DICKIE DEAN #2 - A War on War

Story presented this post:
Dickie Dean - A Machine to End War (story and art by Jack Cole)
Silver Streak Comics #4 (May 1940 - Lev Gleason)

For a 14-year old boy, DICKIE DEAN is not only extraordinarily brilliant, but also surprisingly altruistic.

DICKIE DEAN's honorary grandson, JIMMY NEUTRON, is also a boy genius inventor, but he mostly uses his talents to make yummy candy, hypnotize his parents into giving a birthday party every day, and to build cool little rocket ships. DICKIE DEAN, in his first appearance (see our blog post here), creates a machine to listen to voices from the past, and immediately decides to apply it to fighting crime.

In his second adventure, Dickie decides to invent a machine that will end war, in reaction to the death of his uncle, who is a soldier fighting a fictitious war. When he has a chance to sell the machine and become wealthy, Dickie -- like a young Buddha -- turns the offer down.

In these earnest stories made at the beginning of Jack Cole's career, one can find nothing of the tongue-in-cheek humor for which he would become famous. Even though his plots are deadly serious, Cole's restless imagination and penchant for cramming his comic book stories with more ideas per square inch than just about anybody else, makes the DICKIE DEAN stories a fun read.

In this story alone, aside from a machine that makes the air too thick for bullets and machines of war to speed through, we also see Dickie's extremely cool laboratory, an ingenious door-answering periscope, and a wireless radio that Dickie conceals in a hollowed-out heel of his shoe.

Dickie's friend and sidekick, Zip Todd is more present in this story. Being a little heavyset and dense, as well as bravely loyal to Dickie, Zip is a sort of boy-version of Woozy Winks. In the rest of the eight DICKIE DEAN stories, Zip becomes pretty much a fixture in the series.

What's amazing about this story is that Dickie actually succeeds in transforming humanity, and ending war. Much like the first story in this series, the writing works as a sort of poetic allegory. Cole ends the story with Dickie hard at work on his next invention, much as Cole must have been hard at work creating his next amazing comic book story.

Silver Streak #4 cover (not by Cole)

DICKIE DEAN BOY INVENTOR - Episode 3 - Cole's First Speedboat Story

Story presented in this post:
Dickie Dean (story, pencils, inks, and lettering by Jack Cole)
Silver Streak Comics #5 (June 1940, Lev Gleason)

We've looked at some memorable early stories Jack Cole created in which the action centered around speedboats. There's Cole's single Quicksilver story, his landmark fourth Midnight story, and in our previous post, we saw a mind-blowing Midnight story involving a speedboat that traveled on land. Having established Cole's fondness for speedboat stories, here now is, as far as I can tell , his very first speedboat story: the third episode of his highly entertaining DICKIE DEAN series.

I'm not sure why Cole was so fond of drawing speedboats and water. Perhaps there was a flood in his hometown of New Castle, Pennsylvania when he was a child, or perhaps his Dad had a speedboat. In any case, there is a strong sense of place in this story, which makes it even more vivid than ever. This story reminds me of the more recent, but equally entertaining story, Won't Be Licked; The Great '37 Flood of Louisville, by one of my favorite modern cartoonists, Dan Zettwoch (the story appeared in The Best American Comics 2007, Chris Ware, editor).

Perhaps Jack Cole's interest in speeboat stories was purely graphical. If you study these stories, you can see that he used the boats as pointers on the page layout, directing the eye effortlessly to the next panel. The result is a sense of movement that is often exhilarating.

This story stands alone in the DICKIE DEAN series. It's the only one of the eight that Cole did in which Dickie's friend/sidekick doesn't appear. Instead, there is a genial, faintly Dad-like newspaper reporter named HAP who joins Dickie on his adventures. I like the chemistry (if you'll pardon the pun) between these two characters and I wish Jack Cole had explored this duo more. Alas, this is the only story in which HAP appears.

Like many of Jack Cole's comic book stories of 1940-42, there is a way cool information drawing, explaining the main invention, a boat that can make water disappear by running through it:


There are also several other fun inventions in this story, including an automatic apple dispenser, an accordion hat retriever, and an acid-spewing fountain pen. Cole also speaks directly to his boy readership at the start and end of this story, proving no small amount of enthusiastic encouragement to invent. Cole's words are so compelling, that I felt myself growing keenly interested in inventing something as I read the story!

