Dave-El's Book Report: The Charlton Companion

It's time for the return of Dave-El's Book Report and today's book is The Charlton Companion by Jon B. Cooke about the history of a strange outlier in the comic book industry, Charlton Comics. 

Full disclosure: I never purchased or read a Charlton comic book. But I've always been fascinated by this unusual comic publisher, who they were, how they came about and their sad, ignominious end.   

In 1931, Italian immigrant John Santangelo Sr began what became a highly successful business publishing song-lyric magazines out of Yonkers, New York. It was a business model that involved violating copyright laws so Santangelo went to jail for that in 1934 for about year. 

In 1935, Santangelo went right back to that highly successful business, this time partnered up with lawyer Ed Levy who made sure the requisite permissions were acquired to reproduce lyrics in such magazines as Hit Parade and Big Song Magazine. 

In 1940, Santangelo and Levy  founded the T.W.O. Charles Company and would later become known as Charlton Publications.  

Printing presses that aren't printing aren't making money so Charlton got into the comic book business. 

Their first comic book was Yellowjacket, an anthology of superhero and horror stories launched September 1944.

Charlton Comics ran out of a factory building in Derby CT. Unlike other comic book operations, Charlton ran the whole process from one location: creating content, editing, production, printing and distribution.  This process actually helped the company to survive and even flourish at a time when other comic book enterprises were flaming out.  Those same practices would later drive the company to extinction. 

By the early 1950’s, the declining interest in super hero comics and the restrictions of the newly formed Comics Code Authority (CCA) were driving a lot of publishers out of the comic book business. Charlton was able to buy up a bunch of unused inventory on the cheap and greatly expanded their portfolio. With some editing to make sure this material was now CCA compliant, Charlton Comics would print virtually anything.  

And what couldn’t be covered by this ready-made found inventory, new material was produced paying the lowest rates in the industry.  Beggars cannot be choosers in a flagging industry.   

Mostly the Charlton line up consisted of a hodge podge of westerns, war comics, romance comics and humor books.  They also published licensed comics based on newspaper strips and TV shows. 

 Charlton did venture into super hero stuff in the 1960s with an initiative spearheaded by artist/editor Dick Giordano called the Action Hero line which gave us Capt. Atom, Blue Beetle, the Question, Nightshade, Peacemaker (yes, THAT guy from James Gunn's Suicide Squad movie and his own TV series on Max) and more.  Charlton pulled the plug on those titles because, as Giordano put it, “Charlton was more interested in saving $5 than in making $5.”  

 

In the early 1970s, Charlton provided a training ground for up and coming talent who would move on better pay and greater exposure at DC and Marvel. The pay sucked hard but it was an opportunity to hone their skills.   

• Before breaking in big time with Marvel’s X-Men, John Byrne got his start as the artist on Charlton’s Doomsday +1 series.   
• Mike Zeck would go on to draw Captain America and the first Secret Wars series at Marvel  but did time on Charlton’s horror and mystery titles.  
• Joe Staton drew E-Man for Charlton before coming a mainstay at DC Comics, principally on Green Lantern.  
• Jim Aparo and  Don Newton did time drawing Charlton’s comic book version of the Phantom before moving on to draw Batman for DC Comics. 
• Artist and editor Dick Giordano and writer Denny O'Neil also made the move from Charlton to the big leagues of DC and Marvel.  

While it was not unusual to see people do their time at Charlton and then leave, there was a least one person who kept going back: Steve Dikto. Given a choice of working for Stan Lee at Marvel or grinding away in near anonymity for the low wages at Charlton, Dikto chose Charlton. He was instrumental in redesigning Captain Atom and Blue Beetle for Giordano's Action Hero titles.  Over the years, Dikto would schlep back to DC or Marvel for some work but then he would pack up his portfolio and go back to Charlton. The infamously prickly Steve Dikto was easily offended by others he had to work with at DC and Marvel. While Charlton paid really low page rates, they pretty much left Dikto alone to do whatever the hell he wanted.  

There were those who came to Charlton in desperation. In the 1960's, Superman creator Jerry Siegel spent some time working for the boys in Derby on some truly awful attempts at creating the next super hero sensation. (Mr. Muscles? Really, it was a thing.)  

And there were the people who never left. Writer Joe Gill wrote maybe 90% of the comics that Charlton published.  OK, that may be an exaggeration but not by much. Gill was a veritable writing machine that churned out scripts for almost every comic in every genre that Charlton produced.

Speaking of machines, Charlton would often employ a typesetter for lettering word balloons and caption boxes. It was supposed to be a cost saving measure but it took a lot of time and effort to set up and it just looked weird.  

At their peak, Charlton Comics was a major player in the industry, competitive with Marvel and DC.  But Charlton was bound by a corporate structure that only got into comics to keep their printing presses running.  There was no incentive to grow Charlton Comics, to develop and nurture properties that appealed to the changing tastes of comics fans. Licences for comics based on children's animated characters were lost and went to other publishers. Charlton had nothing left for children and what was left was unwanted by older readers.   

In 1976, when 80 year old John Santangelo Sr saw reports that Charlton Comics was losing money, he did not order a review to look for a way to change their declining fortunes. No, he issued the following 2 word edict: "Stop comics!" 

And Charlton Comics stopped. About a year later, Charlton returned but was no longer producing new comic books. The Charlton line was now reprints of older comics.  As Dick Giordano said, “Charlton was more interested in saving $5 than in making $5.” 

Charlton made a few forays into trying to publish something new. Charlton Bullseye featured new stories written and drawn by heretofore unknown talent who agreed to let Charlton print their work for free in order to gain exposure for actual paying work. 

Steve Dikto found a new publisher to get ticked off at (independent publisher Eclipse Comics) and took his toys back to Charlton in an attempt to kick start that company's fortunes.

It was all too little too late and by the mid 1980's, Charlton Comics stumbled and gasped it's way across the finish line and a few years after that, the old factory in Derby with it's worn out and decrepit printing press was destroyed.  

The Charlton Companion is a comprehensive look at the rise and fall of this strange comic book company.  Jon Cooke has interviewed dozens of comics pros and read hundreds of documents to pull together an extensively and meticulously researched history of Charlton Comics.  

This book is jammed with tons of information and that's not always a positive. Sometimes this book is a bit of a slog to get through and I think some of that extensive and meticulous detail could have used some editing and streamlining. 

It doesn't help that the print font used on this book is very, very tiny. It is very difficult to read outside really bright light.  

The overly dense narrative and the tiny font aside, The Charlton Companion is undeniably a great resource about the comic book company that was and perhaps could've been. 

from the cover art by Joe Staton