John Byrne

He was married to actress and photographer Andrea Braun Byrne for 15 years.

John Byrne was born in Walsall, England, on July 6, 1950. His father was Frank Byrne and his mother was Nelsie Byrne. His parents immigrated to Canada when he was eight.

He joined the ‘Alberta College of Art and Design’, Calgary, Canada, in 1970 where he created his first comic character ‘Gay Guy’ for the college newspaper. He also published his first comic book ‘ACA Comix’ here. He left the college in 1973 before completing graduation.

In early 1974 he started his comic-book career with a Marvel Comics promotional publication ‘Fan Art Gallery’.

Later in August 1974, he drew black-and-white illustrations for a two-page story written by Al Hewetson of a horror magazine ‘Nightmare’ from ‘Skywald Publications’.

He made his debut in 1975 in color comics as a freelancer with Charlton Comics with the ‘Rog-2000’ series.

He worked for the series ‘Emergency’, ‘Space: 1999’ and ‘Wheelie and the Chopper Bunch’.

With Joe Gill he created a science fiction comic called ‘Doomsday 1’ around this time.

The ‘Golden Age’ brought back by the series ‘The Fantastic Four’ is supposed to be John Byrne’s greatest achievement.

His second achievement was the recreation of DC Comic’s flagship character ‘Superman’.