Knowledge Waits is a feature where I just share some bit of comic book history that interests me.

Just last month I did a Comic Book Legends Revealed about how Chris Claremont was inspired by a story about how Walter Simonson's daughter reacted poorly to suddenly seeing him with a new hair style (namely, without his trademark beard). Claremont decided to work that approach into the pages of "Uncanny X-Men" by having Storm get a very different haircut. Many years earlier, I had done a Comic Book Legends Revealed about how Paul Smith (who was drawing "Uncanny X-Men" at the time) gave Claremont and editor Louise Jones (Walter's wife, who told the story about their daughter to everyone) some hair style options including, as a joke, a mohawk. Jones and Claremont liked the mohawk and went with it.

At the end of "Uncanny X-Men" #173 (by Claremont, Smith and Bob Wiacek), Storm debuted her new look and Kitty Pryde (like the Simonsons' daughter) freaked the heck out...

However, while I've explained the origin of the hair change and the fact that Smith suggested the mohawk choice as a joke, I've never actually showed all of the possible choices that Smith submitted - until now! Check 'em out, courtesy of Smith's always-informative website.

Very cool stuff! Looking at the choices, I can honestly see how the mohawk was sort of appealing, especially, though, since the goal WAS for the new haircut to be a shocking change, whatever it ended up being.

Thanks to Paul Smith for posting this great piece of X-Men history!

If anyone else has a cool piece of comic book history that they'd like to see featured, feel free to drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!