Barry Allen (New Earth)

Real Name: Bartholomew Henry Allen Nicknames: Fastest Man Alive, Scarlet Speedster, Sultan of Speed Former Aliases: No known former aliases Other Current Aliases: No other known current aliases

Status
Occupation: police scientist Legal Status: American citizen with no criminal record Identity: Secret Marital Status: Married Group Affiliation: Justice League of America Base of Operations: Central City

Origin
One night during an electrical storm, Barry Allen returned to an experiment after a short break. All of a sudden, a bolt of lightning streaked through the window, knocked him over, and smashed down certain chemicals, giving him a bath in them. Dazed, he decided to return home in a taxi. However, the taxi started to pull away without noticing him. Barry sprinted after it, only to run straight past it as if it had been standing still. He decided sit down and recollect his thoughts at a diner. A passing waitress accidentally spilled the items of her tray onto Barry, who amazingly caught them all in mid-air and returns them to the tray. The next day, Barry amazingly saved Iris from a stray bullet. There was no question about it: the freak accident had somehow given Barry superhuman speed!

Place of Birth: Fallville, Iowa Place of Death: Anti-Matter Universe Known Relatives: Henry and Nora Allen (parents), Malcolm Thawne (brother), Iris Allen (wife), Don and Dawn Allen (children), Bart Allen and Jenni Ognats (grandchildren), and Wally West (nephew) First Appearance: Showcase 4 Final Appearance: Crisis on Infinite Earths 8

History
Barry Allen and a twin brother were born on May 13, two weeks late, to Henry and Nora Allen in the small midwestern town of Fallville, Iowa. The brother was pronounced stillborn by Dr. Gilmore. However, in actuality, he had been born healthy, but given to another family, the Thawnes, whose child had died during birth. The lateness of Barry's birth only foreshadowed his bad habit of always being late. Barry grew up reading the adventures of his favorite super hero, Jay Garrick, the original Flash, and acted many of his hero's adventures out with his friend and future actress, Daphne Dean.

In high school, Barry had a reputation for being slow and easy-going. On his first date, he went to a carnival. His date had wanted to put a little motion in his life, and they went on the roller coaster first thing. Because of this, he developed a fear of roller coasters, a fear that he didn't get rid of until much later in his life.

Barry loved chemistry from an early age, and that helped his skills as a farmer. He won first place in the Fallville County Fair Agricultural Competition, a prize which included an scholarship to Sun City University. He graduated in three years summa cum laude with a major in organic chemistry and a minor in criminology.

While a senior, Barry helped the authorities apprehend a bank robber, and he was offered a job as a police scientist for the Central City Police Department Scientific Detection Bureau. Eager to be in the sister city of his boyhood hero's home, Keystone City, he accepted the offer.

After moving to Central City and getting an apartment with a laboratory in the back, Barry began dating Picture News reporter Iris West, who he met while examining an apparent murder that she was reporting. She was charmed by his honesty and stability.

One night during an electrical storm, Barry returned to an experiment after a short break. All of a sudden, a bolt of lightning streaked through the window, knocked him over, and smashed down certain chemicals, giving him a bath in them. Dazed, he decided to return home in a taxi. However, the taxi started to pull away without noticing him. Barry sprinted after it, only to run straight past it as if it had been standing still. He decided sit down and recollect his thoughts at a diner. A passing waitress accidentally spilled the items of her tray onto Barry, who amazingly caught them all in mid-air and returns them to the tray. The next day, Barry amazingly saved Iris from a stray bullet. There was no question about it: the freak accident had somehow given Barry superhuman speed!

Deciding to use his powers to help humanity, Barry designed a special costume. He used a special cold cast polyester he developed in college, which could be molded into miniature outfits from liquid material, that, when submersed in a special liquid, became sensitive to hydrogen, expanding on contact with the hydrogen in the air. A charge from a battery-powered ring he wore on his finger caused the fabric to release the extra hydrogen and shrink into the ring. He later revised the process, making the fabric sensitive to nitrogen instead. He called himself the Flash, a tribute to his childhood idol. The first villain he faced was the Turtle Man.

One summer, Iris's nephew Wally came to visit her in Central City. He was an incredible Flash fan, and he knew his aunt's boyfriend was a "friend" of the Flash, so a meeting was arranged. Flash answered all of Wally's questions. When Wally asked about the lab experiment, Barry set up the cabinet of chemicals in his lab just as it had been during the accident. All of a sudden, lightning came through the window and made Wally into Kid Flash!

Eventually, Barry proposed to Iris on a Ferris wheel at the fair. She accepted, and they were married, in spite of the efforts of Professor Zoom, who attempted to foil the ceremony. Barry hid his identity from Iris for a year, although she had known the entire time because he had spoken in his sleep on their honeymoon. He was worried that the accident had made him less human and that they would not be able to have children. However, after performing many tests that first year, he determined that they still could, and he revealed his secret.

However, it was not long before Zoom took Iris's life at a masquerade party. Barry chased him into the timestream and left him there.

Barry met and began to date another woman, Fiona Webb. However, on the day they were supposed to be married, Zoom showed up again, claiming that he would once again kill the wife of the Flash. Barry chased him across the world, and failed to show up for his own wedding. In the end, Zoom was about to kill Fiona, but Barry unwittingly killed him. The Flash was charged with manslaughter and had to face a long trial.

Barry's face was disfigured severely in a battle with Big Sir. He went to Gorilla City to have his face repaired. Since Barry Allen had supposedly been missing, he decided to have it reconstructed into a completely new face, so that he could keep his secret identity dead.

Later, Barry was brought to the 30th century, where Iris was from and had been reborn. For about a month, they lived in happiness. Iris would later have twins, Don and Dawn Allen.

The Crisis on Infinite Earths brought Barry out of retirement. The 30th Century was beginning to fall apart: natural disasters were occuring despite the technology that had been created to stop them, and reality itself was fraying. Flash returned to the 20th century to warn his fellow heroes. Just as he started to warn Batman, he was pulled into the anti-matter universe by the Anti-Monitor, where he was mentally tortured by the Psycho-Pirate. Finally, he used the Psycho-Pirate to turn all of the Anti-Monitor's servants, the Thunderers, against him. This gave him enough time to destroy the Anti-Monitor's anti-matter cannon by running around it and destroying the outer casing. He ran so incredibly fast that he entered the speed force forever.

Characteristics
Height: 5'11" Weight: 179 lbs (81 kg) Eyes: blue Hair: blond Unusual Features: No unusual features

Powers
Known Powers: Superspeed. Known Abilities: No known abilities. Strength Level: Strength level unknown

Miscellaneous
Equipment: Costume ring. Transportation: No known transportation. Weapons: No known weapons.

Recommended Readings

 * Flash (1st series) #105-350
 * Flash (2nd series) #0 (October, 1994)
 * Flash #19 (December, 1988)
 * Flash #34 (January, 1990) hallucination
 * Flash #35 (February, 1990) hallucination and flashback
 * Flash #76 (May, 1993) flashback
 * Flash #99 (March, 1995) flashback
 * Flash #144 (January, 1999) flashback
 * Flash Secret Files #1 (November, 1997)
 * The Life Story of the Flash
 * Showcase #4 (September-October, 1956)