Monday, July 13, 2009

The house where Superman lived...

Yes, I’m more Spider-Man than Superman, but I wanted to share this one with you all. I found it today and, well, this is truly where we all started.

The story of Superman started on June 2, 1932, when Michel Siegel was robbed in his second-hand clothing store not far from his home. He died later that night of a heart attack.

The youngest of his six children, a gangly, 16-year-old comic-book fan and budding artist named Jerry, began to fantasize about how his father might have been saved, said Bradley Ricca, who teaches a Superman course at Case Western Reserve University.

The next year, in a cramped bedroom, the young Mr. Siegel imagined a bulletproof "Man of Steel" whose superpowers were cloaked under the mild-mannered guise of a bumbling alter-ego. According to lore, Mr. Siegel sprinted nine and a half blocks to the apartment of his friend, Joe Shuster, to describe his vision. Mr. Shuster began to draw the first renditions of the square-jawed hero.

In 1938 the first Superman comic strip was published. It sold out immediately.

For more on this story read it in the Wall St. Journal.

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