CAPTAIN AMERICA: MORE 1940s STORIES

This weekend’s escapist and light-hearted superhero post here at Balladeer’s Blog picks up where my original review of his 1940s adventures left off.

CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS Vol 1 #6 (Sep 1941)

Story 1: The Camera Fiend

Synopsis: Captain America and Bucky prevent the theft of Great Britain’s Crown Jewels by a Nazi spy/ British traitor called the Camera Fiend. That villain wielded a camera (duh) that shot poison darts and other projectiles. He also had a gang of thugs, but they all fell to Cap, Bucky and agent Betsy Ross.

Story 2: Fang, Arch-Fiend of the Orient

Synopsis: Imperial Japanese supervillain Warlord Fang, one of Captain America’s best remembered foes from World War Two, is operating an undercover ring of spies in Chinatown. When Chinese officials in exile arrive in America to discuss what their country is suffering under the Japanese invaders, Fang and his men try to assassinate them but Cap, Bucky and Betsy defeat them. 

Story 3: Captain America Meets the Hangman

Synopsis: Captain America and Bucky are assigned to protect Russian American scientist Dr. Vardoff, who has developed a new type of rope that is fireproof, & incredibly strong but flexible. Our heroes prevent organized crime plus an Italian fascist agent named Dino Cardi from stealing the invention. A costumed supervillain called the Hangman steals the rope material, then uses it to hang Vardoff, his lab assistant and others. Cap and Bucky defeat the Hangman and ultimately expose him as Dr. Vardoff himself.

Story 4: Trap for a Traitor

Synopsis: American traitor Fred Haynes breaks out of prison and seeks revenge on Cap and Bucky for capturing him. Haynes nearly kills Bucky but Cap arrives in time to save the day.

CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS Vol 1 #7 (Oct 1941)

Story 1: The Red Skull: An Ear for Music

Synopsis: The Red Skull returns to America to assassinate more political and military officials as well as kill Captain America and Bucky. NOTE: For the first time, the Skull uses Chopin’s Funeral March as the calling card for his assassinations, an m.o. revived by the villain in the 1970s. Our heroes eventually foil the Red Skull again, but he escapes. 

Story 2: Death Loads the Bases

Synopsis: Active duty enlisted men Steve Rogers and James Buchanan Barnes (Bucky) take in a baseball game between Brooklyn and Boston. The New York pitcher is killed mid-game by a supervillain calling himself the Black Toad. Steve and Barnes become Cap and Bucky but the Black Toad manages to escape them.

They fight the villain a few more times as he kills New York players with exploding baseballs and bats poisoned with deadly toad secretions. When the Black Toad and his gang are beaten, it turns out to have been an illegal plot to force the New York owners to sell their team cheap.

Story 3: Horror Plays the Scales

Synopsis: A Nazi supervillain called the Fiddler uses the sonic weaponry built into his violin to assassinate assorted U.S. politicians who are in favor of joining England in fighting the Axis Nations. Captain America and Bucky eventually put a stop to the slayings by defeating the Fiddler.

CAPTAIN AMERICA Vol 1 #8 (Nov 1941)

Story 1: The Ruby of the Nile

Synopsis: Captain America, Bucky and Agent Betsy Ross are in attendance at a party where archeologist Henry Sanders unveils the Ruby of the Nile, which he recently discovered. In the days and nights ahead, Cap, Bucky and Betsy thwart multiple attempts to steal the ruby by a pharaoh-costumed supervillain called Ra. At last, our heroes capture Ra, who turns out to be Henry Sanders.

Story 2: Murder Stalks the Maneuvers

Synopsis: Major Pierre DuMort, a French traitor working for the Nazis who have conquered France, arrives in the U.S. where he and his men carry out sabotage against American army maneuvers. The sabotage results in multiple deaths before Captain America and Bucky put an end to it all.

Story 3: Case of the Black Witch

Synopsis: Captain America and Bucky come to the aid of beautiful heiress Karin Lee, who stands to inherit Hagmoore Castle, an old-fashioned castle built in Virginia by her eccentric uncle. To inherit the castle and the late uncle’s fortune, Karin has to spend three nights in a row in the castle. With Cap and Bucky at her side, she survived many attacks by the Black Witch, a villainess using a jet-propelled broom and remote-controlled suits of armor to drive Karin away. The Witch also had illusion devices and a gang of thugs disguised as monsters and demons. Our heroes won out and exposed the Black Witch as Karin’s uncle’s executor in disguise. 

Story 4: A Blow for Justice

Synopsis: Captain America and Agent Betsy Ross save several youngsters from death at the hands of gangsters when the kids witness those criminals’ activity.

CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS Vol 1 #9 (Dec 1941)

Story 1: The White Death

Synopsis: Two villains share the nom de guerre White Death in order to give each other alibis for when their costumed alter ego commits murders in pursuit of wealth. Captain America and Bucky fail to stop them from killing several victims but do manage to save their final intended victim Lucy Harrow and expose the two men who split the White Death identity (lower right.)

Story 2: The Man Who Could Not Die

Synopsis: Cap, Bucky and Betsy clash repeatedly with supposedly dead gangster Nick Pinto, who leads a crime spree of other criminals who were all supposedly put to death in the electric chair. Ultimately, it turns out that the prison executioner would accept bribes to provide mild electric shocks in the chair to fake the deaths of criminals, then smuggle them out of the prison in his hearse. Our heroes shut it all down.

Story 3: The Case of the Black Talon

Synopsis: Cap and Bucky clash with the portrait-painter themed supervillain called the Black Talon and his two sidekicks. The Black Talon was a Spanish painter named Pascal Horta who lost his right hand in an accident. Doctors replaced that hand with the hand of a black man and the deranged artist convinced himself it was a Hands of Orlac situation where the hand’s original owner had been a killer. Black Talon and his two men began strangling victims after he did paintings of their deaths. Cap and Bucky eventually stop his reign of terror. 

CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS Vol 1 #10 (Jan 1942)

Story 1: Spy Ambush

Synopsis: Privates Steve Rogers and James Buchanan Barnes are part of the security for the transport of a new secret weapon. Nazi operative Countess Mara and her henchmen ambush them and make off with the weapon. Our heroes don their costumes and as Captain America and Bucky they find Mara’s lair and defeat all her Nazi troops and her booby-traps. Then Cap defeats the countess (lower right) and her purse’s weaponry – grenades, a gas-gun and a regular gun.   

Story 2: Hotel of Horror

Synopsis: In New York City for a Defense Fund Drive, Cap and Bucky check into the Hotel Zargon. The hotel is secretly a base for Nazi spies led by a supervillain called Net-Man, whose weapons are all manner of nets and knives. (Think of an early version of the Trapster.) Cap and Bucky survive the sneak attacks and take on all the spies in the place. Most die in a resulting fire but Net-Man is captured.

Story 3: The Phantom Hound of Cardiff Manor

Synopsis: In England with other American troops getting ready for deployment, Privates Rogers and Barnes become Captain America and Bucky to look into murders at Cardiff Manor. They ultimately defeat the man-sized Hound committing the killings and learn it is a maniac in a costume.

CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS Vol 1 #11 (Feb 1942)

Story 1: The Squad of Mystery

Synopsis: Captain America and Bucky take on a Nazi “Squad of Mystery” which has been randomly killing and abducting American troops. They trail the squad to their underground HQ and defeat them all, including their leader Herr Grotz.     

Story 2: The Feud Murders

Synopsis: Drafted male members of two feuding southern families (think Hatfields and McCoys) start killing each other among the units they are serving in. Captain America and Bucky reveal that a Nazi spy named George Brinner has really been committing the murders and framing the opposing family’s men to kill off American soldiers while sowing discord. 

Story 3: The Symphony of Terror

Synopsis: The title SHOULD be Opera of Terror. During performances of an opera version of Faust, a man in a Mephisto costume keeps killing members of the cast and crew, utilizing secret passageways throughout the opera house. Cap and Bucky eventually catch “Mephisto” and expose him as a jealous former member of the opera company.

CAPTAIN AMERICA COMICS Vol 1 #12 (Mar 1942) 

Story 1: Dr. Crime

Synopsis: This is Captain America and Bucky’s first clash with the supervillain called Dr. Crime. With chemicals found in the jungles of South America Dr. Crime used his scientific genius to create chemical weapons for himself. His greatest threats are his shrunk-down henchmen, whom the villain uses as custom-sized thieves and assassins to sneak into places.

Our heroes find Dr. Crime’s lair but get shrunk down to doll-size by his shrinking gas. Even so, they outfight the doctor’s “Pygmies of Terror” (shrunken henchmen), his hungry cat and finally the villain himself. They force him to return them to normal size and arrest him.

Story 2: Rozzo the Rebel

Synopsis: To help keep a Pro-Allies ruler of a fictional South American country from siding with the Axis Nations, Captain America and Bucky protect him from multiple assassination attempts by a supervillain called Rozzo the Rebel and his men. Rozzo uses explosives, a gun, a sword and several bolas in battle. Our heroes defeat Rozzo and his men.

*** Only two Captain America stories this time around. Other heroes like Father Time and Headline Hunter were featured in stories of their own.