The Marvel Comics Bullpen Bulletins Index: The Merry Marvel Marching Society

The Merry Marvel Marching Society

Also in 1965, Marvel created its own fan community with the Merry Marvel Marching Society, The club crystallized Lee's happy-go-lucky public persona. Announced in the January books, those who joined for the price of $1 received a package consisting of a membership card, stickers, a membership button, and a letter of introduction signed by 'The Bullpen Gang'."

From Stan Lee and the Rise and Fall of the American Comic Book, by Jordan Raphael and Tom Spurgeon

Click the image to the right to download an mp3 of the MMMS's record... You'll never want to part with it!
A great, image-packed article on the history of the MMMS by Terrence J. Brady
Merry Marvel Marching Society vs Mary Marvel Marching Society
Dograt.com's article on the MMMS's Flexi disc recordings, with mp3s
YouTube slideshow of the first Flexi disc recording and Bullpen photos
Jack Kirby's memories of the recording session, via Mark Evanier
YouTube slideshow of the MMMS's history
Fred Hembeck's December 15th, 2004 blog entry about Marvel's various fan clubs
Bullpen Pages featuring MMMS rolls

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When I was a kid, there was this series of hardcover juvenile adventure books featuring a character named Jerry Todd. They were something like the Hardy Boys, but they had a lot of humor mixed in with the adventure. And at the very end of each book, the publisher printed letters from the readers as well as responses from the author himself. It was so informal, so warm...it made me feel like I knew these guys and they cared about what their readers thought. I was surprised at the time other books didn't see what a great idea this was. I don't know if I consciously remembered those books when I set out to do the Bullpen page years later, or if I was unconsciously influenced and only afterwards realized where I got the idea from. I do know that talking to the readers informally and indirectly seemed like the natural thing to do."

-Stan Lee
From Mark Gruenwald's Origin of the Bullpen Bulletin

Marvel Bullpen Bulletins': a page of Marvel gossip and advertising featured in every issue of every comic, written in a style that could be characterised as High Hipster - two parts Lord Buckley, one part Austin Powers. Stan Lee was a writer gone Barnum, who'd abandoned new work in favour of rah-rah moguldom. He was Marvel's media liaison and their own biggest in-house fan, a schmoozer."

-Jonathan Lethem

Most of the comics Stan [Lee] worked on in the sixties have been praised to Asgardian proportion and I certainly agree there was wonderment aplenty in there. But I also really liked the friendly editorial "voice" he established in his letter columns, house ads and especially in the Bullpen Bulletins. He put himself on a first-name basis with the readership at a time when the rival DC editors generally came across not only as adults but stodgy adults. He simultaneously bragged about the greatness of Marvel and expressed such humility that when they screwed up, as they occasionally did, you were willing to cut them a lot of slack."