golden age Archives

Doom" is universally associated with the Marvel Comics supervillain and nemesis of the Fantastic Four, the Golden Age of comic books featured the origins of not one, but two characters bearing the same name.  The first Dr Doom, a super-science supervillain, was introduced in Fox Feature Syndicate's Science Comics #1, intriguing readers with his sinister[...]

and its accompanying court testimony is a goldmine of historical information about the formative moments of the Golden Age comic book boom.  Filed by the company that would become known as DC Comics and asserting similarities between Superman and Fox's Wonderman, DC v Bruns is perhaps my favorite comic book history historical document, and a[...]

As we'll be discussing Baker's work a lot over the coming weeks, it should be noted that identifying Baker's art in comic books can sometimes be an inexact science.  This is true of the work of many comic book artists of the Golden Age (and beyond).  Unsigned work was commonplace and working in a studio/shop[...]

Matt Baker's handful of covers for the Quality Comics romance line came at an important turning point in his career.

Hing's work on this series is an underappreciated moment from the Golden Age of comic books There are copies of three issues of Blazing Comics up for auction in the up for auction in the 2024 July 14-16 Sunday, Monday & Tuesday Comic Books Select Auction #122429 at Heritage Auctions. Blazing Comics #2 featuring the Green[...]

The title never did make it to the planned monthly release schedule.  That was just the beginning of what seems to have been a somewhat problematic production for the series, and that might help explain the mystery behind the cover of The Saint #4.  An iconic late Golden Age cover, there's a The Saint #4[...]

A very popular late-era Golden Age character, there's a Tiger Girl Group of 9 (Fiction House, 1947-52) Condition: Average GD- at the 2024 July 7-9 Sunday, Monday & Tuesday Comic Books Select Auction #122428 at Heritage Auctions. Fight Comics #32 is the first appearance of Tiger Girl, a long-running jungle girl character from publisher Fiction House[...]

The Werewolf Hunter feature in Rangers Comics was one of Golden Age artist Lily Renée's early assignments at Fiction House Professor Armand Broussard, the Werewolf Hunter, was an occult investigator whose adventures brought him up against a wild variety of supernatural creatures, exotic sorceresses, and artifacts of dark magic Lily Renée brought inventive and detailed[...]

Rip Regan, Power Man was an early Fiction House hero, Fight Comics #12 also features the earliest known comic book work by Reed Crandall.

A few months after beginning to work on Fiction House titles at Iger Studio, Matt Baker did his first covers for Crown Comics.

The obscure Atomic Comics #4 contains an eclectic mix of material including the boxing adventure Kid Kane by Matt Baker.

The creation of artist Frank Bolle, the masked hero Black Phantom had a classic villain-to-hero story arc in the pages of the Tim Holt comic.

The Ken Shannon story in Police Comics #104 appears to be influenced by a two Gorgeous George wrestling matches that took place in May 1950.

The publisher is… probably… unrelated to the Consolidated Magazines which published pulp-adjacent titles like Blue Book, Red Book, and Green Book in the 1920s and the likes of Peppy Stories and Paris Nights in the 1930s.  Like many publishers who quickly jumped in and out of comics in the 1944-1945 in a likely bid to[...]

Fiction House star artist Maurice Whitman covered Man O' Mars #1, an attempt by the publisher to survive the turmoil of the mid-1950s.

Superheroes with various kinds of fire-based power were practically their own category in the Golden Age.   Marvel/Timely's Human Torch and his sidekick Toro are the most famous of these, of course, but there's also Fox Feature's the Flame, MLJ's Fireball, Centaur's Fireman, Quality's Wildfire, Nedor's Pyroman, and numerous others.  Legendary cover artist Alex Schomburg played[...]

A desirable issue of a tough series, there's a Captain Flight Comics #5 (Four Star, 1944) CGC VG+ 4.5 Cream to off-white pages up for auction in the 2024 May 30 Adventures in the Golden Age Comics Showcase Auction #40261 at Heritage Auctions. Captain Flight Comics #5 (Four Star, 1944) The series seemed to hit its stride[...]

