All-American Publications



All-American Publications is one of three American comic book companies that combined to form the modern-day DC Comics, one of the world's two largest comics publishers. Superheroes created for All-American include the original Atom, Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, and Wonder Woman, all in the 1940s' Golden Age of comic books. Max Gaines, future founder of EC Comics, formed All-American Publications in 1938 after successfully seeking funding from Harry Donenfeld, CEO of both National Allied Publications (publisher of Action Comics and other titles) and sister company Detective Comics (publisher of that namesake comic book).

While All-American, at 225 Lafayette Street in Manhattan, was physically separated from DC's office space uptown at 480 Lexington Avenue, it used the informal "DC" logo on most of its covers for distribution and marketing reasons. (The DC logo at the time was also used for National's unofficial branding, capitalizing on the success of Batman in Detective Comics.) In 1944, Gaines let Liebowitz buy him out, keeping only Picture Stories from the Bible as the foundation of his own new company, EC. "Liebowitz promptly orchestrated the merger of All-American and Detective Comics into National Comics.... Next he took charge of organizing National Comics, Independent News, and their affiliated firms into a single corporate entity, National Periodical Publications".

Notable Creators

 * Max Gaines (Publisher)
 * Al Smith
 * Art Helfant
 * Bill Finger
 * Bill O'Connor
 * Carl H. Claudy
 * Charles Reizenstein
 * Evelyn Gaines
 * Joe Green
 * John B. Wentworth
 * Leonard Sansone
 * Martin Nodell
 * Russell Cole
 * Sheldon Mayer
 * Stan Aschmeier
 * William Moulton Marston
 * William Smith