Problem: Joe Simon was born in 1913 as Hymie Simon and raised in Rochester, New York, the son of Harry Simon, who had emigrated from Leeds, England, in 1905, and Rose (Kurland), whom Harry met in the United States. Harry Simon moved to Rochester, then a clothing-manufacturing center where his younger brother Isaac lived, and the couple had a daughter, Beatrice, in 1912. A poor Jewish family, the Simons lived in "a first-floor flat which doubled as my father's tailor shop." Simon attended Benjamin Franklin High School, where he was art director for the school newspaper and the yearbook - earning his first professional fee as an artist when two universities each paid $10 publication rights for his art deco, tempera splash pages for the yearbook sections.

Upon graduation in 1932, Simon was hired by Rochester Journal-American art director Adolph Edler as an assistant, replacing Simon's future comics colleague Al Liederman, who had quit. Between production duties, he did occasional sports and editorial cartoons for the paper. Two years later, Simon took an art job at the Syracuse Herald in Syracuse, New York, for $45 a week, supplying sports and editorial cartoons here as well. Shortly thereafter, for $60 a week, he succeeded Liederman as art director of a paper whose name Simon recalled in his 1990 autobiography as the Syracuse Journal American, although the Syracuse Journal and the Syracuse Sunday American, were the separate weekday and Sunday papers, respectively. The paper soon closed, and Simon, at 23, ventured to New York City.  There, Simon took a room at the boarding house Haddon Hall, in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of Manhattan, near Columbia University. At the suggestion of the art director of the New York Journal American, he sought and found freelance work at Paramount Pictures, working above the Paramount Theatre on Broadway, retouching the movie studio's publicity photos. He also found freelance work at Macfadden Publications, doing illustrations for True Story and other magazines. Sometime afterward, his boss, art director Harlan Crandall, recommended Simon to Lloyd Jacquet, head of Funnies, Inc., one of that era's comic-book "packagers" that supplied comics content on demand to publishers testing the new medium. That day, Simon received his first comics assignment, a seven-page Western.  Four days later, Jacquet asked Simon, at the behest of Timely Comics publisher Martin Goodman, to create a flaming superhero like Timely's successful character the Human Torch. From this came Simon's first comic-book hero, the Fiery Mask. Simon used the pseudonym Gregory Sykes on at least one story during this time, "King of the Jungle", starring Trojak The Tiger Man, in Timely's Daring Mystery Comics #2 (Feb. 1940).

How did he get involved in comic books?

Answer with quotes: Sometime afterward, his boss, art director Harlan Crandall, recommended Simon to Lloyd Jacquet, head of Funnies, Inc., one of that era's comic-book "packagers"


Problem: Joe Simon was born in 1913 as Hymie Simon and raised in Rochester, New York, the son of Harry Simon, who had emigrated from Leeds, England, in 1905, and Rose (Kurland), whom Harry met in the United States. Harry Simon moved to Rochester, then a clothing-manufacturing center where his younger brother Isaac lived, and the couple had a daughter, Beatrice, in 1912. A poor Jewish family, the Simons lived in "a first-floor flat which doubled as my father's tailor shop." Simon attended Benjamin Franklin High School, where he was art director for the school newspaper and the yearbook - earning his first professional fee as an artist when two universities each paid $10 publication rights for his art deco, tempera splash pages for the yearbook sections.

As superhero comics waned in popularity after the end of World War II, Simon and Kirby began producing a variety of stories in many genres. In partnership with Crestwood Publications, they developed the imprint Prize Group, through which they published Boys' Ranch and launched an early horror comic, the atmospheric and non-gory series Black Magic. The team also produced crime and humor comics, and are credited as well with publishing the first romance comics title, Young Romance, starting a successful trend.  At the urging of a Crestwood salesman, Kirby and Simon launched their own comics company, Mainline Publications, in late 1953 or early 1954, subletting space from their friend Al Harvey's Harvey Publications at 1860 Broadway. Mainline published four titles: the Western Bullseye: Western Scout; the war comic Foxhole, since EC Comics and Atlas Comics were having success with war comics, but promoting theirs as being written and drawn by actual veterans; In Love, since their earlier romance comic Young Love was still being widely imitated; and the crime comic Police Trap, which claimed to be based on genuine accounts by law-enforcement officials. Bitter that Timely Comics' 1950s iteration, Atlas Comics, had relaunched Captain America in a new series in 1954, Kirby and Simon created Fighting American. Simon recalled, "We thought we'd show them how to do Captain America". While the comic book initially portrayed the protagonist as an anti-Communist dramatic hero, Simon and Kirby turned the series into a superhero satire with the second issue, in the aftermath of the Army-McCarthy hearings and the public backlash against the Red-baiting U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy.  The partnership ended in 1955 with the comic book industry beset by self-imposed censorship, negative publicity, and a slump in sales. Simon "wanted to do other things and I stuck with comics," Kirby recalled in 1971. "It was fine. There was no reason to continue the partnership and we parted friends." Simon turned primarily to advertising and commercial art, while dipping back into comics on occasion. The Simon and Kirby team reunited briefly in 1959 with Simon writing and collaborating on art for Archie Comics, where the duo updated the superhero the Shield in the two-issue The Double Life of Private Strong (June-Aug. 1959), and Simon created the superhero the Fly; they went on to collaborate on the first two issues of The Adventures of the Fly (Aug.-Sept. 1959), and Simon and other artists, including Al Williamson, Jack Davis, and Carl Burgos, did four issues before Simon moved on to work in commercial art.

Did Simon also create romance comics?

Answer with quotes:
The team also produced crime and humor comics, and are credited as well with publishing the first romance comics title,