Street Scene: Jack Kirby Way

Today at noon, May 11, 2026, the street sign unveiling ceremony will be at the northwest corner of Essex and Delancey Streets. Nearby subway stations at 2nd Avenue, Delancey Street and East Broadway (F Line); Essex Street (J, M and Z Lines); Grand Street (B and D Lines). Guests included Paul Levitz, Jim Steranko and Mark Evanier.

Kirby (Kurtzburg) Manhattan Addresses
1910 United States Census: 136 Suffolk Street
1917 World War I Draft Card: 147 Essex Street
1920 United States Census: 131 Suffolk Street
1930 United States Census: 172 Delancey Street

Atlas of the Borough of Manhattan, City of New York
G.W. Bromley & Co., 1916
Plate 17

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking East

 

Looking West

Looking West

 

Left to right: Jillian, Tracy and Jeremy Kirby, New York City

Council Member Christopher Marte, and Roy Schwartz

 

Buttton
 

Related Posts

Jack Kirby’s Birthplace
Anatomy of a Logo: The Complete Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby’s 9-Panel Fights 
Jack Kirby’s “Facts” You Haven’t Seen 
Jack Kirby in the Census and Army

Jack Kirby’s World War II Draft Card

 

 

(Updated 10:55 pm; next post on Monday: A Few Details About Alex Schomburg, Artist)

Comics: Charles Paris, an Artist, Inker and Letterer

Charles Spurgeon Paris Jr. was born on September 25, 1911 in Greensboro, North Carolina according to the North Carolina Birth Index (at Ancestry.com) and his World War II draft card.

The 1920 United States Census counted Paris (line 89), his parents, Charles and Ida, and brothers, Henry and James, in Greensboro at 103 South Cedar Street. Paris’s self-employed father was a paper hanger.

The Greensboro Daily Record, July 26, 1921, reported Paris’s fall from a tree. The injury required removal of his right kidney.

Paris’s poster for “H. M. S. Pinafore” was reproduced in the Greensboro Daily Record, May 14, 1929.

The Greensboro Daily Record, January 25, 1930, listed the mid-term high school graduates. Paris was one of 49 students. The 1930 census said the Paris family (lines 4 through 8) was at the same address. Paris’s occupation was listed as “commercial advertiser” in the theater industry.

The 2007 book, Batman: The Sunday Classics 1943–1946, said “Paris also worked for a theater chain for eight years, designing poster displays.” In Alter Ego #19, November 2002, Ike Wilson interviewed Paris who said

My first job was in a movie house here on South Elm Street called The Alamo. It’s long, long gone but it was a part of a chain that Paramount bought out. There were the Alamo, the Imperial, the National, and the Carolina Theatres, all of which were included in the same company and were of importance in that order. I worked for them for about seven or eight years and worked my way up to where I was working at the Carolina.

The 1933 Greensboro city directory listed Paris as a commercial artist.

The Greensboro Daily News, July 8, 1945, said Paris moved to New York City in 1934.

Paris and Phoebe Tuulikki Ketonen obtained marriage license number 15696, in Manhattan, on July 10, 1937. They married on September 25, 1937 in Brooklyn. Their marriage reported in the News and Record, October 3, 1937.

Charles Paris, and Miss Ketonen Wed in New York
The marriage of Miss Phoebe Ketonen, of Brooklyn, N. Y. and Charles S. Paris, of New York city, formerly of Greensboro, was solemnized Saturday afternoon, September 25, in a 3 o’clock ceremony at 44th Street Lutheran church in Brooklyn. Just the immediate family attended. Rev. Mr. Joka officiated.

After the service there was an informal reception at the home of the bride’s mother, Mrs. H. M. Illka, in Brooklyn. The young couple are now at home in New York city at 29 East 11th street.

The bridegroom is eldest son of Mr. and Mrs. Charles S. Paris, of 103 South Cedar street, Greensboro. After graduation from Greensboro high school he studied art in Washington and New York city and is now house artist for Wannamaker’s in New York. The bride’s parents were natives of Finland, her father, the late Rev, H. Jalmar Ketonen, having been sent from Finland as a missionary to the United States by the Finnish Methodist church. She is a graduate of Bayridge School for Girls and is a talented musician.

Batman: The Sunday Classics said Paris graduated from Pratt Institute’s School of Fine and Applied Arts in 1938. Paris was not in the 1938 Prattonia yearbook. He probably completed the courses in the evening school. The Greensboro Daily News, July 24, 1938, said

Now Charles Paris is studying at the Art Students league in New York, still at night, and working for Wannamaker’s [sic] in the day time. And he is not satisfied yet.

The 1940 census said Paris (line 69) and his wife were Manhattan residents at 29 East 11th Street. He was an artist at a department store and she a clerk at an aviation company.

Six months later Paris signed his draft card on October 16. His employer was the John Wanamaker Company. Paris was described as five feet, 125 pounds, with blue eyes and brown hair.

According to Batman: The Sunday Classics, Paris studied at Harvey Dunn’s Grand Central School of Art where he met DC artists Stan Kaye, Cliff Young and Gene McDonald. In Spring 1941, Paris met John/Jack Lehti at Dunn’s student get-together. In Alter Ego #19, Paris explained how he got into comics.

