Welcome to the five hundred and fourth in a series of examinations of comic book legends and whether they are true or false. Click here for an archive of the first five hundred (I actually haven't been able to update it in a while. It's actually kind of weird. I'll work on it!). This week is a speciall All-Superman edition! Did Superman really cause a disagreement between Albert Einstein and Isaac Asimov? Did the introduction of the Supermobile in Action Comics inspire the toy or was it the other way around? And did DC seriously fabricate a bunch of "famous" Lois Lane stories?

Let's begin!

NOTE: The column is on three pages, a page for each legend. There's a little "next" button on the top of the page and the bottom of the page to take you to the next page (and you can navigate between each page by just clicking on the little 1, 2 and 3 on the top and the bottom, as well).

COMIC LEGEND: Superman's speed sparked a disagreemnt between Albert Einstein and Isaac Asimov

STATUS: False

Superman comics often depicted Superman's speed. And while the exact levels of his speed rarely came into play, when they DID, they were often described as being at some pretty over-the-top levels, like 1954's Superman #89, which shows that Superman is faster than light and time itself.



So it IS true that Superman comics of the early 1950s featured at least one instance of Superman discussing being faster than the speed of light.

Okay, so we go to the story at hand. Larry Tye, in his great book, Superman: The High-Flying History of America's Most Enduring Hero, discusses Mort Weisinger a bit, beginning with how weird it was for Jerry Siegel to be working for Weisinger, having some guy tell HIM, the creator of Superman, how Superman was supposed to act...

Whatever Jerry thought, it was Mort who now was Superman's boss as well as his mouthpiece...An MIT class sent Mort a letter from Albert Einstein, who asserted that nothing, not even Superman, could move faster than the speed of light. Mort consulted his "good friend" Isaac Asimov, the science fiction writer, who said that "Professor Einstein's statement is based on theory. Superman's speed is based on fact." Mort knew everyone, or pretended to, and he had no shame promoting himself and his comic book star despite his feigned modesty.

It's a great line and a great story.

Now is it TRUE?

Right off the bat, a big red flag for me is the fact that Mort Weisinger did not even officially take over the Superman titles until around 1957 (officially 1958). When he took over officially, it was a pretty big demarcation point - as he changed the books dramatically, including stuff like adding a letters column. Weisinger's letters columns were famous (I have a whole feature just devoted to Weisinger's letters columns). Weisinger was certainly no shrinking violet - he loved publicity and he pretty much made himself the public face of the Superman comics when he took over. So right there, it just seems unlikely that the scenario described would have taken place, since Einstein passed away in early 1955.

However, while Weisinger OFFICIALLY took over in 1957/1958, he had been working for DC editorial since the 1940s and had specifically been working on the Superman books for a number of years under Whitney Ellsworth, who eventually gave up the Superman titles because of his involvement with the Superman television series. Ellsworth began working on the Superman TV series in the early 1950s, so there were a number of years there where while Ellsworth was still enough in charge that Weisinger couldn't put his own stamp on the book, Weisinger was likely doing a lot of the day-to-day editorial work on the Superman titles of the time (except for the time when Weisinger was also out in Hollywood working on the show, too. I presume Jack Schiff was covering things then). So theoretically, if something wanted to contact a Superman editor in 1954-1955, Weisinger possibly could be that guy (although, again, there was no letter column at the time, so it seems a bit hard to believe that the class would send in a letter before there was a letters column - as an aside, before there were letters columns, comic would use text pieces instead, like this one from 1953's Action Comics #178...





).

But here's where the story really falls apart for me. The first time this story was ever told was by Mort Weisinger himself, a year before he died. In the lead up to the Superman movie's release in 1978, there was a lot of interest in Superman and in October of 1977, Weisinger wrote about his history with Superman in a long piece that was syndicated in a number of newspapers across the country. And in that piece, Weisinger tells that story just about the way that Tye does. Tye, in fact, is quoting Weisinger there (Weisinger refers to Asimov as his "good friend," hence Tye's quotes for that). However, note what else Tye says about Weisinger:

Mort knew everyone, or pretended to,

The bolding is mine, but Tye gets the point across well. Weisinger was always known to involve himself in a bit of puffery during his lifetime. So the notion that this story just magically appeared over twenty years after it allegedly took place just sounds like a load of hooey (especially as it requires us to believe that Weisinger wouldn't have bragged about it in public before 1977).

Which leads to the nail in the story's coffin. Here's Asimov himself in Nebula Winners Fourteen in 1980, three years after Weisinger invented the tale:

Weisinger, a couple of years ago, made up the following story:

"Isaac Asimov was asked how Superman could fly faster than the speed of light, which was supposed to be an absolute limit. To this Asimov replied, 'That the speed of light is a limit is a theory; that Superman can travel faster than light is a fact.'"

I assure you it never happened and I never said it, but it will be repeated, I am quite certain, indefinitely, and it will probably be found in Bartlett's quotations a century from now, attributed to me, after all my writings have been forgotten.

