Jack C. Harris

American comic book writer
Jack C. Harris
Born (1947-08-30) August 30, 1947 (age 76)
NationalityAmerican
Area(s)Writer, Editor
Notable works
Wonder Woman

Jack C. Harris (born August 30, 1947)[1] is an American comic book writer and editor known mainly for his work in the 1970s and 1980s at DC Comics.

Biography

Early life and career

Jack C. Harris attended the Philadelphia College of Art and graduated with a BFA. He served in the Signal Corps while in the United States Army and was stationed in Germany. He was hired by DC Comics as part of the company's "Junior Woodchuck" program and became the assistant to editor Murray Boltinoff before being promoted to the post of editor himself.[2] Harris wrote text articles and letters columns for various series and his first published comics story was "Political Rally Panic" in Isis #3 (February–March 1977).[3]

Harris wrote several issues of Kamandi, an assignment he considered a personal favorite.[4] As writer of the Wonder Woman comic book, he returned the series to a contemporary setting to reflect the timeframe change made from the World War II era to the present day in the television series.[5] Harris was briefly writing every DC feature starring a female character.[6] He and artist Trevor Von Eeden proposed an all-female superteam named the "Power Squad" to DC but the idea was not approved for publication.[7]

In 1992, Harris and artist Joe Quesada co-created an updated version of the Golden Age character the Ray.[8] At Marvel Comics, Harris co-created the character Annex in The Amazing Spider-Man Annual #27[9] and wrote a limited series featuring the new character the following year.[4] In 1994, Harris wrote the graphic novel Batman: Castle of the Bat, painted by artist Bo Hampton. A Hulk and the Human Torch story written by Harris and drawn by Ditko in the 1980s was published by Marvel as Incredible Hulk and the Human Torch: From the Marvel Vault #1 in August 2011.[3][10][11] Two Kamandi stories written by Harris and drawn by Dick Ayers and Danny Bulanadi in 1978 were finally published in 2017 in Kamandi Challenge Special #1.[12]

Editor

Harris edited the first appearances of several new characters in their own eponymous series including Black Lightning, Shade, the Changing Man, and Firestorm.[13] As editor of the Legion of Super-Heroes title, Harris hired Steve Ditko to draw several issues, a decision which garnered a mixed reaction from the title's readership.[14] Harris edited the Madame Xanadu one-shot in 1981,[13] which was DC's first attempt at marketing comics specifically to the "direct market" of fans and collectors.[15]

Among the new talent Harris helped to enter the comics industry was the writing team of Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn[16][17] and artists Trevor Von Eeden,[18] John Workman, and Bob Smith.[19] On the advice of artist Joe Staton, Harris gave British artist Brian Bolland his first assignment for a U.S. comics publisher, the cover for Green Lantern #127 (April 1980).[20]

Educator

Harris was on the faculty of the School of Visual Arts in New York City in the BFA Cartooning Program.[21]

Bibliography

DC Comics

HM Communications

  • Heavy Metal #v6 #9, 11 (1982–1983)

Marvel Comics

Nintendo Picture Books

  • The Legend of Zelda: Molblin's Magic Spear (1990) Molblin's Magic Spear is a children's picture book based on the Legend of Zelda series. It takes place during the storyline of the original game. It was written by Jack C. Harris and illustrated by Arthur Ellis and Kim Ellis. It was published by the Golden Books division of Western Publishing on February 1, 1990.[22]