Another hallmark of Cole's work is an interest in using decorative patterns to provide visual richness (such as Woozy Winks' polka-dotted blouse). In this story, he uses the diffusion of the water molecules as an excuse to populate several panels with wonderful arrays of floating spheres of water. The effect is magical, like something out of LITTLE NEMO:

In addition to the Dickie Dean story in this issue, Jack Cole also delivered the lead feature, a ripping Silver Streak adventure (which I'll share at a future posting). Cole was the editor of this title, and in addition to his two stories in this book, he also turned in a wonderful cover:

Note Dickie Dean in the lower right-hand corner, the only time Cole drew his full figure on a cover.

By the way, have you checked out my pal, Frank Young's superlative articles and reprints of some great Jimmy Thompson ROBOTMAN stories at Cartoon Snap? If not, be sure to hop over there once you've finished reading this amazing DICKIE DEAN story... you'll be glad you did. Thompson is the most under-appreciated artist of the Golden Age, and Sherm's Cartoon Snap blog is one of the best out there!

Just an aside: if you happen to be enjoying a scan blog and see some links to ads posted, clicking on a few is an easy way to help support that blog, since the blogger will get a little dinero for each click. Just a suggestion. We're not supposed to solicit clicks for ourselves. I just wanted to raise general awareness of this issue. For example, out of 15,000 page impressions on this blog there have been only 8 clicks on the advertising links! I always make it point to click a few times to help the blogs I like... it's the polite and helpful thing to do!

Here then, is the third Dickie Dean episode, another lost gem, excavated for your reading pleasure from the Cole-mine!

MIDNIGHT 4 (1941) - A Jack Cole Classic

Story presented in this post:
"Midnight - Gabby, The Talking Monkey" (Story and art by Jack Cole)
Smash Comics #21 (April 1944 - Quality Comics Publications)

In his fourth Midnight story, Jack Cole found a new mastery of the recently born graphic storytelling form, and created one of the best stories of his career.

The month that Smash Comics #21 came out, Silver Streak Comics #9 (Lev Gleason) also sold off the stands, with 18 pages by Cole. The 10th issue of Silver Streak would contain his last work on that title and for Lev Gleason. These were stories Cole had created months earlier. By April, 1941, he had moved on to greener pastures, having been recruited to Quality Comics a few months earlier.

Smash Comics #21 (April 1941) Not by Cole.

Cole must have been excited and uplifted by this step up. His first stories for Quality were a series of beautiful, tightly plotted and superbly realized 5-page MIDNIGHT adventures. Not only had Cole discovered a newfound confidence in his writing and art, but he also had begin to combine screwball comedy, crime stories, and superhero comics into a new, highly entertaining mixture.

In an earlier post, we looked at the first three MIDNIGHT episodes. With an analysis to follow, here is the landmark fourth adventure of Midnight, an early masterpiece by Jack Cole:





The closing sentence, with it's weird mix of sincerity and satire, in some ways, sums up what the magic of Jack Cole's pre-war stories were all about: "And with a talking monkey, Midnight brings a new weapon into action against the forces of evil."

There are several ways this story represents a stand-out in Cole's work. First, the artwork is particularly graceful and well-realized. Panels such as this Will Eisner-esque sewer scene are rich with detail, vibrating with dynamic poses, and move the story forward beautifully.


In fact, the entire page is a tour de force of design, elegantly moving the reader through the story in a dense, rich series of up and down curves that work left to right, in three tiers (click to study a larger version):

The red lines and arrows show how Cole used his character's poses, and props such as the waterfront dock pilings, to create design elements that resulted in an extremely clear communication of movement on the page. The speedboat, with it's triangular shape, serves as almost an arrow in itself, directing us first down into the bottom tier, and then onto the next page.



This page also contains a DICK TRACY moment, in which Cole stops the manic chase for a beat to give us an information diagram that introduces Midnight's new weapon. The suction cup gun is a crazy invention that would never work in real life, but as we have seen Cole -- an inventor himself -- was quite fond of putting fantastic devices into his stories.



Here's another beautiful panel, demonstrating how Cole's art often used patterns as a design device. I love how there are two sets of shadows in this composition, visually suggesting a connection between the two characters that would come to pass (Midnight will adopt the woman's pet/child when she dies). This is literal foreshadowing, and innovative graphic storytelling!



