20 Facts About John Severin

1.

John Powers Severin was an American comics artist noted for his distinctive work with EC Comics, primarily on the war comics Two-Fisted Tales and Frontline Combat; for Marvel Comics, especially its war and Western comics; and for his 45-year stint with the satiric magazine Cracked.

2.

John Severin was one of the founding cartoonists of Mad in 1952.

3.

John Severin was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, of Norwegian and Irish descent.

4.

John Severin was a teenager in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, New York City, when he began drawing professionally.

5.

John Severin was the "Charles" of the Charles William Harvey Studio, the other two being William Elder and Harvey Kurtzman.

6.

Around this time, John Severin did his first confirmed work for two publishers with whom he would long be associated, Marvel Comics and EC Comics.

7.

John Severin drew stories for both Two-Fisted Tales and Frontline Combat.

8.

When Kurtzman dropped the war comics to devote more time to Mad, John Severin became sole artist on Two-Fisted Tales for four issues and scripted some stories.

9.

John Severin illustrated stories written by his friend Colin Dawkins and future Mad art director John Putnam.

10.

John Severin appeared in nine of Mad's first ten issues, drawing ten pieces between 1952 and 1954.

11.

Sergeant Barney Barker, drawn by John Severin, was Atlas' answer to Sgt.

12.

John Severin contributed to Topps' line of bubble gum trading cards.

13.

John Severin was one of the artists on Joe Kubert's self-published Sojourn series in 1977.

14.

Circa 2000, writer Jeff Mariotte recalled in 2002, John Severin phoned Scott Dunbier, a group editor at DC Comics' WildStorm imprint, "and said he was looking to do comics again" after working primarily for Cracked at the time.

15.

John Severin liked what he saw and wanted to play along.

16.

John Severin illustrated the controversial 2003 Marvel limited series The Rawhide Kid, a lighthearted parallel universe Western that reimagined the outlaw hero as a kitschy though still formidably gunslinging gay man.

17.

John Severin died at his home in Denver, Colorado, on February 12,2012, at the age of 90.

18.

John Severin received an Inkpot Award in 1998 and was inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame in 2003.

19.

John Severin was among the winners of the Cartoon Art Museum's 2001 Sparky Award.

20.

In 2022, John Severin was awarded the Inkwell Awards Stacey Aragon Special Achievement Award for his lifetime achievement in inking.