Number 1357: Boyoboy! The Boy Heroes

We’re beginning another theme week, “Boyoboy! Week,” where we’ll see some of the kid gangs of the Golden Age. I’ve got posts featuring Boy Commandos, the Newsboy Legion, and the Little Wise Guys following up today’s posting of a Boy Heroes strip from Harvey Comics' All-New Comics. A group I won’t be showing is Young Allies, because that bunch included Toro and Bucky, two superhero sidekicks. Our kid gangs are strictly from the streets, and while they might be heroes, they aren’t super.

The Boy Heroes were created by Louis Cazeneuve. The group mainly operated in Europe during the war years, making eight appearances in All-New. To begin this adventure in Transylvania they seem confident, boasting as they motor along, “Boy, we sure took care of them dratted Nazis back in Rumania, eh, kids?”

“Sure, we did! Dey’re duck soup!”

But of course the boys soon end up in the soup, and being in Transylvania they are fighting, of all things, a werewolf. I assume the idea behind having young boys behind enemy lines fighting Nazis was to feed into the fantasy of the young readers back home that even those too young to enlist could accomplish heroics during the war. In real life American kids were urged to collect scrap and buy savings stamps to aid in the war effort, but in the comics they could do what they really wanted to do — kick butt!

I’ve shown this story before back in the early days of this blog, but I’ve re-scanned the pages. Art attributed to Louis Cazeneuve, from All-New Comics #10 (1944):

Number 60


Boy Heroes: Terror In Transylvania


Kid heroes were all the rage in the 1940s, especially during the war years. Simon and Kirby came up with Boy Commandos, Timely had the Young Allies, and Harvey Comics had the Boy Heroes.

I'm sure there were a lot of kids during that period that wished that somehow they could be part of the war, could help defeat the enemy. The comics provided a great fantasy outlet. Some of these kid groups stayed around for a time after the war, but didn't last much into the 1950s. About the only kid group that was published during the 1950s I can think of is Simon and Kirby's Boy's Ranch. That's off the top of my pointy little head. I might be missing someone, and I'm sure one of you will let me know if I am.

The Grand Comics Database guesses the Kirbyesque artwork might be by Louis Cazeneuve, with a question mark.

The cover of All-New Comics #10, September 1944, where this story appeared, is another Alex Schomburg action fest. It didn't matter whose heroes he was drawing, or what company it was for, Schomburg put in a lot of detail and his covers are a true joy to study.