Duke and David Chen returned to the Marvel offices the following afternoon.
The initial excitement of the acquisition had worn off, replaced by the grim reality of securing the legal foundation.
Stan Lee had been easy he wanted power, and they had given him the greatest position here in Marvel.
Jack Kirby was different, he wanted respect, and he wanted justice for two decades of exploitation.
The air in the office felt slightly less frantic than the previous day, but the artists were still hunched over their desks.
Jack Kirby was waiting in the small, dingy conference room they had arranged.
He was a stocky, built man, in his mid-fifties, with big hands. He didn't pace; he sat heavily in his chair with a impassive face.
Stan Lee was also present, at Duke's insistence. Stan, still riding the high of his promotion, was nonetheless fidgeting.
He knew this meeting was unavoidable, and he hated it because it was a direct confrontation with a man whose creative contributions were undoubtly great.
Duke sat down across from Kirby.
"Jack," Duke began, his voice low and direct. "Let's be clear on how the new management, sees you as, you helped built this. Goodman signed the checks, but you drew the goods. I didn't come here to dismiss that."
Kirby's eyes sharp, and skeptical met Duke's. "So what did you come for, then? I've seen enough people like you come and go."
"You want to thank me, pat the talent on the head, and then you try to get me to work longer hours for a smaller salary. I'm telling you, if you push me i'll form an union before leaving."
"We're not cutting your salary," Chen interjected, "We're raising it actually."
Kirby blinked, momentarily stunned. "A raise, and what's the kick?"
"The kick is that we need to protect our investment," Duke said, leaning back.
"We didn't buy Marvel for the paper. We bought it for the intellectual property and right now, the IP is built on sand because the legal terms of the past are a mess."
Duke turned his focus to the historical injustice, "You've been treated like a hired hand. Your original art was never returned, you weren't given screen credit, you were also given no financial stake in the merchandising that your characters fueled."
Stan shifted uncomfortably. "Jack, we gave you fantastic credit in the comics! 'The King of Comics!'"
"And you paid me minimum wage for Captain America during the war, Stan," Kirby retorted, his voice heavy. "I don't have a need for titles. I need respect and money."
Duke silenced Stan with a quick glance.
The goal here was not to spend a lot of cash now, but to buy off the historical grievance and secure the future at minimum cost.
He knew, with the memories of his previous life, that the lack of clear contracts would lead to multi-million dollar lawsuits decades later, jeopardizing the Marvel empire while under Disney.
Securing the rights now was the cheapest insurance policy imaginable.
"We agree," Duke said simply. "The past was handled badly. We can't fix that, but we can fix the future, and we can settle the past debts of respect."
Duke placed two documents on the table: the new contract and a separate sheet listing specific concessions.
"Here is our offer, Jack. It requires no massive upfront payout, which we can't afford anyway, but it gives you what you've earned."
Duke tapped the concession sheet. "First, Credit. For all future projects films, cartoons, toys, and comics you will be credited as 'Jack Kirby, Co-Creator' alongside Stan Lee. No more 'and Associates.' You'll get your name, visibly."
Stan shot up in his chair. "Duke, wait a minute! 'Co-Creator'? My name is the brand! That dilutes the value!"
"Sit down, Stan," Duke commanded, his voice hardening for the first time.
"This is non-negotiable."
Stan slumped back into his chair, silenced.
"Second," Duke continued, addressing Kirby, "all Original Art for your past and future work will be inventoried and returned to you, the artist, within one year of publication. That work belongs to you, not the publishing house."
This concession was massive. In 1968, comic companies routinely threw away original art or used it for collateral.
This had always been Kirby's deepest wound. He stared at the term.
"And third," Duke said, hitting the financial point, "you will receive a 1.5% royalty pool on all gross revenue derived from merchandising, specifically toys, lunchboxes, bedsheets, and action figures based on characters you co-created as long as you work here."
Kirby finally leaned forward, his cynicism replaced by guarded optimism. "Merchandise? Goodman always said that was company income."
"It is," Duke conceded. "But merchandising is a perpetual revenue stream, and it's the purest extension of your designs. That percentage will pay you for decades."
