Golden Age Doc Savage

Here is the Golden Age Doc Savage comic book from 1943. Doc Savage started in the Street & Smith pulp magazines in 1933 as a prose adventure, and added to their comic book line around 1940. Doc Savage was revised in the Bantam paperback series in 1964, and all the prose stories were reprinted. A fanzine reprinted most, if not all, of the Doc Savage comic book stories beginning in the 1990s. Doc Savage has a long history of popularity.

Doc Savage Digest

Doc Savage: “The Sasquatch Terror” by Tom Johnson. In August, 1944, a young Canadian woman comes to New York to enlist the help of Doc and his crew in finding her missing father. It seems a legendary Sasquatch is terrorizing the Canadian woods, and it was seen in the area where her father mysteriously disappeared. Doc, Monk and Ham fly into Canada to discover a mystery plot, and high adventure.

This was originally written when rumors circulated that Moonstone might be publishing an anthology of Doc Savage short stories. But that was only a rumor, and it never came about. With no chance of the story ever being published, it remained strictly fan fiction. The late David Burton and I talked about the story, and what fun it would be to have a new magazine in the pulp tradition featuring Doc Savage. Our Fading Shadows magazines were publishing new pulp stories since 1995, and there are numerous Doc pastiches around – even a few fan fiction novels featuring the Bronze Man. David worked up a mock cover for a fictitious new magazine, which would feature Doc Savage in new short stories. It was a lot of fun, but had no real possibilities of ever being a reality. I thought it would be nice to at least share David’s proposed cover for the fans.

Tom's Infamous Wall of Heroes

Tom’s Infamous Wall of Heroes

For a change of pace, I thought I would share a couple of pictures with the Group. Above is my infamous wall of heroes. My first two heroes were Batman and Superman, comic book super heroes I discovered in 1947, at age seven. I guess I read comic books for 33 years, giving them up in 1980. I had discovered new heroes, not men wearing tights (LOL). In 1963 & ’64, I discovered Doc Savage and The Shadow, along with REH and ERB, while I was stationed in France with the US Army. From that time onward, my interest in comic books began diminishing, and a love for exciting pulp tales was escalating. On the wall below Superman and Batman you will see Doc Savage, The Shadow, and The Phantom Detective, three of my all-time favorite heroes from the pulp magazines – but certainly not the only ones. The picture below is my den; wall-to-wall pulps, paperbacks, and digest magazines surround the pool table.

Doc Savage

Doc Savage

            Two of the most popular pulp heroes of the 1930s and ‘40s were Doc Savage and The Shadow. I’ve already discussed The Shadow a bit, so this time I will give a little information about The Man of Bronze, Doc Savage.

           

After the huge success of The Shadow in 1931, STREET & SMITH Publications was looking for a sister magazine of equal popularity. They came up with world adventurer, Doc Savage and his five aides. They would solve the world’s problems for 181 issues, beginning in 1933 and ending in 1949. Writing as Kenneth Robeson, the main author was a Missouri writer named Lester Dent. The action was fast paced, with wild plots, and plenty of action to make the Depression Era readers beg for more. Doc may have actually been more popular than The Shadow, though The Master of Darkness sold more issues.

Wanting to capitalize on the comic book market, in the 1940s STREET & SMITH published a Doc Savage comic book, but it failed to pull in the revenue other comic books of the day were making in profit.

Perhaps the true success of Doc Savage came in the early 1960s, long after the pulp and comic book editions had fallen by the wayside. Bantam paperbacks began reprinting the series with an iconic cover art by Bama, which captured a new generation of readers. The Shadow failed to find a good home in the paperbacks, but Doc Savage prospered. Eventually, all 181 original novels were reprinted, plus a rejected manuscript was finally published, and a new series began with Will Murray now writing the adventures.

In 1975, Ron Ely portrayed The Man of Bronze on the silver screen. The actor nailed the part perfectly, but the script was a bit too campy, and fans had mixed feelings about the movie. Plans are in the making for a new film, so we’ll see how that goes.

Doc Savage continued to be popular among fans, and has appeared in numerous fan fiction pieces. Plus, Sanctum Books is closing in on finally reprinting the series in total a second time in facsimile reproductions, including inside illustrations from the actual pulp magazines. Will Murray continues to write the new adventures, published through ALTUS PRESS, and fans still love the character.

The Media And The Shadow

The Media And The Shadow

As a child, one of my favorite radio dramas was The Shadow, the mysterious man who could cloud men’s minds and thwart evildoers in a thirty-minute broadcast. The Shadow had an odd beginning. An announcer on Street & Smith’s Detective Hour began calling himself The Shadow, and listeners ran to the newsstands looking for Street & Smith’s Shadow magazine. It didn’t take Street & Smith long to copyright the character by introducing a pulp magazine featuring The Shadow.

The Pulp Shadow by Walter Gibson

Walter Brown Gibson created and wrote the original stories under the Maxwell Grant house name. The pulp Shadow was quite a bit different from the radio Shadow that appeared afterwards. The first novel appeared in 1931. He was a mysterious personage who wore all black – patterned somewhat after Dracula, and could fade into the shadows. He didn’t ‘cloud the minds of men’. But radio was a theater of the mind, while pulp novels presented printed text for readers.

The Comic Book Shadow

         Street & Smith got into the comic books when they saw Superman selling millions of copies. Pulps were lucky to sell 7 or 8 hundred thousand copies, and that was their more popular titles. So in the 1940’s The Shadow made his appearance in comic books and newspaper comic strips. Since 1973, there have been several comic book adaptations of The Shadow, each apparently losing much of the true background of the original character, until modern comic book versions only visually resemble the character created by Walter Gibson in 1931.

         But that wasn’t the end of it. There was a 15-chapter serial from Columbia in 1940 starring Victor Jory. Several minor movies were produced early on, but three late 1940's from Republic proved successful, though somewhat comedic. Even a TV pilot was shot, which thankfully didn’t make it. The 1984 movie starring Alec Baldwin proved fairly successful, though it was a mixture of the pulp and radio Shadow.

Paperback Shadow Novels

         Although the pulp Shadow ran for 325 novels, and was highly popular during the pulp era, for some reason paperback publishers failed to reach out to the character. In 1963, Belmont Books brought out a new series of The Shadow, updating the character to the popular spy rage of the time. Walter Gibson was brought in for the first issue, then Dennis Lynds wrote eight more stories, and the series ended. In 1969, Bantam reprinted the first pulp novel in a new series to run along side their extremely popular pulp hero, Doc Savage. Unfortunately, The Shadow only lasted seven issues. Some blame the covers for its failure. A final paperback series was again brought out in 1974 from Pyramid/Jove, lasting for 23 issues, with some great covers by comic book artist, Steranko. There were some hardback editions that also appeared, but overall, the series just didn’t seem to catch on to modern readers. Tony Tollin, of Sanctum Books, has done better. He has reprinted over 150 Shadow novels in his double novel series, reprinting the novels in facsimile format, including illustrations, and reaching new fans of the character. His goal is to release all 325 Shadow novels.

         The Shadow has reached all media formats, and has been considered one of the most iconic characters ever created in fiction. Yet he appears to remain mysterious to the modern generation.

         A shame.