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. Comic book historians estimate that he wrote more than 4,000 comics stories.

Early life and career

Gardner F. Fox was born in Brooklyn, New York. He was raised Roman Catholic. Fox recalled being inspired at an early age by the great fantasy fiction writers. On or about his eleventh birthday, he been given The Gods of Mars and The Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs, books which "opened up a complete new world for me." He "read all of Burroughs, Harold Lamb, Talbot Mundy," maintaining copies "at home in my library" some 50 years later.

Fox received a law degree from St. John's College and was admitted to the New York bar in 1935. He practiced for about two years, but as the Great Depression continued he began writing for DC Comics editor Vin Sullivan. Debuting as a writer in the pages of Detective Comics, Fox "intermittently contributed tales to nearly every book in the DC lineup during the Golden Age." He was also a frequent contributor of prose stories to the pulp science fiction magazines of the 1930s and 1940s.