FLASH: YEAR ONE (1940)

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post here at Balladeer’s Blog takes a look at the early adventures of the original Flash, Jay Garrick.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #1 (Jan 1940)

Title: Origin of the Flash

Villains: The Faultless Four

Synopsis: College senior Jay Garrick foolishly smokes while conducting atomic experiments with hard water/ heavy water. This exposes him to fumes which put him in a coma for a time. After regaining consciousness, Jay gradually becomes aware that he now has powers related to super-speed.

He graduates from Midwestern University and at age 21 starts work as an assistant professor at New York City’s Coleman University. He adopts the costumed identity of the Flash to fight the forces of evil, starting with a protection racket.

Jay’s love interest Joan Williams asks him to find her father, who has been abducted by enemy spies called the Faultless Four and led by the French Sir Satan. The Frenchman and his British, Russian and Slavic colleagues want her retired major father to reveal the secrets of America’s new Atomic Bombarder.

Joan learns that Jay Garrick is secretly the Flash as he rounds up the Faultless Four and frees her father.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #2 (Feb 1940)

Title: The Terror of Goll

Villains: Lord Donelin and Goll

Synopsis: Joan Williams and Jay Garrick become aware of gangsters strong-arming various Broadway performers in New York City.

The gangsters are the self-styled “Lord Donelin” and his thug named Goll. Flash overcomes the pair as well as their exotic weapons and booby-traps to save the lives of entertainers who refused to pay Donelin and Goll part of their earnings.

Flash plays some weird games with his girlfriend Joan, often beating her to her destinations via his super-speed and taking her by surprise after she arrives.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #3 (Mar 1940)

Title: The Trial of Major Williams

Villain: Berstoff the Spy

Synopsis: A foreign spy named Berstoff runs a ring which frames Joan Williams’ retired father Major Williams for espionage.

Williams is imprisoned to await trial while Flash investigates the situation, hoping to clear the major, who becomes privy to the fact that the superhero is really his daughter Joan’s beau Professor Jay Garrick.

Flash manages to prove the major’s innocence and brings down Berstoff and his men.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #4 (Apr 1940)

Title: The Gambling Ship

Villains: The gangsters aboard the casino ship The Seven Seas.   

Synopsis: Flash saves a woman from drowning. She reveals to him that she was nearly killed by gangsters who abducted her fiancé, the son of a steel magnate.

The gangsters’ entire ship serves as a casino and operates in international waters. The kidnappers are using the fiancé to force his father to do what the gangsters say.

Jay Garrick poses as a gambler to board The Seven Seas and becomes Flash to defeat the entire crew of gangsters and free the woman’s kidnapped fiancé. 

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #5 (May 1940)

Title: Menace of the Vandal

Villain: The Vandal

NOTE: The Flash faces his first costumed supervillain in this story.

Synopsis: A villain called the Vandal has been leading his several-strong gang in robbing art museums. Flash thwarts their latest robbery, prompting the Vandal to try a new plan.

The art-themed villain buys several paintings from young, struggling, nobody artists then starts killing them off, driving up the price of the paintings he bought.

This allows the Vandal to make a lot of money, but Flash shuts down this plan, too and sends the Vandal and his men to jail.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #6 (Jun 1940)

Title: The Olympic Adventure

Villain: Boss Maloney

Synopsis: Joan Williams and Jay Garrick visit their alma mater, Midwestern University, to watch some Olympic trial races.

Strange goings-on convince our hero and his lady love that the competition isn’t on the level. As Flash, he proves that the racketeers led by Boss Maloney are drugging athletes to get the outcomes they desire.

Flash takes down the bad guys and the Olympic trials are set to be held again without criminal interference this time.

ALL-STAR COMICS Vol 1 #1 (Jun 1940)

Flash Title: The Murder of Widow Jones

Villain: Clutch Widdles

Synopsis: Flash has been outdoing the police so thoroughly at fighting crime that the commissioner is always being asked about it by the press.

One day, our hero manages to solve the murder of an elderly woman called Widow Jones in record time and Commissioner Gardner (based on Gardner Fox himself) figures if you can’t beat them, join them.

