Creepy - The Creepy Launch

The Creepy Launch

Russ Jones, the founding editor of Creepy in 1964, detailed the magazine's origins and his lengthy negotiations with Warren in his memoir, "Creepy & Eerie," at his website. While doing covers, illustrated stories and photo stories for Warren, Jones continued to pitch the idea of doing a comics magazine, and eventually Warren agreed:

Originally it was to be a 64-page magazine. Jim cut it back to 48... I made a sketch of my host for the mag and sent it off to Jack Davis to work up a cover. Still no title. Titles are tough. Ask anyone who ever had to come up with one. One night I was sitting in the studio alone, looking at Woody's tear-sheets from the ECs, when Warren called. He was furious and demanded a name for Project D. I was looking at a balloon over an Ingels Old Witch, and in her narrative, the word "creepy" grabbed out at me. I muttered the name to Jim... We now had a title for our mag.

Joe Orlando was not only an illustrator for Creepy but also a behind-the-scenes story editor on early issues. His credit on the first issue masthead read: "Story Ideas: Joe Orlando." Bill Pearson also worked on the first issue.

This publication and later companion Eerie, were inspired by legendary EC Comics' line of horror and suspense publications, from story content and host storyteller Uncle Creepy (similar to EC's GhouLunatics) to Warren's use of many former EC artists. The EC tone for Warren was furthered with the addition of Blazing Combat, a gritty war comic that recalled EC's war titles, Two-Fisted Tales and Frontline Combat. On those merits alone, the earlier efforts of the Warren line were relatively well regarded by the small cadre of organized comics fandom of the era.