Stu Schwartzberg 1937-2021

Funny Man In A Dark Room

“My worst day at Marvel was better than my best day at any other job.”—Stu

Stu was the second person I met at the Marvel Editorial offices. [After Mary MacPherran, who was the Receptionist! Back then, she wore a neon green micro-mini skirt with long blonde hair that fell below it. A fascinating spectacle. –Too Young Brown]

I went to my mom’s office after school. When one of her co-workers needed some “art” to be photostated to a particular size, I was tasked with walking it over to Stu. Stu ran the “process camera.” It was a medieval contraption that ran light-sensitive paper through it and was processed in chemical baths right there! [Larry Hama recognized it from his childhood in Japan! –Sir! Yessir! Brown]

What is a “stat?” At this dawn of graphic-art-department and pre-xerographic machine time, a stat was the only way to shrink or enlarge “art”—and unite elements into one piece of paper! Art back then, was anything from type to drawings to photographs or bits and pieces of all of the above that would work better as one piece of paper. [If you have time, find an old comic and flip through till you find a maddeningly crowded page of little, tiny ads! Stacked on one page, you could get X-Ray Specs and learn to play the guitar and much, much more! — Itching Powder Brown] The stat paper was a tough piece of paper that could take rough handling.

Of historical hilarity only, this was at the strange office space before the comic offices all moved into a much larger space at the parent company, Magazine Management—over on 56^th-57^th Streets and Madison Ave. This space was at 621 Madison—I think, but a few blocks north, which was a narrow hallway that led to Stan Lee’s corner office. Lining the hall was Stu’s entryway, then three drafting tables with taborets. Little did I know at the time, with Morrie Kuramoto, John Romita Sr, and Marie Severin all in a row!

Stu’s entry was a door—like a closet – but with black material filling it perfectly. It was not obvious until Stu rolled it open, that it was a light-tight darkroom door. A rotating half-cylinder of stuff that kept the light out.

The door was wobbly and made scraping sounds, then Stu would appear like a stage magician.

I never got to see the stat camera until Marvel’s offices were located at 57^th Street. I was still messengering during the summer break times. [Mom’s office was Marvel’s unattached advertising agency! Smart fellows, Sid Kalish, Al Quigley and Jesse Rosen had made a deal with Marvel for all the ad space in all the comics, in fact all the magazines that Mag Management produced. A “Men’s Line” and a “Woman’s Line”—Action For Men, True Adventure and Modern Romance… great stuff! I’m sorry to have to inform adherents to these thrilling days of yesteryear—the “all true; it happened to me!” stories were all made up! — “I Rafted Down The Amazon With 8 Nurses And Nazi Gold” Brown]

This was Stu’s first beast—which I think was made by Itek. The lens was the most expensive part and there was only one! I invite you to take a close look just to image right of the hand-crank in the lower right. That is a string. That frayed bit of ancient technology was what opened/closed the shutter! And… yes, there was only one… Stu was a human exposure timer! And for several types of paper.

Here is my favorite picture of Stu (and Danny Crespi too!).

I still see this as a still from the stage production of Trials of a Jewish Statman. Danny is the Rabbi/father who wanted his son to be a cantor. Instead Stu wanted to be a statman. It’s all there—just look at it. [Rabbi Crespi, “I’ve heard you sing in the shower—you’ve got the pipes!” –Tin Ear Brown]

Here’s the stats: Stu was born in Passaic, NJ in 1937. At the tender age of 3, he moved to Patterson, where he stayed until 1982! After that he moved in with his best loved-one Susan Ehrenreich (who was one of Marvel’s phalanx of bookkeepers—she was an executive, whom I had little to do with. But she was often downstairs (from the lofty aerie on 9 at 575 Mad, then 11 at 387 Park) for business and perhaps monkey business with Stu!

During his Patterson years, he noted that the family had as many as 5 dogs! One of those dogs was “Roger” and who was an epileptic. I think I am more amazed at that than anything else we discussed. At that appropriate age, he was drafted into the Army. Unfortunately, I did not get back around to asking more of his solider time. That is something he never mentioned when we worked together.

