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Roosevelt and the Implements of War: Startling Comics #16, at Auction

In Startling Comics #16, President Franklin D. Roosevelt's January 6, 1942 State of the Union sets the stage for cover mayhem and Fighting Yank drama.

Published Sun, 07 Dec 2025 19:58:03 -0600

by Mark Seifert

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Article Summary

Startling Comics #16 draws upon President Roosevelt's 1942 State of the Union to set its wartime narrative.
Fighting Yank faces a Nazi sabotage plot targeting American armament production with espionage and science fiction twists.
The issue reflects contemporary anxieties and optimism, blending patriotic themes with the era's "Good Girl" art tradition.
Kin Platt and Jack Binder contribute to stories and visuals, highlighting the creative talent behind Better Publications titles.

Startling Comics #16 hit newsstands in May 1942, some six months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, and a time of profound unease mixed with rising determination. The contents of this issue were put into production after President Franklin D. Roosevelt's State of the Union address delivered on January 6, 1942, with the lead Fighting Yank feature using that address to kick off the story's plot. Even this issue's cover is a likely reference to Roosevelt's speech, which emphasized the need for "swift and driving increase in our armament production", by showing a naval officer and a bound woman menaced underwater by an octopus. The implicit message of the cover in the context of its time seems clear: the U.S. Navy needed an adequate force to take on the menace of the "Axis Octopus" (a common propaganda symbol of that time, representing the Axis powers' grasping influence across the Pacific and Atlantic). For the moment, Fighting Yank would help face this particular threat, but over the longer term, something more would be required. For readers standing at the rack in 1943, it worked as a simple promise of action. For modern collectors, it is a unique example of how serious real-world concerns of that time could so effectively collide with comic book storytelling, including the Good Girl art tradition.

A colorful comic book illustration features a woman in a red dress tied up, while a masked man in a tri-corner hat, appearing determined, works to rescue her. A snake-like creature wraps around them, adding tension to the scene. — Startling Comics #16 (Better Publications, 1942)

Inside this issue, the lead Fighting Yank story begins with President Roosevelt himself, delivering his speech and promising, "In 1943 America will build 125,000 planes… 75,000 tanks… 35,000 anti-aircraft guns." These figures are directly from the text of the speech itself, and the story proceeds to show Hitler being informed of soaring war production in America, and vowing to crush this effort completely. The plot centers on a Nazi plan to interfere with American war production by faking deaths and misusing scientific knowledge, with a "suspended animation" drug used to conceal the removal of key defense personnel.

Kin Platt's Captain Future story also stands out in this issue. During this period, he was one of the creators who could shift comfortably between straightforward adventure and lightly absurd science fiction, a skill that he would employ to great effect over his career. The Captain Future pages here lean on gadgets and ray devices, and it's not a long step from the "Plasmatons" and remote-controlled weapons in this feature to the domestic space-age gags that show up years later in his work on The Jetsons.

GCD tentatively attributes this cover to Jack Binder, and it certainly does seem to have some Binder hallmarks. There are only 19 Universal entries for Startling Comics #16 on the CGC census, with the highest-graded CGC 9.4 Edgar Church copy going for $20,400 in 2022. This issue is worthy of far more attention than it gets for its uniquely historical inspirations alone, and there's a Startling Comics #16 (Better Publications, 1942) CGC GD/VG 3.0 Cream to off-white pages copy up for auction at the 2025 December 11 Golden Age Comics Century Showcase Auction IV #40315.