I started researching this subject because I wanted to know more about what was going on at Marvel in the period leading up to the Fantastic Four's introduction and the couple of years after. In any post of this kind it's easy to make mistakes, so any corrections are welcome.
The version of Two-Gun Kid who debuted in Aug. 1962 wore a mask and had a secret identity, like a superhero. This wasn’t a new wrinkle, though: quite a number of earlier Western heroes had worn masks and/or costumes, and/or maintained dual identities. Examples are Magazine Enterprises’s Ghost Rider, and DC’s Nighthawk (who wore a mask) and Johnny Thunder (who didn’t, but still had two identities). Jack Kirby had done a character of this kind when he was still partnered with Joe Simon called Bullseye.
Possibly these kinds of Western hero ultimately go back to the Lone Ranger, who wore a mask, but wasn’t (usually) portrayed as maintaining a double identity. Zorro might be cited as a still earlier example, but he’s associated with a different period of history.
A previous long-running Marvel hero of this kind was the Black Rider, who debuted in 1948. From what I can tell the character stopped appearing regularly in 1955 when Western Tales of Black Rider became Gunsmoke Western. In 1957 Marvel tried to relaunch his feature with Black Rider #1. (The previous series with this title had begun with #8. That issue had a photographic cover with an image of the Black Rider: according to the GCD the guy in the costume is “allegedly Stan Lee”.) This time around the art was by Kirby, and to judge by the issue’s cover, the Black Rider wore a domino mask. The issue appeared in June, just ahead of the 1957 cutback of Marvel's line. Three further Black Rider stories with art by Kirby later appeared in Gunsmoke Western #47 and #51 and Kid Colt Outlaw #86. The GCD speculates these were intended for an unpublished Black Rider #2.
The Westerns that survived the cutback were Kid Colt Outlaw, Wyatt Earp, Two Gun Kid, and Gunsmoke Western. (A final issue of Ringo Kid appeared in August.) At the time the titles carried a number of stories in each issue, and usually in the first three at least one was a non-series story or starred some other character.
Kid Colt's eponymous title started in 1948 as Kid Colt (the cover title was Kid Colt Hero of the West), which ran for four issues. After a brief hiatus the series came back as Kid Colt Outlaw. Eventually Jack Keller became the main artist on the Kid’s feature. I can’t say for sure when he started on it: the earliest Kid Colt stories attributed to him at the GCD appeared in Wild Western #26 in Nov. 1952, but it often doesn't have credits for stories from the period. Keller remained with the feature all the way to #132 in 1966.
In the period from 1957 to the mid 60s there were only a couple of new Kid Colt stories by other artists (according to the GCD there was one in #81, by Joe Maneely, and one in #109, by Sol Brodsky). Kirby never drew the feature, despite his many Kid Colt Outlaw and Kid Colt Gunsmoke Western covers. However, he did do non-series stories for both titles, and the aforementioned Black Rider stories. After Keller the title continued for just over a year, with new Kid Colt stories drawn by Sol Brodsky, Marie Severin, Herb Trimpe, Dick Ayers, Tom Sutton and Werner Roth. The final issue was #139 in Nov. 1967. In Sep. 1969 the comic was revived as a reprint title, with a new eight page Kid Colt story in #140 drawn by Werner Roth and a new Two-Gun Kid story of the same length in #141 drawn by Ogden Whitney. Presumably these were unused stories from a couple of years earlier.
Wyatt Earp debuted with #1 in 1955. Artists on the feature before #10 include Joe Maneely, Norman Maurer, and John Severin. #10 had two stories by Severin and two by Dick Ayers (and a non-series story). From #11 all the Earp stories were by Ayers. Kirby contributed a number of covers to the title, but apparently no stories. The series was cancelled, apparently to make way for the revival of Rawhide Kid, after Jan. 1960.
