In 2002, forty one years after his first appearance, Benjamin Jacob Grimm, AKA The Thing, was revealed to be Jewish. Wooohooo! I have Yiddish pride gushing through my Semitic pores. The Ever-Lovin’ Blue-Eyed Thing was created in 1963 by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee; both members of the tribe. Kirby also co-created the legendary characters Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, The Avengers, The Hulk, The X-Men, The Black Panther, and many more. Grimm’s character was inspired by Kirby’s life. Grimm is a stocky, stubborn, cigar-smoking, tough guy who has a heart of gold; just like Kirby.

GRIMM AND KIRBY grew up on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, the Jew-iest place ever to exist in America. The Lower East Side was one of the densest neighborhoods on the planet with around a quarter million people squished into every square mile. Between 1880 and 1915, over 2 million Jews fled to America from Russia and Eastern Europe to escape pogroms and anti-Semitism. Most of those Jews moved to the Lower East Side. Families who lived there were so poor, they often had to cramp as many as 10 people into one bedroom tenements (apartments).

Grimm lived at 7135 Yancy Street, probably inspired by the real Delancey Street. You can take a trip to the Lower East Side and walk the same streets on which Grimm spent his youth causing trouble. You can visit Essex St., where Kirby was born Jacob Kurtzberg on August 25, 1917, and then walk to the Suffolk Street tenements he grew up at.

I recently took a trip with my niece and girlfriend to Katz’s Delicatessen on East Houston St. I ordered a ridiculously overpriced bowl of matza ball soup and a pastrami sandwich while wondering if Kirby had ever ordered the same meal. I imagined Grimm bickering with the dude behind the register about the price, right before informing him “IT’S CLOBBERING TIME!”