Number 2156: Congo Bill in the jungle of dinosaurs

Congo Bill was a longtime second banana character for DC. I remember him from the fifties when he palled around with Janu, the Jungle Boy. (Here we go again, with grown men and young boys going on adventures together.) Quoting Wikipedia: “Congo Bill was a long-running DC Comics adventure comic strip, running in various DC Comics titles from 1940 until Action Comics #248 (January 1959), when Congo Bill was transformed into Congorilla (the title of the strip was likewise changed). The Congo Bill strip was a standard adventure strip, often reminiscent of Alex Raymond's Jungle Jim newspaper strip.”

I like gorillas, but I drew the line at Congo Bill becoming a gorilla. Even at the tender age I was in 1959, I knew this was a non-starter of an idea, so I dropped Congo(rilla) Bill from my reading list.

This earlier story, from before Janu the Jungle Boy showed up, is from Action Comics #40. This 1941story has a science fiction slant. No gorillas, but dinosaurs. Fred Ray, who drew it, was one of DC’s top artists, working on Superman covers and later doing a long stretch on Tomahawk. I am not vouching for any dinosaur details being correct in this story, but it is a breezy six-pager. For being a guy who survived for years in the back pages of DC Comics, Congo Bill lasted quite a long time, even if he did end up a gorilla. Someone must have had a sentimental attachment for him.

Number 381


Congo Bill and the Pirates


Another year gone by, and another Talk Like A Pirate Day upon us. Yo ho, mateys! Hope your roger is jolly, your plank is being walked and your poopdeck isn't pooped.

For a double dose of piracy and horror today visit The Horrors Of It All.

This Congo Bill story is by writer George Kashdan, and is drawn by the wonderful Fred (Tomahawk) Ray. It comes from Action Comics #106, March 1947. It's one of those "Was it a dream? Here's something that proves it wasn't!" stories. That ending worked over a hundred years ago, but we've seen it too many times since. At least the artwork by Ray lifts it out of the mundane. I've also included an in-house ad.