| Additional Information |
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| Publication | March 1943 | Price: 0.10 USD | Pages: 1 | Frequency: monthly |
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| Content | Genre: Humor | Characters: Smitty (main cover); Dick Tracy (inset); Tiny Tim (inset); Winnie Winkle (inset); Harold Teen (inset); Smitty (inset) |
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| Advertisement | Fun For Boys (1 page) |
| Synopsis | Clothbound. |
| Credits | Letters: typeset |
| Notes | C2 - cover 2 - inside front cover.
B&W and shades of red/pink. |
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| Comic Story | Tess and John Lavir ends - Natnus, Nat the Fur King begins (8 pages) |
| Synopsis | 1) Tess's boyfriend, John, is stealing dogs. Tess is angry. He reminds her she is half-owner, and threatens her life. She takes some of the dogs back at night. He is wise to her, rigs a dog with razor steel fangs bolted to its real ones. He ends dead, hoist with his own petard. Police find Tess holding a piece of glass over John's corpse. Using police science, Tracy exonerates her.
2) Natnus's chauffeur sideswipes a police car, forcing him to ditch a load of furs. His racket: he sells stolen furs, then his crew posing as cops take them back. He starts calling himself Nat the Fur King. |
| Content | Genre: Detective-mystery | Characters: John Lavir; Dirks; Pat Patton; King (guard dog); policeman; Chief Brandon; Natnus; Natnus's chauffeur; Junior Gibbons; Mr. Gibbons; Heinie; Duffy |
| Notes | John Lavir ("rival" spelled backwards) debuted July 5, 1939.
Natnus ("suntan" spelled backwards) Nat the Fur King appeared from September 27, 1939 to October 23, 1939.
No dates appear in the panels. Page 4 of the feature, top tier, between panels 2 and 3, a plot gap exists which suggests those two panels were from dailies, and the plot gap was filled on (in) a Sunday. |
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| Comic Story | "Bitsy" ends - "Playing the Ponies" begins (4 pages) |
| Synopsis | Bitsy returns to her Mom. Will starts playing the ponies. |
| Content | Genre: Humor; Domestic | Characters: Winnie Winkle; Bitsy; Will; Mrs. Walker; Dopey Dooley; Boss |
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| Content | Genre: War | Characters: Jim Ellis |
| Notes | Final appearance |
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| Content | Genre: Aviation; War |
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| Content | Genre: Humor | Characters: Moon Mullins |
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| Content | Genre: Humor | Characters: Smitty |
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| Comic Story | Anticipating the Swing Champ Challenge (4 pages) |
| Content | Genre: Humor; Teen | Characters: Harold |
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| Comic Story | Boxing Match Slip-up: George Grunt versus Jones (4 pages) |
| Synopsis | George trains for the bout. In the ring, Jones has the advantage; until Jones'kid, in his excitement, throws a banana peel into the ring. Upset! Jones concedes amicably. |
| Content | Genre: Humor | Characters: Tiny Tim; George Grunt; Mom; Jones; Jones' kid; referee; the crowd; George's friends |
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| Synopsis | Morro and Oom escape from a Japanese patrol and down a Japanese fighter plane. |
| Content | Genre: Jungle; Superhero; War | Characters: Magic Morro; Oom |
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| Comic Story | Sledding Exhausted (1 page) |
| Content | Genre: Humor | Characters: Sweeney |
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| Content | Genre: Western-frontier | Characters: Little Joe |
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| Comic Story | Cold Cream Caper (1 page) |
| Content | Genre: Humor | Characters: Mrs Ripple; Harvey Ripple; Kitchie Ripple; Mrs Richey |
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| Text Story | Radium Review (1 page) |
| Synopsis | A group of scientists report that lead provides protection from radium burns. Muller's boyfriend is found dead. Autopsy reveals radiation poisoning. She admits carelessness with radium. Gestapo Director Zellner is diagnosed with a serious throat ailment. Dr. Adelman, deported to Poland by the Reich, is sent to perform surgery to save Zellner, who recovers, relapses, is confined, then transferred to a high post in Argentina. Muller's diary tells of Adelman putting a small vial under Director Zellner's hat band, and her failure to find a tiny bit of radium, enough to kill a man. Heil Hitler! |
| Credits | Letters: typeset |
| Content | Genre: War | Characters: Dr. Aschenbrenner (Berlin police medical examiner); Anna Muller (German nurse at Bismarck Hospital, Berlin); Herr Kurt Von Zellner (Gestapo Director, Berlin Bureau); Dr. Morris Adelman (famous continental surgeon, an implied Jew) |
| Notes | Du Bois authorship i.d. by David Porta, August 2019, based on Du Bois markers (below), and Michael Barrier's assumptions (page 123, paragraph 4) in FUNNYBOOKS (UCPress, Oakland, 2015).
The story is told in the form of excerpts from various sources: a research report, police reports, dated newspaper clippings, an official confidential communique issued by the German High Command, digest of an American correspondent's radio flash, a BBC radio flash, dated record of the Asylum for Incurables, official communique to all newspapers, and Muller's diary. The implication is that Zellner has died or is terminal, and that the official communique about his transfer to Argentina is a lie, a cover-up which Muller swallows whole.
Du Bois markers:
• It's a text war story (WWII), a staple of Du Bois at the time.
• It invokes race/ethnicity and bigotry, both common Du Bois themes.
"Dr. Morris Adelman, famous continental surgeon, has been deported to Poland."
"The Nazis forget racial prejudice to save the life of a member of the high command." |
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| Comic Story | Aztec Safari, Episode 1: How Beatty Met Gaywood (4 pages) |
| Synopsis | Clyde recalls a safari of several years before, to the Yucatan to find Aztec artifacts. He notes a labor shortage. The local mayor cannot help. Enter Señor Gaywood, who procures porters, on condition he accompany the expedition. Beatty agrees, but demands to know why. On condition of secrecy, Gaywood reveals a map of the sacred temple of Ichtitual, where the last Aztec chief left a treasure in gold. Gaywood attests its authenticity, but hems and haws explaining how he came by the map from a native friend who died. Jim is suspicious. |
| Content | Genre: Adventure; Jungle | Characters: Clyde Beatty; Mayor; Gaywood; Wig Wong; native porters |
| Notes | Du Bois authorship i.d. by David Porta, November 2019, based on Du Bois markers (below), and Michael Barrier's assumptions (page 123, paragraph 4) in FUNNYBOOKS (UCPress, Oakland, 2015).
Notable editorial pattern: when Du Bois's contribution to a comic book series consisted of a single feature (often a backup feature) and a text story, the feature would immediately follow the text story, as is the case here in Super Comics (also in Popular Comics, Red Ryder Comics, The Lone Ranger, etc.).
Du Bois markers:
• animal reference ("the elephant's tent")
• accents, dialect, foreign language ("It's the bad season, Señor"; "There is nothing I can do, Señor"; "Pardon me, bud"; "Yes, yes, Señor. Señor Gaywood is the only one"; "Anyway, Missy Beatty, we going, too, and that's what count, eh?")
• jungle location (a mainstay of Du Bois's work: compare Tarzan, Korak, Jungle Jim, Young Hawk, Korak, the Lassie African settling, Elephant Boy, Jon of the Kalahari, Mabu Jungle Boy, Two Against the Jungle, Brothers of the Spear, Andy Panda's origin, Ringy Roonga's origin, etc.)
• foreign religion ("That's a map of the sacred temple of Ichtitual")
• foreign culture ("Aztec ruins in Yucatan"; "I am on this expedition to procure relics of the ancient Aztec civilization for my museum"; "The X marks the spot where the last Aztec chief left a treasure totalling millions in gold")
• word play ("Gaywood" is a play on "Gaylord Du Bois": the writer's last name is French, meaning "of the wood," as "bois" is French for "wood." Du Bois used wordplay on his name previously for the creator credit on the SKY RANGER feature he and aviation cartoonist Bob Jenny produced, crediting it to "Bob Gaylord," a mashup of their first names.) |
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| Content | Genre: Adventure |
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| Advertisement | Webster's Complete Reference Dictionary and Encyclopedia (1 page) |
| Synopsis | FREE to examine. |
| Credits | Letters: typeset |
| Notes | C3 - cover 3 - inside back cover.
B&W and shades of red/pink. |
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| Advertisement | American Seeds for Victory Gardens (1 page) |
| Synopsis | Send me the prize book, 40 packs of seeds, I will resell them at 10¢ each, send you the money promptly, and get my prize. |
| Credits | Letters: typeset |
| Notes | C4 - cover 4 - back cover. |
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| The data in the additional content section is courtesy of the Grand Comics Database under a
Creative Commons Attribution License.
More details about this comic may be available in their page here |
