I drew a picture on the back of a calendar in pencil. In those days they used to give out free calendars, I had no art paper, so I took whatever else I could.

Clark Kent, I suppose, had a little bit of Harold Lloyd in him.

I was mild-mannered, wore glasses, was very shy with women.

In the beginning, we had a great deal of freedom, and Jerry wrote completely out of his imagination - very, very freely. We even had no editorial supervision to speak of, because they were in such a rush to get the thing in before deadline. But later on we were restricted.

Jerry and I always felt that the character was enjoying himself. He was having fun: he wasn't taking himself seriously. It was always a lark for him, as you can see in my early drawings.

Jerry reversed the usual formula of the superhero who goes to another planet. He put the superhero in ordinary, familiar surroundings, instead of the other way around, as was done in most science fiction. That was the first time I can recall that it had ever been done.

I came from Canada when I was about 10 years old, and our family settled in Cleveland, Ohio.