The offer was brilliant: it gave Kirby the respect, the legacy, and the long-term financial stability, all while avoiding the current, debt-riddled cash reserves that Ithaca have for the moment.
"Now," Duke said, the friendly tone dissipating. Chen stepped forward and tapped the main contract.
"The cost of these concessions is the legal foundation of our future. We need you to sign this new agreement, Jack.
"It retroactively and perpetually defines all work past, present, and future as Work-for-Hire for Marvel Comics, a subsidiary of Ithaca Productions."
Kirby's face hardened again. He knew what that meant. He was signing away any future claim of ownership. This was the trade-off.
"You want me to sign away my kids' inheritance," Kirby stated flatly.
"I want to make sure your kids have an inheritance," Duke countered, looking directly into Kirby's eyes.
"If you don't sign this now, and you continue to work for us without a clear WFH, the legal ambiguity remains. In thirty years, your estate will sue us or whoever owns us for ownership of Spider-Man, the Hulk, and the X-Men."
"They will spend ten years and millions of dollars in court, you will lose, and the courts will rule that you were only owed damages, not ownership."
Duke leaned in, his voice becoming intensely personal.
This was the core of his deal today, to avoid the Disney/Kirby estates lawsuit.
"This WFH contract settles the argument now. It guarantees that we, the company, own the property, which protects the asset's longevity."
"But in return, we pay you royalties on the merchandise, and we guarantee your name is forever attached to the characters."
"You trade the faint hope of future ownership for the guaranteed reality of immediate respect and passive income. This contract protects the value of your contribution far more effectively than a lawsuit ever could."
Kirby stared at the papers, the clean, precise language of the WFH and the handwritten, revolutionary promise of the royalty pool.
Stan, meanwhile, had recovered and was still protesting the only part he cared about.
"Duke, the royalties are fine, but the credit why is that so important? I've been giving him credit for years!"
"Because, Stan," Duke snapped, finally losing patience with the writer's ego, "Jack is a part of the structural foundation of the company."
"Also if he leaves and creates a new character to compete with Spider-Man, our IP will be irrelevant in the eyes of the bank which could hurt my loan."
"The WFH legally binds him to us, and the credit and royalties are the way of keeping him"
Chen placed a pen next to the contract. "We need this done today, Jack."
Kirby picked up the pen.
He looked at Stan, whose anxious face confirmed that the credit and royalties felt like a profound loss to him.
Kirby signed the contract with a firm, decisive stroke.
As the door closed behind them, Stan Lee immediately started arguing with Duke, furious about the shared "Co-Creator" credit.
"It sets a terrible precedent, Duke! Every artist will want a piece now! Why should I share the glory?"
"Because, Stan, without Jack's characters, and i mean no offense by this, you would be selling glorified westerns," Duke said, walking away, leaving the finance to Chen.
"The credit costs us nothing. The legal security protects us from billions in future damages. Learn to share the glory, or debt will swallow us."
Chen remained behind, methodically reading the signed contract once more while Duke though about leaving New York once and for all and come back to California.
---
The call from Leo Walsh came through Duke's secure line in New York just as he was reviewing the final, meticulous balance sheet for the Charlton Distribution switch.
Walsh didn't bother with preamble. "Duke, I swear to God, if I have to listen to Joe Jackson complain about the typography on a regional radio ad one more time, I'm going to put him on a bus back to Gary."
Duke leaned back in his leather chair, a low sigh escaping him. "What is it now, Leo? Is he still demanding that we pay his rent?"
"Worse. He's trying to rewrite the marketing plan for 'I Want You Back.' He keeps calling my newly hired regional managers in Chicago and Detroit, demanding we change the placement."
"He thinks we need a full-page spread in Ebony magazine before we even hit the radio, which would cost us a third of the print budget."
Walsh's voice was strained, the stress palpable even through the phone line. "The man is an anchor, Duke."
"We won against Motown, we secured the contracts, we got the most talented kids in a decade, and now we are stuck with their father over the size of the font on a promotional flyer."
