SGT. FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS 565
a result of the 1954 Kefauver hearings, EC canceled all their comic book titles and
turned Mad Comics into a magazine.
Severin was hired by Atlas comics in 1956, doing touch-up, paste-up, lettering, and
other production work until the comic book implosion of the late 1950s, when Atlas,
like most of the comic book publishers in the last 1950s, severely reduced their staff s to
keep from going under. In 1958 she went to work as a staff artist for the Federal Reserve
Bank, where she produced, among other things, a 20 page comic book called “Th e Story
of Checks.” During this period, she was also freelancing, and drew a story for DC’s
Challengers of the Unknown #4, in 1958.
She returned to Timely, now called Marvel Comics, on a freelance basis in 1964
and joined the staff in 1965. She continued doing production work until 1966, when
she drew her fi rst comic book for Marvel, an issue of Doctor Strange. Among the many
titles Severin has worked on for Marvel over the ensuing years are Sub-Mariner, Crazy,
Th e Hulk, Iron Man, FOOM (the Marvel in-house magazine), Th e fi rst issue of Th e
Cat (inks) and the fi rst issue of Star Wars (colors), and a special one-shot, “Th e Life
of Pope John Paul,” in 1982. She also worked on Marvel’s Star line during the 1980s,
drawing the Muppet Babies and eight issues of Fraggle Rock, and has said in interviews
that her favorite work has been light, humorous stories like the ones she drew for the
Star line.
Marie Severin received the Inkpot Award at the San Diego Comicon in 1988, and in
1997 she was inducted into the Women Cartoonists Hall of Fame by Friends of Lulu,
an organization that promotes participation in comics by women. She was inducted
into the Will Eisner Hall of Fame in 2001.
Trina Robbins
SGT. FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS. Sgt. Fury and His Howling Comman-
dos were a heroic group of seven highly capable misfi ts led by Sgt. Nick Fury, whose
cigar chomping, take-no-prisoners attitude informed their commando raids during
World War II throughout all of Europe, and on occasion Japan. In the early 1960s,
Marvel wanted to work off the formula that brought DC success with their army
comic book Our Army at War, specifi cally the character Sgt. Rock. In response, Stan
Lee, Jack Kirby, and Dick Ayers combined their eff orts and created Sgt. Fury and
his Howling Commandos, who fi rst appeared in their own self-titled comic in 1963.
Th e group was composed of fairly standard formulaic types, including the second in
command “Dum Dum” Dugan, who was a former circus performer (and requisite
Irishman, complete with bowler); Dino Manelli, a handsome man/movie star who
joined the war to do his duty; Izzy Cohen, the jaunty Brooklynite who could fi x any-
thing; “Junior” Juniper, the Ivy League college graduate who met an untimely end early
on in the series; “Rebel” Ralston, a southern Jockey who was wiry and a sure shot;
and Gabriel Jones, an African American who liked to play his bugle while going into
battle. Th is last member of the team is of interest, as regular units of the American
Army in World War II were segregated until near the end of the war. Th e timing of
