Richard Goldwater, President and Co-Publisher of Archie Comics
Brad Ferguson
Richard Goldwater, the president and co-publisher of Archie Comics,
died on Tue 2 Oct, age about 71.
Goldwater was the son of John Goldwater, who with two partners founded
MLJ Publications in 1939. (The company was renamed Archie Comics
Publications five years after the Archie Andrews character first
appeared in 1941.) Richard began working for his father around 1950,
when he was 14 or 15. With the son of another founder, Richard wound
up buying the company during the 1980s. The company still publishes
more than two dozen titles every month and takes in around $7.5 million
doing so.
Archie was loosely (and, er, informally) based on the then-popular Andy
Hardy film series. The character was named for a high school friend of
John Goldwater's. Archie's pal Jughead was said to have been based on
John Goldwater himself. BTW, John Goldwater died in 1999 at the age of
83.
Brad Ferguson
<thir...@frXOXed.net> wrote:
> Mark Evanier reports (via his blog at http://www.newsfromme.com/) that
> Richard Goldwater, the president and co-publisher of Archie Comics,
> died on Tue 2 Oct, age about 71.
>
> Goldwater was the son of John Goldwater, who with two partners founded
> MLJ Publications in 1939. (The company was renamed Archie Comics
> Publications five years after the Archie Andrews character first
> appeared in 1941.) Richard began working for his father around 1950,
> when he was 14 or 15. With the son of another founder, Richard wound
> up buying the company during the 1980s. The company still publishes
> more than two dozen titles every month and takes in around $7.5 million
> doing so.
That's $7.5 million per year. Sorry.
David Carson
wrote:
>Archie was loosely (and, er, informally) based on the then-popular Andy
>Hardy film series. The character was named for a high school friend of
>John Goldwater's. Archie's pal Jughead was said to have been based on
>John Goldwater himself.
Never mind that - who was Veronica based on?
La N
"David Carson" <da...@neosoft.com> wrote in message
news:yMWdnQEDnrZugZra...@speakeasy.net...
Hmmm .... memories are coming back to me. I used to love Betty and Veronica
in the Archie comics when I was a mere sprout. But I positively *adored*
Patsy and Hedy in the comics of the same era. I had forgotten about them
until now. I kind of remember Patsy and Hedy cut-out dolls in the comics.
I think comic books then were something like 12 cents.
- nilita
Brad Ferguson
Carson <da...@neosoft.com> wrote:
I think Jenna Jameson can be ruled out.
My endless research into Archie comics (consisting of a few minutes
last evening) indicates that Betty was featured in the very first
Archie story (Pep Comics #22, December 1941), and Veronica came along
four issues later. Veronica was named for Veronica Lake and the Lodge
family of Boston.
J.D. Baldwin
In the previous article, Brad Ferguson <Brad Ferguson> wrote:
> Archie was loosely (and, er, informally) based on the then-popular
> Andy Hardy film series. The character was named for a high school
> friend of John Goldwater's. Archie's pal Jughead was said to have
> been based on John Goldwater himself. BTW, John Goldwater died in
> 1999 at the age of 83.
Was Goldwater the motivating force behind those weird Xian "Archie"
issues where they go around witnessing to one another? Or did
some other guy just pay him a licensing fee and do them himself?
--
_+_ From the catapult of |If anyone disagrees with any statement I make, I
_|70|___:)=}- J.D. Baldwin |am quite prepared not only to retract it, but also
\ / bal...@panix.com|to deny under oath that I ever made it. -T. Lehrer
***~~~~-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Brad Ferguson
<INVALID...@example.com.invalid> wrote:
> In the previous article, Brad Ferguson <Brad Ferguson> wrote:
> > Archie was loosely (and, er, informally) based on the then-popular
> > Andy Hardy film series. The character was named for a high school
> > friend of John Goldwater's. Archie's pal Jughead was said to have
> > been based on John Goldwater himself. BTW, John Goldwater died in
> > 1999 at the age of 83.
>
> Was Goldwater the motivating force behind those weird Xian "Archie"
> issues where they go around witnessing to one another? Or did
> some other guy just pay him a licensing fee and do them himself?
Those were done by Al Hartley, a writer/artist who licensed Archie from
John Goldwater and published about twenty Christian Archie comics
through Spire Christian Comics. Hartley had worked for Goldwater on
Archie and related features. (Hartley is probably better remembered
for having worked on Marvel's '60s-era humor and fashion-model comics
such as "Patsy and Hedy.")
Hartley became a born-again Christian in 1967 (at the age of 46) and,
afterward, was accused by his Archie Comics editors of including too
much religious material in his stories. Hartley then went to Goldwater
and pitched the licensing deal. The comics were produced for about
five years beginning in 1972, and they were republished endlessly until
Spire (then known as Barbour) folded in 1988. Hartley died in 2003.
Hartley wound up doing about 60 comics for Spire, including those 20 or
so Archies. I've never seen any of Hartley's Christian Archie comics,
but I've seen some of his others for Spire. They're not bad at all.