The hero of the Iron Man comics started out as the gifted son of an industrialist, who entered university at 15. He ended up taking over his father's empire, turning it into a multi-million dollar business engaged in defense work for the military at the age of 21.
While in Viet Nam, testing one of his company's weapons, Tony Stark, a.k.a. Iron Man, is injured by the shrapnel of a landmine, with a piece lodging near his heart. Facing certain death unless it is removed, Stark is captured by the Vietnamese, who promise to release him if he builds them a super weapon.
Stark, immobilized by his injury, teams up with another scientist, but instead of building them a weapon, he builds himself a suit of iron, with the electrical power to keep his damaged heart beating. His fellow prisoner sacrifices himself, delaying their captors until the new Iron Man can fully charge the suit and escape.
When he returns to the U.S., Stark improves the suit's functions, and plans to market it until he is called on at a tennis match to don his own, to defeat a group of terrorist. Realizing the suit's potential in the wrong hands, he keeps it to himself, and his identity as Iron Man, a closely guarded secret.
In the initial issue, Iron Man was part of Tales of Suspense, with a great deal of interaction between him and Captain America. For many years, he was part of the Avengers, before rising to his own starring role in the Iron Man comic books that rolled off the press in 1968.
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