"Gaines says his father, Max, an advertising man, invented the comic book. Gaines senior conceived the idea of producing small, hand-lettered color pictorials for department stores to use as giveaways. "As the family legend goes, he came up with the idea of putting a 10-cents sticker on them and putting them on the newsstand," Gaines said. The comics moved so quickly that he was able to persuade Dell Publishing Company to back him. His first comic book was called "Famous Funnies.""