Shirrel Rhoades ( SHUR-əl ROHDZ; born May 19, 1942) is an American writer, publisher, professor, filmmaker, and the former executive vice president of Marvel Entertainment.
Shirrel Rhoades was born in rural Wilkes County, North Carolina. His father owned a furniture store where his mother helped out. He has a brother, Bill, and a sister, Dawn, both younger by ten and thirteen years.
Rhoades was raised in Mulberry, North Carolina, and attended Wilkes Central High School. He was voted Most Versatile and was a member of the yearbook staff.
After graduating in 1960, he attended Wake Forest University on the George Foster Hankins Scholarship, before transferring to Stetson University, where he received his BA in Fine Arts in 1964. He also holds graduate credits in children's literature from Chapman University.
After college, Rhoades started out as a layout artist with The Florida Times-Union. He quickly became the Sunday Magazine's assistant editor and chief feature writer, as well as the newspaper's film and theater critic. There he won Associated Press and Florida Press Association awards for feature writing.
In 1968, Rhoades became the executive editor of Etienne Dupuch Jr. Publications, the Nassau-based publisher of The Bahamas Handbook and other travel and educational titles. In 1972, he returned to the States to launch Directions (a travel magazine for the Great Smoky Mountains region) and created an annual book series and quarterly travel publication about the Cayman Islands.
In 1973, he joined Open Court Publishing in Illinois to launch Cricket, a literary magazine for children. In charge of Open Court's Magazine Division, he launched a British edition called Cricket & Company and oversaw London-based Encounter Magazine.
In 1976, Rhoades became associate publisher of Harper's Magazine during the editorship of Lewis Lapham. Three years later, he was recruited to Charter Publishing as vice president of consumer marketing for Ladies' Home Journal, Redbook, and Sport.
After an interim assignment with American Heritage, Rhoades joined Scholastic in 1983 to launch Family Computing magazine. As vice president and group publisher, he simultaneously oversaw Scholastic's Consumer and Professional Magazines divisions.
In 1988, he purchased his own periodical, Opportunity Magazine. Later he would launch a sister publication, Income Plu$, both aimed at small business entrepreneurs. Through a separate company he published a number of newsletters, including Woman's Day Helpful Hints.
In 1996, Rhoades became executive vice president of Marvel Entertainment, succeeding Stan Lee as publisher of Marvel Comics. He left Marvel three years later following the "Comic Wars." Joining Reader's Digest as vice president of New Business Development, he went on to launch a new book division for RDA.
During the early 2000s he served on a consulting basis as editorial director and fiction editor for The Saturday Evening Post.
In 2013 Rhoades, along with attorney Albert L. Kelley, founded Absolutely Amazing eBooks, a virtual publishing company that specializes in ebooks and POD paperbacks. In 2015 they also acquired New Pulp Press, an award-winning publishing house known for its crime fiction and noir mysteries.
For a number of years Rhoades has acted as consultant and advisor to dozens of companies, domestic and international. His clients have included Microsoft, Warner Bros., Time Inc., DC Comics, Mad Magazine, Disney Publishing, Hilton International, Discovery Channel, Canadian Living, Annie's, Strategic Fulfillment Group (SFG), Grey Advertising, J Walter Thompson Direct, Times-Mirror, Highlights for Children, Merk-Medco, Twinlab, Bronson Laboratories, Age Wave Communications, Guideposts, New York, Poets & Writers, Prudential OA, Johnson and Johnson, and Honduras-based OPSA.
He has helped develop strategic plans for such media companies as America Online (AOL), The Saturday Evening Post Society, U.S. Kids, Cowles Media, Mad Magazine, Carus Publishing, and DRG Publishing. He co-authored a worldwide fulfillment strategy for Microsoft.
Shirrel Rhoades was honored by the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication as Professional of the Year 2014.
In 2012 Stetson University honored him as a Distinguished Alumnus.
He has chaired the Consumer Marketing Committee of the Magazine Publishers of America and was a member of MPA's Finance Committee.