Duke opened the dossier on the Jackson 5 deal.
"Remind him of his title, Leo," Duke said calmly. "He consults. He doesn't execute. His only job is getting his sons to the studio on time. That's it."
"He doesn't listen," Walsh lamented. "He cornered a guy here in the company to convince on a national release, he tries to sit in on the mastering sessions, and he keeps questioning the beachhead strategy."
A beachhead strategy is a focused way to launch a product.
You concentrate all your resources on winning over a small, specific group of customers in a manageable market first which in this case would be black people in Gary and its surrounding.
Once you're undeniably successful and established there, you use that base that "beachhead" as a proven and stable platform from which to roll out to bigger, wider markets.
Creedence Clearwater Revival's ongoing success still generating the crucial, steady cash flow Duke needed to keep the Marvel debt service afloat had given Ithaca Records immense credibility.
But CCR was a phenomenon that another Label distributed.
"I Want You Back" was the first single Ithaca was launching entirely from scratch, using their own carefully crafted, yet inexperienced distribution and promotion methods.
"The strategy is sound, Leo," Duke emphasized. "Tell him the numbers. This is why we didn't buy a Motown band; we bought an Ithaca band. I will not be competing with Berry Gordy in Detroit and Harlem right now."
The strategy was to target key Midwestern radio markets Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Cleveland where pop tastes were more malleable and less dominated by the established coastal labels.
Flood those markets first, spending heavily on radio play and local promotional appearances by the group.
Once the song gains critical mass in the Midwest, then take the established hit to the tougher, bigger markets like New York and Los Angeles.
Joe Jackson, however, was obsessed with prestige. He wanted to debut in Manhattan and LA, the big-time markets that would validate his ambition.
"He wants a New York premiere," Walsh sighed. "He says if we don't start in New York, the industry won't take them seriously."
"I told him to kick rocks and he said, 'If Motown had them, they'd start in New York.' He seems to resents that we strong-armed him, and he's waiting for the first sign of failure to completely turn on us."
Duke rubbed the bridge of his nose.
He knew that the stakes for this single were not financial, but psychological.
The massive success of CCR, while providing credibility, had also set an impossibly high standard, specially considering their lack of experience in Music Distribution.(Im trying to learn more about the music Industry in this time period.)
The Jackson 5 were not meant to be a cash flow supplement; they were meant to be a reliable, decade-long income stream that would secure Ithaca Records in the long term.
"Leo, look at the big picture," Duke instructed, his voice firm but patient. "The Jackson 5 do not affect the Marvel debt right now. The debt is going to be paid by income from our upcoming movies and by CCR. The Jacksons are an afterthough in our overall plan."
The reality was that both Duke and Walsh had already classified Joe Jackson as an inconvenience a legal necessity who happened to contain a golden asset.
They were prepared to spend managerial time on him because the upside the Jackson children and most specifically, Michael Jackson was worth the hassle.
"So, what's his latest demand?" Duke asked.
"He wants three extra rooms at a Chicago hotel for the promotional swing," Walsh reported. "And he's demanding we hire an external choreographer because he says the current one is bad.'"
"Well, is our choreographer bad?," Duke asked, genuinely curious.
"That doesn't matter, what matter is that Joe is trying to assert his executive power, which, legally, he doesn't have Duke."
"I told him we already signed off on the choreography, and that he is welcome to hire his own choreographer out of his own consultant salary, but they won't be allowed on stage during the official promotional tour."
Duke felt a grudging respect for Walsh's tenacity.
Managing talent was a war of attrition, and Walsh was winning by simply being the bigger, better-funded headache.
"Approve the extra three rooms," Duke decided. "But deduct the cost from his monthly retainer."
"Send him a memo from Chen detailing the deduction with the subject line: 'Compliance with Budgetary Necessity.' Make it look cold and corporate."
"Use Chen to apply financial pressure; that's the only language Joe understands. Oh and make sure a bodyguard is around just in case."
"Deduct the cost," Walsh repeated, the idea clearly pleasing him. "I like that. Let's hope he'll see the number and back off."
----
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