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I think it's instructive to look at Kirby's output in May, 1948 (Thanks to Ray's Kirby chonology). Jack drew 51 pages of material that month, Justice Traps #4 and Young Romance #5. He also spruced up a large story in YR #5 that he gets no credit for in the Kirby Checklist.

I picked this month because I am wrapping up loose ends on my restoration of Young Romance #5, so I am very familar with the material. 51 pages is a lot of pages- more than one a day - and this isn't super-hero art where many pages are devoted to drawing the naked form. This is drawing real life characters - and drawing and inking clothing is a lot of work. Drawing sexy women is a lot of work, too. Kirby was great at it during this period, contrary to popular myth.

You get tired just looking at the effort that went into this art.

So I think it's safe to say Joe Simon had a hand inking these issues. Or someone besides Kirby did.

My hypothesis is Joe was the business leader of S&K studios. When they were launching books in the infancy of titles, Joe would have heavy involvement in the art, as would Kirby who drew most of Young Romance #5. This is the same pattern we see duplicated at Marvel, where Kirby establishes the titles for a few issues, then others take over. I don't think this is a novel concept in comics, but a tradition: grab the audience with an established creative team, ease them into other creators.

So it seems to me that we can be pretty sure Simon heavily contributed to inking key issues, particualrly when the page load was high, then he probably moved on to hiring other talent and other editorial duties. But I believe Joe when he says he touched all the pages -sure there are probably months where he didn't - but I can see him proofing a book before it went to press with a brush in his right hand.

As we get into the 50's, one senses that there is less and less involvement.

But to suggest that it's Kirby inking based on recollections of Evanier's discussions with Kirby is as faulty as the Kirby's court case, franky. It's all hearsay. Joe Simon is ancient, Kirby is gone and had questionable memory.

It's all conjecture when you get down to it. That's why I think it makes more sense to attribute inking to a stable of artist rather than trying to say "Jack inked this, Joe inked that."

Still, the entire exercise is conjecture. You can say Simon drew this, Kirby drew that. There's no way to know, really.

We do know that Kirby was the artist in the team, no matter how talented Joe was. I think Kirby had Joe beat on speed, so for a business man like Joe - nothing could say "find something else to do you are better at" -- which seems to be the direction the team took.

There's a story in Young Romance #7 story which the Checklist does not attribute to S&K; there are many panels in this story where you can see as plain as day it's Jack's hand, but he gets no credit. So I don't think one can rely on the testimony of "experts" on this subject. All you can do is look at the page count, and work from there.  

Here's a page Kirby didn't draw -- sure looks like familiar inking...

What is a hot link, anyway?

So, did Harry ask for hot links to be removed, then use one himself?????