Silver Age Comic Trivia Fail!

I pride myself one on my comic book knowledge in general, and my familiarity with the Silver Age of Comics in particular (having served on a Silver Age Trivia Panel in Chicago more times than I can recall). Just this past week, for example, a friend was asking me to assess one of his boxes of 1970s/80s/90s comics and I was naming many of them after seeing only the bottom 1/3 of a cover (they were in the box upside down)! I also pointed out to him that, aside from a few War comics that he had, I probably owned a copy of every comic he showed me. So my credentials on the topic are fairly respectable, shall we say.

How, then, to explain today's revelation when I read this week's edition of Comic Book Legends Revealed and discovered that the Silver Age Doom Patrol's Robotman had actually started out his existence under the name of Automaton?! I had never heard that before! In fact, an hour ago I probably would've bet someone $20 that it wasn't true. Not only did he start off under that name, but he continued to be called that for several issues! Now, I don't actually own many early Doom Patrol appearances (perhaps the only superhero team that I can say that of), and so it's not like I had read them and forgot that bit of trivia. But I'm still amazed that I'd never run across it before now. I'm so embarrassed!