Who inked Fantastic Four #1?
Well, first, let’s name some folks who didn’t: Bill Everett, Dick Ayers, Art Simek, Marvin Stein, Sol Brodsky and Jack himself. All have been wrongly credited over the years. Jack himself once was quoted as saying it was Simek and he was wrong. Artie Simek was one of the best letterers in the business and he lettered #1…but there is no record of him ever doing anything in comics besides lettering. And whoever inked F.F. #1 also inked #2 (which was not lettered by Simek) as well as a few concurrent non-series stories in Marvel’s anthology comics. It is doubtful Jack ever knew who inked the first Fantastic Four in 1961, as he paid very little attention to that kind of thing. As for who did: Some historian-types argue for Christopher Rule, whose career dated back to work on newspaper strips of the twenties. He had mostly drawn for comics like Patsy Walker but occasionally inked some of Jack’s stories for the monster anthology books. I believe it could be Rule. The inking in F.F. #1 does