I was going to the Grand Central School of Art, studying under Harvey Dunn, who was a very famous illustrator. Some of the fellows in that class were working for DC at that time, so I knew them there. Every year in the spring, after school was out, Dunn would have a cookout for the students and past students. It was at one of those that [comic artist] Jack Lehti asked me if I’d like to be his inker. I had to ask him what an inker was, because I was in the department store display at that time. He told me and advised me to keep my job while he taught me how to ink. I inked for him for about two or three months, when he told me I could quit my job. From then on, I was into comics; I just fell in the back door.

Lehti helped Paris get hired in DC’s bullpen. The Grand Comics Database said Paris inked and lettered Lehti’s Crimson Avenger in World’s Best Comics #1, Spring 1941; Detective Comics #51, May 1941; Detective Comics #52, June 1941; Detective Comics #53, July 1941; Detective Comics #54, August 1941; Detective Comics #55, September 1941; Detective Comics #57, November 1941; Detective Comics #58, December 1941; Detective Comics #59, January 1942; Detective Comics #60, February 1942; Detective Comics #61, March 1942; Detective Comics #62, April 1942; World’s Finest Comics #5, Spring 1942; Detective Comics #64, June 1942; Detective Comics #65, July 1942; Detective Comics #66, August 1942; Detective Comics #67, September 1942; Detective Comics #68, October 1942; Detective Comics #69, November 1942; Detective Comics #70, December 1942; Detective Comics #71, January 1943; Detective Comics #72, February 1943; Detective Comics #73, March 1943; Detective Comics #74, April 1943; Detective Comics #75, May 1943; Detective Comics #76, June 1943; Detective Comics #77, July 1943; and Detective Comics #78, August 1943.

Detective Comics #59, January 1942

Complete story at Four-Color Shadows

In Comics: Between the Panels (1998), had this Paris anecdote about Lehti.

“Jack Lehti was a dogface,” Paris said. “He told me one time that he jumped into a foxhole in France and there was a copy of Detective Comics, with the Crimson Avenger. It gave him a funny damn feeling. Here he is lying out in the middle of nowhere, he might as well be on another planet with shells falling around and dead people and mud and dirt . . . and there’s a copy of a DC comic book. A whole other life flashed through his head.”

In 1943 Paris was called to serve and was classified 4F, not acceptable for service.

American Newspaper Comics (2012) said Paris was the inker on the Batman and Robin comic strip. He did the daily strip from October 25, 1943 to February 9, 1946, and March 25 to November 2, 1946; the Sunday strip from November 7, 1943 to April 21, 1946, and August 25 to October 27, 1946. In Alter Ego, Paris said

[Editor] Whit [Ellsworth] then offered me the dailies and Sundays to ink. The dailies were drawn by Kane and the Sundays by Jack Burnley. And if memory serves me correctly, I went to Jerry Robinson and asked him if it’d be all right with him if I took the job. He said, “Yes,” and I jumped at it because it immediately doubled my salary and got me out of the bullpen. I could work at home and work all night and sleep all day if I wanted to, as long as I made the deadlines. And that was one of the great advantages in freelancing for the comic books. … So I took this job and worked probably for three years or so before it was dropped. …

Freelance artist Paris (line 8) and Phoebe were at the same address in the 1950 census. At some point they divorced.

 

The Arizona Daily Star (Tucson, Arizona), November 30, 1956, said Paris and Isabel McQueen Morris were issued a marriage license. Batman: The Sunday Classics said Paris moved to Tucson in 1958. DC mailed pages to Paris who continued inking to 1968.

Paris and Isabel’s divorce notice appeared in the Tucson Daily Citizen, October 31, 1959. Paris’s third divorce, from Anne Gerry Paris, appeared in the Tucson Daily Citizen, September 9, 1967.

Paris, as Chuck Paris, copyrighted his song “Blue Norther” in March 1961.

On August 1, 1973, Paris filed a claim for Social Security benefits.

On February 17, 1989, a fire destroyed Paris’s home. On November 3, 1989, Paris was one of the featured guests at Acmecon in Greensboro.

Greensboro News & Record, November 3, 1989

A 1989 photograph of Paris appeared in Entertaining Tucson Across the Decades, Volume 2: 1986–1989.

Paris passed away on March 19, 1994 in Tucson.

