ACCOUNT OF AN EXPEDITION TO THE INTERIOR OF NEW HOLLAND (1837) – Written by multiple parties, with Lady Mary Fox, Richard Whateley and Lord Holland the likeliest authors. “New Holland” was an old name for Australia. In 1860 the novel was reissued under the title preface The Southlanders.
The story centers around an expedition that travels hundreds of miles into the interior of Australia, where the off-course explorers find a fictional chain of lakes and rivers with a Lost Civilization founded by English Dissenters during the Protestant Reformation.
This Lost Civilization is called Southland by its mixed-race inhabitants. The major language is English as it was in the 1500s when Southland was established, so some words and expressions differ from the English spoken by our expedition members. Otherwise, they can communicate with each other just fine.
Southland boasts a population of roughly four million and is divided into eleven distinct regions which, though under one overall parliamentary government, enjoy a large amount of internal sovereignty. Some regions are republics and others live under a hereditary monarchy. In several of the republics, however, their chief executive figure is still called a king despite being elected.
The citizens are nearly all mixed-race now after three centuries of intermarrying among the white population and the aborigines. Continue reading
IRON MAN Vol 1 #57 (April 1973) 
Synopsis: We pick up an unknown number of days or weeks after our previous installment. Tony Stark returns to Stark International’s Long Island headquarters only to learn that while he and the other Avengers were occupied with taking on Magneto (Avengers 110 & 111) the workers at Stark International re-organized under a whole new union. (It’s a comic book. Ignore the real-world problems with that happening so quickly and just go with it.) 
THE STOLEN PLANET (1906) – Written by John Mastin. Jervis Meredith, a wealthy young British man and his equally wealthy friend Fraser Burnley are so brilliant they invent anti-gravity. Next the young tycoons have a spaceship built so they can use their anti-gravity device to tour outer space. 
The explorers make the eccentric decision to explore the region around Sirius first, rather than our own solar system. Enroute the Regina accidentally pulls an uncharted planet out of its orbit (?) and causes it to collide with another uncharted planet. This collision causes a new sun to be born. (Regular readers of Balladeer’s Blog will remember that this was apparently a big idea for a time since a lot of these old stories feature suns forming from colliding planets.)
ONE: This four-part story dealt with Cap and Falc taking on the revived 1950s substitutes for Cap and Bucky. The worldviews of two Captain Americas from different decades came into conflict. Click 
IRON MAN Vol 1 #54 (January 1973) 
Elsewhere, deep below the waters of the Pacific Ocean, a vessel constructed through the superior technology of the Eternals of Titan travels like a submarine for the moment. This vessel launches a futuristic satellite into orbit, a satellite with cloaking tech and other capabilities. 
Weekends are the time for Balladeer’s Blog’s escapist forays into superheroes, who seem to be everywhere these days. This time around it will be a multi-week look at Iron Man and one of his most memorable story runs from the 1970s. 
IRON MAN Vol 1 #52 (November 1972) 
This afternoon all of the destructive devices and traps are overcome by Iron Man’s latest improvements. The test session over with, Tony Stark catches a flight to California. With his engagement to long-time girlfriend Marianne Rodgers called off recently our hero is off on a vacation. 
Superheroes continue to dominate pop culture right now, and as I’ve often said, I think hero tales work best when set in their original time period. 
HERO FOR HIRE Vol 1 #1 (June 1972) 
Using those powers, Lucas escaped Seagate Prison but misled the authorities into thinking he died in the ocean while trying to get away. With Carl Lucas pronounced dead, our main character settled in New York City under the name Luke Cage and became a literal Hero for Hire, using his superpowers to earn a living. 
CAPTAIN AMERICA & THE FALCON Vol 1 #183 (March 1975) 
Dialogue from the four combatants lets us know that Nomad came to Harlem looking for the Falcon and hasn’t been able to find him. Gamecock and his two underlings make it clear they were looking for Falcon, too, to kill him. 
CAPTAIN AMERICA & THE FALCON Vol 1 #180 (December 1974) 
GEORGES (1843) – Published just one year before The Three Musketeers, this novel is not only a rollicking adventure full of action, romance and double-crosses but it deals with racial issues in such a way that you would have thought it would have been adapted for film four or five decades ago. The title character uses his sword to fight slavery! 
Balladeer's Blog 