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"Newsboy Legion: "The Fuehrer of Suicide Slum"": Scrapper has a very bad dream in which the Nazis take over his home town, and all the important Nazi jobs are held by the Newsboy Legion's despised enemy, Gas-House. In the dream, Jim Harper reveals his secret identity as the Guardian.

Quote1 ... next t'ing ya know ... Chisel, da bell-hop, who is now a bomba ... bomberdi ... bombodee ... who is now in de Air Force ... plunks it smack on a Nazti battleship, an' ... why Mrs. Bloom! t'ink of it ... YOU JUST SUNK A BATTLESHIP !! Quote2
Gabby

Star-Spangled Comics #19 is an issue of the series Star-Spangled Comics (Volume 1) with a cover date of April, 1943.

Synopsis for Newsboy Legion: "The Fuehrer of Suicide Slum"

Scrapper has a very bad dream in which the Nazis take over his home town, and all the important Nazi jobs are held by the Newsboy Legion's despised enemy, Gas-House. In the dream, Jim Harper reveals his secret identity as the Guardian.

Appearing in Newsboy Legion: "The Fuehrer of Suicide Slum"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Nazis (In dream sequence only)
  • Gas-House (Single appearance)

Other Characters:

  • Mrs. Bloom (Single appearance)

Locations:

Items:


Synopsis for Star-Spangled Kid: "Too Fat to Fight"

Stripesy has gotten fat and the Kid razzes him about it, as they beat up a gang of scrap-iron thieves, who get away. Back at their base, they check out Pat, who now weighs 220 lbs and has a 40-inch waist. Pat is in denial about every bit of it, but he does send away for some iron dumbells and a week later he starts training. Then his weights get stolen, right out of the Pemberton Garage! The Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy jump into the Star-Rocket Racer and pursue the thieves. They catch them at the railroad yard and beat them up, and they're the same punks from last week. This time they catch them, using a big electro-magnet mounted on a crane, but then drop them onto a freight train, loaded with scrap metal, which is already in the process of being stolen by some more members of this gang. The Kid and Stripesy just barely get on board it, unseen, as it gathers speed.

The train travels for an hour and stops at a great city depot, with a huge freight yard and industrial complex, guarded by the U.S. Army. The hero duo learn that the local underworld has been donating many tons of stolen scrap to the U.S. Army, dishonestly but patriotically. This turns out to be a lie, however, and the "thieves" are actually fifth-columnists, loading nitroglycerin into hollowed-out hunks of iron, in order to blow up a lot of blast furnaces across the country. S.S.K. and Stripesy get captured and endungeoned but unguarded, and escape, and spy out the enemy's set-up. A whole regiment of undercover agents are training and hiding out at the Excelsior Gym. The Comrades in Combat set off an alarm, and soon are being hunted by German, Italian, and Japanese gunmen. They elude and outwit them, set off a fire alarm, call in the police, then chase down and punch out the leaders. They find enough written records to warn the scheduled recipients of the booby-trapped scrap metal, and the police take the fifth-columnist leaders away. Also, all of this escaping and fighting and chasing and fleeing has been quite strenuous, and by the end of this adventure, Stripesy finds that he has slimmed back down to 195 lbs.

Appearing in Star-Spangled Kid: "Too Fat to Fight"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Fifth-columnist gang
  • Axis officers of three nations (German officer wears a monocle)
    • regiment of undercover agents

Locations:

  • New York City Area
    • Pemberton Estate
    • junk yard
    • railroad yard
    • Excelsior Gym and Baths

Vehicles:

Synopsis for Tarantula: "Me, Gangster... by Chips Conrad"

Chips Conrad rebels against his gangster boss Lucky Maxton. He wins a skirmish with the Tarantula, which gains him enough credibility to recruit a gang, with which he attacks Maxton right in his own night club. The Tarantula intervenes, and the two leaders briefly team up against him, but no sooner do they capture the Tarantula than Conrad knocks out Maxton, then shoots him with a tommy gun. The fight resumes, Tarantula turns the tide, the cops arrive, Chips Conrad is arrested, and sentenced to life in prison. He writes a book about his own career, and dies in prison.

Appearing in Tarantula: "Me, Gangster... by Chips Conrad"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Chips Conrad, convict (Single appearance; dies)
    • his gang
  • Lucky Maxton, gangster (Single appearance; dies)
    • his mob

Other Characters:

  • Anthony Mellon (Single appearance)

Locations:

  • Sing Sing Prison
  • New York City
    • The Water Hole (Lucky Maxton's Night Club, on a moored ship)
    • Conrad's secret dock

Items:

Synopsis for Penniless Palmer: "The Case of the Prince of Pennies"

Palmer protects his wealthy client's fortune, and defeats four crooks, but earns only paltry pennies for this job.

Appearing in Penniless Palmer: "The Case of the Prince of Pennies"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Chopper (Single appearance)
    • two henchmen: Runt, Fats (Single appearance)
  • Centigrade's Butler (Single appearance)

Other Characters:

  • Cyrus Centigrade, retired slot-machine magnate (Single appearance)

Synopsis for TNT & Dan the Dyna-Mite: "Power Is Where You Find It"

A fifth-column saboteur named Schmidt cuts some important wires in a power plant, causing massive electrical failure in the city and its factories. Tex Thomas and Danny Dunbar happen to be on the scene, and Tex knows just what to do. They touch their Dyna-Rings and become two living powerhouses, supplying over a million horsepower to the spinning dynamos, and the lights come back on everywhere. The saboteurs have a sniper at the scene, and he tries to pick off TNT and Dan, but they divert a fraction of their power output and strike him blind.