Alas, he got an early, compassionate discharge because of the death of Richard, his younger brother. Again never a mention. If you get the idea that Stu kept a lot bottled up, you would be right.

After mustering out, he entered the School of Visual Arts—he wanted to learn about making newspaper strips. “Strips” are those elysian fields just over that rainbow-draped horizon… if you get a strip that takes off, you’re set for life! Alas, Stu pitched a few that I knew of, probably more that I did not. The “syndicates” who controlled the content of those strip art pages, were cruel taskmasters and they knew what they had. Gold. [Sadly, not Nazi gold… –Throw Me The Idol Brown]

Here is one of my other favorite pics of Stu:

Commandeering a drafting table after hours was one of the perks of the biz! He is laying out a newspaper strip page. No, he never showed his strips or talked about his concepts.

At SVA, he met Herb Trimpe and Bullpenner of Old and Sometime Inker, John Verpoorten. John would soon be the Art Director of the Marvel Bullpen. It was he who put Herb into the stat room first. When Herb wanted to step out to do art, it was Verpoorten who then tapped Stu to replace him. (Which Stu remembers as Monday, February 12, 1968!)

I believe the Pope was in town.

Stuie was cheap—oh yes he was! He never went out to lunch with us, nor dinner. The only luxury was a treasured box of stuff from the premiere pastry company, Entenman’s!

I found a mail-in coupon for an Entenman’s coffee mug—I got two. I think Stu was touched. I still have mine. And I think of my buddy every time I use it.

I tried getting a shot lit by the copy lights. So-so. But you can see the “copy table” at far right which held artwork. You had your choice of moving that up and down or the rear of the camera to and fro in order to focus or change size. You had to center the lens to the middle of the copy table. It was large enough to handle a “four up” proof roll (an 18×24 inch copy of 4 pages of a comic). Stu would have to change out the paper to the largest size and he didn’t like doing that in the middle of the day as people would come in for emergencies… and they’re all “emergencies,” usually something about the size of a post card.

As for Stu’s place in Comic History—remember that every single comic needed a stat of the cover logo. Until myself and cohort statman Robbie Carosella came along, that was one of the major activities Stu performed. That’s a LOT of comic covers.

Then some wise guy up in Bookkeeping got the great idea that Stu could make direct, negative to negative copies of every comic. I said that correctly, “every” comic. Recall, there are four sheets of film for every “four-up” flat – so that’s a lot to wrestle around. So this new Leviathan was assembled at 575 and then moved to 387 Park, where it got it’s own room. I am pretty sure Stu did not like that. I do believe he got a lot by rubbing elbows with all of us other comic nuts.

Eventually, Marvel even moved the whole enterprise, negative flats, broken down neg pages, proof rolls, off to another, cheaper space on West 25^th Street. And that was the last we ever saw of Stu! Which was too bad. Because we got a lot from him.

First Day down at 387 Park Avenue South, 1982. Stu picked out a nice soft desk and relaxed.

Stu was cool—taught me about “skin socks” (no socks), how to make the >ditch< noise that was a funny “punch” sound effect, and here is one of his walkin’-around jokes: (Mom said, if you have to explain ‘em, they’re no good—but, the ad campaign for V-8 was, “Wow, I could’ve had a V-8!”—okay–) he randomly got in position and knocked his forehead in mock self-disappointment, saying in a German accent, “Ach! I could’ve had a V-2!” It finally came to everyone’s attention that Stu never went out to lunch with us—so the office ordered him a take-out steak lunch. With all the aplomb of a Carnegie, he simply sat down, opened it up and had his lunch with all his pals around him. Cool.

I never found out whether he’s a Stuart or a Stewart. Eternally Stu.

Of note, he recalls getting a $5 check from Legendary Creator Harvey Kurtzman for a gag that appeared in an “international” magazine. (Not quite sure what that might be—but this would be a long time ago.) And he was rightly proud.

Finally, he and Sue settled down. He retired from Marvel, after 33 years, in 2007, moved down to Florida. I’m sure he found the Entenman’s Discount Outlet…