365 Days of Defiance, Day 240: Kirby Says: Don't Ask, Just Punch a Nazi! (aka Today in Comics History, August 28: Happy birthday, Jack Kirby!)

Today is Jack Kirby's One Hundredth Birthday. Happy Birthday, Jack!


Self-portrait from Forever People #4 (August 1971), as reprinted in Kirby: King of Comics (2002) by Mark Evanier; pencils by Jack Kirby, inks by Vince Colletta
I've spent this year focusing on mostly fictional acts of defiance and rebellion from the pages of our favorite medium, but let's take a moment on Jack's birthday to salute this actual hero of a man who not only drew supers who would punch Nazis and their sympathizers, he would put his money where his mouth was in real life:


from Kirby: King of Comics (2002) by Mark Evanier
The only sad thing about those paragraphs is that the last sentence is no longer true.

We need Kirby more than ever, but alas, he's departed from us. His absence leaves us all a little poorer, but he's left behind his work, his words, his art, and his ideas to continue to inspire us. So now's your time to step into the shoes of the King and try to carry on his legacy. Imagine. Create. Write. Draw. Believe. Resist. Rebel. Defy. Be a king.