The Origin of Iron Man

Iron Man is a fictional character that appears in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The Iron Man character first appeared in Tales of Suspense #39 in March 1963. The hero of the Iron Man comics, Tony Stark, started out as a gifted son of a wealthy industrialist. By age 15 he had enrolled at MIT (The Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and graduated at the top of his class. At the age of 21, after his parents were tragically killed in a car accident, Tony inherited Stark Industries.

Tony turns the company into a multi-million dollar empire from defense contracts for the military. While testing one of his company's weapons, he suffers a severe heart injury caused by an explosion that lodged shrapnel near his heart. He is kidnapped and forced to build a super weapon, with another captive, the famed Nobel award-winning physicist, Yin Sen. Stark, immobilized by his injury, instead builds a suit of power armor, with the electrical power to keep his damaged heart beating. Yin Sen created a diversion, sacrificing himself so that Stark could put on the power armor in time and escape captivity. In the suit, Stark took on the warlord and his men and avenged Yin Sen's death; as a result Iron Man was born.

In the initial issue, Iron Man was part of Tales of Suspense, with a great deal of interaction between him and Captain America. In the character's original incarnation, Iron Man was a vehicle for Stan Lee to explore Cold War themes, particularly the role of American technology and business in the fight against communism. Subsequent re-imaginings of Iron Man have gradually removed the Cold War themes, replacing them with more contemporary concerns such as corporate crime and terrorism. For many years, he was part of the Avengers, before rising to his own starring role in the Iron Man comic books that rolled off the press in 1968.