Fred Kida

Fred Kida (December 12, 1920 – April 3, 2014) was a Japanese-American comic book and comic strip artist best known for the 1940s aviator hero Airboy and his antagonist and sometime ally Valkyrie during the period fans and historians call the Golden Age of Comic Books. He went on to draw for Marvel Comics' 1950s iteration, Atlas Comics, in a variety of genres and styles, and then again for Marvel superhero titles in the 1970s. He drew the company's The Amazing Spider-Man newspaper comic strip during the early to mid-1980s. Kida also assisted artist Dan Barry on the long-running strip Flash Gordon from 1958 to 1961 and then again from 1968 to 1971.

Biography Air Fighters Comics vol. 2, #2 (Nov. 1943): A typically cleavage-baring Valykrie provides the "latest war thrills". Cover art by Kida

Early life and career Born on December 12, 1920, in Brooklyn Like many young artists in the 1930s to 1940s Golden Age of Comic Books, he then broke into the field at the Jerry Iger Studio,

Airboy and afterward In 1942, he joined Hillman Periodicals, where he drew such features as "Iron Ace" (from its premiere in Air Fighters Comics #2, Nov. 1942), "Boy King" and "Gunmaster", and the following year began work on his most prominent Golden Age character, Airboy. That aviation hero, created by writer Charles Biro with scripter Dick Wood and artist Al Camy, appeared initially in Air Fighters Comics, later renamed Airboy Comics.

Atlas Comics' Willie the Wiseguy #1 (Sept. 1957): Cover artist Kida in a cartoony vein. Kida remained on the feature through 1948, afterward working with writer Biro on such Hillman crime comics as the seminal Crime Does Not Pay. and from 1946-47 assisted Fujitani (also known as "Bob Wells") on the comic strip Judge Wright. He also briefly assisted Milton Caniff on the strip Steve Canyon. returning to do the Sunday editions from September 1996 to July 1997.

Personal life Kida married Elly Ahnert on October 5, 1946, and they had two children, Paul and Peter.

Reprints include Fred Kida's Valkyrie! (Ken Pierce, Inc., 1982) Black-and-white reprints of selected stories from Air Fighters Comics vol. 2, #2 & 7; and Airboy Comics vol. 2, #12, and vol. 3, #6 & 12. Introduction by Alex Toth.