70 Years of Marvel - 1948

Superheroes might have been on the way out, but super-strong boxers? Another matter entirely. Marvel-Timely's answer to Popeye the Sailor, Powerhouse Pepper was a good-natured strongman (who it appears the Sandman would later base his look on), created by Basil Wolverton, a cartoonist who would spend much of the 40s and 50s working for Timely on various scary books, but who is best remembered for his work on this character.

Elsewhere in 1948, Olivier was back with another Shakespeare adaptation, Hamlet, which would win him an Oscar or two. John Wayne and John Ford were teaming up for Fort Apache. Bogie was starring in Key Largo and the Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Good times. And Milton Berle was becoming a tv star.

Meanwhile, in the real world, Gandhi was being assassinated and Israel was declaring statehood and fighting with its neighbours, forever at this rate.

70 Years Of Marvel - 1947

By 1947, the superhero books were in a decline, evidenced by the renaming of All Winners Comics to All Teen Comics, with accompanying dancing teenagers dressed in outfits that were almost as garish as those worn by the superheroes. Namor, Cap and the Torch still had their own books, but Timely had sensed that things were changing, and the remained of the 40s would see a move away from super-books to more family-orientated fare.

Meanwhile, at the pictures, adventure fans could see Danny Kaye living the Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Those of a more arty disposition could watch Blanche Dubois depend on the kindness of strangers. Oh, and in the real world, aliens were turning up in Roswell. Or were they?

70 Years of Marvel - 1946

With the war over, new comics characters no longer found themselves on the front lines. New heroes, like the Blonde Phantom, took to fighting more conventional battles, against gangsters and jewel thieves, all the while draped in the finest frocks that post-war austerity could muster.

One of Stan's creations, the Blonde Phantom would have, in all likelihood, have vanished into the mists of time, had she not been chosen by John Byrne to be sidekick to She-Hulk, in his 80s relaunch of that title. Here she is, folks!


He's a wacky guy, that John Byrne. Anyway, if comics weren't your thing in 1946, you could perhaps enjoy a visit to the picture house, to see Larry Olivier thesping it up in Henry V, or Jimmy Stewart getting all schmaltzy in It's A Wonderful Life. Meanwhile, British children were faced with the spectacle that was Muffin the Mule...

70 Years of Marvel - 1945

Created by Simon and Kirby, who would shortly thereafter head over the street to DC Comics and create the spookily similar Newsboy Legion, the Young Allies were a group of children who decided to join in the war effort. Consisting of "the fat kid", "the smart kid", "the tough kid" and, um, "the black kid", the Allies were joined by teen superheroes, Bucky and Toro for most of their adventures, which saw them beat merry hell out of any number of Axis leaders. Good on you, lads!

In the real world, of course, WWII was reaching its conclusion, Hitler was killing himself, Roosevelt was winning a 4th term as President, before dying, and America was demonstrating the power of the atom in order to persuade Japan to give up.

70 Years Of Marvel - 1944

Miss America was one of the more successful Timely heroines, though given how few of them there were in the '40s, this perhaps isn't saying very much. Created by Otto Binder, who who would go on to do a power of work for DC, Miss America gained her powers through a not-yet-a-trope lightning strike. She would go on to be a member of the All-Winners Squad, before disappearing at the tail end of the decade.

Years later, Marvel Editor-in-Chief, Roy Thomas, would make use of Miss America in one of his continuity-establishing exercises. According to Rascally Roy, Miss America had married fellow hero, the Whizzer, and the two of them had gone on to have children, two of which were now famous superheroes: Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch. Later, of course, the Maximoff twins' parentage would be revised somewhat, and the Miss America connection would be severed.

Since then, Miss America's been pretty much gone, other than a brief reappearance, in the pages of X-Statix, a couple of years back. God bless Pete Milligan, for remembering a little bit of Marvel history.

Meanwhile, in the real world, the war was going badly for the Axis Powers, the Normandy invasion and the Battle of Guam among several setbacks. Terrible things continued to happen in various concentration camps, and Anne Frank was on her way to one of them.

July 6th saw the Hartford Circus fire, which killed several hundred members of the audience, when the big top they were, which was waterproofed by means of parrafin and gasoline, caught ablaze, Nasty stuff.

Film fans may note that 1944 saw the release of Double Indemnity, a nice bit of film noir, in which she-vixen Barbara Stanwyck persuaded Fred MacMurray to participate in a spot of mariticide. More related to our topic, Captain America was starring in a Republic serial, which by all accounts was terrible.