Related Letterer Posts

A. Machine and Royal Cartoon, Mario Acquaviva, Gerald Altman, Gene Barnett, Vivian Berg, Daniel Bhang, John Bulthuis, Ray Burley, Ray Burzon,

Jean Callahan, Helen Chu aka Duffy Mohler, Milton Cohen, Ellen Cole, Herb Cooper, Danny Crespi, 

Jon D’Agostino, James Daleo, Martin DeMuth, Shel Dorf, Marty Epp, Howard Ferguson, Herb Field, 

Gerda Gattel, Selma Meyers Gleit, Louis L. Goldklang, Angelo Grasso, Anita Greene, Al Grenet, Ed Hamilton, Ray Holloway, IBM Directory, Alex Jay, Albert and Charlotte Jetter, 

Abe Kanegson, George Kapitan, Anna Kaufman, Gary Keller, Rick Keller, Nadine French King, Ralph Komisarow, Grace Kremer, Morrie Kuramoto, Al Kurzrok, 

Bob Lander, Bob Laughlin, Bob Leatherbarrow, Shelly Leferman, Len Leone, Joe Letterese, Veda Lufkin, 

Robert N. MacLeod/Leroy Lettering, Lee Maroshek, Larry Mayer, Ed McLean, Jack Meltzer, Mel Millar, Jim Novak, Bill Oakley, Ben Oda, 

Walter Palais, Stephen Palmisano, Otto Pirkola, Fred Proctor, Jerry Robinson, Joe and Sam Rosen, George Roussos,

Georgette Sauterel, Ira Schnapp, Irving Settel, Rome Siemon, Artie Simek, Lora Sprang aka Pat Gordon, Herman Stackel, Stan Starkman, Daisy Swayze, Zoltan and Terry Szenics, 

Richard Deane Taylor, Alberta Tews, Matthew Tweedy, Frank Vina, George Ward, Irv Watanabe, Irving Werstein, Leo Wurtzel, John Yakata, Bill Yoshida, Bernie Zuber

 

(Next post on Monday: Jack Kirby Way)

 

Under Cover: Art Direction 1961

 

January: Arthur Eckstein and Bernard Stone

 

 

February: Bradbury Thompson

 

 

March: Norman Gollin

 

 

April: Bernard Owett

 

 

 May: Zoltan N. Kiss

June: Salvatore J. Taibbi

 

July: Bud Blake

 

 

August: George Samerjan

 

 

 September: Herb Lubalin

 

 

October: Ken Saco

 

 

November: George Guido

 

 

December (cover colors are black and blue): Chuck Ax

 

(Next post on Monday: Charles Paris, an Artist, Inker and Letterer)

Comics: A Few Details About Syd Shores, Artist, Inker and Art Director

Syd Shores was born Sydney Lawrence Schwartz according to his daughter, Nancy Shores Karlebach, in an interview published in Alter Ego #167, January 2021. The name change was noted on his World War II draft card that said he was born on September 4, 1913, in Lawrence, Massachusetts.

The 1915 New York state census recorded Shores, his parents, Louis and Anna, and older sister, Retha, in Brooklyn at 452 Williams Avenue, apartment 13 (lines 8–11). His father, a Russian immigrant, was a fur operator. 

In the 1920 United States Census, the family of five had moved across the street to number 461 (lines 56–60). 

Shores was a student at James Madison High School in Brooklyn. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 24, 1929, said 

51 H.S. Students to Receive Prizes from Art League

Fifty-one Brooklyn and Queens high school students will receive medals and awards from the School Art League tomorrow afternoon at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, having won distinction in art work in their respective schools. 

Those who receive the arts-in-trades medal for work in design are: … Sidney [sic] Schwartz, James Madison …

The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 28, 1929, covered the graduation at James Madison High School. 

1929 Log yearbook

According to the 1930 census, Shores had three sisters. The family continued to reside in Brooklyn at 351 Barrett Street (lines 79–84).

During the 1930s, Shores attended evening classes at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. He studied pictorial illustration and graduated in 1936. Shores also met his future wife, Selma Hirschhorn, who studied advertising design and graduated in 1935. 

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 19, 1936

The 1940 census counted Shores, his parents and siblings at 1586 East 22nd Street in Brooklyn. He was a “whiskey rectifier” in the “liquor distilling” industry (lines 9–13). 

Later in 1940, Shores and Selma Hirschhorn married in New Jersey. 

On October 16, 1940, Shores signed his World War II draft card. His address was updated three times. His description was five feet eleven inches, 168 pounds, with black hair and brown eyes. Shores was self-employed.

In 1941, Joe Simon hired Shores. 

Shores enlisted in the Army on March 16, 1944. Shores was a commercial artist. His veteran’s file said he was discharged on January 19, 1946.

Shores and his family were counted twice in the 1950 census. In Brooklyn they lived at 135 Caton Avenue (lines 29 and 30; his daughters were on the next sheet). In Randolph, New Jersey, Shores was in his father-in-law’s household (lines 22–29). 

Timely-Atlas-Comics posted a photograph of Shores and his wife. 

Shores passed away on June 3, 1973 in New York. His wife passed away on October 25, 1976. 

Further Reading

Writer’s Digest, November 1947

Men, November 1957

Editor and Publisher, September 19, 1970

Secrets Behind the Comics (1947)

The Great Women Superheroes (1996)

Marvel Comics: The Untold Story (2012)

Heroes of the Comics (2014)

A Tribute to Syd Shores by Gene Colan

Interviewed by Alan Hewetson

Fantastic Fanzine #12, 1970 interview

Grand Comics Database

Lambiek Comiclopedia

Who’s Who of American Comic Books 1928–1999

Hirschhorn Family Chart

(Next post on Monday: Art Direction 1961)