Herb Trimpe
I found out today that artist Herb Trimpe passed away. Perhaps you’ve not heard the name before, but you’ve probably heard of The Incredible Hulk, who Trimpe worked on for most of the 1970s, establishing many of the character’s iconic elements, Wolverine, a character first drawn by Trimpe (who he also co-created with Len Wein and John Romita), and GI:Joe, the long-running action toy line, defined in large part by Marvel Comics’ seminal 151 issue run in the 1980s, whose first issues were drawn by Trimpe (and more than anything else, was the book that hooked me on comics in the first place).
I had the honor of meeting Mr. Trimpe a couple of times at VA Comicon events, where I found him to be gracious, charming, and a hell of storyteller, comfortably holding court with the fans sharing tales about working in Marvel’s “bullpen” with Stan Lee and the rest (although he did most of his work at home) during the “silver age”, much to the delight of all the fans and admirers present. He also signed a couple of my early GI:JOE issues, which hold places of particular honor in my collection. I’d tried several times to get a couple of pages of his original art (really good stuff), but always got outbid.
It’s always a shame when we lose one of the greats; especially someone as consistently great and prolific (if not as well-known) as Herb Trimpe. This is just my small attempt to bring these things to light.
