Number 2451: The lady was a robot

The Phantom Lady had quite a career during the 1940s, and into the '50s and beyond. She began as a character for Quality Comics, then Fox, then Farrell. She got around.

In “The Beauty and the Brain,” from Phantom Lady #13 (actual #1, 1947, published by Fox), Phantom Lady, who is Sandra Knight, daughter of a U.S. senator, is replaced by a robot who is her double. The robot is recognized as Sandra, but then Sandra also masquerades as the robot. This kind of story doesn’t have to make sense.

I have mentioned before (more than is necessary, really) that no one recognizes Sandra when she is Phantom Lady, despite not changing her appearance, just her clothes. However, I haven’t forgotten this is a comic book, where costumed heroes and heroines manage to keep secret identities that would be instantly seen through in real life.

The artwork is by Matt Baker. The stories were produced by the Jerry Iger shop, which piled on pulchritude to make the female characters stand out. The author is credited as Gregory Page, a pseudonym for usual Iger scripter, Ruth Roche.

Two Phantom Ladies! Just click on the thumbnail. 

Number 2433: Stuart Taylor says goodbye 1946, hello 1975!

“Stuart Taylor, Weird Stories of the Supernatural” was a silly feature from Jumbo Comics, played for laughs. I like a silly story as much as any other kind of comic...just go back a few posts to the story of the Deadlings.

I have sometimes forgotten what I have posted in the past, so I made sure to check that I had not shown this story before. What I found was that I had shown the Stuart Taylor story for Jumbo Comics #89, which preceded this. When those issues of Jumbo were published they were a month apart. In this case it took procrastinating Pappy almost 10 years to post the second part, from Jumbo #90 (1946).

The story is provided by the Iger Studios, who did most of the contents for Fiction House, if not all. Grand Comics Database credits Alex Blum with the artwork.

The link to the previous Stuart Taylor story; just click on the thumbnail.

Number 2414: The ghost spotter

“Grimm, Ghost Spotter” is a character from the Iger studio, published in Bomber Comics #1 (1944), from Elliott Publishing Co. This first episode also appeared the year before in Harvey Comics’ War Adventures Comics. I don’t know why the same Grimm story showed up the next year in a wholly different publication, but a guess is that Harvey had hired Iger to do some features, and then there was some problem, so Iger took Grimm the Ghost Spotter back and put him in another comic book.

The ghostly manifestation in the story reminds me of the later ghost tales from ACG’s line of supernatural comics (Adventures Into the Unknown, Forbidden Worlds, etc.) where ghosts are more of a physical presence than something diaphanous hovering between the afterlife and our world. Back here in the land of the living, I’d be grim, too, if I were facing apparitions like this.

Number 2370: Tangy Tangi

Since I am unfamiliar with the character, Tangi, who is yet another jungle girl in an abbreviated costume, I refer you to the Public Domain Super Heroes website:

“Tangi was a white Jungle Girl who lived in a village with other humans, including her friends Cheela and Tangoh. She rode zebras on long distance trips and could communicate fairly effectively with her primate friends, Ongah, the gorilla and Chitchee the monkey. On her own, she was a good swimmer and athlete, and knowledgeable about the jungle and its inhabitants. She carried a knife and proved that she could kill a panther with it. However, she apparently had a code against brutality and killing humans unless it was absolutely necessary. She worshiped at the sacred graveyard of her ancestors at Takhor, far from her village. She knew how to perform ritualistic dances to bring rain to her people.”

And when I say abbreviated costume, I mean it. I like Tangi’s footgear, also. Artwork is from the Iger shop, and is at least partially done by Jack Kamen.

I can’t vouch for any of the factoids in the endpiece, “The Arabian.” I am no fan of tattoos, but I am intrigued by ladies having their legs tattooed to look like hosiery. Maybe I could get a pair of black socks tattooed on my feet. No more having socks go missing!

It is from Dagar Desert Hawk #16 (1948).

Number 2298: Rulah and the Ice Beast

Now here is something we don’t often see...if ever. A beautiful barefoot girl in a skimpy two-piece outfit on snow skis. Rulah comes up against a bad man with a weather machine. It looks like an old boiler on wheels, but it can make snow in the jungle.

It is winter as I write this. I live in a place where snow and cold can make life miserable. I commiserate with Rulah’s problems, except going out in the cold without proper warm clothing would put her in danger of frostbite. For not being used to the cold, Rulah is able to maintain her cool (ho-ho), and solve the problem. What else would one expect a jungle goddess to do?

“The Ice Beast” is from Fox’s Zoot Comics #10 (1947). Story and art by the Iger Studio.

Number 2289: In the Madhouse

Madhouse was publisher Robert Farrell’s attempt to get on the Mad bandwagon. He turned over the creative end to the Iger Studio, which produced the comic book. There were no artists like those found in Mad, nor a writer/editor like Harvey Kurtzman, but in its own way Madhouse has an amiable goofiness about it.

A pair of ghostly failures, needing help in haunting a house, go to expert haunter Emily Ghost. It is a takeoff of Emily Post, the famous author of books of etiquette. The image of Emily in the story is inspired by Chas Addams’s slinky Morticia,* who was an inspiration to Vampira and others.

 I found this scan of Addams’s original art online.

From Madhouse #3 (1954):

*The characters of the macabre family, created by Addams, were unnamed until the television show, The Addams Family, was created in the early sixties.