Murphy Anderson

Early life and career

Murphy Anderson was born on July 9, 1926, in Asheville, North Carolina, and while in grade school moved with his family to Greensboro, North Carolina. After graduating high school in 1943, he briefly attended the University of North Carolina before moving to New York City seeking work in the comics industry, and was hired by Jack Byrne as a staff artist at the comic-book publisher Fiction House. His first confirmed credit is the 2 2/3-page nonfiction aviation featurette "Jet Propulsion" in Wings Comics #48 (cover-dated Aug. 1944), and his first fiction feature was an eight-page "Suicide Smith and the Air Commanders" story in Wings Comics #50 (Oct. 1944). By the following month he was the regular artist on the Planet Comics features "Life on Other Worlds" and "Star Pirate". Anderson continued doing comics work, as well as illustrations for science-fiction pulp magazines, during his stateside postings while serving in the United States Navy from 1944 to 1945.

From 1947 to 1949, Anderson was the artist on the Buck Rogers comic-book series. During the 1950s, Anderson worked for several publishers including Pines Comics, St. John Publications, Ziff Davis, DC Comics, and Atlas Comics, that decade's predecessor of Marvel Comics.

Anderson succeeded artist and co-creator Carmine Infantino on the superhero feature "Captain Comet" beginning with the story "The Girl from the Diamond Planet" in Strange Adventures #12 (cover-dated Sept. 1951). Years later, Anderson and writer John Broome created the feature "Atomic Knights" in Strange Adventures #117 (June 1960), which Anderson later described as his favorite assignment. Anderson and writer Gardner Fox launched the Hawkman series in May 1964 and introduced the Zatanna character in issue #4 (Nov. 1964). Comics historian Les Daniels noted that "Hawkman really took off when artist Murphy Anderson took over...Anderson came into his own with his elegantly ornamental version of the Winged Wonder." The Spectre was revived by Fox and Anderson in Showcase #60 (Feb. 1966) and was given his own series in December 1967. In the 1960s Anderson proposed that comics pages be drawn at 10x15 inches rather than the prevailing standard of 12x18 inches, which allowed two pages to be photographed at the same time, and this subsequently became the industry standard.

Anderson designed the costume of Adam Strange. With his frequent collaborator, penciler Curt Swan, the pair's artwork on Superman and Action Comics in the 1970s came to be called "Swanderson" by fans. He often hid his initials somewhere within the stories he inked. In the early 1970s, DC assigned Anderson, among other artists, to redraw the heads of Jack Kirby's renditions of Superman and Jimmy Olsen, fearing Kirby's versions were too different from the established images of the characters. In 1972, he drew Wonder Woman for the cover of the first issue of Ms. Magazine. In 1973, he established Murphy Anderson Visual Concepts, which provided color separations and lettering for comic books.

Anderson also contributed for many years to PS, the preventive maintenance comics magazine of the U.S. Army.

Personal life

Anderson and his wife of 67 years, Helen, had two daughters, Sophie and Mary, and a son, Murphy III. Anderson died in Somerset, New Jersey on October 22, 2015, at the age of 89, of heart failure.

Awards

Anderson's accolades include the 1962 Alley Award for "Best Inker"; a 1963 Alley for "Artist Preferred on Justice League of America"; 1964 Alleys for "Best Inking Artist" and for "Best Comic Book Cover" (Detective Comics #329, with penciler Carmine Infantino); 1965 Alleys for, again, "Best Inking Artist" and "Best Comic Book Cover" (The Brave and the Bold #61), as well as for "Best Novel" (an untitled story in Showcase #55, with writer Gardner Fox).

Anderson received an Inkpot Award in 1984 and was inducted into the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1998 the Will Eisner Hall of Fame in 1999, and the Inkwell Awards Joe Sinnott Hall of Fame in 2013.