Win Mortimer

Win Mortimer was a Canadian-American comic strip artist and writer best known as one of the major illustrators of the DC Comics superhero Superman. He additionally drew for Marvel Comics, Gold Key Comics, and other publishers. He was a 2006 inductee into the Canadian comics creators Joe Shuster Hall of Fame. Born in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, Mortimer found work as an illustrator after a short stint in the Canadian Army during World War II. He worked for various advertising studios and magazines, such as Collier's and The Saturday Evening Post. He began working for DC Comics in 1945, and quickly became a cover artist for comics featuring Superman, Superboy and Batman. His first known comics work is as the penciler and inker of the 12-page lead Batman story, "The Batman Goes Broke" by writer Don Cameron, in Detective Comics 105 (Nov. 1945); contractually credited to Bob Kane, it is also signed Mortimer. The introduction of Batman's Batboat in Detective Comics 110 (April 1946) was another Cameron,Mortimer collaboration. He also launched a Robin feature in Star-Spangled Comics 65 (Feb. 1947). He succeeded Wayne Boring on the Superman newspaper strip in 1949, leaving it in 1956 to create the adventure strip David Crane for the Prentice-Hall Syndicate. Following his run on that series, Mortimer produced the Larry Bannon strip for the Toronto Star beginning in 1960. During the same period, Mortimer returned to DC and worked on a large variety of comics, ranging from humor titles such as Swing with Scooter to superhero features starring the Legion of Super-Heroes and Supergirl. He and writer Arnold Drake co-created Stanley and His Monster in 1965. ²³ By the early 1970s, Mortimer was also freelancing for other publishers. At Marvel, he drew virtually every story in the TV tie-in children's comic Spidey Super Stories, starring Spider-Man, for its entire 57-issue run (Oct. 1974 – March 1982) as well as the short-lived Night Nurse series. Mortimer's work at Gold Key Comics included Boris Karloff Tales of Mystery, The Twilight Zone, and Battle Of The Planets. He left comics in 1983 to do advertising and commercial art for Neal Adams' studio, Continuity Associates. Mortimer's last superhero art was the four-issue DC miniseries World of Metropolis (Aug.–Nov. 1988), plus some character drawings for the reference Who's Who in the Legion of Super-Heroes 7 (Nov. 1988). His final comics work was penciling the four page Noble Heart story for The Big Book of Martyrs (Aug. 1997). He died of heart failure in 1998.