Number 2325: Tarzan in the Ivory City...with The Strangler!

Going through my archives, I see I have posted Tarzan stories on 25 occasions. I enjoy the Tarzan comics, as I did the original novels and even an occasional movie.

The Tarzan novels featured several hidden civilizations in the jungle, and those cities figured into a lot of stories for the comics, also. In this story, Tarzan tracks his son who has been taken by slavers to the Ivory City. Tarzan doesn’t get a chance to save the lad before being himself thrown into a life-and-death fight with a gigantic, boastful gladiator called the Strangler. I particularly like this part of the story because it has a sense of humor. Strangler asks Tarzan which he would like pulled off first, an arm or a leg, and Tarzan just replies, “Take your choice.”  It is probably not a spoiler to reveal that Tarzan prevails, mainly because he is practiced in jungle judo.

The story is written by regular scripter Gaylord Dubois, and drawn by Jesse Marsh. It was published in Tarzan #19 (1951).

I showed the other Tarzan story from this issue a few years ago, which has Tarzan with dinosaurs. Along with lost cities, Tarzan was often involved with creatures and people from the lost land of Pal-Ul-Don. Just click on the thumbnail.

Number 2324: Enter the Fighting Yank!

The origin of Fighting Yank was published in 1942, the year that America entered the war. Patriotic heroes were popular, so Startling Comics editor, Richard E. Hughes, wrote the origin story, and it was drawn by Jon L. Blummer. The story, which has a supernatural cause for Bruce Carter’s powers as Fighting Yank, is fairly typical for the time; patriotic hero goes after Nazis. The character went on for several years and several artists, including a run by Jerry Robinson and Mort Meskin in the late '40s, before Fighting Yank hung up his cape and hat.

I have been doing some thinking about all of the heroes introduced in the wake of Superman, before official hostilities were declared, and then after the war began. Who bought all of these comic books that continually repeated themes? Despite much criticism, comic books had certainly come into their own, and they enjoyed huge sales. Kids bought comic books, or their parents bought comic books for them. Some of it was the convergence of the comic books with America’s entry into the war. Paper rationing was instituted, so each publisher had a paper allotment. With thousands of troops being drafted the comics sold extremely well in PX's. What I have read is that anything that was printed was sold. Publishers were encouraged to stay in the business because comic books were money in the bank...10¢ at a time. At least until the end of the war, when tastes changed from what had been traditional in comic books. My feeling is that troops were attracted to reading material that even for the less literate servicemen, could be “read” by looking at the pictures.

The comics were good for morale, the war was good for the comics.

The story is from Startling Comics #10 (1942):

Number 2323: “The sweet torment of a strange new hunger!”

Mike just doesn’t move Arline, even though they are engaged. When a woman thinks “. . . I tried frantically to respond to the burning demand of his embrace! But I was untouched by his ardor. . .” then you think she wants to live in a romance novel, not a real-life romance with pitfalls and impediments to love. Arline and Mike are flying to South America to get married when a clogged fuel line puts them down on an island with some island rowdies who hang around bars. That’s when she meets Chris and falls for him, despite being torn between love and duty to her future husband, Mike.

“Derelict Bride,” the tale of Arline’s “strange new hunger” is from Quality Comics’ Love Scandals #5 (1950). It is not an untypical love comic story, but has some added cheesecake: Arline’s sexy costume when she agrees to sing in the nightclub, and a lingerie panel to add a bit more spice to the tale of two guys fighting for the love of a woman who might not deserve either one of them.

Sorry, although I know romance-starved readers would just love to know who wrote and drew this, it is unknown by the Grand Comics Database.