The commissioner makes Flash an official detective deputy of the New York City Police Department. 

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #7 (Jul 1940)

Title: The Metal Disintegrator

Villain: Black Mike

Synopsis: The Flash’s superspeed lets him solve a case in Duluth, MN while maintaining his secret identity as Professor Jay Garrick in New York City.

Our hero investigates when vehicles near Duluth are being disintegrated. He learns that a villain called Black Mike is using an inventor’s disintegrator ray to target cars.

Flash thwarts Black Mike’s plan to use the disintegrator to fix a car race and manages to defeat Black Mike for the cops. 

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #8 (Aug 1940)

Title: The Building Swindle

Villains: The Jenkins Racketeers

Synopsis: After Flash saves potential victims of substandard building materials, he investigates the racket boss behind it all.

Jenkins, a powerful racketeer in league with the Chief of Police and others, is forcing construction companies to buy his cheap, chintzy building materials.

Flash compiles sufficient evidence to take down all the villains involved in this racket.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #9 (Sep 1940)

Title: The Giant Animals

Villains: Canadian criminals

Synopsis: A lumber company in Canada requests help from the Flash regarding a huge lizard creature on the loose.

Flash looks into the situation and learns that crooks are forcing a scientist named Dr. Tyler to use his growth formula on Gila Monsters, making them giant size.

The villains, using electric prods to control the beasts, eventually ride six of the giant lizards into a city to rampage so they can loot and plunder. Flash must save as many lives as possible while thwarting the crooks and helping the military deal with the giant Gila Monsters.

ALL-STAR COMICS Vol 1 #2 (Sep 1940)

Flash Title: The One-Man Newspaper

Villain: The Boss

Synopsis: A criminal leader called the Boss wants to take over a newspaper that ignores threats to stop reporting on his gang’s crimes.

The Boss intimidates all but two employees to quit so Flash, charmed by their courage, uses his superspeed powers to help them keep publishing the newspaper.

In the end, Flash defeats the Boss and his mobsters and the newspaper stays afloat long enough for all its former employees to return. 

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #10 (Oct 1940)

Title: The Education of Killer Kelly

Villain: Killer Kelly

Synopsis: Organized crime boss Killer Kelly and his men are diverting tax money intended for schools into their own pockets.

Flash learns about this from a school official forced out for refusing to go along with the illegal activities.

Our hero uses all his powers and works at defeating all of the bad guys and putting an end to Killer Kelly’s ugly deeds. Naturally, he succeeds in the end.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #11 (Nov 1940)

Title: The Kidnapping of Natalie Nixon

Villain: The Chief and his men

Synopsis: In this story, Flash takes on an organization run by a shadowy criminal mastermind called the Chief.

For his current plot, the Chief engineers the abduction of Natalie Nixon and holds her for ransom.

Flash manages to rescue Natalie Nixon and put the kibosh on the Chief and his men.

FLASH COMICS Vol 1 #12 (Dec 1940)

Title: Trouble in Kurtavia

Villains: The aggressor nation of Nural

Synopsis: When the nation of Nural invades the peaceful country of Kurtavia, the Kurtavian ambassador to the United States reaches out to Flash for help.

Flash, acting on his own, takes on the Nuralite army and navy.

Our hero wages a super-powered war on Nural’s forces, including their submarines. Ultimately, Flash succeeds in driving the invaders back into their own country and a peace treaty is signed.

ALL-STAR COMICS Vol 1 #3 (Dec 1940)

Title: The First Meeting of the Justice Society of America 

NOTE: DC launched the very first superhero team in history by having several of their heroes band together at the government’s request. 

Synopsis: As a prelude to attending the 1st meeting of the JSA, Flash learns about modern day pirates harassing an attempt by a salvage ship to recover the treasure aboard a sunken ship called the Sancta Maria.

He excuses himself from dinner with Joan Williams and races to Panama, where he helps the salvage crew locate and retrieve the sunken treasure plus single-handedly defeats the crew of pirates.