these crossovers that I’m spotlighting here in honor of his birthday. JLA is a lifelong favorite title of mine, discovered when it was still being drawn by Mike Sekowsky. The annual Earth-One/Earth-Two crossovers with the Golden Age JSA characters (initiated by editor Julie Schwartz and writer Gardner Fox beginning in 1963’s JLA #21–22) became probably the most eagerly awaited event of the DC Comics year. I’d originally intended to write about the Earth-One/Earth-Two JLA/JSA stories...
MORRISON MONDAYS meets TOYHEM — again! By BILL MORRISON Well blow me down! December is the birth month of Elzie Crisler Segar, the creator of Popeye the Sailor! Over the decades, Segar’s comic strip, Thimble Theatre Starring Popeye, along with the Fleischer brothers’ (and later, Famous Studios’) cartoons, generated an incalculable number of laughs, and possibly an equally multitudinous amount of toys. I was introduced to the one-eyed sailor through Popeye and His Pals, a local TV show from Windsor, Ontario, that we picked up across the Detroit River in the Motor City. The show was emceed by two sailor-themed kiddie show hosts, Captain Jolly on weekdays, and Poopdeck Paul on the weekends. I was plopped down in front of the TV set pretty much every day to watch that show, and it made me an avid Popeye fan, so naturally, Popeye toys were a part of my childhood. But it was as a young professional artist that I began collecting Popeye toys and other merchandise, due to a more serious interest in the Fleischer cartoons, and to reading the early comic strips in a series of books published by Fantagraphics. My accumulation of Popeye stuff has always competed for attention with my Batman collection, so it’s modest at best. But since December is not only Segar’s birth month (he was born Dec. 8, 1894) but also the annual TOYHEM! celebration here at 13th Dimension, I thought it would be fun to show 13 FAVORITE POPEYE TOYS from my collection! — This rubber jointed Popeye doll was made by Cameo in the 1950s. I’m still on the hunt for the missing pipe! — In the 1960s Soaky bubble bath always made bath time fun. A few decades ago, I had a huge collection of Soaky bottles featuring just about every cartoon character you can imagine, from Huckleberry Hound to Jiminy Cricket. That collection took up a lot of space, so I ended up selling most of it. But of course, along with Batman, Robin, Superman, and the Universal Monsters, I kept this wonderfully off-model Popeye bottle. — Before Spotify and iTunes, and even before Walkmans, kids took their music with them via transistor AM radios. This cool Popeye radio, complete with carry strap and wooden pipe, was made in the swingin’ ’70s by Philgee International in Hong Kong. —...
The celebrated Mr. K pays tribute to one of Supergirl’s greatest artists…
Corner boxes! Byrne! BULLPEN BULLETINS!
Kirby Krackle! Pym Particles! EXCELSIOR!
