Golden Age of Comic Books The first packagers to emerge were in the late 1930s, supplying comics features and complete comic books to publishers testing the waters of the emerging medium.
Otto Binder,
Charles Biro,
Mort Meskin,
George Tuska,
Nina Albright,
Toni Blum, and many others. Packagers were responsible for the creation of a number of notable comics titles and characters. Funnies Inc., for example, founded by
Lloyd Jacquet, supplied the entire contents of
Marvel Comics #1 (cover-dated Oct. 1939), the first publication of what would become the multimedia corporation
Marvel Comics — not to mention featuring the debuts of such legacy characters as the
Sub-Mariner, the
Human Torch, and the
Angel. Funnies Inc. employee Joe Simon is also credited with creating
Blue Bolt (for
Novelty Press). While with Eisner & Iger, Eisner is credited with co-creating such characters as
Doll Man and
Blackhawk for
Quality Comics, and
Wonder Man and
The Flame for
Fox Publications. Eisner & Iger also created
Sheena, Queen of the Jungle. By the late 1930s, the packaging business was flourishing. Chesler, who also acted as a publisher, recalled in a 1976 profile, "besides about 75 of my own titles, we produced comics for some 50 different publishers. At one time, there were 40 artists working for me and I had 300 comic titles on the newsstands." Most of the early crop of packagers petered out by the mid-1950s as the remaining publishers produced their comics in-house.
Modern era With the advent of the 1970s, a number of new packagers arose, most of whom provided comics art but not stories to their clients. These included
Continuity Associates and
Selecciones Ilustradas. Continuity Associates (later known as
Continuity Studios), was formed by cartoonists
Neal Adams and
Dick Giordano in 1971. At first, Continuity primarily supplied
motion picture storyboards and advertising art, but it soon became an art packager for comic book publishers, including such companies as
Charlton Comics,
Marvel Comics,
DC Comics, the
one-shot Big Apple Comix, and even Adams' own
Continuity Comics. Continuity served as the launching pad for the careers of a number of professional comics artists. (When doing collective comics work, the artists were often credited as "
Crusty Bunkers.") More established cartoonists like
Win Mortimer found work at Continuity profitable enough that they left the comics industry to work exclusively on Continuity projects. Selecciones Ilustradas, a Spanish art agency, provided artists for the
horror comics magazine publishers
Warren Publishing and
Skywald Publications in the period 19711983, providing an entrée into the U.S. comics market for a great number of these Spanish artists. From the mid-1970s to the mid-2000s,
Byron Preiss (as
Byron Preiss Visual Publications) packaged
graphic novels,
comics,
illustrated books, and
children's books to various publishers using the talents of comics artists such as
Howard Chaykin,
Dennis Francis,
Marc Hempel,
Gray Morrow,
Alex Niño,
Ralph Reese,
Tom Sutton, and
Mark Wheatley.
David Campiti, with
Campiti and Associates ( 19851988) and then
Glass House Graphics (1993present), operated more like a traditional comics packager, supplying complete comics to such publishers as
Eternity Comics, Continuity Comics, DC Comics,
Eclipse Comics,
NOW Comics, and his own
Innovation Publishing. Campiti and Associates was active in comics packaging during the "black-and-white boom" of the mid-1980s. Independent publishers whose work was produced almost exclusively by Campiti and Associates include: •
Sirius Comics (1985–1986) •
Pied Piper Comics (1986–1988) •
Eternity Comics (1986–1988) •
Imperial Comics (1986–1987) •
Amazing (1986–1987) •
Wonder Color (1987) Glass House Graphics played a major role in the entrée of Brazilian artists such as
Ed Benes,
Joe Bennett,
Mike Deodato, and
Luke Ross into the American comics market.
The U.K. comics market Starting in the 1950s, the
British comics market often used art packagers — often artists from Spain, from such studios as A.L.L.I. and Bardon Arts. == Notable comics packagers ==