Space Hero Saturdays ROCKET KELLY "Mr Weather's Revenge"

As a Heat Wave Bakes the Continental US...

...we thought you'd enjoy a Space Hero Saturday story involving something cooling...like glaciers!

Gotta admit, a smiling Sun is not what you'd expect in the final panel of an ostensibly-serious strip!

This never-reprinted tale from Fox's Rocket Kelly #4 (1946) was credited to "Ted Small", a Fox in-house pseudonym used on all the Rocket Kelly stories (despite several obviously-different writers and artists) along with a number of one-shot features!
Illustrated by Arnold Hicks, this story is from the third (and final) version of the strip, after being a WWII aviator with a souped-up fighter-bomber...then a WWII aviator who accidentally ends up aboard an alien spacecraft...to an ex-WWII aviator whose genius father gives him his own creation to fly around in and keep the Earth safe.

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Space Hero Saturdays FANTASTIC COMICS "Space Smith and the Mummified Meteor Vacuumites"

If that title doesn't lure you into reading this post...

...I'll eat my Cosmic Transtator!

Enjoy this even weirder-than-usual installment of Space Smith by the legendary Fletcher Hanks from Fox's Fantastic Comics #6 (1940)!

Say what you will about Fletcher Hanks' sometimes-iffy technical proficiency, but his stories are never dull!

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I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Planets!

by

Fletcher Hanks
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Space Hero Saturdays CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT "Beyond the Sun"

If a Hero is Judged by the Quality of His Arch-Enemies...

...Captain Midnight has just made a quantum leap from "space pirate" to "ruler of an entire planet"!

Scientific note: though it was known to the scientific community since the 1930s that Saturn, like Jupiter was a gas giant, science fiction/fantasy stories continued to show them as large planets similar to Earth, but with heavy cloud cover that prevented observation of the surface!
Illustrated by Leonard Frank, Fawcett's Captain Midnight #64 (1948) introduces Cap's second (and final) alien arch-enemy, Xog: Ruler of Saturn!
You'll see more of him next month!

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Captain Midnight Archives

Volume 2

Captain Midnight Saves the World!

(Which includes this story)

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Friday Fun BABE "Dora Dumm"

Yes, It's "Politically-Incorrect"...

...but this never-reprinted short is not as bad as you might think!

Illustrated and likely written by Dick Briefer, who was in the middle of his humorous revival of the Frankenstein Monster for Prize Comics!

This sole appearance of Dora Dumm appeared in tbe back of the premiere issue of Boody Rogers' female version of Li'l Abner, Prize Comics' Babe #1 (1948).

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Frankenstein

The Mad Science of Dick Briefer

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Space Hero Saturdays CAPTAIN MIDNIGHT "Flying Saucers of Death!"

Though He Doesn't Go into Outer Space in This Post...

...the "Sentinel of the Spaceways" does take on flying saucers like The Shadow, Buck Rogers. and Spurs Jackson before him!

Trivia: The insignia shown in the final panel are from the US Army Air Corps, the predecessor to the US Air Force....which was formed in September, 1947.

But, though the cover date is 1948, the story was written and illustrated around summer 1947...before the official creation of the Air Force!

Dr Osmosis had appeared once before, in Fawcett's Captain Midnight #52 (1947).
Intended to be an ongoing genius criminal arch-enemy to Cap, his career was derailed by the introduction of colorful alien enemies to battle Midnight.
Dr Osmosis would appear twice more, then disappear into the ether!

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Captain Midnight Archives

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Captain Midnight Saves the World!

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Space Hero Saturdays ROCKETMAN "Venus Afire" / SPURT HAMMOND "Fiery World"

Apparently, People Being Unwilling to Take in Refugees is Not a New Problem!

In fact, it dates back to the 1950s, when this tale was published...or an unspecified future, where this story is set!

This tale from Ajax/Farrell's Rocketman #1 (1952) ignores some basic science, like the fact that the homeless Venusians would have to pass Earth's orbit to get to Mars!

Perhaps that's because this story originally-appeared a dozen years earlier, when science in comic books was at a somewhat more primitive state!

And, please, no jokes about the lead character's name...

When this tale, part of an ongoing Spurt Hammond series (which ran in Planet Comics from #1 to #12), appeared in Fiction House's Planet Comics #8 (1940), the artist was identified through Fiction House records as Henry Kiefer.

But as for who modified the art at the Iger Studios for re-use in Rocketman, we have no idea!
In addition, the other three Rocketman stories were modified and re-used from earlier Iger Studio-provided art for other features...and other publishers!

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Science Fiction Comics

Taylor History of Comics

Vol 3

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