That's Joe Sinnott in an old photo. (The other guy is me in hairier days.) The Spider-Man newspaper strip just ended and that was the last thing Joe was working on so the 92-year-old artist is officially retired.
He actually retired from full-time work for Marvel in 1992 but put in an extra 27 years inking the Spider-Man feature. That caps a 69 year career in comic books. I will retype that sentence so you can read it again: That caps a 69 year career in comic books. That would be impressive even if the work was mediocre and the artist was often late turning it in. As it happens, Joe was never late and the work was never anything but excellent.
Joe Sinnott started in comics in 1950. At first, he was mostly an assistant helping out other artists, mainly Tom Gill. Within two years though, he was drawing whole stories on his own as well, though he occasionally teamed with others. His work was clean, precise and when necessary, meticulously researched. In the sixties though, he turned more often to inking the pencil art of other artists, most famously on Jack Kirby's work for Fantastic Four. He would eventually ink almost every major Marvel artist and work on almost every major Marvel title.
In so doing, he redefined what it meant to be an inker in comic books, setting a new standard and causing new artists — and even many of his contemporaries — to study and ape his work. He made poor artists look good and good artists look spectacular. I don't like superlatives like "Joe Sinnott was the best inker in comics" but if you said that in a hall filled with professional artists, you wouldn't hear much disagreement. You might not even hear any.
So he was brilliant at what he did and he always met deadlines. Is there anything else I can say about the man? Oh, yes: He was and still is one of the nicest people to ever work in the industry. Such a gentleman. Congratulations, Joe, on one of the great careers ever in comics. Now, take it easy and please show up at more conventions so we can all tell you how much we love you and all that wonderful artwork you gave us.