Charlton Comics

Though perhaps not celebrated as widely as some of his peers, penciller, inker and editor Dick Giordano is one of the key figures in the history of superhero comics. Richard Joseph "Dick" Giordano was born in Manhattan on July 20, 1932. He attended the School of Industrial Art in Manhattan, and at the age of 20 he got a job pencilling for Charlton Comics. He drew for Charlton for over a decade, and one of his panels from a 1964 Strange Suspense Stories issue was used by Roy Lichtenstein as the basis for his Brushstrokes series of paintings.

If Steve Ditko's only accomplishment in comics had been co-creating Spider-Man, he would still be one of the medium's most famous creators. But that's not all he's done. In the 60-plus years since he started drawing for Key Publications and Atlas --- the company that would become Marvel --- Ditko put an indelible stamp on comic books, while remaining something of a mystery; he's one of comics' most notoriously reclusive creators. Ditko was born on this day in 1927 --- though judging by his reputation, he probably won't make that big of a deal out of it. He got his start drawing romance and science-fiction comics, but he would find his wheelhouse while working at Charlton, where he drew mystery, science fiction and horror stories.