Another hallmark of Cole's graphic storytelling is the masterful use of sound effects as graphic devices. Look at how the sound effects in this panel point to the action like arrows. Also notice Cole has thrown a pair of white eyes in the blackness, Gabby's eyes. The panel is a great illustration of Cole's newfound combination of action-adventure and comedy, which he would employ to great effect in his PLASTIC MAN stories.



Towards the end of the story, Cole creates a lovely silhouette with a full moon backfrop, something he was quite fond of during this period. Also, very appropriate, as Midnight's early adventures take place in the, um, dead of night. Midnight's pose is also characteristic of Cole's early hero work. The sideview-running pose was something Cole created and used often, until he began to think in more three-dimensional terms in his PLASTIC MAN stories. For example, here is a comparison with Cole's splash page from Silver Streak #4 (May 1940 - Lev Gleason):




Jack Cole's stories also often included a woman. The women in his early hero stories were usually typical damsels in distress. The women in his later stories were sexy villains. The woman in this story, who shares the last name of another Cole creation, Angles O'Day, is rather unique, being a talented scientist who invents a way to give Gabby the monkey the power of human speech. Cole even draws her differently, with her hair chastely pulled back in a bun, and often with her face and body partially obscured. At the risk of being too psychoanalytical, one could say the inventor-female in this story is a shadow of Jack Cole himself.




This story would not rank as a Jack Cole classic unless somebody dies in a bizarre way that vengefully corrects an injustice. In this case, the man who kills the woman scientist is impaled on a church steeple. One can safely assume that Cole didn't stop to think too hard about the socio-religious implications he had made with this climactic ending. Part of the appeal of Cole's comics (and much of golden age comics) is the streaming flow of imagery and symbolism from the collective unconscious.

Incidentally, this church clocktower is the very one which Midnight swung into action across in the stunning opening page if this story. Cole has brought the reader full-circle, and provided a deeply satisfying poetic ending as the clock tolls midnight.

I hope you enjoyed this analysis of a true Jack Cole classic in which justice is served at (and by) midnight!

Speed on Paper - Quicksilver (1941)

Story presented in this post:

"Quicksilver" (Story and art by Jack Cole)

National Comics #13 (July, 1941 - Quality)

How do you show three-dimensional movement at high velocity in a two-dimensional context?

Or, minus the five-dollar words, how do you show speed on paper? That's a question that seems to occupy Jack Cole's mind in the early and, to a lesser degree, middle years of his career as a graphic storyteller. A great deal of his comic book work from 1939-1950 has speed both as a concept of the story, and a quality of the pacing itself. Cole's stories zip, screech, and zoom through ideas and innovations like no other, and it's one of the things that makes Cole great.

Jack Cole didn't create the character of Quicksilver, but he easily could have. Just a year or so earlier, he created another silvery speedster, THE SILVER STREAK, as well as THE COMET. Both heroes drew their power from whirlwind speed.

The "laughing Robin Hood," as Quicksilver was often called, debuted without an origin story in National #5, and ran for eight episodes before Cole turned in the one and only story he would make with this character. The primary artist on the series was the great Nick Cardy, but Cole's story is the stand-out in the series, which stayed a 6-page backup feature through 1949.

Poor Quicksilver never had an origin story or civilian identity. It hardly seems to matter in Cole's story. Aside from the greatest PLASTIC MAN stories, this dense six-page story may be the most perfect and pure expression of a Jack Cole superhero story. The words and images are perfectly melded together, the characters are lively and well-realized, the action is breathless and bizarre, and -- of course -- the level of invention in showing speed on paper is unsurpassed.

In comparing the earnest but grimly moralistic tone of his earlier superhero creations, THE COMET and SILVER STREAK, one sees the emergence of a sense of humor, and a decision to treat the idea of fighting crime as an absolute absurdity in itself, rich with irony and subtext -- a new direction that would result in the creation of Jack Cole's satirical and slapstick masterpiece, PLASTIC MAN, which would debut just one month later.

A word about about digital restoration. In some cases, it seems a good idea to take raw scans and alter them so they are more readable. The original work is treated with great respect. The biggest alteration we make to the pages is the replacement of the background paper, which is often discolored and has the reverse-side printing bleeding through. In the example below, you can see an example of what, hopefully, you will agree is an improvement. On this page, in addition to restoring the background paper, the areas of the title and the target were touched up.

