Jack Burnley (January 11, 1911 – December 19, 2006) was the pen name of Hardin J. Burnley, an American

comic book A comic book, comic-magazine, or simply comic is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panel (comics), panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are often accompanied by descriptive prose and wri ...

artist and illustrator. Burnley was the first artist, after co-creator

Joe Shuster Joseph Shuster ( ; July 10, 1914 – July 30, 1992) was a Canadian-American comic book artist best known for co-creating the DC Comics character Superman, with Jerry Siegel, in ''Action Comics'' #1 ( cover-dated June 1938). Shuster was involv ...

, to draw

Superman Superman is a superhero created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, which first appeared in the comic book ''Action Comics'' Action Comics 1, #1, published in the United States on April 18, 1938.The copyright date of ''Action Comics ...

in comic books.

Biography

Early career

Born in

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

, Jack Burnley began his comics career working for the

King Features Syndicate King Features Syndicate, Inc. is an American content distribution and animation studio, consumer product License, licensing and print syndication company owned by Hearst Communications that distributes about 150 comic strips, columnist, newspape ...

, providing cartoons for the sports section (including work for

Damon Runyon Alfred Damon Runyon (October 4, 1880 – December 10, 1946) was an American journalist and short-story writer. He was best known for his short stories celebrating the world of Broadway theatre, Broadway in New York City that grew out of the Proh ...

). In 1929 he became the then-youngest artist to have a syndicated feature, and also produced illustrations for advertising.Biography by Joe Desris, in ''Batman Archives'', Volume 3 (

DC Comics DC Comics (originally DC Comics, Inc., and also known simply as DC) is an American comic book publisher owned by DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery. DC is an initialism for "Detective Comics", an American comic book seri ...

, 1994), p. 223 In 1938, Burnley began to freelance, producing "single-page sports fillers" for

, by whom he was subsequently hired in 1940. His first published assignment was the cover illustration for ''New York World's Fair 1940'' (AKA ''World's Fair Comics'' #2); the cover portrayed

with

Batman Batman is a superhero who appears in American comic books published by DC Comics. Batman was created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger, and debuted in Detective Comics 27, the 27th issue of the comic book ''Detective Comics'' on M ...

and Robin, the first time the trio had ever appeared together in print. Burnley went on to provide uncredited artwork for ''

Action Comics ''Action Comics'' is an American comic book/Comic anthology, magazine series that introduced Superman, one of the first major superhero characters. The publisher was originally known as Detective Comics Inc., which later merged into National ...

'' until 1947. Burnley's work was often credited to other artists. In the 1945 Batman newspaper strips which Burnley penciled, the stylized Bob Kane signature logo appears, although Kane had not worked on the sequence. The version of Superman he created was noted for its carefully drawn musculature, which set the style of superheroes for years to come. “I gave Superman a lot more muscle than he had originally,” he told a Charlottesville, Virginia newspaper in 2000. “When I came into comics I had a background in drawing the musclemen and heroes of sports, so it was rather easy for me to make the transition to drawing the comic figures.”

Later DC work

Burnley co-created (with writer

Gardner Fox Gardner Francis Cooper Fox (May 20, 1911 – December 24, 1986) was an American writer known best for creating numerous comic book characters for DC Comics. He is estimated to have written more than 4,000 comics stories, including 1,500 for DC ...

) the superhero Starman, which first appeared in ''

Adventure Comics ''Adventure Comics'' is an American comic book series published by DC Comics from 1938 to 1983 and revived from 2009 to 2011. In its first era, the series ran for 503 issues (472 of those after the title changed from ''New Adventure Comics''), ...

'' (April 1941). He "became DC's top ghost artist," working on the main characters and titles. In addition to pencilling over 100 covers, he also worked (for a brief time in 1944), as uncredited penciler on both the Batman and Superman Sunday

comic strip A comic strip is a Comics, sequence of cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often Serial (literature), serialized, with text in Speech balloon, balloons and Glossary of comics terminology#Captio ...

s.Comic creator: Jack Burnley
/ref> Burnley left DC and the comic book field in 1947, and returning to newspaper sports cartooning. He worked for the ''

Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph The ''Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph'' was an evening daily newspaper published in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from 1927 to 1960. Part of the Hearst newspaper chain, it competed with '' The Pittsburgh Press'' and the ''Pittsburgh Post-Gazette'' until be ...

'' for four years, then for the '' San Francisco News'' until his retirement in 1976. Burnley and his wife, former cabaret dancer Dolores Farris relocated to

Charlottesville, Virginia Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city (United States), independent city in Virginia, United States. It is the county seat, seat of government of Albemarle County, Virginia, Albemarle County, which surrounds the ...

in 1981. Burnley died on December 19, 2006, at the Heritage Hall senior facility in Charlottesville, following a fall that broke his hip.

Notes

External links

Jack Burnley
on Comiclopedia

{{DEFAULTSORT:Burnley, Jack American comics artists 1911 births 2006 deaths Golden Age comics creators