98 is a very respectable age for someone to reach.
His longtime collaborative partner Jack Kirby died in 1994, at the age of 76.
Most of what Joe Simon is famous for is his collaborations with Jack Kirby, such as Captain America, the Newsboy Legion, Boy Commandos, Manhunter, and Sandman.
And in the later forties and early/mid fifties, a prolific assortment of Simon & Kirby romance, war, crime, and horror comics. When the comics market imploded in 1955 (combined with congressional hearings that resulted in formation of the comics code) Joe Simon opted to leave in pursuit of an advertising career. While Kirby stayed and continued to work for DC. And after a bitter parting of the ways with DC editor Jack Schiff, Kirby made his way to Marvel, where he eventually started a renaissance co-creating the Marvel universe with Stan Lee.
But since I only began reading comics in 1972, I missed a lot of that, and only saw these earlier S & K stories later in reprint form at DC. First as reprints in the FOREVER PEOPLE, NEWS GODS, MR MIRACLE and JIMMY OLSEN books. Then reprints in 1972 and 1973 of BOY COMMANDOS and BLACK MAGIC in their own titles, as well as sporadic S & K reprints in various 100 pagers in ACTION, DETECTIVE and elsewhere.
Simon was most recognizable in this era for BROTHER POWER THE GEEK around 1968-1969, which I only ever saw in house ads but never read.
And then
PREZ which ran for several issues in 1973-1974.
And THE GREEN TEAM that ran for one issue in
FIRST ISSUE SPECIAL issue 2, in 1975. Although there were two additional issues created that finally ran in CANCELLED COMIC CAVALCADE after the DC Implosion of 1978. A last unpublished issue of PREZ finally saw the light of day there as well.
The only Simon creation that seemed to get any traction in the 70's was the new
SANDMAN that briefly re-united the Simon and Kirby team in late 1974. As I recall, the two collaborated on what appeared to have been intended as a one-shot, and then after a good reception in the market, Kirby continued the series on his own after a few months hiatus. (The final issue 7 of SANDMAN also finally saw print in CANCELLED COMIC CAVALCADE).
I always enjoyed Simon, either as part of the S & K team, or on his own with his wacky 70's solo creations. They were arguably out of touch with the 70's market, but also a fun diversion from other titles of the period.
