For this weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post here at Balladeer’s Blog let’s go Old School and look at the 1940s character Red Cross.
THE RED CROSS
Secret Identity: Peter Hall, MD
First Appearance: Captain Aero Comics # 8 (September 1942).
Origin: Doctor Peter Hall, a captain, was a physician serving in the field with America’s armed forces in World War 2. Outraged at Axis atrocities in the Philippines he vowed to take action but, constrained by his Hippocratic Oath he employed the VERY intellectually dishonest strategy of adopting a second, costumed identity.
Calling himself the Red Cross he took to battling both the Japanese and the Germans – with his physical abilities and with guns. (I’m guessing his motto was “First I’ll INFLICT their wounds, then I’ll HEAL their wounds!”). Not even his aide – Nurse Lucy Feller – suspected that the dedicated field surgeon Dr. Hall was also the homicidally violent Red Cross. You’d think the big Rx prescription logo on the superhero’s chest might have given her a clue. Continue reading
HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM BALLADEER’S BLOG! This year for my October 31st horror post I’m looking at my favorite stories from H.P. Lovecraft’s earliest works by year of publication. 
THE ALCHEMIST – Count Antoine de C- is the last of his family line. Hundreds of years earlier one of his ancestors caused the death of the sorcerer Michel Mauvais. Michel’s sorcerer son Charles cursed the Count’s family so that all male descendants would die shortly after turning 32 years of age. 
THE CAPTAIN AND TENNILLE (1976-1977) – Balladeer’s Blog’s recurring Forgotten Television posts look at the variety show hosted by the musical duo called the Captain and Tennille. The pair were married in real life and their full names were Toni Tennille and Daryl Dragon. Since “Captain Dragon” sounds like a superhero, the recording partners just went by the Captain and Tennille. 
“UNRIVALED” is the name of the brand-new Women’s Basketball league set to tip off in January of 2025. WNBA stars like Napheesa Collier are running the league and some other big-name WNBA players have already been signed. CAITLIN CLARK is being wooed with a fat contract but has not yet committed. 
FIRST, FOR OVERSEAS READERS – Trump supporters are basing that support on THE FOUR YEARS HE ALREADY HAD IN OFFICE, not on “promises”, like anti-Trump fanatics pretend. 
REMEMBER THAT EVEN IF TRUMP DOES NOT GET BACK TO THE WHITE HOUSE, YOU WON’T BE ABLE TO GET AWAY FROM HIS NAME BEING IN THE NEWS. Democrats have seen how well they can work their conformist sheep into a frenzy using Trump’s name. They will go on using his name in political campaigns against every male and female candidate who could remotely be construed as ever having agreed with President Trump on any issue. 
AND NO MATTER WHO THE NEXT PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE IS FOR THE OPPOSITION PARTY … be ready for the usual endless screeching and propagandistic comparisons of that candidate to Hitler, Mussolini and others. IT WILL CONTINUE. The Democrats have been doing that at increasingly shrill levels for the past few decades. 
I WAS A TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN (1957) – Herbert Strock’s follow-up to I Was a Teenage Werewolf always calls to mind the Movie Host shows of the past and the way they would often pair up those two Teen Monster flicks as a Double Feature the nearest Saturday night to Halloween. 
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