Digging once again into my horde of newly-rediscovered photos, we have this one from an early San Diego Comic Con…from back before they called it Comic-Con International. The year is 1973 and we have four folks who entered that year's masquerade. I have no idea who three of these people are but the larger of the two Supermen is a gent who'd been teaching high school art and also doing some drawings for amateur magazines about comics and science-fiction.
A few attempts to crack DC and Marvel to work as a comic illustrator had yielded naught but rejection so he'd set his sights a bit lower. At the time of this con and photo, he'd just sold his first professional work to the smaller, lower-paying Charlton Comics Group. His hope, he told me, was that he'd learn his craft with the Charlton work and become noticed enough to step up to big pay at one of the majors. It took about three years but that's exactly what happened.
He had a pretty good career drawing Batman, Aquaman, Captain Marvel and other popular comics until his untimely death in 1984 at the age of 50. He was a great guy and a great talent and I'm sorry I only got to work once with him. His name was Don Newton. If you'd like to know more about him, there's a whole website devoted to the man and his work.