Mainline Publications, also called Mainline Comics, was a short-lived, 1950s American comic book publisher established and owned by Jack Kirby and Joe Simon.
Foundation
With the 1950s backlash against comics, led by the psychiatrist Fredric Wertham, and propagated during the televised debates about comics leading to juvenile delinquency, as part of the Kefauver hearings, several publishing houses folded. This caused a problem for the printers. As Joe Simon detailed, "Comic book publishers were dropping out of the business in wholesale numbers. The printers grew frantic. It was a necessity of their business that the presses keep running. When the presses were silent, printing companies still had to pay overhead, so they were more than willing to back a new comics organization if it showed promise."
To serve as business manager for their Mainline Publications, Inc., they brought in Crestwood Publications office manager Nevin Fidler, who knew the mechanics of distributors and other necessary vendors, offering him a piece of the company. While keeping their hand in at Crestwood to fulfill their contract, Simon and Kirby invested their savings in their new company, working with veteran paper and printing broker George Dougherty, Jr. The two had long wanted to self-publish, and they further wished to create comics for the adults of the 1950s who had read comics as children in the 1940s.
In an attempt to save on the cost of original artwork for a story in Crestwood's Young Love, Simon recycled an earlier Crestwood story by providing a new story and title to fit the existing art. This was spotted by a Crestwood employee, and legal advice taken over possible repercussions. Crestwood "took up the matter with their attorney [who] informed Crestwood that there was nothing in the contract that specified what kind of book we were obliged to turn in — as long as we turned in a book on schedule. That didn't satisfy the publishers, who naturally turned more hostile. They continued to hold off paying us while we grew increasingly desperate." and on the other Crestwood publishers Teddy Epstein and Paul Bleier as well as general manager M. R. Reese.
- Bullseye: Western Scout (Western), #1-5. Charlton Comics published #6-7
- Foxhole (war), #1-4. Charlton Comics published #5-7
- In Love (romance), #1-4. Charlton Comics published #5-6, then renamed it I Love You
- Police Trap (crime), #1-4. Charlton Comics published #5-6