Today we continue the series in
which award-winning nonfiction authors discuss the joys and challenges of the
research process with an essay by Marc Tyler Nobleman. Thank you, Marc.
Bruce Wayne is Batman’s real name. His secret
identity.
Yet that’s not his biggest secret.
Batman is one of the most successful fictional
characters in any medium of all time. In his 1939 debut, his “created
by” line had one name: cartoonist Bob Kane.
But a Finger had a hand in it, too—Bill Finger, the uncredited original writer
of Batman.
Bill also designed the costume; wrote the
first stories of other icons including Robin, the Joker, and Catwoman; named
Gotham City; and nicknamed Batman “the Dark Knight.” All
anonymously.
Dark night indeed: in 1974, at age 59, Bill
died, with little money and no official credit. (Also no obituary, no funeral,
no gravestone. No kidding.) Bob died in 1998, wealthy and semi-famous.
My lifelong love of superheroes inspired me to
write a picture book biography of Bill (photo on right). But I was also motivated by the desire
to correct a colossal cultural injustice.
The scant information on record about Bill came
from Bill and his colleagues, so to flush out unpublished gems, I set out to
find people outside of the comics industry who had personally
known Bill. Specifically family.
But on day one—maybe hour one—of research, I
learned the following:
—Bill had only one child, Fred.
—Fred was gay.
—Fred died at age 44 in 1992.
I was nearly 15 years too late to interview
Fred, seemingly the last of the family line. (I thought it unlikely that a gay
man of Fred’s era could’ve adopted.)
When talking to kids, I liken research to hide
and seek—both are exciting pursuits of something others haven’t found. Still determined to track down
relatives, I combed New York Times obituaries—but not for
Bill. I’d done that already, with no luck. This time I searched for Bill’s
first wife because she had an uncommon first name: Portia. She had died in 1990
and had no obit in the Times, but I hoped she would pop up in
someone else’s obit—along with other names.
At that time, Times obits prior
to 1981 were online but not digitized—meaning a hit would bring up not the
individual obituary but rather the entire scanned page the obit was on. And the
search term was not highlighted, so with each hit I had to skim dozens of
small-print obits for any containing both “Portia” and
“Finger.”
Several squint-filled hours later, I came across
the 1971 obit for Portia’s mother, which mentioned Fred . . . and two names I’d not
seen before: Fred’s cousins Judy and Eric Flam. Hidden no more.
A Zabasearch for “Judy Flam” situated
one on the east coast, as was I. It was 11 pm—too late to call. “Eric
Flam” yielded 19 listings. One was in the southwest—where it was two hours
earlier.
Fingers crossed, I called. A man answered. I said I’m an author and he cut me
off.
“What do you want?”
I explained. Eric’s tone softened as he spoke to someone near him. “This
guy is calling about my Uncle Bill. No one has asked me about him before!”
He said his sister Judy would remember more
about Bill. But the best person to talk with, he continued, was Bill’s
granddaughter.
Record scratch.
“But Bill doesn’t have a
granddaughter,” I stupidly said. “Fred was gay and died
childless.” As it came out, I realized I had no documentation that
Fred died childless. It was merely an inference.
“Yes, Fred was gay, but he had a
child.” A biological child, turns out, from a hetero marriage that didn’t
last.
Her name was Athena, same as the Greek goddess of wisdom and war. As
Bill’s direct descendant, she could do what no one else could: legally contest
the Batman credit line.
Of course—of course—neither Eric nor Judy
had contact info for Athena. So began a new game of hide and seek.
Ancestry.com produced her marriage license. Then
I saw her husband’s name on the site of a drummer, who told me that I could
contact Athena via the hot social network of the
moment—MySpace.
Did she know her grandfather’s legacy? That
question was promptly answered by a photo on her page captioned “my dog
Bruce Wayne.” Finding an heir would have a profound impact on both of my
goals.
Three years to the day I found Athena, Charlesbridge made an offer on the
manuscript. Two years later, Bill the Boy Wonder came out.
Three years after that—41 years after Bill’s death and 76 years after Batman’s
first appearance—DC Comics added Bill Finger to the Batman credit line.
Hidden no more.
Whether writing a book or trying to change
history—or both—you won’t get far without research.
Marc Tyler Nobleman is the author of Bill the Boy Wonder,
which inspired the twist-filled Hulu documentary Batman & Bill, the first film based on a nonfiction picture
book. It’s making people cry
worldwide. His other titles include Thirty Minutes
Over Oregon and Fairy Spell. He has spoken at schools in
nearly 30 states and a dozen countries from Peru to Vietnam.
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One Response
I've been swamped and it took me a while to get around to reading this post, but I'm so glad I did because WOW! Batman was the first superhero comic I started reading in childhood and so I'm fascinated by the story of poor Bill who went uncredited for so long. But I was even more fascinated by the detective work (hah! joke intentional) Marc did to uncover this incredible story. I will have to get a copy of this book…just because of this post. 🙂 Thanks, Marc and Melissa!