Stan the Man, a brief history
Stan Lee joined what was to become Marvel Comics, when he was 16 years old. Just one year later he was the youngest editor in the business. But when World War II came around, he joined the Army, serving in the Signal Corps. For three years, the Army had Lee write training films and manuals for all branches of military service. Stan Lee has the distinction of becoming one of only nine men, including William Saroyan, in the U.S. Army to be given the military classification "playwright."
It was in the early '60s that Stan Lee ushered in what has come to be known as "The Marvel Age of Comics," creating major new superheroes while breathing life and style into such old favorites as Captain America, The Human Torch and The Sub Mariner.
During his first twenty-five years at Marvel's helm, as editor, art director and head writer, Stan scripted no fewer than two and as many as five complete comic books per week. His prodigious output may comprise the largest body of published work by any single writer. Additionally, Stan wrote newspaper features, radio and television scripts, and screenplays.
By the time he was named publisher of Marvel Comics in 1972, Stan Lee's comics were the nation's biggest sellers. In 1977, Stan brought Spider-Man into the newspapers in the form of a syndicated strip. This seven-days-a-week feature which he has written and edited since its inception, is today the most successful of all syndicated adventure strips, appearing in more than 500 newspapers worldwide.
Stan Lee has written more than a dozen best-selling books including The Origins of Marvel Comics, The Silver Surfer, How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way, Bring on the Bad Guys and The Superhero Women. He also wrote the introduction to the best-selling coffee-table book Marvel: Five Fabulous Decades of the World's Greatest Comics. Recently, he published his autobiography.
Lee was the co-executive producer of the syndicated Marvel Action Hour starring The Fantastic Four and Iron Man and the Saturday morning series The X-Men. He also acted as the Executive Producer of UPN's The Incredible Hulk.
Although he left regular comic scripting behind, he continued to write his weekly column "Stan's Soapbox" for many years. And from time to time he still finds time to script the occasional comic. He continues to write the daily newspaper comic strip Spider-Man.
Stan Lee recently ended his exclusive agreement with Marvel Comics, although he still acts as the don of Marvel Comics, making cameos in many of the Marvel films in the past few years. A host of Dot Com ventures and even some work for DC has also kept him busy.