According to Toonopedia the appearance of Two-Gun Kid #1 in 1948 was the start of Marvel’s Western line. The first version of the title lasted ten issues. The title was revived in 1953 as Two Gun Kid (without the hyphen). I think he was originally intended as dressed all in black, like the Buster Crabbe version of Billy the Kid, but this is obscured on some of the covers of his first series by the colouring. (On these the highlights on his top are coloured white, so instead of shiny black it looks like he’s wearing a white shirt with odd dark shadows.) Later, at least on the covers, he was normally shown wearing a tight blue shirt and matching trousers. This was probably originally intended for black, as blue sometimes is in comics: he clearly has a black shirt on in the Chuck Miller panel here.
At the time of the cutback Miller was the main artist on his feature. His last stories for it appeared in #40 in October. Joe Maneely drew the first of the Kid’s stories in that issue, and the ones in ##41-44. Jack Davis took the feature over for ##45-47, Al Hartley for #48, and John Severin for ##49-57. Kirby took it over for the last two issues, ##58-59, having already drawn covers and non-series stories for the title. On the covers of ##57-58 he depicted him wearing a jacket with a button-up flap, like the one worn by the Silver Age Rawhide Kid. Whether this design was used in any of the stories he drew for the feature I don’t know. On the cover of the final issue before the title’s hiatus, from Jan. 1961, he seems to be back in a tight blue-for-black shirt with matching trousers, coloured a much darker blue than had been used for a while.
Gunsmoke Western began its run in Sep. 1955 with #32. Kid Colt stories appeared in it throughout its run, usually one per issue (#59 had two). All of these were drawn Jack Keller. ##32-34 also each carried a Billy Buckskin story and three non-series Western stories. In ##35-36 Wyatt Earp replaced Billy Buckskin, in stories by John Severin and Joe Maneely. The series then carried non-series tales behind a single Kid Colt story until #42. "Wyatt Earp" returned in the first issue after the cutback, #43, and continued until #58. The story in #43 was illustrated by Angelo Torres, but all the others were done by Dick Ayers. "The Kid from Texas" stories by Joe Sinnott appeared in #49 and #52, and a "Ringo Kid" story by Joe Maneely in #53. Presumably these, like the two "Black Rider" tales, were pre-cutback leftovers. "Gunsmoke Kid" stories by Jack Davis appeared in ##54-55. The other stories with this character listed at the GCD appeared in Wyatt Earp #25 and Kid Colt Outlaw #87 at about the same time. Two-Gun Kid stories by John Severin appeared in ##57-61, and by Kirby (contemporary with his time on that character's title) in ##62-63. From #64 the title carried non-series stories behind a Kid Colt tale until the series ended with #77 in May 1963.
Rawhide Kid had been one of the casualties of the cutback, but it was revived in Mar. 1960, with a new version of the Kid. The character was the first new Marvel character of the 60s, and the first successful Lee and Kirby co-creation. The artists on the Rawhide Kid's feature were as follows:
Jack Kirby ##17-32
Jack Davis ##33-35
Dick Ayers ##36-40
Jack Keller #41
Larry Lieber ##42-58
Dick Ayers ##59-61
Paul Reinman #62
Larry Lieber ##63-78
Werner Roth #79
Larry Lieber ##80-81, 83, 85, 87-95
Dick Ayers #96
Larry Lieber ##97-100
Dick Ayers #101
Larry Lieber ##102-03, 105-06, 108-10, 112-15
By the time the new Two-Gun Kid debuted DC had dropped its Western titles other than Tomahawk. The last to go had been All-Star Western, which ended its run in April, 1961. Charlton, however, was still publishing them. Its characters included a masked Western hero called Gunmaster, who at the time was appearing in Six-Gun Heroes, but later received his own titles.(1) Another Charlton hero of this type was the Masked Raider, but the company had dropped him the previous year. Dell’s The Lone Ranger had recently ended, but my guess is that was due to Dell’s 1962 break with Western Publishing, which revived the series as a Gold Key title in 1964, rather than sales.
The new Two-Gun Kid debuted in Two Gun Kid #60 in Aug. 1962. The artists on his feature during its 1960s run were as follows:
Jack Kirby ##60-62
Dick Ayers ##63-85
Vic Carrabotta #86
Ogden Whitney ##87-92
Marvel's last new Western feature of the 1960s was Ghost Rider, which debuted in Dec. 1966. The title character was almost a straight revival of the Magazine Enterprises hero, and his stories were pencilled by Dick Ayers, who had drawn the earlier version. The title lasted less than a year, but in 1970 the feature was revived again, again with Ayers drawing, in the first issue of a new series of Western Gunfighters, and continued there until #7. In the course of these instalments Marvel's first Ghost Rider was killed, and his mantle was assumed by his brother.
