Sol Brodsky

Soloman "Sol" Brodsky (April 22, 1923 – June 4, 1984) was an American comic book artist who, as Marvel Comics' Silver Age production manager, was one of the key architects of the small company's expansion to a major popular culture conglomerate. He later rose to vice president, operations; and vice president, special projects. "Sol was really my right-hand man for years", described Marvel editor and company patriarch Stan Lee.

Brodsky worked primarily behind the scenes, uncredited. His accomplishments include co-creating, with letterer Artie Simek, the long-familiar logo of The Amazing Spider-Man, as well as other Marvel logos still in use in the mid-2000s. He was belatedly credited after decades as the inker of Jack Kirby's pencil art for The Fantastic Four #3–4 (March–May 1962) and many other landmark comics.

Lee described Brodsky as "my assistant for years and the company's production head. He could write, he could draw, he could ink — he could do everything."

Biography

Early life and career Brodsky inked one of penciler Jack Kirby's most significant comics, The Fantastic Four #3 (March 1962). Born in Brooklyn, New York City, New York,

That year Brodsky began his long, if initially intermittent, association with Marvel, writing and drawing four one-page "Inky Dinky" gag strips in Mystic Comics #10 (Aug. 1942) and an additional one in Comedy Comics #11 (Sept. 1952), for the company's 1940s predecessor, Timely Comics. His earliest known cover art is for Holyoke's Blue Beetle #17 (Dec. 1942).

Upon his return from military service, Brodsky created the feature "Red Cross" in Holyoke's aviation series Captain Aero Comics, where it ran as a backup from issues #21-25 (Dec. 1944 - Feb. 1946).

Roy Thomas described the Marvel offices in 1965 as "just three or four little rooms. Stan's office was as big as everything else put together, and Sol Brodsky, [secretary/receptionist] Flo Steinberg, and [artist/colorist/production person] Marie Severin were crowded into two other little rooms."

Some Marvel humor comics with art credited to Brodsky may not have been his work. As comics historian Mark Evanier notes:

Tales to Astonish #40 (Feb. 1963), a rare interior by the occasional cover-art team of penciler Jack Kirby and inker Sol Brodsky. Ant-Man stars.

Skywald Publications and return to Marvel Brodsky spent some time away from Marvel in the early 1970s. In 1970, he and Israel Waldman co-founded Skywald Publications — the company name composed of truncated versions of their last names. Skywald lasted until late 1974; Brosky returned to Marvel sometime in the period 1972 to 1974.

Al Hewetson, who succeeded Brodsky as editor at Skywald, recalled that in 1972 Brodsky had told him, "Marvel has made me an offer to go back and develop their overseas syndication, and I'm going to do it. This is a big opportunity." Brodsky's last credited issues as Skywald editor, and Hewetson's first, are cover-dated August 1972.

One-time Marvel editor-in-chief Jim Shooter, however, recalled that after Skywald went defunct (in late 1974), "Sol needed a job, and approached Stan Lee , but a new production manager had been hired in Sol’s absence — John Verpoorten. Stan convinced the [then-parent company] Cadence board to create a new position for Sol, 'V.P. of Operations'. Essentially, he was Stan's right-hand man again."

Sometime before May 19, 1978 (the date of a letter, put up for auction years later, that Brodsky had sent to a Marvel fan), Brodsky's Marvel Comics title had become vice president, operations.

Later, as vice president, special projects,

In 1985, one year after his death, Brodsky's son Gary founded the independent-comics company Solson Publications, which published an issue of the T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents update T.H.U.N.D.E.R., by writer Michael Sawyer and artist James E. Lyle, plus the short-lived "super-president" spoof series Reagan's Raiders.

Brodsky's daughter, Janice Cohen, has been a Marvel colorist.

Occasional 1970s Marvel writer Allyn Brodsky, who served as assistant to editor-in-chief Stan Lee, following Al Hewetson, is not related.

Fictional portrayals

A fictionalized Brodsky is among the beachgoers gathered around the unconscious Namor in penciler Marie Severin's splash page for The Sub-Mariner #19 (Nov. 1969). As an in-joke, Severin had drawn the Marvel staff (as well as three personal friends) as onlookers. Brodsky is the man in the Hawaiian shirt at lower right, gesturing to the police (and standing in front of a cigar-smoking Mike Esposito).

A fictionalized Brodsky also appeared alongside Lee, Kirby, and Steinberg — all transformed into a Marvel Bullpen version of the Fantastic Four — in the alternate-reality comic What If Vol. 1, #11 (Oct. 1978). Written and drawn by Kirby, the tale featured Brodsky as the Human Torch.

Audio — Merry Marvel Marching Society record, including voice of Sol Brodsky