George Roussos

George Roussos a.k.a. "George Bell" (born August 20, 1915, Washington, DC, United States; died February 19, 2000, Southside Hospital, Bay Shore, New York) was an American comic book artist best known as one of Jack Kirby's Silver Age inkers, including on landmark early issues of Marvel Comics' The Fantastic Four.

One of comics' most famous covers: The Avengers #4, art by Jack Kirby and George Roussos.

The son of Greek-Americans William and Helen Roussos, George Roussos and his sisters Helen and Alice were orphaned as children. George was sent to live at the Brooklyn Orphan Asylum in New York City, and attended Public School 125 in the Woodside neighborhood of Queens. Roussos was influenced by the art of cartoonist Frank Miller (1898-1949) in the aviation comic strip Barney Baxter in the Air. Other influences included Chester Gould (Dick Tracy), Stan Kaye, Robert Fawcett and Hal Foster (Prince Valiant). "I had no schooling [in art] except the things I learned by myself," Roussos said [1].

The Golden Age of Comics

He entered comics in 1939 as letterer of the Spanish-language version of the newspaper panel Ripley's Believe It or Not. The following year, National Publications, the primary company that would evolve into DC Comics, hired him to assist penciler Jerry Robinson ghosting Bob Kane on Batman stories. Roussos' duties included drawing backgrounds, inking, and lettering. He later worked on features starring the characters Vigilante, Johnny Quick, Superman, Starman. His most notable DC work was as penciller of the Detective Comics backup feature "Air Wave", on which he experimented, on at least one story, with using only shades of gray for color.

Other companies for which Roussos drew during the 1940s Golden Age of comic books included Marvel-precursor Timely Comics, as well as Avon, Standard/Better/Nedor, Family, Fiction House, Hillman Periodicals, Lev Gleason Publications, and Spark. He also did 16 internationally distributed educational pamphlets for General Electric, receiving a World War II draft deferment to do so. After a brief attempt to open an art school with comics-artist colleague Mort Meskin, Roussos added comic strips to his repertoire through the 1960s, assisting artist Dan Barry's Flash Gordon, Charles Flanders' The Lone Ranger, Dan Heilman's Judge Parker and Sy Barry's The Phantom, and succeeding Fred Kida as artist on Judge Wright from 1947 until the strip's demise the following year. Roussos unsuccessfully pitched syndication companies his own comic strips, such as the science fiction feature 2001 A.D. in 1945, the archeology strip Azeena in 1967, and Transisto, with Batman writer Bill Finger, in the late '60s.

Marvel and later

Comic-book clients during the 1950s included that decade's Marvel precursor, Atlas Comics, along with Crestwood, EC, and St. John. In the 1960s, ironically gained the most prominence of his career under the psuedonym George Bell when he became Jack Kirby's inker on landmark early issues of Marvel's The Fantastic Four. His bold if blocky inking gave a rough-hewn solidity to issues #21-28 (Dec. 1963 - July 1964), which featured two early Doctor Doom confrontations, the first Hulk vs. Thing battle, and guest stars The Avengers; Roussos had previously inked the Kirby covers of issues #11, 13, 18-20. He also inked the return of Captain America in Kirby's The Avengers #4 (March 1964) — the cover of which has become one of comics' most famous — as well as Kirby's classic Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos #3-7 (Sept. 1963 - March 1964).

After doing some work for Warren Publishing's black-and-white horror-comics magazines in 1970 and 1971, Roussos — who was frequently the uncredited colorist on many Marvel Silver Age comics, as was Marie Severin — became Marvel's full-time staff colorist.

A Renaissance man whose myriad interests included architecture, astronomy, automobiles, gardening, natural medicine, philosophy and photography, Roussos died of a heart attack. He was married twice: to Viola Fink, followed by Florence Lacey (married 17 November, 1980, died 1988). Roussos had three sons (William, Robert, and Louis) and a daughter (Marie).

Quotes

Atlas Comics [retailer] Presents the 20 Greatest Inkers of American Comic Books [2]: #15 George Roussos "was so adept with a brush in his hand that his co-workers appointed the nickname 'Inky' to him. His style was often thick, heavy with blacks, and sported nice contrasts which complimented [ sic ] one of his prime collaborators in the 50's, Mort Meskin."

References

• "The Art and Life of George Roussos" by Dylan Williams
• The Unofficial Handbook of Marvel Comics Creators
• The Grand Comic-Book Database
• The Jack Kirby Museum
• Don Markstein's Toonpedia
• Classic Comic Books
• The Comic Strip Project: Credits
• POV Online: Why did some artists working for Marvel in the sixties use phony names?