History of the Golden and Silver Age of Comic Books

History of the Golden and Silver Age of Comic Books — Comic book scholars have classified American comics into eras based on content, the medium which they were printed on, and what was going on in the world at that particular time. The Golden Age was the most revolutionary and saw the greatest amount of change. The Silver Age came after the Golden Age and this era was greatly influenced by the implementation of the Comics Code Authority. Comics from this era saw a reformation. These eras do not have a definitive start and end but there are characteristics of each era that help distinguish them from one another.
Antecedents
In the late 19th century, comic strips began to be published in the Sunday edition of newspapers. The very first of these comic strips was created by Richard Felton Outcault. Outcault created a character by the name of The Yellow Kid, which appeared in the February 16 issue of The Hearst New York American in 1896. By March of the following year, Outcault’s Yellow Kid strips were being compiled and published into Hearst’s Sunday Journal and sold for five cents a journal. From the beginning of the 20th century up until the 1930s, Americans saw many publishers attempt to recreate The Yellow Kid’s success with their own characters. While most companies were unsuccessful, there were a number of characters that gained popularity and still remain popular to this day.
Max Gaines came to be known as the forefather of comics. It was his idea to sell reprints of Sunday comics in newsstands in an organized tabloid. Since America was experiencing a depression, Gaines wanted the comics to be affordable so he decided to advertise them with the price of ten cents, which was clearly advertised on the cover. These early comic books contained reprints of Little Orphan Annie, Popeye, and Dick Tracy, to name a few. They provided children and teens with hours of inexpensive entertainment during a period when families were faced with little or no money for food, let alone an outside source of fun.
In February 1935, an ex-cavalry officer by the name of Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson started publishing tabloid sized comic books titled New Fun Comics #1 under the company National Allied Publications, which would later become DC Comics. This was an important time in the history of American comics because up until this point comic books were just reprints of the Sunday comic strips. Wheeler-Nicholson became the first person to publish a comic book that contained completely new material. Since all the material was new, there weren’t any recognizable characters in New Fun Comics #1. Most of the stories were written by Wheeler-Nicholson himself. He took a great risk by publishing all new stories and characters in a new format and it turned out to be a great success.
In December 1935 Wheeler-Nicholson launched a second comic titled New Comics #1 which contained all new material and characters as well. In 1937, after 11 issues, Wheeler-Nicholson changed the title to New Adventure Comics. He would later change the title again, after 31 issues, to Adventure Comics, and it would remain under this name until it ceased publication in 1983 after 503 issues. Wheeler-Nicholson was generating success and decided to launch a third title. Despite the success he was having with his first two titles, he was experiencing some financial trouble and was forced to hire a partner by the name of Harry Donenfeld. Together Wheeler-Nicholson and Donenfield created the company Detective Comics.
Wheeler-Nicholson’s previous two comics contained various unrelated stories and they wanted this comic to contain one theme, detective stories. Despite the growing popularity of Detective Comics, Wheeler-Nicholson still could not escape his financial troubles and was forced to sell his share of the company to Donenfield in late 1937, less than a year after starting the company. Eventually Donenfield would change the title of his company to its initials, DC Comics.
While Donenfield and DC were getting established, other influential artists were hard at work. In February 1936 Lee Falk of King Features created a character for a daily newspaper comic strip called The Phantom. The Phantom was outfitted in a skintight purple bodysuit and a black mask, making him the first costumed superhero. Although Phantom didn’t have superpowers, he could still subdue his opponents with his strength, intellect, and ghost-like characteristics. The Phantom would become a color Sunday comic strip on May 28, 1939 and is still in production today. Lee Falk and his character The Phantom would influence and inspire many artists to create similar crime fighting superheroes sparking the era that would later be known as the Golden Age.
The Golden Age begins
While there isn’t a definitive “start” to the Golden Age of comics, some believe the introduction of Superman by DC Comics in 1938 in Action Comics #1 marked the beginning. Kane created something that had not been done before, a dark detective with a secret identity that could stop crime with his intellect and intimidation. Kane’s Batman first appeared in Donenfield’s Detective Comics in May 1939. By April 1940 Batman had become so popular that it received its own self-titled comic book published by DC Comics.
Clearly, the Golden Age has become synonymous with the introduction of costumed superheroes. Soon drugstore shelves were packed with comic books containing tales of masked men whose focus was to put an end to criminal activity as their main priority. Superman and Batman were doing so well that DC and sister company All-American Comics introduced other superheroes to their repertoire.
At this point in time America was at war and it was influencing the comic industry considerably. Superhero comic books flourished during this time because Americans saw these comics as a way to keep their spirits up. Reading about the reduction of crime, bad guys getting what they deserve, and an overall sense of justice helped Americans stay positive and superheroes were their inspiration during a time of loss and uncertainty. By 1941, characters like Batman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Lantern, and Aquaman had been established as popular superheroes.
