Brownstone Intermediate and Gildersleeve Elementary, Portland, CT

On 10/22/15, I got to see a town new to me in my home state: Portland, CT. I spoke at two lovely schools, Brownstone and Gildersleeve.

Brownstone was built in 1932, so naturally I asked if it hid any ghost stories.

I was told yes. The story given as an example was the rumor that the school used to have a bowling alley. They did not state this explicitly, but I am going to believe that phantoms bowl there now...

The auditorium in which I spoke featured two unretouched paintings dating back to the Great Depression, done under the Works Progress Administration.

  

It also boasted a dinosaur skeleton, but alas, I did not get the story behind that.

In its cafeteria, Gildersleeve posted fun facts about nutrition and foods from around the world. More schools should do this! A huge, daily opportunity for a teachable moment!

 

Doesn’t Gildersleeve sound like the forgotten fifth house of Hogwarts?

Thank you to both schools for welcoming me!

Bill Finger credited in Batman-related comics, week 3

Week 1 of the corrected credit—three titles.

Week 2—six titles (not counting weekly print series where the credit had already appeared).

Week 3—two titles (but one is the big ticket item):

Detective Comics #46

(the series in which Batman began)

Batman: Arkham Knight #10

Coincidences: Batman, Hollywood Walk of Fame, and family

Bill Finger was name-dropped three times during the ceremony to unveil Bob Kane’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame:

• 18:09 loud applause
• 25:37
• 30:30 by Jim Lee

 The woman in the white blouse is the 

widow of Bob Kane.

By the way…

• Bob Kane’s Hollywood Walk of Fame was unveiled on 10/21/15.
• Bill Finger’s co-creator credit in Batman comics was unveiled…on 10/21/15.

I would not be surprised if DC hoped that the Finger credit would overshadow the Kane star!

(Also on 10/21/15: Marty McFly time-traveled from 1985.)

My personal Bill/Bob coincidence:

• My paternal grandfather died in early 1974. So did Bill Finger.
• My paternal grandma died on 11/3/98. So did Bob Kane. Yes, SAME DAY.

Frank and Bertha Nobleman, August 1962

A ghostly disclaimer

In 2007, my book Ghost Hunting Handbook came out. Perhaps you missed it (like a ghost itself).

Upon revisiting it recently, I saw that I missed—or rather forgot—something about it…the copyright page has no ordinary disclaimer:

Bill Finger credited in Batman-related comics, week 2

Week 1 of the corrected credit—three titles.

Week 2—six titles (not counting print series where the credit has already appeared, namely Batman & Robin Eternal): 

 Batgirl #45

 Batman ‘66 #28

 Grayson #13

Justice League: 

Darkseid War—Batman #1

Robin: Son of Batman #5

We Are Robin #5 

(but please all-cap either both names or neither!)

And we haven’t even gotten to flagships Batman or Detective Comics.

We Are Bill Finger.

Speaking to graduate students about nonfiction

Thank you, Susannah Richards, for inviting me to talk with your Eastern Connecticut State University students on 10/20/15 about the blurred lines of nonfiction.

Favorite topic! Fun group! Let’s do it again!

And special thanks for your most kind comment here:

First Bill Finger credits on TV and in comic books

On 10/10/15, we got our first glimpse of the newly worded Batman credit “Batman created by Bob Kane with Bill Finger.” It is from what some called a house ad but what actually seems to be a title page.

A little more than a week later, the credits are coming fast and furious now.

On 10/18/15 (technically 10/19/15, since the show aired at midnight), the first known Bill credit in a TV show ran—Robot Chicken DC Comics Special III: Magical Friendship:

Later on 10/19/15, in the end credits of the fifth episode of the second season of Gotham (“Scarification”), we first saw the credit in a television series where said credit will now appear each time:

Today, on 10/21/15, we encounter the first three credit appearances in comic book series: 

Batman & Robin Eternal #3

Batman: Arkham Knight—Genesis #3

Gotham Academy #11
 

The covers of the above (courtesy of the Bill Finger Appreciation Group):

We’ve come a long way.