The Wyatt Earp series was probably created to take advantage of TV show The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp. From what I can tell, the Marvel series debuted the month before the TV show. (Charlton also published Wyatt Earp stories in the period, including in the title Wyatt Earp Frontier Marshall.) The Gunsmoke Western name was possibly supposed to suggest the radio and TV series Gunsmoke. The first issue apparently appeared the same month as the first TV episode, just ahead of it. The revival of Rawhide Kid in 1960 may have been partly due to the success of the TV show Rawhide, begun a year earlier.
(1) The GCD lists Gunmaster series from 1964 and 1965. The first lasted four issues. Charlton then dropped it in favour of publishing a version of the title that continued the numbering of Six-Gun Heroes.
Sources: Principally, DC Indexes (which has a Marvel annex; I've relied on it for the months in which the issues appeared), the Grand Comics Database, Toonopedia (which has articles on many of the characters mentioned here; I also owe it the example of Nighthawk), the IMDB, and Wikipedia.
Replies
Great article, Luke! It's really interesting and makes me want (even more) some Essential Marvel Westerns!
BTW, Marvel Comics #1 from 1939 had The Masked Raider, who was rancher Jim Gardley who donned a tight-fiiting black mask and rode a white stallion, Lightning, to battle evil in the Old West! Did he last long?
I'm mostly done tweaking it, but I want to add some comments on when the westerns transitioned to longer stories and a reference to The Mighty Marvel Western. There were also further new Rawhide Kid stories in the 70s that I should have listed.
You'll note that I've only looked at artists, not writers (i.e. if I say a story was by Larry Lieber I only mean he drew it). Also, that my references throughout are to the issues' dates of publication according to DC Indexes, not their cover-dates.
Some new western features that I haven't covered were introduced in Western Gunfighters #1. Fort Rango from "Tales of Fort Rango" later showed up in Old West issues of Red Wolf.
Outstanding entry, Luke!
I never would have touched this topic for my Deck Log---I'm not much of a western-comic fan---so I really appreciate your effort here.
I want to note several corrections, although I made some of them a week ago. I initially missed the fact that Kid Colt Outlaw went on hiatus after #139. I mistakingly listed the new Two Gun Kid story in Kid Colt Outlaw #141 as a new Kid Colt story. I initially omitted the Wyatt Earp #25 tale from the list of “Gunsmoke Kid” appearances. I mistakenly listed the lead story from Rawhide Kid #82 as new Dick Ayers tale: it was a reprint. I mistakenly thought Rawhide Kid #83 was the last non-reprint issue (because the next issue was all-reprint), but it wasn’t. I wrote that it was during Dick Ayers's run on Rawhide Kid that the issues went to having one long lead story: more accurately, that was when the comic started regularly running eighteen-page leads. Several thirteen-page leads had appeared before, and nineteen-page stories in ##21-22.
I’ve now extended the list of Rawhide Kid artists to #115, which I think was the last issue before the comic became solely a reprint title. (There were briefly two errors in my extension of the list, but I've corrected them.) I’ve also found further non-reprint Two-Gun Kid and Kid Colt stories, but I’ll post on them separately instead of inserting them above.
Kid Colt Outlaw and Two Gun Kid ceased publication after Nov. 1967. A reprint title, The Mighty Marvel Western, initally carrying a mix of Rawhide Kid, Kid Colt, and Two-Gun Kid stories, started in July 1968 and ran into 1976. Kid Colt Outlaw was revived as a reprint title in Sep. 1969 (with the new stories in its first two issues noted above), and Two Gun Kid as the same in Apr. 1970. They continued to 1979 and 1977 respectively. The last non-reprint issue of Rawhide Kid was #115 from Jun. 1973. The title continued to 1979. Kid Colt reprints were also included in Western Gunfighters from #16, the character taking over the covers. The title continued to 1975.
