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Award-winning comic book-style illustrator and historian Arlen Schumer explores the specific Jewish creation of the American superhero and its antecedents in older, ancient myths—from Ben Grimm to the Golem—as well as the significant contributions Jews have made to the medium of comic book art itself.  One day in 1933, newspaper publisher Max Gaines (nee Ginzburg) came up with a novel idea: he took some pages of his tabloid-sized Sunday newspaper comics, folded them over twice, and stapled them on the side—creating the comic book as we know it! That same year, two 18-year-old aspiring newspaper cartoonists from Cleveland, writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, created a character whom they hoped to sell to the very newspaper syndicates who worked with Gaines: Superman! And the rest, as they say, is history! Thus began the history of comic books and super heroes,  largely created by American Jews like Gaines, Siegel and Shuster, for their innovations sparked a 20th Century American pop culture explosion that has only gained in prominence and stature here in the 21st Century!  In essence, American Jews not only created the original superheroes—they created the American comic book itself! “The People of The Book” became “The people of the comic book”

Arlen Schumer,  is one of the foremost historians of comic book art, named by Comic Book Artist magazine in 1998 as “one of the more articulate and enthusiastic advocates of comic book art in America.” His coffee table book, The Silver Age of Comic Book Art, won the Independent Publishers Book Award for best Popular Culture book

www.ArlenSchumer.com