In 1986, DC Comics decided to clean up their continuity by, in Crisis on Infinite Earths, destroying the numerous timelines and variant characters that had been developed over the years, and subsequently re-launching most of their titles and characters. Crisis would run as a series from April 1985 through March 1986 (all dates given are cover dates), with developments being reflected back into the characters’ own titles as the story progressed. As part of the company-wide change, the Superman titles were paused after their September 1986 issues. John Byrne was hired to re-launch Superman in a new title, Man of Steel, which would run from October-December 1986 concurrent with Crisis, after which the Superman titles would be re-launched in January 1987 “under new management.”

With longtime editor Julie Schwartz knowing that his final issues were imminent, he decided to treat this as an opportunity to wrap up the decades of continuity that collectively made up the Silver Age Superman, and approached Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel about writing the story. This didn’t work out because of scheduling and legal issues, so Julie commissioned Alan Moore to write a two-part story to be published in Superman #423 and Action Comics #583, both cover dated September 1986, titled “Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?” Longtime Superman artist Curt Swan provided the pencil art, with George Perez (who was penciling Crisis) the primary inker, Murphy Anderson inking the covers, and Kurt Schaffenberger inking the final chapter. All were fan favorites, and Swan, Anderson, and Schaffenberger had been drawing the characters for decades. The story was billed as “The last Superman story.”

Following its original publication in 1986, the story was reprinted in 1997 in trade paperback form (although only 48 pages and comic book size, so more a square-bound comic than a paperback) with an introduction by Paul Kupperberg. The 1997 edition was pulled from the market in 2006 and the story packaged, along with “Batman: The Killing Joke”, as Across The Universe: The Stories of Alan Moore. The first printing did not include the Kupperberg essay, although later printings did. A hardcover edition followed in 2006, and deluxe hardcover editions in 2009 and 2020. If you want to know more about the publishing history, a few minutes with Google will yield abundant information and opinions, including videos that offer page-by-page and panel-by-panel dissection of the story. That may sound snarky, but it was one of those page-by-page reviews that piqued my own interest.

In the 1997 trade paperback edition, Paul Kupperberg’s introduction included three pictures: Julie Schwartz and Jerry Siegel; Curt Swan and John Byrne; and Curt Swan, Kurt Schaffenberger, Julie Schwartz, and Murphy Anderson. All three were apparently taken at comic cons, although not credited or labelled as such.

The third one I am absolutely certain of, because it is from ITHACON 13, an annual convention organized by the Comic Book Club of Ithaca list since 1976, and the second longest running comic con in the US, behind only San Diego.

For ITHACON 13, April 23 & 24, 1988, we pulled all the stops and invited a Superman-related guest list of John Byrne, Murphy Anderson, Kurt Schaffenberger, Curt Swan, Mike Carlin, Denny O’Neil, Julie Schwartz, Jerry Ordway, and Roger Stern. This was a massively impressive guest list, especially considering that only about 425 people attended! But by 1988 we had established a good reputation as a fan-oriented con that was not crowded, was enjoyable for the guests, and where we treated the guests as guests - no “Artist’s Alley” where we charged people for the privilege of being our guest. All of the listed guests accepted, and it was a spectacular convention and a rare opportunity to see all those Silver Age greats together.

Here’s what animation storyboard artist Warren Greenwood had to say about that photo:

At Ithacon 13, someone snapped a photo of Curt Swan, Kurt Schaffenberger, Murphy Anderson, and Julius Schwartz all together – a sort of League of Extraordinary Silver Age Comic Book Creators. (The Silver Age of Comics ran roughly from 1956 to 1970.)

Curt Swan was the definitive Superman artist for three decades. Kurt Schaffenberger, another great Superman artist, specialized in Lois Lane comics. Murphy Anderson drew Hawkman, all the most memorable and emblematic Justice League of America covers, and inked Carmine Infantino’s pencils on The Flash and Gil Kane’s pencils on Green Lantern. (He also drew a fabulous book called Atomic Knights, written by the sublime Silver Age writer John Broome, which was set in a post-apocalypse America where the heroes wore radiation-proof medieval knight armor and rode giant Dalmatians. It doesn’t get any better than that.)

