The Heap appears for the first time in Air Fighters #3 in 1942. The “muck monster,” created by Harry Stein and artist Mort Leav, appears in various forms in different comics by Hillman Periodicals in the 1940s and 1950s and is the proto-type for Marvel’s Man-Thing and DC’s Swamp Thing characters in 1970s.
This Day in Halloween: Influential comic book “muck monster,” The Heap appears for the first time in "Air Fighters" #3 in 1942. / Illustration by Noah Ayub