It's too bad Jack Cole only made one Quicksilver story. On the other hand, it's a terrific story. Enjoy!

Cole-isms #1 - Death Patrol (Military Comics #31, 1944)

Story presented this post:
Death Patrol - Mt. Fuijama (Story and art by Jack Cole)
Military Comics #31 (August, 1944 - Quality Comics)

Jack Cole's eighth, and last, DEATH PATROL story from 1944 is a perfect storm of his unique design and stylistic elements - his "Cole-sisms."

Before we look at some of these, I have a little personal story to share.

I've been following a new blog, The Panelogical Pantheon, in which the author -- a fellow comic book freak -- writes as much about his personal life as he does about comics. I cannot recommend this blog as his taste is different than mine, to put it politely, and he has some odd ideas (for instance, he insists on referring to Jack Cole as "John Cole"). This blog author, incredibly, seems to worship some of the worst comics ever done. However, his personal stories are interesting, and so, inspired by his example, I thought I'd share a little story with you about how I came to own a copy of the pages in this posting.

In 1982, I was 20 years old and living in Tallahassee, Florida with my girlfriend. One weekend, we had a tag sale in our apartment's front room. Among the people who came were a 19-year old guy, his girlfriend, and his younger brother (maybe 16). The boys saw part of my comic book collection in the living room and became very excited. I had a suitcase of old 1960's Marvels out.

The 19-year old fellow, who had a little fuzz on his upper lip and talked with a southern twang, insisted I sell him the suitcase. No way, I thought. He then told me he wanted to open up his own comic book shop and needed the collection for his stock. I asked if he had any golden age comics.

He said that he and his younger brother had broken into a deserted house and found in the attic a huge pile of golden age comics. Now THIS caught my attention! I told him I might consider a trade. He seemed to like the idea. I got his address and made plans to drop by his place that evening with my suitcase of silver age Marvel comics.

"At last!" I thought, my dreams of finding a horde of old golden age comics was becoming reality! I had feverishly desired to make just such a find for myself for nearly half of my 20-year old life!

When I arrived, they were having dinner. The boys lived with their mother. I was shown into a bedroom, where the golden age comics were. I was very excited. As we walked into the room, the boys explained that the comics they found were a little "torn up." They left me in the room and went back to finish their dinner.

There, in front of me were two large cartons, both filled with loose pages of golden age comics. The first thing I pulled out was the cover of Plastic Man #1! I rooted around and saw the cover of Four Color #9 (the very first Carl Barks comic story and already worth some money back then), and a few pages from it, as well. There were pages from DC comics, Timely comics, and Quality comics from the early 1940s. In some cases, there was a complete coverless comic, or a near-complete section. It was both wonderful and tragic!

I wound up trading my suitcase of old Marvels for the two boxes of bits and pieces, and fifty dollars in cash. Soon after, the prices of the Marvels I had traded away began to rise, and had I held on to that box until today, they would be worth maybe 10 to 20 thousand dollars! No matter, I originally bought them all for ten cents apiece from The Book Nook in 1975.

At the time, finding golden age comics was totally out of the question. There were very few reprints around, and the original comics were out of my price range. At the time, I reasoned, this was my only chance to see this material!

My friend, and fellow comics freak Frank Young (see his great blog, Stanley Stories, devoted to the great comic book writer and artist John Stanley) and I spent many dizzying hours breathing in the acrid dusty fumes from these treasure boxes and sorting through them. Even then, Frank had an astonishing encyclopedic knowledge of comics and identified artists and writers I had never even heard of! We pieced together about three quarters of Four Color #9 (which I later sold for a four hundred bucks on eBay), and several other cool items.

Among the pages, we assembled a small, fascinating pile of Jack Cole comics, which I spent years studying. These pages sparked the interest in Cole's non-Plastic Man work that eventually led to the creation of this blog, 26 years later!

I recently excavated this stack of pages from the linen closet where I keep my pared-down comics collection (non-digital comics, that is!). My pal, Frank Young, who has a top-notch scanner graciously scanned these pages for this blog. Thanks, Frank! There are a few items in this set that, as far as I can tell, have not previously been scanned or circulated, including this astonishing DEATH PATROL story from Military Comics #31 (August, 1944):

First off, it needs to be stated up front that the portrayal of non-white people in this story is disgraceful, and I do not approve. That being said, such portrayals were, sadly, the standard of the day. The portrayal of Japanese people in this way was probably a reaction to the very real threat Japan posed to the United States when they were at war.