Schmidt's vision slowly returns and meantime he must wear dark glasses, which draws him a rebuke from his Nazi boss, who wears a monocle. He sends Schmidt back out, this time directly to the munitions factory that is their real target, and also this time accompanied by four Bundist enforcers. Tex Thomas also figures out the real target, and he also goes there, but the five Nazi agents get the jump on Tex and Dan, who get trussed up and stashed in a deserted room, then left unsupervised. The heroes have been tied to a cannon barrel, which conducts electricity, so they are able to make their rings work, and soon they blaze into action against the Axis agents. The Nazis are ordering all of the workmen out of the factory, with submachine guns to emphasize their instructions, but TNT and Dan bring to bear a cannon, plus a lot of energetic fisticuffs. Only one of the saboteurs escapes the scene, and of course it's Schmidt, the biggest coward. He flees directly back to the Bund hide-out, but also calls ahead to warn them. But the atomically-powered heroes overcome all these thugs, who are soon arrested and marched away.

Appearing in TNT & Dan the Dyna-Mite: "Power Is Where You Find It"

Featured Characters:

Antagonists:

  • Nazis
    • Herr Streicher, (wears a monocle) (Single appearance)
    • Schmidt, saboteur and sniper (Single appearance)
    • Streicher's Helpers: Karl, Julius, Hans, Claus (Single appearance)
    • at least two more gunmen

Locations:

Items:

Synopsis for Robotman: "King for a Day"

A game between the chess master George Smith versus the reigning champion Carlson grabs the headlines, drawing a crowd to the Great Central Palace to view the event. But when Mr. Smith is found drugged, Robotman takes his place, wearing a new disguise that impersonates him. During the game, "George Smith" finds himself shot in the back, albeit unharmed due to his steel body. King Carter, a gambler who bet against George winning tonight, makes an escape after the failed assassination attempt. The real George Smith then wakes up and enters the fray to a very confused audience. Robotman removes the disguise, letting Smith take over at the board. But the chess master wanted to repay his savior, so he goes with him to track Carter dwn.

Together, they track the crooks to a factory. Smith is told to wait outside, to his chagrin, while Robotman deals with the dangerous part. When he enters, King Carter shouts, and a vat full of glue is poured over Robotman's body. It seeps into his joints, making it hard to move. For all intents and purposes, the hero was done for. Meanwhile, back outside, George Smith is having a battle within himself. All his life he's been standing aside while others do all the work, and he was sick of it! He decides to disobey his metal companions orders and heads inside to help. The gang is surprised when a raging Smith starts attacking them. Though he was still outnumbered, and not used to fighting. A shout from Robotman acts as his encouragement: "En Passant", a chess term that means to capture a pawn. Smith pushes an attacking "pawn" towards Robotman, who holds the man until the glue keeps them stuck together. Smith keeps pushing the crooks into the sticky arms of Robotman, until all are in checkmate.

The police arrive with a water hose to spray the glue, and the grimy crooks, off of Robotman.

Appearing in Robotman: "King for a Day"

Featured Characters:

Antagonists:

  • King Carter (Single appearance)
    • 15 costumed "chessmen" thugs

Other Characters:

  • George Smith, chess challenger (Single appearance)
  • Carlson, chess champion (Single appearance)
  • Cops
  • 16 kidnapped "chessmen" temps

Locations:

  • New York City
    • Great Central Palace, in Grand Central Park
    • Glue Factory

Notes

  • Published by Detective Comics, Inc.
  • Continuity
    • The captions and dialogue in Newsboy Legion: "The Fuehrer of Suicide Slum" mention New York City by name.
    • This issue is the last Golden Age appearance of the Tarantula, in his original yellow-and-purple costume. Necessarily, all of these episodes chronologically precede the Tarantula's meet-up with the All-Star Squadron, in All-Star Squadron #18, on January 30th, 1942.
    • This issue's episode of TNT & Dan the Dyna-Mite, like all episodes of this series, takes place before April 26th, 1942, the date of Tex Thomas' death.[1]
  • Crime-fighting is dangerous:
    • Robotman, in disguise, is shot in the head with a handgun, several times, and he doesn't even break character, let alone fall down or black out.
    • Star-Spangled Kid & Stripesy both get head-konked unconscious, with iron pipes. These concussions are Syl's fourth, and Pat's sixth.[2]
    • The Tarantula gets head-konked unconscious, with an awning frame; this is his ninth concussion.[3] He also gets a dose of police tear gas.
    • When TNT & Dan touch their Dyna-Rings, "and a flood of atomic power rips away outer clothes to reveal --- TNT and DAN the Dyna-Mite!" So that must be expensive for them and hazardous for everybody around them.
  • The Tarantula's feature is replaced, next month, by Liberty Belle.
  • Also appearing in this issue of Star-Spangled Comics were:
    • "Good Books Worth Reading" (text article) by Josette Frank
    • two half-page ads for the Boy Commandos, in their own magazine (64 pages) and in World's Finest Comics (96 pages), art looks like it's by Vincent Sullivan.
    • Stamps: "Andorra" (text article) by Sidney M. Elias
    • full-page ad for Mutt & Jeff, Green Lantern, Superman, Wonder Woman, All-Flash, Batman, All-Star Comics, and Picture Stories From The Bible

Trivia

  • The Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy created special "maneuvers". These moves are mostly illegal for anyone who isn't a costumed crimefighter to use.
    • "Maneuver ZX-127": Lift a heavy object and toss it at the enemy.
  • Pat Dugan's normal fighting weight is 200 lbs.


See Also


Links and References

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