Joe Shuster Hall Of Fame Inductees: Templeton, Bell And Good

Named for the Toronto native who would grow up to co-create Superman and launch the world of superhero comics, the Joe Shuster Awards are dedicated to honoring Canadian comic book creators. It's a pretty high honor for the Canadian cartooning community, and today, they announced the highest honor of all: The three inductees into this year's Shuster Awards Hall Of Fame.

The three creators being honored include posthumous induction for two Golden Age creators, Cy Bell and Edmond Good, and honors for veteran cartoonist Ty Templeton.

Bell and Good's induction represents an acknowledgement of Canada's contribution to the Golden Age. Bell was the founder of Bell Features, which, according to the Shuster Awards website, stepped up to to take on the job of "putting out Canadian comic books to fill in a void caused by a parliamentary ban of the importing of American comics into the country that was put in place at the end of 1940." One of his titles was Dime Comics, in which Good created his most famous character, Canadian hero Rex Baxter:

Templeton, on the other hand, is very much active today, drawing DC's Batman '66/Green Hornet crossover. That, however, is just the latest in a long career that's seen Templeton taking on virtually every aspect of comics, from writer and artist to publisher and teacher. Recently, he contributed illustrations to Mark Tyler Nobleman's Bill Finger biography, Bill The Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman.

Specifically, among his many contributions to Batman comics over the years, he provided art for what may be one of my favorite Batman stories of all time, "The Joker's Late-Night Lunacy" from Batman Adventures #3, where he and writer Kelly Puckett perfectly captured one of the most terrifying scenes in the character's history:

For more, check out the Shuster Awards website, and congratulations to Ty Templeton.