While in high school, he was hired by
Jerry Iger to work in the
S. M. Iger Studio, Feldstein wrote, drew and packaged the complete
Junior and
Sunny books for Fox, and produced a comic book adaptation of
Meet Corliss Archer. Warned by his letterer Jim Wroten to be cautious about payments from Victor Fox, who'd "gotten himself into financial trouble", Feldstein approached
Bill Gaines, who'd just taken over as EC Comics publisher following his father's death in a speedboat crash. Feldstein's initial EC assignment was drawing a teenage book, the beginning of a long working relationship with Gaines. While developing a stable of contributing writers that included
Robert Bernstein,
Otto Binder,
Daniel Keyes,
Jack Oleck and
Carl Wessler, he published the first work of
Harlan Ellison. EC employed the comics industry's finest artists and published promotional copy to make readers aware of their staff. Feldstein encouraged the EC illustrators to maintain their personal art styles, and this emphasis on individuality gave the EC line a unique appearance. Distinctive front cover designs framing those recognizable art styles made Feldstein's titles easy to spot on crowded newsstands. Feldstein moved in 1992 to
Paradise Valley,
Montana, near
Livingston, finding new approaches to depict the Western way of life in his
acrylic paintings. In 1999, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Arts degree by
Rocky Mountain College in
Billings, Montana, and that year again ranked in the Top 100 of the Arts for the Parks' Competition. He is represented by numerous Northwest galleries, and he continued to create his Western, wildlife and landscape paintings at his 270 acre (1.1 km2) ranch south of Livingston and north of
Yellowstone National Park. Feldstein died on April 29, 2014, at his home in Paradise Valley, Montana, near Livingston. No cause of death was released. ==References==