Tarzan & Kazar: Who came first

[Miyamoto Musashi]

A question that popped in my mind since yesterday:
Who came earlier in the world of comics:

1. Marvel's "Ka-Zar"
or
2. Dark Horse: "Tarzan"

[Ed Liu]

Interestingly enough, there are about 3 or 4 different ways to answer this question, though in most of them Tarzan wins.

Marvel's Ka-Zar existed well before Dark Horse Comics was founded in 1986, since Stan Lee created the version who's running around the MU in the 60's. Limiting yourself to the DH Tarzan is the only way that Ka-zar comes out on top.

However, there were Tarzan comics well before Marvel created Ka-Zar. They just weren't published by Dark Horse, but ran in comics and newspaper comic strips since the 20's (http://www.geocities.com/hollywood/hills/6569/tarzan/). He actually pre-dates Mickey Mouse as the first multi-media fictional phenomenon -- Edgar Rice Burroughs published him in 1912 to immediate success, and wasted little time in merchandising him to the hilt with toys, radio shows, movies, and comics. If you've ever heard of "Tarzana, California, (http://www.tarzana.ca/)" it was re-named to honor its most famous resident back in the 1920's-30's.

You can get a lot closer if you drop the "Marvel" part of Ka-Zar, since apparently he was a pulp magazine character from the 30's (http://home.comcast.net/%7Ecjh5801a/Ka-Zar.htm) who was an obvious attempt to capitalize on the success of Tarzan. He re-appeared in the first issue of Marvel Comics in 1939, back when Marvel was still called Timely Comics. The pulp character had different origins than the one Stan re-created for the comics, similar to how "The Flash" is at least two different people. Still, this Ka-Zar was published at least a decade later than any comic book version of Tarzan, so Tarzan is still published earlier.

Classic case of Google making me look smarter than I actually am...;)

-- Ed