America was experiencing a rise in juvenile crime and some authorities believed this to be a direct result of what was being published by the comic book companies. There were many comics being printed that contained stories of violence, sexual content, drugs, and crime. It started to become a concern to parents and schools all across the country. Comics were being banned from schools and homes and eventually Legislature passed laws limiting and even banning the sale of comics. Needless to say the comic industry was experiencing dark times.
The faith in comics would only become worse with the 1954 release of Dr. Frederick Wertham’s book The Seduction of the Innocent. Dr. Wertham strongly believed comics were corrupting America’s youth and he professed his thoughts in a 400 page attack on the comic book industry. The Senate committee agreed with Dr. Wertham and felt it was necessary to implement rules that prohibit any material that could potentially demoralize anyone that read the comic, particularly children. While his book may seem like it was written in response to only crime and horror comics, Dr. Wertham felt that even Batman contained drawings and material that was too lewd. Now that comics containing vulgar language and art were becoming less popular it created a window of opportunity for the beloved superhero comics to return.
The Silver Age begins
This rebirth of the superhero has become known as the Silver Age of comics. Comic scholars have gone on to say that the Silver Age began when DC decided to reintroduce their successful characters from the Golden Age. The first character to be revived was The Flash in the comic in October 1956. The Flash had originally been introduced during January 1940, but the Silver Age Flash was not a complete revival of the original character. The Silver Age stories of The Flash did not simply pick up where the Golden Age Flash left off. In fact, the only similarities were his name and his super speed. The revival of The Flash was an immediate hit so DC decided to bring back another character from the Golden Age, Green Lantern.<ref name="Miller" />
Green Lantern, like The Flash, reappeared in an issue of Showcase in 1959. Bringing Green Lantern back proved to be a good idea and in July of the following year Green Lantern was awarded his own title. Like The Flash, Green Lantern did not pick up where it left off in the Golden Age.
Marvel Comics’ publisher Martin Goodman saw the success DC was having with The Flash and Green Lantern and it sparked an idea Goodman had for the future of Marvel Comics. With Stan Lee and Jack Kirby as part of Marvel’s staff, Goodman ordered the duo to create a team of superheroes. In November 1961 Lee and Kirby created a team of four superheroes known as The Fantastic Four. The Fantastic Four were an instant hit. The following year, Marvel decided to raise the price of their comics from the standard of ten cents per issue to twelve cents per issue. The increase in price, however, did not stop consumers from purchasing Marvel Comics. While DC ruled the Golden Age and even sparked the Silver Age, Marvel was the most successful company of the Silver Age. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby would go on to create legendary characters and write amazing stories.
In 1962 Lee approached Martin Goodman with an idea of a character that had the senses and abilities of a spider, they would call him Spider-Man. Spider-Man made his debut in the August 1962 issue of Amazing Fantasy and by March of the following year he was awarded his own title, The Amazing Spider-Man. Spider-Man, and his secret identity of Peter Parker, was unique because he was more involved in his personal problems than fighting crime, which differed from most of the superheroes before him. Some readers even felt that Spider-Man was a criminal after the first few issues. It wasn’t until his Uncle Ben was murdered that Spider-Man began to fight crime.<ref name="Santos" />
Marvel continued to dominate the superhero genre during the 1960s. By 1969 the price of comics rose again from 12 cents to 15 cents and nearly all of Marvel’s competition was struggling. DC canceled most of its titles and the Silver Age was coming to an end.
The Silver Age also experienced a rise in pop art. Roy Lichtenstein, one of the greatest pop artists of all time, picked individual panels from comic books and repainted them with some minor modifications. Lichtenstein’s art generated some controversy because the artists that inspired his work, Jack Kirby for example, were not receiving any credit.
Beginning of the Modern Age
While there isn’t a clear cut event that ended the Silver Age, some comic scholars believe that the Silver Age was officially over when Jack Kirby returned to DC Comics. Later that year both Marvel and DC increased the price of their comics from 15 cents to 25 cents and also increased the length of the comics from 36 pages to 52 pages. After a month of 52-page comics Marvel returned to the 36-page format but would only drop the price to 20 cents.
The Golden and Silver Ages of comics were a time when comic enthusiasts purchased comic books for the sole purpose of enjoying the great artwork and the incredible stories produced by the artists. The thought of buying comic books to keep them in their protective sleeves and have them sit on a shelf would not cross the mind of a true enthusiast from these eras. Unfortunately shortly after the Silver Age ended, the trend of purchasing comics for collection purposes grew immensely and some would believe that the stories suffered as a result. This marks the beginning of the Modern Age of comics. Not many artists from the Golden and Silver ages are still working on comics and with the introduction of many new media forms, the way comics are created has changed considerably.

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