I'm going to be solidly in the "YES" camp. Virtually everything we all love about Spider-Man as a character, as an iconoclast, as a role model, as us was established under Stan. It's his "Smoke on the Water" (for literal lack of any better metaphor on a Tuesday), endlessly riffed on and taken into very interesting quadrants, but eventually you always come back around to the original

I didn't mean that there was absolutely no evidence aside from the credit-boxes, though I can see why you might have thought that. I'm not sure I remembered this particular Stan-quote, though I was certainly reading the JOURNAL during this period, but obviously Ditko has been fairly vocal on the subject as well. Stan's quote is interesting because it does indicate that at some point he was, or believed that he was, pitching plot-ideas alongside Ditko in what seems more like a true partnership. 

I'm recusing myself, since if I've read a half- dozen issues of Spider-Man written by someone besides Stan, it's a lot (let alone remembered who wrote them). But, like many here, I'd go with Stan on the strength of the early issues.

The not exactly valid comparison of Spidey before and after Ditko that came to me is the Marx Brothers at Paramount compared to the Marx Brothers at MGM. The earlier stuff had a unique energy, even if it could be a little crude or undeveloped at times. The later stuff was slicker, but just tried to reproduce what had gone before. Some good stuff, but more conventional.

Oh, cool.  Thank you!  I knew that was online somewhere, but I sureshell couldn't find it.  (I totally got the name of the quoted publication wrong, too.)

well, it might have been a little to the point if Ditko was unedited, and they were paying Stan for something. Stan did write better dialog than Kirby or Ditko, but still those guys plotted and made up dialog, it was up to Stan to edit, and polish, and basically make as good as possible, a task he was very good at. (s well as taking complete credit)
Thanks for the welcome, this is an awesome site.

Much of the time he improved it, or at least made it snappier and more entertaining, but sometimes he messed with it to the point of changing the story and characters from Kirby's intentions, which is why Kirby eventually stopped putting forth his best ideas, and finally departed for DC. Unlike a lot of readers, I would NOT have wanted Stan to rewrite Kirby's dialogue for the New Gods or the Eternals: he wouldn't have understood what Kirby was trying to do in those stories and we would have lost more than we'd have gained with Stan - or rather with some other, younger writer, since Stan had largely stopped writing by the time of Kirby's solo series in the 70s.

I think part of it, and this is just supposition from things I have read, is that both John B and John R spent considerable time in the advertising and commercial art fields outside of comics before coming to work at Marvel and were much more accustomed to being company men and commercial artists who drew what they were paid to draw. Kirby came out of the studio system, and had pretty much always worked in comics, specifically with Joe Simon where the studio (and Kirby himself) were largely responsible for creating the content wholecloth and Kirby was used to being the driving force in the creation of the content; as long as they were producing material that sold he was left to his own devices. I am not sure what Ditko's background was prior to working in comics, but I think they key difference of autonomy vs. company man in the backgrounds of some of these artists went a long way towards defining their relationship with Stan; Ditko and Kirby both worked with him but chafed under lack of complete autonomy, which eventually eroded the working relationship until it ended, Ditko sooner that Kirby. Buscema and Romita were used to demands of the commercial art field so were more willing to toe the line so to speak and do what was needed to get the job done whatever way it needed to be done. They were all creative powerhouses and extremely talented, but Romita and Buscema had a different approach and mindset to the job than it seems Kirby and Ditko did. 

-M