Posted in: Comics, Heritage Sponsored, Vintage Paper | Tagged: Atomic Age, Captain Flash, mike sekowsky, Sterling Comics

Mike Sekowsky's Obscure Atomic Age Hero Captain Flash, Up for Auction

Mike Sekowsky's obscure Atomic Age Hero Captain Flash was an interesting Cold War-era debut in a period considered a superhero wasteland.

We tend to think of the mid-1950s era between the publication of the last Fawcett Captain Marvel comics in 1953 and the reboot of the Flash in 1956 as a superhero wasteland, but this is not quite true.  The success of the Superman TV show beginning in 1953 sparked a new superhero boom.  Marvel took a shot at bringing back its foundational heroes, Robert Farrell and Jerry Iger brought back a number of Fox superheroes (and soon launched new ones) and DC Comics wisely expanded the franchise with Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen.  While many of these characters were either reboots or extensions of Golden Age heroes, Sterling Comics' Captain Flash was among the first of this period with a new superhero character, and with powers firmly rooted in the atomic age.  Created by well-regarded longtime artist Mike Sekowsky and Sterling Comics co-owner and editor Martin Winter Grupsmith, there's a complete run of the short-lived Captain Flash series up for auction in the 2024 May 12-14 Sunday, Monday & Tuesday Comic Books Select Auction #122420 at Heritage Auctions.

Captain Flash has an origin of the type that would become familiar in the subsequent Silver Age.  A professor working at "Atom City" has an accident with atomic material, which should have killed him but instead gave him strange powers.  Interestingly, clues in the story make it clear that "Atom City" is based on Los Alamos, New Mexico — the location of Los Alamos National Laboratory. Made famous in the wake of the development of the atomic bomb, the idea that an unusual but thriving community of atomic scientists, support staff and their families had grown up around the laboratories of "A-Bomb City" began to make the news in the early 1950s. In another interesting touch, the plane that Captain Flash flies is clearly the distinctive and experimental Douglas X-3 Stiletto.

All in all, these sorts of details make the Captain Flash series a fascinating example of mid-1950s Cold War-era comic books. There's a complete run of the short-lived Captain Flash series up for auction in the 2024 May 12-14 Sunday, Monday & Tuesday Comic Books Select Auction #122420 at Heritage Auctions.

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