Editing C. C. Beck (section)

===Fawcett Comics===
In 1933, Beck joined [[Fawcett Comics|Fawcett Publications]] as a staff artist, where he created pulp magazines. When the company began producing comic books in autumn 1939, Beck was assigned to draw a character created by writer [[Bill Parker (comics)|Bill Parker]] called "Captain Thunder". Before the first issue of ''[[Whiz Comics]]'' came out, the character's name was changed to [[Captain Marvel (DC Comics)|Captain Marvel]].{{sfn|Hamerlinck|2001|pp=101, 107}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Cremins |first=Brian |date=2016 |title=Captain Marvel and the Art of Nostalgia |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CiCHDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA15 |location=Jackson, Mississippi |publisher=[[University Press of Mississippi]] |page=15 |isbn=9781496808769}}</ref> Besides Captain Marvel, Beck also drew other Fawcett series, including the adventures of [[Spy Smasher]] and [[Ibis the Invincible]].{{sfn|Hamerlinck|2001|p=136}}

His early Captain Marvel stories set the style for the series. Beck favored a cartoony versus realistic rendering of character and setting, which also came to be reflected in the whimsical scripting (by [[Otto Binder]] and others). The Captain Marvel stories boasted a clean style which facilitated Beck's assistants and other Fawcett artists emulating Beck's style (one exception was [[Mac Raboy]] whose work on [[Captain Marvel, Jr.]] was more in the style of [[Alex Raymond]]). While Beck oversaw the visual aspects of the various comics featuring Captain Marvel, he emphatically stated in an interview with Tom Heintjes published in ''Hogan's Alley'' #3 that he and his fellow artists had no input or influence on the scripts they illustrated, noting "In the 13 years I spent drawing Captain Marvel, I wrote only one story, about Billy's trip to a Mayan temple [''Whiz Comics'' 22, "Capt. Marvel and the Temple of Itzalotahui"], which had to be submitted in typed form and edited and approved before I was allowed to illustrate it." At most he allowed the art and editorial departments "did develop an interplay of ideas ... that kept Captain Marvel changing and developing."<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.hoganmag.com/blog/an-interview-with-c-c-beck |title=An Interview with C.C. Beck |last=Heintjes |first=Tom |date=June 28, 2017 |website=Hogan's Alley |access-date=August 21, 2017}}</ref>

The popularity of Captain Marvel allowed Fawcett to produce a number of spin-off comic books and Beck to open his own New York City comics studio in 1941. He later expanded his studio, adding one in [[Englewood, New Jersey|Englewood]], New Jersey. Beck's studio supplied most of the artwork in the Marvel Family line of books. In this he acted as Chief Artist (akin to an [[art director]]), a role Fawcett formally recognized on the contents page of ''Captain Marvel Adventures''.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.okchistory.com/media/marvel/comic.html |title=Captain Marvel Visits OKC |website=OKC History |access-date=March 1, 2012}}</ref> This facilitated Beck's efforts to bring a coherent look to the stories with Captain Marvel and related characters, ensuring they adhered to the style he originated. The studio also did commercial art, most prominently a series of advertisements in comic strip form starring Captain Tootsie promoting Tootsie Roll. Done in the style of the Marvel Family books and similarly whimsical (this Captain had a large T on his shirt instead of a lightning bolt),{{sfn|Hamerlinck|2001|pp=101–103}} the ads appeared in comic books published by both Fawcett and its rivals, and in Sunday comic strip sections of newspapers.

After years of litigation due to a suit lodged by [[National Comics Publications]] (one of the companies that would later become [[DC Comics]]) against Fawcett for [[copyright infringement]] claiming that Captain Marvel was a copy of Superman (see ''[[National Comics Publications, Inc. v. Fawcett Publications, Inc.]]''), Fawcett in the early 1950s (partly in response to flagging sales) reached a settlement with DC in which it agreed to discontinue its comic line.{{sfn|Hamerlinck|2001|pp=12–13}}