Number 2066: Ramona Fradon puts us through the wringer

Ramona Fradon was a comic book artist off and on for decades, beginning her career  in 1950, and along the way drew Aquaman for Adventure Comics, Metamorpho, the Element Man, and Super Friends. She left comic books to draw the Brenda Starr comic strip until her retirement in 1995. As of this writing, Ms Fradon, at age 90, is still doing commission work.

Fradon had a looser, more cartoony style than many of her male contemporaries, which serves the funny “Through the Wringer,” written by David V. Reed and published in The Amazing World of DC Comics #10 (1976).

Number 507


Puglyon's Crypt


I always liked Ramona Fradon's artwork; she worked on the Aquaman backup strip in the 1950s and into the early '60s, then drew Metamorpho. The last work I saw by her was on Super Friends in the 1970s. I thought she had one of those great old-fashioned styles, solid drawing and cartoony exaggeration when necessary. This story, from House of Secrets #116, February 1974, is one where that exaggeration plays a part. It doesn't look all Fradon to me, more like a collaboration of Fradon and Jerry Grandinetti. If it is then Grandinetti isn't credited, or maybe it was just Ramona being influenced by his style. Writer David Michelinie plays on the Poe-esque premature burial idea, but why set the story in 1923? I dunno. It's a good story, though. It observes Pappy's First Law of Horror Comics: "The main character shall be as awful and unredeemable as possible, to justify his horrible fate." Yet it is Code approved. By the early '70s, after twenty years and the rising age of comic book readers, the Code was backing down from prohibiting horror themes.

Number 187


The Waterboys

Here's something you don't see anymore: a monster story combined with Cold War jitters. "The Merman Menace" is from Forbidden Worlds #5, published by the American Comics Group, dated March-April, 1952. The writer is unknown, but according to the Grand Comics Database, the artist is Lin Streeter, about whom I know little. About all I could learn about Streeter is that he was active in comics from the early '40s until at least the 1950s.

You've gotta love having a monster pumped full of adrenalin and benzedrine to get him back up to speed, so he can get revenge on the Reds. It's in the story, folks. I don't make this stuff up.

It's a bonus! I'm enclosing an extra story about another famous half-fish, half-human hero. The story is from the late 1940s, and was part of the box full of comic book tear sheets I received years ago. I went through and assembled the complete stories, of which this is one. Comic title unknown, by a writer and artist unknown. (See note by reader Darci below.)