And Julius Schwartz would be the Professor X of the team. An editor at DC Comics, Julie Schwartz inaugurated the Silver Age – introducing the Silver Age JLA, Flash, Green Lantern, Batman, Hawkman, Atom, and the concept of the DC multiverse.

- Excerpted from Warren Greenwood’s article on ITHACON 38 in the Ithaca Times for February 27, 2013

It’s a historic picture, but as far as I can tell, it was never used again after the 1997 printing! When Kupperberg’s introduction was restored to later editions of Whatever Happened… it was without the pictures. I had the 1997 edition, but no later ones. I happened upon one of the ”turn the page” videos online and noticed the pictures were not there. Now the story of the lost pictures just provides another page in the ITHACON memory book.

But this was not the first time the Comic Book Club of Ithaca had a connection with the Superman events of 1986. On September 14, 1985, at one of our smaller “back to school” events, John Byrne attended as a last-minute replacement for Al Williamson, who had to cancel. Byrne shocked comic book fandom by announcing that he had signed on to relaunch Superman! This was before any of us had heard about Crisis. As reported by S.J. Getman in Amazing Heroes,

Just when you thought nothing could shock you with regard to the ever-changing personnel on today's comic book titles, John Byrne has dropped what may be a historical bombshell - the superstar artist/writer, known for his work at Marvel, will soon also chronicle the exploits of comicdom's premier hero, Superman.

Byrne, speaking at an open house given by the Comic Book Club of Ithaca, New York, surprised (if not flabbergasted) the attending fans when several of them overheard him make a passing remark to writer Roger Stern concerning the villain Terminus.

"Terminus would be the perfect Superman villain," Byrne said, "l kind of wish I'd known when I put him in The Fantastic Four that I'd be doing Superman."

"You're kidding... " Someone glancing over the table of Byrne's original art looked up. "When?"

"I've already started," Byrne replied. "You'll see it come out in July (of 1986)."

Byrne said he would be inked by Dick Giordano. "When I told them I'd do the book, I said I wanted the best inker they had," he explained, "and that's their editor-in-chief." He said he thought long-time Superman artist Curt Swan would be moved over to Teen Titans, but his personal feeling was that "DC should give Curt a very comfortable pension for the rest of his life - after 30 years, he deserves it!"

When asked what issue of Superman Byrne's tenure would begin with, he replied "Number One. That's one of the things I asked for when DC and I discussed doing the book. I'm starting everything all over again... as far as I'm concerned, this is the only Superman."

Amazingly, the prolific Byrne will continue writing and drawing both his Marvel assignments, Incredible Hulk and Fantastic Four, while shouldering the considerable task of revamping Superman as well.

Throughout the afternoon, Byrne responded to fans' questions regarding his plans for the Man of Steel.

- Excerpted from S.J. Getman’s article in Amazing Heroes #82, November 1, 1985

So one story for our memory book leads to another. And when Byrne was interviewed on the Today show about the relaunch, I was told (although I have no verification) that someone who attended that Fall Open House knew someone who was a stringer for NBC and passed the word along, leading to reportage in the national media. It’s interesting to think about the intertwined events over the years – Marv Wolfman, who championed Crisis as an idea, then wrote it, was one of our four pro guests at ITHACON 2 in 1977. The road goes ever on.

References

“38th Annual Convention of the Comic Book Club of Ithaca” by Warren Greenwood
The Ithaca Times, February 27, 2013
https://tinyurl.com/25fnn9go
https://www.ithaca.com/entertainment/38th-annual-convention-of-the-comic-book-club-of-ithaca/article_d24c0f4c-80fd-11e2-9a2a-001a4bcf887a.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=email&utm_campaign=user-share

“Look! Up in the Sky! It’s a Bird! It’s a Plane! It’s… John Byrne?!” by S.J. Getman
Amazing Heroes #82, November 1, 1985

“The Today Show 1986 - John Byrne Superman”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TB38awGVdc

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