looking for a way of getting into this comic book boom," In a 2004 interview, he elaborated on that meeting: Eisner negotiated an agreement with the syndicate in which Arnold would copyright The Spirit, but "[w]ritten down in the contract I had with 'Busy' Arnold —and this contract exists today as the basis for my copyright ownership—Arnold agreed that it was my property. They agreed that if we had a split-up in any way, the property would revert to me on that day that happened. My attorney went to 'Busy' Arnold and his family, and they all signed a release agreeing that they would not pursue the question of ownership". This would include the eventual backup features "Mr. Mystic" and "Lady Luck". Selling his share of their firm to Iger, who would continue to package comics as the S.M. Iger Studio and as Phoenix Features through 1955, for $20,000, Eisner left to create The Spirit. "They gave me an adult audience", Eisner said in 1997, "and I wanted to write better things than superheroes. Comic books were a ghetto. I sold my part of the enterprise to my associate and then began The Spirit. They wanted an heroic character, a costumed character. They asked me if he'd have a costume. And I put a mask on him and said, 'Yes, he has a costume!'" The Spirit, an initially eight- and later seven-page urban-crimefighter series, ran with the initial backup features "Mr. Mystic" and "Lady Luck" in a 16-page Sunday supplement (colloquially called "The Spirit Section") that was eventually distributed in 20 newspapers with a combined circulation of as many as five million copies. It premiered June 2, 1940, and continued through 1952. Eisner has cited the Spirit story "Gerhard Shnobble" as a particular favorite, as it was one of his first attempts at injecting his personal point of view into the series. 1942–1970s: Military publications, The Spirit, and new endeavors World War II and Joe Dope Eisner was drafted into the U.S. Army in "late '41, early '42" and then "had about another half-year which the government gave me to clean up my affairs before going off" to fight in World War II. He was assigned to the camp newspaper at Aberdeen Proving Ground, where "there was also a big training program there, so I got involved in the use of comics for training. ... I finally became a warrant