The Clock was the first masked hero of the Golden Age, who eventually led the way for later iconic characters such as Batman and Superman Add in early appearances of the Black Condor by the legendary Lou Fine, and this series has a historical significance that continues to stand the test of time.  The are[...]

An obscure but fascinating Golden Age giant comic book, there's a Gold Medal Comics #nn (Cambridge House, 1945) CGC FN- 5.5 Off-white pages up for auction in the 2024 May 30 Adventures in the Golden Age Comics Showcase Auction #40261 at Heritage Auctions. Gold Medal Comics #nn (Cambridge House, 1945) Little is known about Cambridge House Publishers. [...]

One of his other robot covers from this era, the infamous Bender prototype cover of Startling Comics #49, is one of the most highly-desired non-Marvel/DC comic books of the Golden Age.  Another stand-out example of what made Alex Schomburg so great, Brick Bradford #6 (Standard, 1948) cover by Alex Schomburg. In regards to the artistry of Alex[...]

Instead, he chooses to devote his life to fighting evil of all kinds." The entire Ace superhero line is incredibly underrated, and Magno in Super-Mystery Comics was among the best of the bunch, and a lot of the run is tough to get.  An important superhero debut from the early WWII era, there's a nice copy[...]

But the final story of the issue, "World War III with the Ants" by unknown creators, is the real stand-out story here.  An overlooked issue from the atomic age, there's a high-grade Captain Science #6 (Youthful Magazines, 1951) CGC VF 8.0 Off-white to white pages up for auction in the 2024 May 30 Adventures in[...]

We recently noted that the series Ghost Comics is in demand by vintage collectors, largely due to the covers of an underrated artist of the late Golden Age, Maurice Whitman.  But Whitman's work graced a large number of comics of the mid-1940s through the early 1950s that are undeservedly overlooked After serving in WWII, Whitman[...]

But all this is getting a bit heavy, right? And it's time for Obsidian to make the joke that everyone has been making since Bleeding Cool first scooped the story of Alan Scott being a gay man back in 2012. Yup, the Golden Age Green Lantern's power weakness is wood… ALAN SCOTT THE GREEN LANTERN #6 (OF[...]

In early 1945, he hurled out his ultimatum: "You buy me out or I'll buy you out." We do know that Gaines's relationship with Donenfeld was volatile during this period, to the point that he severed the branding tie-up with DC Comics that year, briefly using the All-American brand on covers rather than the DC Comics[...]

take part in an epic battle against a character called Captain Nazi, who had been ordered by Hitler to take America's heroes down.  This iconic battle of good vs evil began in  Master Comics #21, then continued in Whiz Comics #25 and Master Comics #22.  There's an affordable copy of the beginning of this historic[...]

One of the most memorable female characters of the Golden Age with an iconic cover by Kida, there are copies of several of her appearances up for auction in the 2024 May 30 Adventures in the Golden Age Comics Showcase Auction #40261 at Heritage Auctions. Air Fighters Comics V2#2 featuring Valkyrie (Hillman, Fall, 1943) Valkyrie's greatest desire[...]

Ace Periodicals' Four Favorites title was a similar concept to Fox's Big 3, DC Comics' All-Star Comics and All-Winners Comics.  It was an anthology series that featured some of the publisher's most popular characters that ran for 32 issues from 1941 to 1947.  This started out as including the superheroics of Magno and Davey, Vulcan,[...]

"Busy" Arnold's Quality Comics, Smash Comics started out as an anthology featuring a fairly typical if well-executed mix of pulp-inspired adventure heroes and humor.  But by issue #14, the superhero character The Ray was introduced in stories beautifully drawn by legendary artist Lou Fine.  The character began to get periodic cover-features in the title by[...]

Despite working on and co-creating numerous characters now considered obscure, Lou Fine was considered one of the best artists of the Golden Age.  He was an artist that even other comic book greats admired, and his cover work for publishers Fox Feature Syndicate, Fiction House, and Quality Comics is still highly regarded by collectors to[...]