Your Grandparents and A World Without Superman

[Clark_Kent]

Have you ever asked your grandparents if they remember a world without Superman in it? They wouldn't have had to be a fan of the character to recognize the cultural icon he became after his intro in 1938 - on everything from comics to radio to war bonds to Superman Bread - but at one point in time in their lives (if you are old enough) this icon didn't exist.

I had never really thought much before about it until this morning. I lost all 4 of my grandparents by the time I was 6. If they had lived longer, I would have loved to talk to them about it. When did they first hear about it? Do they remember the first time they heard the name "Superman"? And did they ever become a fan?

I remember the first Superman comic I ever had, but I don't remember when I was first exposed to the character. He was just always there. Learning that Superman existed was like learning how to spell your own name; you don't remember when or how you learned it, you just did. For example, I remember a world before the internet. I can remember when the internet became a thing, and just part of our daily lives. My kids, 9 & 6, have no concept of this; it's just always been there. My grandfather on my mothers side was born in 1918. He would have known a world without Superman. I wish I could ask him about it, but can't.

Did you have grandparents old enough to remember this time before Superman? Ever talk to them about it?

[Powerboy]

I have thought about that. But I never thought to talk about it with them.

I never got to know my grandparents on my mother's side but, on my father's side, my grandfather was born in 1897 and my grandmother in 1898. So they were about 40 years old when Superman appeared. Though I never asked them, I remember my grandfather once saw how fascinated I was with super heroes and he commented that if I wanted real heroes, I should look at boxers and football players and soldiers because they existed in reality. The whole comic book super hero phenomenon was just too late for him to be fascinated with it and I am sure that even Superman didn't have any real impact on him except that he was aware it was an extremely popular children's character. But Superman, Peter Pan, Paul Bunyan. I think he just thought of them as children's stories, all the same.

My father was born in 1928 so Superman might have been a part of his childhood but he never said anything about him except once. My Mom just knew he was a popular kid's character, probably the most popular and thought he just wore bulletproof clothes and that's why bullets bounced off. My father laughed and explained that he was bulletproof. He seemed to know the core stuff but it was probably Golden Age core stuff. I never heard him mention any of the Silver Age stuff. That was much later when he was an adult and wasn't reading comics anymore.

[Clark_Kent]

Thank you for sharing, it's cool to read perpectives of others in regards to something like this. Like the "bulletproof clothes" thing, that's interesting.

[Jim Kelly]

In my case, my parents were born at about the same time as your grandparents. Of course, they lived in Canada not the U.S., but American comics were being sold in Canada in 1938 and 1939 (usually at 15 cents rather than 10 cents), before the government instituted the War Exchange Conservation Act (passed by the Commons on December 6, 1940).

Still my parents never bought comic books as far as I know (would that they had and that they had saved them *sigh*).

You have to remember that the Depression was still a pressing concern in '38. People didn't have a lot of money to spend on trivial things. However, my parents did read the funnies in the paper. But they probably were most familiar with Superman from the radio show. My parents related to those old radio show voices like they were old friends.

[Lois]

My Grandparents were from Germany.
And they too knew about Superman and remember a time before the creation of Superman.
My Father was born in 1926 and my Mother in 1930. They were both born in Germany.
And they grew up in Germany.
My Father was a fan of Superman as a child.
Seems Superman fans run in the family.

[Hilden B. Lade]

My grandparents are Chinese (PRC) citizens, and I don't remember ever asking them if they knew about Superman back in their youth or if there were even any comics being published (heck, I don't even know if DC/other mainstream US comics are published in the PRC now), but since I remember the Chinese networks airing TAS during my first visit, they probably would've found out at some point.

[Flash Gordon]

My father was born in 1932, 7 years before SUPERMAN made his triumphant debut so he remembers getting "funnies" with SUPERMAN in them.

My grandparents, I never got to ask.

[Michael24]

I never thought to ask about that, but it would be interesting. I never knew my grandparents on my mom's side, though. Her dad died before I was born, and her mom died before I was even a year old. Fortunately, I got many years with my grandparents on my dad's side. My grandma passed away in 2008, but my grandpa is still alive. They were both born in 1930, and while, like I said, the idea of asking them about a world without Superman never came up, I knew they were familiar with the superhero types. My grandma used to tell me stories about listening to The Shadow on the radio, and my grandpa once ask if a large hardcover book I had with "Marvel" on the cover was about Captain Marvel. I knew he'd also had quite a crush on Wonder Woman in his youth, and used to playfully steal away any action figure of her I had while staying at their house. Haha!

[Zainu]

My grandparents were Asian farmers, soldiers and land-owners respectively. Probably never heard of him.

[Steven Ely]

My grandma, my dads mom, took care of me when I was a kid, while my dad was at work, and I remember she said to me something like "I remember Superman a long time ago. He was very popular. He was a good hero. He disappeared for a long time." She would sweetly pretend to me as if the heroic Superman, Santa Claus, etc. are real living people to preserve my childhood sense of wonder, sense of morality, belief in positive role models, and imagination.

I now realize she must have been referring to George Reeves' death in 1959 by telling me Superman had disappeared. All of my grandparents were old enough to remember the world before Superman first appeared in 1938 Action Comics. One of my grandfathers died when I was a baby and my other grandfather was an alcoholic hoarder that I was kept distanced from. My dad was born in 1939, the year Superman first appeared in daily and Sunday newspaper comic strips and the year Batman was first published in Detective Comics.

But he thought costumed superheroes and comic books are just silly kids stuff, as was a typical view from men of his generation, a view cemented by the Comics Code Authority of the '50s and the Batman show in the '60s and the Super Friends in the '70s, and my mother and my Aunt thought superheroes were too violent, that caused a generation gap rift as I grew older and I didn't grow out of liking superheroes and reading comic books in my teen years, I saw Superman and Batman as important icons of American folklore for all-ages, much to my dads disagreement. Yet, my father was a sci-fi fan of The Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman (basically superheroes without costumes or secret identities), Buck Rogers, classic Star Trek and the Next Generation, classic Planet of the Apes, etc. Very comic book-y stuff.

[WillieMorgan]

Never thought about that. All 4 of my Grandparents were born in the 1910's/1920's (My Grandfather on my Dads side was born the year the Titanic sank) so certainly old enough.

Comic books themselves were first introduced to the UK as ballast (amongst other things) during World War II so would have been extremely rare. However picture houses and weekly movie serials existed in their dozens across the region and were immensely popular. It is entirely possible that my Grandparents were introduced to Superman/Batman/Captain Marvel alongside Rocket-man and Flash Gordon. It was almost ritualistic behaviour to attend these Saturday afternoon serials in the days before TV so maybe.

As religious and hard-working Northerners in the grim, freezing late 1940's in particular they probably wouldn't have appreciated such 'silliness' though.

It's something I think to myself about often. There are popular culture institutions in the UK that have lasted decades - Match Of The Day, Coronation Street (yuck), The Sky At Night, Blue Peter, Top Of The Pops and most famously Doctor Who and James Bond. Superman predates them all. In the publishing industry 76 years is an insanely long time. There are countries in the world that are younger. Says a lot about these characters durability.