What ever happened to Dan Adkins?

[edhopper]

I always loved his work as both a penciler and inker. Great prodige of Wally Wood.
He seemed to have left comics in the 80s and did very little after that. He doesn't have a website and there is little about him on the web in recent years.

You may also consider this a Dan Adkins appreciation thread.

[benday-dot]

Dan Adkins is both terrific penciler and inker. He has a highly illustrative touch that can complement very well most artists he works with. He was one of the best inkers of the 60's and 70's as far as I'm concerned. For a period of time he was sort of on his own, away from the New York nexus, out in Ohio, doing his own thing. He met P.Craig Russell there and the formed a close friendship. Adkins helped Russell break into the industry.

Adkins was, as Ed has mentioned, not just a superlative inker, but a crack penciler when the right occasion presented itself. One of his finest jobs came on Eerie #8, with the short "Day After Doomsday".

Here is the splash.

[Grapeweasel]

Wikipedia:

In the 2000s, he illustrated Parker Brothers products

[edhopper]

Wikipedia:

I read that. Scant info indeed. Nothing between the mid 80s and some toy work in the 2000s.
Any Con appearances? What work has he been doing? Seems a waste that such a talent is going unused.

[Rob Allen]

For a period of time he was sort of on his own, away from the New York nexus, out in Ohio, doing his own thing. He met P.Craig Russell there and the formed a close friendship. Adkins helped Russell break into the industry.

IIRC, he also worked a lot with Paul Gulacy, Val Mayerik and Pat Broderick when they were breaking in. I'm not sure if they were all in Ohio.

[DonEMC]

Dan had been living in Ohio as of 2010. I spoke with him at length by phone several times -- the last of which was about him wanting to move south with his son but not having a driver's license and not being able to fly because of that fact. Dan is a native West Virginian, so I had contacted him since I was working some in the town of his birth and was wanting to do a newspaper story on his life in comics. He was still drawing back in 2010. I hate to say it, but I lost contact with him after that and haven't taken the time to try to get back in touch with him.

[berk]

I've always liked his artwork a lot. One of the very best inkers Marvel ever had, but his pencils on Doctor Strange were so good I really wish he'd been able to work more on his own art.

He also painted a very nice cover for Savage Sword of Conan once: SSoC #18. I wonder if he did any more painted cover work for magazines like that, whether at Marvel, or maybe for Warren or whoever?

[edhopper]

Dan had been living in Ohio as of 2010. I spoke with him at length by phone several times -- the last of which was about him wanting to move south with his son but not having a driver's license and not being able to fly because of that fact. Dan is a native West Virginian, so I had contacted him since I was working some in the town of his birth and was wanting to do a newspaper story on his life in comics. He was still drawing back in 2010. I hate to say it, but I lost contact with him after that and haven't taken the time to try to get back in touch with him.

Thanks for the info. Do you know what kind of work he has been doing the last few decades?

[dan bailey]

not having a driver's license and not being able to fly because of that fact.

WTF? Granted, I've never flown (I've been on a plane only six times, anyway, the first time when I was 33 ... I've noted before that I don't care for traveling, anyway, & of course there are economic considerations to boot) without having a license in my possession, but surely it happens all the time.

[Cei-U!]

WTF? Granted, I've never flown (I've been on a plane only six times, anyway, the first time when I was 33 ... I've noted before that I don't care for traveling, anyway, & of course there are economic considerations to boot) without having a license in my possession, but surely it happens all the time.

Yeah, that doesn't make any sense. I've flown dozens of times and I've never had a driver's license. My Washington State ID seemed to be good enough for the airlines.

Cei-U!
I summon the puzzlement!

[dan bailey]

wanting to move south

Then again, perhaps this is the crucial phrase. I haven't ventured north of the Mason-Dixon line by air (or on the ground, for that matter) since sometime before 9/11; perhaps the Confederacy is cracking down on Yankee incursions by using the driver's license requirement as some sort of pretext.

I summon the Magnolia Curtain!

[Red Oak Kid]

I guess you need some type of photo ID to fly and Dan assumed it had to be a driver's license. In most states you can get a photo ID even if you don't drive. I wasn't aware of state issued photo IDs until just a year or two ago.

I summon the misunderstanding.

[Drusilla lives!]

Then again, perhaps this is the crucial phrase. I haven't ventured north of the Mason-Dixon line by air (or on the ground, for that matter) since sometime before 9/11; perhaps the Confederacy is cracking down on Yankee incursions by using the driver's license requirement as some sort of pretext.

I summon the Magnolia Curtain!

I dunno about other parts of the country, but down here in FL you now need to have a birth certificate just to renew your drivers license. Pretty absurd imho... and they really bust your balls if it's not an "official" copy... you know, with a raised seal and all.

[DonEMC]

I am so sorry for the mixup. I had written a long text and then cut some of it out and it all came out wrong, due to my poor editing. Dan didn't have a driver's license NOR a birth certificate with a raised seal on it, so he wasn't able to fly. He had never driven a car and he was born at a time when birth certificates weren't always stamped with a raised seal, so he was having some issues with getting into the air to fly to his son's house.

[Drusilla lives!]

See, I can almost understand why you might want to require an official state issued birth certificate when getting a drivers license for the first time. But EVERY time you go to renew it???... I mean, WTF don't they know about you after that first time?

What's next? We all wear "official" citizen patches on our shirts?