In the early years, Jack studied comic book art, buying art books and drawing endlessly. Born Jacob Kurtzberg and a practitioner of Judaism for his entire life, he worked for many newspapers under the names Jack Curtis, Curt Davis, and Lance Kirby before finally settling on Jack Kirby. Eventually, he got a job in the art business, drawing comic strips for a newspaper. Later he moved to Marvel Comics, where his partnership with Stan Lee began and where he came to be remembered most. He designed the Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, the X-Men, and the Avengers, and when Lee created Galactus in three stories of Fantastic Four, Kirby designed the Silver Surfer as the first known of Galactus's heralds. He did not always work with Marvel, and switched to other comic companies, most notably DC, from time to time. But only one of his DC characters, Kamandi, enjoyed any real success, and he returned to Marvel after his DC tenure was finished.