References

  1. ^ Miller, John Jackson (June 10, 2005). "Comics Industry Birthdays". Comics Buyer's Guide. Archived from the original on February 18, 2011. Retrieved December 12, 2010.
  2. ^ Daudt, Ron E. (2010). "Jack C. Harris Interview (Pt. 1)". TheSilverLantern.com. Archived from the original on September 1, 2012. Retrieved March 20, 2011.
  3. ^ a b Jack C. Harris at the Grand Comics Database
  4. ^ a b Daudt, Ron E. (2010). "Jack C. Harris Interview (Pt. 2)". TheSilverLantern.com. Archived from the original on September 1, 2012. Retrieved March 20, 2011.
  5. ^ McAvennie, Michael (2010). "1970s". In Dolan, Hannah (ed.). DC Comics Year By Year A Visual Chronicle. London, United Kingdom: Dorling Kindersley. p. 179. ISBN 978-0-7566-6742-9. To reflect the modern setting of CBS-TV's The New Adventures of Wonder Woman, scripter Jack C. Harris and artist Jose Delbo produced a story where Earth-1's Amazon helped her Golden Age counterpart apprehend the Angle Man in May's Wonder Woman #243.
  6. ^ Harris in Daudt (Pt. 2): "At one point, and I don't know why this happened, I was doing every DC super heroine at the time. I was writing Isis, I was writing Batgirl, I was writing Supergirl, I was writing Wonder Woman and I was editing Starfire. Those five female characters I was doing...All at the same time. For some reason I was the guy who writes the female characters. I don't know how it happened. I thought it was kind of cool."
  7. ^ "The all-female DC Comics' team book that wasn't". DC Women Kicking Ass. August 3, 2011. Archived from the original on October 8, 2011. Retrieved March 20, 2012.
  8. ^ Manning, Matthew K. "1990s" in Dolan, p. 252: "Longtime DC writer/editor Jack C. Harris reworked the Golden Age character of the Ray into a new hero, assisted by future superstar artist Joe Quesada"
  9. ^ Cowsill, Alan (2012). "1990s". In Gilbert, Laura (ed.). Spider-Man Chronicle Celebrating 50 Years of Web-Slinging. London, United Kingdom: Dorling Kindersley. p. 203. ISBN 978-0756692360. The debut story of Annex was written by Jack C. Harris and drawn by Tom Lyle.
  10. ^ Harris in Daudt (Pt. 2): "I did a Marvel Team-Up that Ditko drew that was The Hulk and Human Torch team-up that never saw the light of day."
  11. ^ Armitage, Hugh (April 22, 2011). "Lost Steve Ditko Comic Unveiled". Digital Spy. Archived from the original on April 25, 2011. Retrieved March 26, 2012.
  12. ^ Marston, George (December 8, 2016). "DC's Kamandi Challenge #1 Gets Bigger, Coming Faster, But Will Cost More". Newsarama. Archived from the original on December 10, 2016. Kamandi Challenge [Special] #1 will now contain 1978's Kamandi #60 and Kamandi #61, which DC never officially released on its own due to the title being part of a wide swatch of cancellations dubbed 'The DC Implosion' by fans.
  13. ^ a b Jack C. Harris (editor) at the Grand Comics Database
  14. ^ Harris in Daudt (Pt. 2): "Some of the fans loved it and some hated it. Nobody was lukewarm about it. It was a very Ditko type of feeling. You hated it or you loved it and there was nothing in between."
  15. ^ Catron, Michael (June 1981). "DC Taps Fan Market for Madame Xanadu". Amazing Heroes (1). Seattle, Washington: Fantagraphics Books: 25. Madame Xanadu, a 32-page/$1.00 comic that marks DC's first attempt at marketing comics specifically to fans and collectors, went on sale in early April. The book contains a 25-page tale by Steve Englehart and Marshall Rogers entitled 'Dance for Two Demons'.
  16. ^ "Amethyst Special Feature: Interview with Gary Cohn and Dan Mishkin". TangognaT Who loves palindromes?. March 15, 2009. Archived from the original on April 25, 2012. Retrieved December 7, 2011. Gary Cohn: Dan and I have been friends since our mid-teens...We were seriously trying to break into comics and had started a correspondence with an editor at DC, Jack Harris, that eventually led to our first sales.
  17. ^ Romero, Max (July 2012). "I'll Buy That For a Dollar! DC Comics' Dollar Comics". Back Issue! (57). Raleigh, North Carolina: TwoMorrows Publishing: 39–41. 'On the Day of His Return', written by Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn. It was their first sale and they were stunned it was drawn by Steve [Ditko].
  18. ^ Gold, Mike (July 1977). "DC Profiles #10: Trevor Von Eeden". DC Comics. Archived from the original on September 8, 2015. Archived at the Grand Comics Database
  19. ^ Stroud, Bryan D. (May 14, 2011). "Bob Smith Interview". The Silver Age Sage. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016.
  20. ^ Bolland, Brian (2006). "The 1970s - Green Lantern". In Pruett, Joe (ed.). The Art of Brian Bolland. Image Comics. p. 102. ISBN 1582406030.
  21. ^ "Our Faculty - Jack C. Harris". School of Visual Arts. 2012. Archived from the original on October 24, 2012. Retrieved March 20, 2012.
  22. ^ Harris, Jack C. (1990). The Legend of Zelda: Molblin's Magic Spear. Golden Books. p. 24. ISBN 978-0307125712.

External links

  • "DC Profiles #9: Jack C. Harris" at the Grand Comics Database
  • Jack C. Harris at the Comic Book DB (archived from the original)
  • Jack C. Harris at Mike's Amazing World of Comics
  • Jack C. Harris at the Unofficial Handbook of Marvel Comics Creators
Preceded by Wonder Woman writer
1978–1979 		Succeeded by
Preceded by World's Finest Comics editor
1977–1981 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Green Lantern editor
1978–1981 		Succeeded by
Preceded by The Warlord editor
1979–1981 		Succeeded by
Ross Andru
Preceded by Ghosts editor
1979–1981 		Succeeded by
Preceded by
Murray Boltinoff
 The Unexpected editor
1979–1981 		Succeeded by
Dick Giordano
Preceded by
n/a
 Legion of Super-Heroes vol. 2 editor
1980–1981 		Succeeded by
Authority control databases Edit this at Wikidata
International
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