It has been announced that legendary comic creator and pioneer Trina Robbins has passed. Robbins was an award-winning herstorian and writer, the first woman to draw Wonder Woman.
Born in August 1938, Robbins was an active member in science fiction fandom in the 1950s and 1960s with her work appearing in fiction fanzines. From there, here comics began to appear in the East Village Other and underground comic Gothic Blimp Works. Robbins designed the costume for Vampirella for Warren Publishing.
In 1970 she published the first all-woman comic book one-shot It Ain’t Me, Babe Comix, and most recently released another anthology Won’t Back Down, protesting the current Supreme Court.
She was outspoken in her beliefs, giving a platform for many without one, in 1986 she teamed with Kurt Busiek for the four-issue limited series The Legend of Wonder Woman. She’d later team with Colleen Doran for the graphic novel Wonder Woman: The Once and Future Story.
Her books The Brinkley Girls: The Best of Nell Brinkley’s Cartoons from 1913–1940 (Fantagraphics, 2009) and Tarpe Mills and Miss Fury (IDW Publishing, 2011) were nominated for Eisner awards and Harvey awards. Her all-ages graphic novel Chicagoland Detective Agency: The Drained Brains Caper (Graphic Universe, 2010), the first in a six-book series, was a Junior Library Guild Selection. Her most recent books are Gladys Parker, a life in comics, a passion for fashion (Hermes Press, 2022), and the Eisner winning The Flapper Queens (Fantagraphics, 2020)
Robbins was a co-founder of Friends of Lulu, a nonprofit formed in 1994 to promote readership of comic books by women and the participation of women in the comic book industry.
Robbins was voted into the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2013 and most recently in December 2023 was honored by receiving the Makherke award at JewCE and awarded an honorary doctorate.