Obviously, Asimov is remembering the made up quote slightly incorrectly, but the main point is that:

A. It seemed highly unlikely that the story ever happened

and

B. One half of the parties quoted in the story specifically said it didn't happen.

That's enough for a false from me!

Thanks to Larry Tye and Isaac Asimov!

Check out my latest Movie Legends Revealed at Spinoff Online: Did the Ghostbusters originally travel through time and other dimensions?

On the next page, which came first - the Supermobile TOY or the Supermobile's appearance in Action Comics?

COMIC LEGEND: DC created the Supermobile because a toy company asked them to create it.

STATUS: True

On Twitter the other week, reader Big Bear asked me to confirm or debunk my pal Alan Kistler's tweet regarding Supermobile (Mark Millar wrote a great bit about the Supermobile in my last book! Go buy it and read it!) being created by DC because a toy company told them to do it.

The Supermobile debuted in Action Comics #481 (which came out either in December 1977 or January 1978) by Cary Bates, Curt Swan and Frank Chiaramonte, with an awesome Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez cover...



In the comic, Superman loses his powers but has to still take on Amazo, who has the powers of a bunch of Justice Leaguers! So how can he stop him? With the Supermobile, of course!









Interestingly enough, the toy did not come out from Corgi until 1979...



However, both Cary Bates and Jose Luis-Garcia Lopez told Mike Pigott in Back Issue Magazine #62 in 2013 that Corgi specifically asked DC to create the toy because they had sold about 150 gazillion Batmobile toys



and figured they could do well with a Supermobile, as well.

So while the comic actually beat the toy to market, the toy still came first.

Thanks to Big Bear for the suggestion and thanks to Mike Pigott, Cary Bates and Jose Luis-Garcia Lopez for the information! And congrats to Alan for being totally right (see, Alan, I told you this legend would just be confirming ya)!

On the next page, did DC seriously fabricate a bunch of "famous" Lois Lane stories?

COMIC LEGEND: Mort Weisinger fabricated a number of "famous" Lois Lane stories.

STATUS: True

Lois Lane's solo comic proved popular enough that DC gave her two annuals reprinting popular stories from the comic in 1963 and 1964...





While the annuals reprinted a number of famous Lois Lane stories, what's even more notable about these comics is what they did NOT print!

You see, in both annuals, the editors of the book (ostensibly Mort Weisinger, but I guess it could have been an assistant) posted other famous Lois Lane stories. Here from #1...



and here, from #2...



That's all well and good except, well, not all of those comics actually EXISTED!

The always awesome Pat Curley got to the bottom of this a couple of years ago. Here's Pat:

Action Comics #20 is the January 1940 issue, and the (untitled) Superman story in that issue has Superman dealing with a headstrong actress; Lois doesn't even appear in there. The May 1944 issue of Superman is #28, and it doesn't include any story with Lois on Krypton; at that point Superman didn't even know the name of his home planet.

Lois did not commit any crimes, perfect or flawed in the November 1945 issue of Superman

So three out of fifteen on the first list were made up.

The SECOND list, though, is crazier! Take it away, Pat...

Lois Lane's College Sweetheart" (Action Comics, March 1939); "Lois Lane on Krypton" (Superman, May, 1944); "Lois Lane's Super-Dream" (Superman, August, 1945); "Lois Lane in Smallville" (Superboy, July, 1945); "The Girl of Gold" (Action Comics, June, 1952); "When Lois Met Green Arrow" (Adventure Comics, December, 1952); and "The Luck of Lois, Lana and Lori!" (Showcase No. 8) were invented for this list.

How awesome is that? Pre-internet, who was really going to fact-check such lists? Weisinger should have just gone nuts with the fake story names, though. Lost opportunities, Mort!

Thanks to Pat Curley for this awesome information. Go read Pat's website, Silver Age Comics. It is amazing.

Okay, that's it for this week!

Thanks to the Grand Comics Database for this week's covers! And thanks to Brandon Hanvey for the Comic Book Legends Revealed logo!

Feel free (heck, I implore you!) to write in with your suggestions for future installments! My e-mail address is cronb01@aol.com. And my Twitter feed is http://twitter.com/brian_cronin, so you can ask me legends there, as well!

Here's my newest book, Why Does Batman Carry Shark Repellent? The cover is by Kevin Hopgood (the fellow who designed War Machine's armor).

If you want to order a copy, ordering it here

gives me a referral fee.

Follow Comics Should Be Good on Twitter and on Facebook (also, feel free to share Comic Book Legends Revealed on our Facebook page!). Not only will you get updates when new blog posts show up on both Twitter and Facebook, but you'll get original content from me, as well!

Also, be sure to check out my website, Urban Legends Revealed, where I look into urban legends about the worlds of entertainment and sports, which you can find here, at urbanlegendsrevealed.com.

Here's my book of Comic Book Legends (130 legends - half of them are re-worked classic legends I've featured on the blog and half of them are legends never published on the blog!).

The cover is by artist Mickey Duzyj. He did a great job on it...(click to enlarge)...



If you'd like to order it, you can use the following code if you'd like to send me a bit of a referral fee...

Was Superman a Spy?: And Other Comic Book Legends Revealed

See you all next week!