Ed Piskor

Ed Piskor (July 28, 1982 – April 1, 2024) was a cartoonist, historian, and broadcaster from Pittsburgh whose obsessive love of comics history drove some of the most ambitious and original work of his generation. Born in Homestead, Pennsylvania, Piskor came up through the alternative comics world, collaborating with Harvey Pekar on American Splendor and the graphic novel Macedonia before launching his own projects. His Hip Hop Family Tree — a meticulously researched, visually intoxicating history of hip hop's origins rendered in the aesthetic of 1970s offset-printed comics — became a genuine crossover phenomenon, debuting on the New York Times bestseller list and winning the Eisner Award for Best Reality-Based Work in 2015. He followed it with X-Men: Grand Design, a sweeping synthesis of decades of X-Men continuity for Marvel, and the visceral horror series Red Room for Fantagraphics. With fellow Pittsburgh cartoonist Jim Rugg, he co-hosted Cartoonist Kayfabe, a YouTube channel that amassed over 1,800 videos and became one of the most significant archives of comics history and creator interviews in the medium's history.

In March 2024, Piskor was publicly accused of sexual misconduct by multiple women, including inappropriate communication with a minor. He died by suicide on April 1, 2024, at age 41, hours after posting a note responding to the allegations. His death — coming just months after Ian McGinty's — deepened the industry reckoning that #ComicsBrokeMe had begun, and raised questions about harm, accountability, public pressure, and the human costs borne across the whole of the comics ecosystem.