TM Maple

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TM Maple was the pseudonym of Jim Burke, a Canadian who wrote more than 3,000 letters to comic book letter columns between 1977 and 1994. His letters were quite popular among readers as well as editors and he wrote prolifically to a diverse number of comic publishing companies and titles. Burke originally signed his letters as “The Mad Maple,” but an editor at Marvel Comics abbreviated it to TM Maple to make it sound like a real name, circumventing a new policy at the company to stop printing letters submitted under pseudonyms. Burke took a liking to the new name and began using it exclusively until 1988, when in Zot! #21 he revealed his real name. Burke published a fanzine about comics in the late ’80s. After he died of a heart attack in 1994, he was eulogized in a number of letter columns published by DC Comics, probably the company he wrote to most prolifically. [1]