William M. Gaines

Willim Gaines became one of the most important figures in comic book and humor history by accident. Gaines' father, M.C. (Max) Gaines, was the publisher of Educational Comics (EC). When the elder Gaines died in 1947 as a result of freak boating accident, the younger Gaines found himself publisher. At the time, EC put out a wide variety of titles. Gaines noticed that the most popular sellers were the horror and SF titles. He canceled all the educational comics, changed the E in EC to Entertaining, and focused his efforts on developing the remaining lines. By the early 1950s, EC was a top performer, featuring such titles as "Vault of Horror", "Tales from the Crypt", "Crime Does Not Pay", and "Weird Science". By 1955, however, a backlash against these types of comics developed, spearheaded by Dr. Frderic Wertham who, in his book "Seduction of the Innocent", argued that comic book violence led to juvenile delinquency. This was followed by a Senate investigation, and the founding of the Comic Code Authority, which made publication of the old style EC comics all but impossible. Luckily for Gaines, EC had one other comic that was untouched by the CCA; a little humor comic called "MAD". Gaines changed the format of MAD from full-color comic to B&W magazine in order to be completely free from the supression of the CCA. Along with editor Al Feldstein and "the usual gang of idiots", publisher Gaines made MAD a touchstone of satire and humor for young people throughout the 60s, 70s and 80s. Gaines was still publishing MAD Magazine when he died in his sleep on June 3rd, 1992.