I finally have enough info to post about John Albano, the veteran comic book writer and cartoonist who passed away last Monday in an Orlando hospital near his home in Altamonte Springs, Florida. His sister-in-law says the cause of death was a heart attack followed by a stroke. He was 82 years old.
Albano had a long, varied career that included stints as an editor for The National Enquirer (for seven years) and magazine cartoons for an array of clients, including Collier's and The Saturday Evening Post. Comic book fans know him best for his time at DC in the seventies where he wrote for Joe Orlando's ghost comics (House of Mystery, etc.), Plop!, Supergirl, Jimmy Olsen, Swing with Scooter,, the revival of Leave It to Binky, and many others. He won the A.C.B.A. (Academy of Comic Book Arts) award for Best Humor Writer in 1972.
His most famous work probably was when he co-created — with artist Tony DeZuniga — the long-running western character, Jonah Hex, who originally appeared in All-Star Western in 1972. Albano wrote the first eleven tales of the scarred gunfighter when a dispute arose over the film rights to his co-creation. A lawsuit was settled with Albano receiving money but his relationship with DC Comics was effectlvely destroyed, and others wrote Jonah Hex for years after.
Albano also worked for the short-lived Atlas comic line of the seventies (Phoenix, Planet of Vampires, etc.) and for Gold Key comics on Underdog, Heckle & Jeckle and other comics produced out of the firm's New York office. He wrote for National Lampoon, authored some children's books and did a lot of work for Archie Comics beginning around 1984. He was writing for Archie as recently as a year ago, and had recently been devoting himself to the script for an off-Broadway play.
My thanks to his friend Michael Browning for gathering information and the photo. I don't think I ever crossed paths with John but if I had, I would have told him how much I enjoyed his work.