From a design standpoint, this 4-page gem is a stand-out in Jack Cole's non-Plastic Man comic book stories. It ranks alongside the fourth episode of Midnight (Smash Comics #21), the first Dickie Dean story (Silver Streak Comics #3), the "Daredevil Vs. The Claw" story (Silver Streak #7), and his one QUICKSILVER story (National Comics #13).

Unlike these other entries in the "Jack Cole Hall of Fame," this 4-pager falls short in the writing, but it is such an outstanding example of Jack Cole's visual style that it merits inclusion.

One of the things that makes Jack Cole's work great is that he invented numerous highly successful and unique stylistic and design elements. Over time, he accumulated a vocabulary of these elements which he used in his graphic storytelling to both distinguish his work and make vivid, entertaining stories. Several comic book artists accomplished the same feat with their own unique "isms."

For example, Jack Kirby's 1940's "isms" include extremely dynamic page layouts, foreshortening, and arms and legs that energetically break out of the panel borders, to name but a few. Steve Ditko's "isms" include slender, long-fingered hands in very specific tensed poses, and close-ups of fear-bulging eyes.

Let's take a look at page two of this story and study the stellar examples of six Cole-isms that are here. You can click on the page below to get a larger, more readable image:

Cole-ism #1: Flames

From almost his first work in comics, Jack Cole loved to draw licking flames. Not only do they add drama to the story, but the way Cole drew flames was a study in the appeal of simple visual rhythm.

Cole-ism#2: Bottom of Foot

Perhaps Cole's first "ism," probably developed in his Landon School of Cartooning exercises. You can see foot bottoms in his earliest "bigfoot" style work done in the Harry 'A" Chesler shop in the late 1930's. Cole kept this affectation up throughout his career. Drawing the bottoms of feet and shoes may have been a byproduct of a much harder to define Cole-ism having to do with how Cole positioned the human figure in "space."

Cole-ism #3: Erupting Volcano

Like FLAMES, this Cole-ism adds drama and must have been fun to draw. Cole liked this element so much he based one of his greatest PLASTIC MAN stories, "The Lava Man," from Plastic Man #2 (Summer, 1944) around it. He used the erupting (or perhaps "ejaculating?") visual to great effect in everything from Plastic Man splash (no pun intended) pages, to humorous one-pagers (see the last Burp the Twerp page in this posting).

Cole-ism #4: Iris Close-up

Used mainly in his early 1940's page layouts, this design element traces back to the style of pre-1929 American silent movies, which Jim Steranko, Cole's best biographer to date, says Jack Cole loved to watch as a boy. In the way he would use the iris, or circular panel to break up a rhythm of squares, Cole simulated the "close-up" effect of early cinema. The circular panels add great visual interest to the page layout without detracting from the flow of the stories.

Cole-ism #5: Celistial Circles (Sun/Moon)

Characters are framed and set off by all manner of enormous circular suns and moons in Cole's early to mid-1940's work. The celestial objects add drama and romance by their very presence, but they add visual interest by pleasantly contrasting with the forest of right angles that is the typical comic book page filled with square panels. Cole brilliantly used this simple design element to create depth of field in his panels. In his best work, including this DEATH PATROL story from Military Comics #31, he creates a delightful visual resonance between the circles of the suns and moons and his IRIS CLOSE-UPs (Cole-ism #5).

Cole-ism #6: Bold Patterns

Jack Cole set his work apart and above that of many of his contemporary comic book artists by the masterful use of this one design element. He frequently made wild, bold patterns a part of his character's costumes, ensuring that there would automatically be plenty of eye-candy on the page. Consider WOOZY WINK's' polka-dotted blouse, of PLASTIC MAN's striped middle. Cole used patterns to create pleasing visual density. On special occasions, as in the example above, Cole's wild patterns also became a story element. (see also this post).

There are many more Cole-isms to identify and look at. We'll return to this subject in a future post, as well as share more of the rarely seen material from my Tallahassee golden age score!

Reminder: your comments provide encouragement and helpful guidance. Please let me know what you think of this blog!