Many of the reprint issues of these titles had new covers. I particularly like this one. Since the story originally appeared in the back of Rawhide Kid #67, this was its first cover. Other stories also received their first cover treatment when reprinted.
In the 70s Marvel altered stories with the original Two-Gun Kid to turn them into stories with the new Two-Gun Kid. (I owe this point to Toonopedia, here, but it says late 60s. The examples I've found at the GCD are from the 70s.)
Some of the Ghost Rider stories from the 60s were reprinted in 1974-75, with the title character renamed (Johnny Blaze had debuted in the meantime), in Night Rider. Subsequently the costumed identity used by the Slade brothers became the Phantom Rider, presumably because, as the Captain has pointed out, night riders is a term for the Klan thugs of the post-Civil War period.
The last non-reprint issue of Rawhide Kid featured the cover blurb “The Last Gunfight!”, also the title of the lead story. The blurb was used again on the title’s final issue, although the issue reprinted an earlier tale.
There were several crossovers involving Marvel’s western stars (but not Ghost Rider, I think) in the 60s. In 1971 Kid Colt guested in Rawhide Kid ##89-90, and Ghost Rider crossed over with Gunhawk in Western Gunfighters. In the mid-70s the three Kids and Night Rider appeared in an Avengers storyline. At the end of this Two-Gun Kid came to the present, and he palled around with Hawkeye for a bit. A story starring the pair appeared in the back of Marvel Tales #100.
I mentioned the new stories in Kid Colt Outlaw #140 (Kid Colt) and #141 (Two-Gun Kid), which I take to be unused stories prepared before the characters’ titles’ cancellations. Other stories I’ve found of which I think this is true appeared in Rawhide Kid #64 (Kid Colt), #66 (Two-Gun Kid) and #67 (Kid Colt). These Kid Colt stories were drawn by Werner Roth, and the Two-Gun Kid one by Ogden Whitney. Mighty Marvel Western #4 had a seventeen-page Two-Gun Kid story drawn by Dick Ayers that might also belong in this category.
Further new Two-Gun Kid stories drawn by Ogden Whitney appeared in Two Gun Kid ##103-104.
In 1974-75 some new Kid Colt stories appeared in Giant-Size Kid Colt ##1-3. The one in #1 was by Larry Lieber, and the ones in ##2-3 were drawn by Dick Ayers. #1 teamed the Kid with the Rawhide Kid, #3 with Night Rider. Another new Kid Colt story, which I think may have been prepared for an unpublished fourth issue, appeared in Kid Colt Outlaw #201. It also teamed Kid Colt with the Rawhide Kid, and was drawn by Ayers.
In my response to Jeff I mentioned the non-reprint features that appeared in early issues of Western Gunfighters, and the Old West issues of Red Wolf. For those who don’t know, the modern-day version of Red Wolf debuted in Avengers ##80-81. The Old West version debuted in Marvel Spotlight #1 and then appeared in Red Wolf ##1-6. The remaining three issues of Red Wolf returned to telling stories about a modern-day version, but apparently Marvel neglected to give him the same secret identity as the Red Wolf from Avengers. More on this here.
I can think of one other 70s Marvel Western title with new lead stories, The Gunhawks from 1972-73. This initially starred a pair of gunfighters, Kid Cassidy, who was white, and Reno Jones, who was black. Cassidy was killed in the sixth issue, and the remaining issue starred Jones by himself, with the cover title changed to The Gunhawk. Gardner Fox wrote that last issue and some issues of Red Wolf (with dialogue rewrites on the latter by Roy Thomas, according to the GCD).
Other reprint series, starring characters from the 50s, were The Ringo Kid in 1969-73 and 1975-76, and The Western Kid in 1971-72.
The Avengers' team-up (actually just Thor, Hawkeye and Moondragon) with the Kids and the Night Rider also included the Ringo Kid when they took on Kang the Conqueror.
I checked out that cover for Mighty Marvel Western #45. If I saw that at my news-stand, I would have bought it in a minute!
Wasn't there a Two-Gun Kid story that took place at the Alamo? When they reprinted it, they actually called it an imaginary story!
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