My book dedications

The Felix Activity Book (1996): To Darby, in the spirit of all the games I used to make for you when you were little [sister]

Felix Explores Our World (1999): To Leslie Moseley and Dan Tucker [two of my three first bosses, who became friends; Leslie was also co-author of The Felix Activity Book]

Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman (2008): To Daniela and Lara, my Girls of Steel [wife and daughter]

Quick Nonfiction Writing Activities That Really Work! (2009): To Andrew, whose word is always true [friend from college]

Vanished: True Stories of the Missing (2010): To Christian, who knows too much about missing someone and who has not vanished after all these years [friend since 4th grade]

Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman (2012): To Charles, Lyn, and Athena, who respectively revealed the soul, heart, and hope of Bill Finger [Charles Sinclair, longtime friend/writing partner of Bill’s; Lyn Simmons, Bill’s second wife; Athena Finger, Bill’s only grandchild]

Brave Like My Brother (2016): To my brothers by choice: Mike, Seth, Darren, Christian, Kevin, Matt, and Matt [best friends since childhood]; added here 11/1/15

The Chupacabra Ate the Candelabra (2017): To Rafael, my favorite funny little fuzzball [son]; added here 3/2/17

Fairy Spell: How Two Girls Convinced the World That Fairies Are Real (2018): To Lara—don’t stop believing.; added here 7/28/18

Thirty Minutes Over Oregon: A Japanese Pilot's World War II Story (2018): To Daniela. I wouldn’t know Nobuo if not for you.; added here 7/28/18

Bill Finger action figure!

Don’t miss the choking hazard.

Thanks to Derek Wolfford (yet again) and Steven Szaplicki.

(P.S. My previous post on this subject.)

“Boys” and “Boy Wonder” “equally riveting”

Gathering Books gathered a series of kind words for Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman:

• “equally riveting” (compared to Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman)
• “The very extensive Author’s Note is a study in first-class sleuthing, dedicated investigation, and single-minded relentlessness in pursuing every lead he could find to look for Bill Finger’s surviving heir. Not only is this a tribute to a brilliant man’s legacy, it also honors his memory by potentially changing the life of his granddaughter whom very few people knew even existed. Truly an amazing work of investigative and comic art. Find it and add this to your library.”

I also especially appreciated this:

“Bill struck me as a man who would rather concern himself with creating and writing—his head [so] bursting with brilliant ideas that perhaps it was just way too much effort for him to stand up to Bob Kane and claim what is rightfully his.”

Thank you, GB, for lending your voice to the effort to preserve the legacy of Bill Finger.

Insulting Bill Finger early (1946) and posthumously (1976)

The calculated campaign to bury Bill Finger’s role in Batman began earlier than some realize...and, in a particularly egregious manner, continued after his death.

Real Fact Comics was a DC Comics series featuring biographies of notable people. Real Fact #5 (1946) was apparently the only time the series profiled the creator of a superhero...the alleged creator, anyway.

The story was called “The True Story of Batman and Robin: How a Big-Time Comic Is Born!” (Thanks to Bill Wormstedt, Bill Jourdain, and John Wells for the scans.)

In this case, a more appropriate title for the series would have been Real Fake Comics. Not only is there no mention of Bill, but the events attributed to Bob Kane are preposterous. The capper: when Bob asks a friend to model a Batman costume his mother made.

Others including Bill Jourdain and Arlen Schumer have already covered this topic well.

Bill Finger died in 1974. Not even two years later, Amazing World of DC Comics #10 (1/76) ran a distasteful story called “Through the Wringer” about a chronically late writer named Phil Binger (get it?) who (spoiler in more ways than one) dies at the end. Even now would be too soon.

Again, others including the incomparable Robby Reed at Dial B for Blog have covered this.

Of course, since 9/18/15, this is all even more moot than before.

Showing you how big my “Brave” is...

(In other words, about 6x8.)

A novel of World War II, told in letters. Due from Scholastic in early 2016.

Bill Finger co-credit - first time in print!

On 10/10/15, I first saw the new normal...Bill Finger’s name on Batman. Not just on Batman stories Bill wrote. On BATMAN.

It appears in Dark Knight Universe Presents: The Atom #1 (a mini-comic correlated to Dark Knight III: The Master Race). Small hero. Big deal.

The language is better than what I speculated. Batman film producer Michael Uslan called this “DC’s most seminal moment in Batman history since Detective Comics #27 [1939] and Batman #1 [1940]”:

(Too bad Jerry Siegel’s name is spelled wrong. Twice.)

Let’s zoom in on the credit heard ‘round the world: