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[Robb_K]

The Masked Raider 1

(1) Masked Raider and Talon The Golden Eagle
This is another story that uses "Dudes" as a mildly derogatory term. This story, like the story of the rancher's daughter, Belle (in "The Hawk 12"), this story features a sheriff's daughter, also having the courage to take on male roles in fighting crime. Likewise, the so-called "Dude" in this story, used that for a disguise.  In this story, the "Dude" was a crime fighter, whereas, he was an agent of the criminal gang in Belle, the rancher's story.  The Dude crime fighter has a pet trained eagle.  He uses the eagle to rescue the sheriff's daughter, and the episode ends wit him continuing to read his lawbooks, and be a disappointment to his father.

(2) Flying Eagle - Continuing Masked Raider Saga
This story, about a Native American, who has sworn to fight against crime (ostensibly not just among Native American peoples, but among the general society of The USA "White Man", as well.  That is a plot line I have never before come across.  So, this should be interesting.  I hope it is better researched, and both the writer and artist know more about The Native American tribes and that era of US history than the other US "Western genre" stories I've reviewed and critiqued in the past on this forum. A pair of gold prospectors forgot to file a claim on an area of land after finding a vein of high-quality gold ore.  Flying Eagle, the fastest runner in the territory, offers to run to the local town's Land Office, to beat other prospectors (who heard them yelling that they found gold) to that office, to file the claim. Already, I have problems. Having had lots of experience in dealing with official government offices in Canada, USA, The Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Belgium, The UK, Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Sudan, Morocco and several other countries, I can't imagine that the US Federal Land Office representative would accept Flying Eagle as the legal representative of the pair of prospectors, with no legal papers showing that HE is their agent.  I assume that he would have to identify the area of their claim on the office's map.  They would have had to lay this out on a map, at least with identifiable landmarks and boundaries with measured distances from known immovable landmarks to help form the legal description of the boundaries of the claim, on the office's plot map.  The prospectors gave him no letter making Flying Eagle their agent, and no map showing landmark boundaries. And they expect Flying Eagle to beat potential rival claimants who may be racing there atop horses, by running on foot.  The crook that overheard and races on horseback to file the claim, chops down a tree to fall across Flying Eagle's path (which shouldn't stop him, unless it fall upon him and injures or kills him(which it didn't)).  And more ridiculous than that, Flying Eagle says that the crook's chopped down tree gave him a new shortcut to The Land (County Clerk's Office) (apparently this story takes place in a US State (rather than a Territory). Much to my surprise and dismay, the "story" is only 3 pages long, and we see very little about what happened!!!  We didn't get to see how the cut down tree provides the short cut which allowed Flying Eagle to beat a horse rider to the town.  This "story" could have been told in one single narrative box, and all the panels showed us nothing more in the drawn panels.  The whole point of mixing visual artwork with dialogue balloons and text narratives in comic strips and books is wasted.  Although the artwork is fairly good, this story was quite disappointing (especially for having a plot idea with lots of potential).

(3)The Boy And The Eagle - Continuing Masked Raider Saga
This story features Les the lawyer(Crime Fighter) from "The Masked Raider and Talon The Eagle" story. He thinks in a narrative the story of his uncle's murder when he was a boy, the murderer shooting him and chasing him, his horse taking him to his secret cave in the mountains, where he meets a fellow wounded eagle, who he adopts as a pet/friend.  Young Les vowed that he and Talon, his Eagle would become a team fighting against crime.  So, that is The Masked Raider's origin story.  According to GCD records, the drawn stories (non-filler pages) were not Charlton productions, but bought from defunct publisher stock. So, there are currently no verified credits, and their original publishing company is not known by indexers.

(4)Slim Jim and Roly-Poly - 1-Page Gag
Clever gag, but not funny. Not a waste of a page, however (although, personally I'd rather they'd have used it to add to the 3-page story.

(5)The Sentinel - Continuing Masked Raider Saga
Yet another story with a murderer trying to pin the crime on the hero! A gold prospector murders his partner after they struck gold. The Masked Raider finds the dead body just as The Sheriff and his posse arrive to the scene.  Les(The Masked Raider) has blood on his shirt from earlier paper cuts (some action hero, eh?).  So, the murderer sees a way to pin the murder on him.  But the fact that the sheriff accepts that as "evidence" to make Les the prime suspect is ridiculous, because the murderer wouldn't stay around the body of his victim for hours afterwards.  If he stayed for more than a few minutes to clear the scene of anything that could potentially identify him, he'd have just buried the body in a place no one would look.  Les' father figures out who the murderer is from an old letter to his son from the victim, and goes to his house to confront him. The murderer tries to kill him, but Les and his eagle arrive just in time to knock him to the ground and dislodge his gun from his hand.  Les escorts his father towards home.  The murderer isn't hurt, and plans to ambush and kill them, as the episode ends.  That provides lots of suspense leading into the next episode.  So, this was the best and most enjoyable episode of this book, so far.

(5) Cowboy Hats - Information Page
Not very interesting. I'd rather they'd have used this extra page for adding to the ridiculously short 3-Page "story".  It still would have been much to short for its plot idea, but it would have helped it a bit.  This book already met the "educational and text requirements" to be eligible for the US 2nd Class discount shipping rate by having its 2- page text story and "How to Tie Useful Knots" information page.

(6) Pistol Packing Pattie Has A Block Party - 1 Page Gag
Not funny at all.  I don't see the point of placing this gag in this book.

(7) Assorted Useful Knots - Information Page
Now, here we have something that is actually useful, and interesting, too.

Overall Assessment
The Masked Raider stories were more interesting and enjoyable than most of stories in "The Hawk 12".  the artwork was solid, all through. The only problem I have is that I can see no way that the hero is or can be a "raider".  Will he make a lot of raids on criminals' headquarters or hideouts in future episodes???  I think rI think "The Masked Avenger and Screaming Eagle" or "The Masked Avenger and Lightning", or something of the sort would have been better.

[Robb_K]

Steve Donovan, Western Marshall

I wasn't familiar with this TV series, so I looked it up and found that it only went for one season in 1955-1956. I assume the story might be one that they did in the TV show? If so, they may have been using some of the stills from the show for inspiration?

In any case, it was good that it was a full-length story. It gave time for the situation to develop. It was good that they had a blurb at the beginning to explain the role of the Western Marshal. (1) Though being an Aussie, I still wasn't sure how the marshal differed from the sheriff. I thought it might be that the sheriff is based in a town, whereas the Marshal covers wider areas to bring in the bad guys and hand over to the sheriff? I looked it up and I wasn't too far off. The marshal is hired at the federal level, but it would have been nice to explain that if they're giving an explanation at all.

The art was very good. The greyhounds on p. 1 didn't look like greyhounds, but the rest was very realistic. I especially liked the artist's use of different perspectives and angles; for example, the close-up of the gun falling from the baddie's hand as the marshal shoots in the middle ground (p. 2 of story), the overhead angle from the position of the lamp (p. 3) and the close-up of the horse from nostrils down with the other action in the middle and background (p. 4).

(2)I did wonder why we suddenly have one black-and white page second from the end. Maybe that was the wrap-around page that matched the introductory blurb about the TV show.

A good pick, Panther, especially for the art.
Cheers QQ.

(1) during the late 1800s in The USA's western Continental Territories (Washington, Idaho, Montana, Dakota, Wyoming, Nebraska, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, and Indian(Oklahoma) Territories), were assigned US Federal Marshals covering Districts (territorial divisions, based on a combination of population and land area.  Population was the first consideration in forming the Districts, but if the remaining areas were lower than the lowest population threshold, but were too large in land area, they were further divided into smaller district sizes that were small enough to be accessible within a short time from a single marshal's office in a centrally-located town.  The Territories of Montana, Dakota, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Nevada had vast areas with too little population spread throughout, leaving a large area not accessible in one or two-day travel from a single office.  So, those Territories had several rural Districts with very small populations given their own District and Marshal office, so that those areas could be reached within a day or two from the office.  This District level of government police service is akin to the Shire level in Australia (at least as it pertains to size and population of rural level administrative service - but not equivalent in the sense that the administration was on the Federal level in USA, whereas, as I understand it, The Shires are local government agencies in Australia.  Have I got that right?  Or are they also funded from Australia's Federal level?

(2).  Yes, you are correct.  The 2nd-to-last page is the IBC (Inside Back Cover) of the comic book, the folded other side of the IFC (Inside Front Cover) of the book.  In USA and Canada during the 1950s, the  cover pages of most comic books were printed on thicker, glossy, heavier duty paper, which was much more expensive to print upon than the book's remaining 51 or 35 newsprint pages, because there was only one page per book in this special run.  So it didn't have the economies to scale of newsprint pages.  Furthermore, I seem to recall that the cost of colour printing on slick paper was higher, because of its difficulty and tendency for more printing failures (do-overs required).  So, although the fronts and backs of the folded covers were printed in colour to grab the eye of the potential buyers, the two inside pages were generally printed in black and white. They had been printed in colour during the 1940s by some US companies (such as Dell) because the cost hadn't become as prohibitive as it did later.

[The Australian Panther]

The Hawk 12 - St John
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=19069
Great Matt Baker cover!
The name Hawk was one that was used by comics creators more than once.
DC had Hawkman and back in their Cowboy days, Nighthawk.
Later Marvel appropriated the NightHawk name. There are probably more. 
Tuska is one of a few artists still working in the 'Silver age' who I believe did not really enjoy Superheroes and didn't try too hard on those books. I think they preferred more realistic narratives, like Westerns and Crime.
This one is better than most of his Big Two work. It's a joy to look at. Apart from the visuals, it's not much of a story. And the ending is much too abrupt. 
Buckskin Belle
One of a suirprising number of female characters in comics in the 40's and 50's.
Tex Blaisdell likes drawing faces.  Also likes drawing Belle in some 'interesting' poses.
Another story which ends too abruptly. Also, doesn't tie all up all the elements of the narrative.
Mustang Jack - Ken Battlefield.
This story is too word heavy for me.
Dude.
My Dictionary says,
Originally US> A city slicker. That makes sense.
Jack Dalton
If he 'served a long term in prison' and he married 'Cattle Annie' [who caught him in the first place] after '40 years of courtship' there is obviously much more to this story. Nice Art from Richard Speed.
Can't find much on him, but he apparently did a lot of work in the early days of comics.
https://www.hobbydb.com/marketplaces/hobbydb/subjects/richard-speed-artist?filters[related_to]=161814&filters[in_collection]=all&filters[in_wishlist]=all&filters[on_sale]=all&order[name]=name&order[sort]=asc&page=2&subject_id=161814&subvariants=true&grouped=false
Graveyard Gulch
You get the impression that Tuska was enjoying himself drawing this. It just has a fun feel to it. I wonder if he did the lettering too? Second panel on the second page is interesting - the thick lines around the hats against the pipes in the background.
This series is in the early 20th century for some reason. There is a telephone booth handy. "I'll phone Pedro to meet us with his car...' and a manhole in the street.
also, 'Pal Joey?!'
cheers! 
   
     

[The Australian Panther]

Masked Raider # 1 Charlton
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=18157
Cover. Yet anouther Bird. There were a few 'Eagle' superheroes.
  Masked Raider and Talon the Golden Eagle
Note on the art

  Inks credits originally given to Mike Sekowsky in error (per Tony Isabella, March 30, 2006). Material likely inventory from a defunct company.   

I beg to disagree. There is clear evidence of Mike Sekowsky's work here.
> The Brows on many of the faces.
> pretty much the whole of the last two pages.
One of the problems with identifying art from uncredited golden age work is that, more often than not, work was produced in 'Studios' and the work of more than one person. Biographical data on Sekowsky tells us that he was very generous and quite fast and was known for pitching in and helping other artists with deadlines.
There was likely more than one artist involved with this.
Pretty smart bird.He can decipher drawings, and when he hears the word,'Red' he can identify it as a colour.
Another feisty female too! As someone pointed out a few years ago - there seemed to be an habit of drawing women with red dresses.
Flying Eagle
An Indian could file a claim without being questioned? And just why is he walking? Can't identify the artist.
The Boy and the Eagle.
Unusually for the Golden Age, this story follows on from the previous one.
Art > Jack Sparling. And an Origin story to boot!
The Sentinel
Jack Sparling again. And nice work for Jack too.
The problem with too many of the Golden age westerns, is that the stories are so short they are basically anecdotes and not full stories. 
But here the stories are at least connected and hint at a bigger picture. 
Pistol Packing Pattie Has a Block Party! Nice pun.
This is an introduction to the character. There are  Pattie stories, and quite entertaining ones, through the remainder of the 'Masked Raider run.   
cheers!

[Robb_K]

Masked Raider # 1 Charlton
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=18157
Cover. Yet anouther Bird. There were a few 'Eagle' superheroes.
  Masked Raider and Talon the Golden Eagle
Note on the art

  Inks credits originally given to Mike Sekowsky in error (per Tony Isabella, March 30, 2006). Material likely inventory from a defunct company.   

I beg to disagree. There is clear evidence of Mike Sekowsky's work here.
> The Brows on many of the faces.
> pretty much the whole of the last two pages.
One of the problems with identifying art from uncredited golden age work is that, more often than not, work was produced in 'Studios' and the work of more than one person. Biographical data on Sekowsky tells us that he was very generous and quite fast and was known for pitching in and helping other artists with deadlines.
There was likely more than one artist involved with this.
Pretty smart bird.He can decipher drawings, and when he hears the word,'Red' he can identify it as a colour.
Another feisty female too! As someone pointed out a few years ago - there seemed to be an habit of drawing women with red dresses.
Flying Eagle
(1)An Indian could file a claim without being questioned? And just why is he walking? Can't identify the artist.
The Boy and the Eagle.
Unusually for the Golden Age, this story follows on from the previous one.
Art > Jack Sparling. And an Origin story to boot!
The Sentinel
Jack Sparling again. And nice work for Jack too.
The problem with too many of the Golden age westerns, is that the stories are so short they are basically anecdotes and not full stories. 
But here the stories are at least connected and hint at a bigger picture. 
Pistol Packing Pattie Has a Block Party! Nice pun.
(2)This is an introduction to the character. There are  Pattie stories, and quite entertaining ones, through the remainder of the 'Masked Raider run.  
cheers!

Thanks, Panther, for filling us in on Sekowsky's and Sparling's work. 
(1) I doubt that ANYONE, Native American or not, could file a claim for other parties, without having a signed note saying that he is their Agent, or is given at least temporary Power of Attorney to act for them in filing such a claim, including detailed information on the claim's location and boundaries, and having a non-interested party also signing as a witness.  I think it is quite ridiculous that a man on foot could outrace a man on horseback in a race of more than a few yards even with a short headstart.  And although knowing a short cut would help, the runner should already have been using that shorter route before he saw that there already was a rival racer.  There are quite a few problems with this story.  It's unusual for me to notice that a Charlton book has stories that make more sense than those of other companies.  But "The Masked Raider" stories were likely originally produced by another producer that went out of business before the artwork was bought by Charlton.  In any case, I enjoyed reading this Charlton publication much more than the St. John Western choice for this fortnight.

(2) I'll have to check a few of them out. 

[Robb_K]

Steve Donovan Western Marshal
I remember seeing a couple episode of this TV show during the mid 1950s, when we were visiting my uncle and aunt in Chicago during Christmas/New Year vacation.  My cousins, my brother, and I were big Western film and TV fans.  Nevertheless, I never bought the book (although, I DDID buy "Turok, Son Of Stone" #1 in 1954). And, my cousins who lived with us in Winnipeg, also didn't buy it.  So, I had never read it, till now.

Everett Kinstler!!! NO WONDER the artwork is so outstanding! It was also nice to have one long story fill the whole book, rather than the choppy, 5 to 7 or 8-paged unrelated stories that usually filled 1950s US Western genre comic books. The story about a big cattle ranchers' cowboys raiding and tearing up a town near their railroad herd delivery stop is very good.  But its plot seems too detailed to support only 20 minutes of filming in a half hour show. If I remember correctly it lasted a half hour, not a full hour.  So, I don't think this comic book story was an exact adaptation of one of the show's episodes.

The only problem I noticed (that Kinstler's Steve Donovan doesn't look at all like Douglas Kennedy, who played the character in the 1955-56 TV series on which the comic was based). Also, Kennedy was 40+ years old during the filming. Clearly, Kinstler didn't base his rendering on stills from the TV series. Interesting that in some scenes he made Donovan look like he was in his 20s, and in others, with more facial detail, he made him look like he COULD be 40. I can't remember Kennedy being in many Western films or starring in any other Western TV series.  I do remember him being in lesser roles as a background cowhand in a few Western movies.  But most of his acting career was spent in "B" or "C" noir/detective films. 
But those few issues don't take away from the story's enjoyability.  The story plot and pacing are basically good.  The only researching pet peeve I have is that there should be no mountains near the railroad cattle drive terminal stations north from Texas, which were located in Kansas, which is all perfectly flat country, without even low hills; and The Rocky Mountains in central Colorado are much too far west of any of those stations, to be seen.

[Quirky Quokka]

(1) during the late 1800s in The USA's western Continental Territories (Washington, Idaho, Montana, Dakota, Wyoming, Nebraska, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, and Indian(Oklahoma) Territories), were assigned US Federal Marshals covering Districts (territorial divisions, based on a combination of population and land area.  Population was the first consideration in forming the Districts, but if the remaining areas were lower than the lowest population threshold, but were too large in land area, they were further divided into smaller district sizes that were small enough to be accessible within a short time from a single marshal's office in a centrally-located town.  The Territories of Montana, Dakota, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Nevada had vast areas with too little population spread throughout, leaving a large area not accessible in one or two-day travel from a single office.  So, those Territories had several rural Districts with very small populations given their own District and Marshal office, so that those areas could be reached within a day or two from the office.  This District level of government police service is akin to the Shire level in Australia (at least as it pertains to size and population of rural level administrative service - but not equivalent in the sense that the administration was on the Federal level in USA, whereas, as I understand it, The Shires are local government agencies in Australia.  Have I got that right?  Or are they also funded from Australia's Federal level?

Thanks for that extra info, Robb. That makes sense now. Yes, Australia has shires. I'm not sure how the funding works, but we do have city councils and regional councils. I live in a large inland town of about 105 000 people and a regional council takes care of local affairs in our town and an area beyond which includes smaller towns and rural areas.

Cheers

QQ

[The Australian Panther]

Steve Donovan Western Marshall
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=34869

Western Marshall was the creation of Ernest Haycock

Ernest Haycox (1899-1950)
https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/ernest_haycox_1899_1950_/
He wrote many books and was the creator of the scripts for Stagecoach, Bugles in the Afternoon, Union Pacific and The Wild Bunch. 

Ernest Haycox(1899-1950)
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0370697/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_0_nm_8_q_Ernest%2520Haycox
    Writer
"Haycox is the writer most often credited with raising western fiction up from the pulps into the mainstream; his influence on other writers of western fiction cannot be overestimated. He was a prolific writer, with almost three hundred short stories and more than twenty novels to his credit, and is among the most successful writers of American western fiction." 

Western Publishing {Dell] had three periods of publishing Westerns.
First they reprinted newspaper strips,
Then they published illustrated versions of novels by top western writers.   And top artists. Most of these are to be found on CB+.   
Third, at the end of Dell's time they did comic versions of popular western TV shows and some movies.
For mine, they were the top US publishers of Comic Books.
I hope this post inspires some of you to go look at these books here. You'll be glad you did. 
Somebody asked what a Marshall was in the US.
https://www.usmarshals.gov/what-we-do

Two modern day fictional marshals are
Tommy Lee Jones' 'US Marshall's' movie and the series Justified in which the central character is Marshall Raylan Givens - created by Elmore Leonard. 
The story.
I chose this book as a contrast to the other two.
One thing they all have in common is an abrupt ending.
Page two is confusing as the colourist has the Marsjhall and one of the prisoners wearing identical colours.
Both the writer [Paul S Newman or Gaylord DuBois?] and the artist clearly took the time to do research for accuracy.
Example> The buildings, The Chuck Wagon [page 18], The comment about the empty chambers on page 20.
But enough for me, make yourself a snack and a cup of Java and enjoy a masterclass of comic visual story-telling.
cheers!