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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 47 "Semi-Imaginary" Stories (Part 2)

As I mentioned last time out, the unbroken popularity of DC’s “Big Three”---Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman---had put the company solidly at the top of the comics-publishing industry.  Not wanting to tamper with success, the powers that be insiste

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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 46 "Semi-Imaginary" Stories (Part 1)

Question:  when is an Imaginary Story not an Imaginary Story?

 

While you think on that for a moment, I’ll set the Wayback Machine for a little trip.  The time:  1959.  The place:  the National Periodical Publications building at 2^d and Dickey Streets,

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Deck Log Entry # 248 Overture

Some of you may have noticed that I’ve resumed making entries in my Deck Log column and are wondering what that speaks to developments in my personal life.  As you’ll recall, I’d suspended my regular Deck Log entries (other than my annual Silver-Age

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Deck Log Entry # 247 Marvel's First Silver-Age Super-Hero

The Golden Age of Comics ended around 1950 or so.  If somebody wants to nitpick, he’d say it should be called the Golden Age of Super-Heroes.  That’s because it was the creation of Superman, followed by hundreds more of his ilk, that caused a boom in

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Deck Log Entry # 246 Rivalry in Space

The excellent reviews of the Silver-Age Adam Strange stories by our pal, Jeff of Earth-J, over on the resurrected Figserello thread, was a different experience for me from most review threads of this type.  In every other instance, at least when it c

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Deck Log Entry # 245 Merry Christmas 2023!

 

The sights and sounds of the Christmas season!  So familiar, so heart-warming.  There was a time when their appearance put a tingle in the air---and a warmer feeling towards our fellow man.  These holiday customs have been around for all of our live

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Deck Log Entry # 244 Happy Thanksgiving 2023!

 

In the sixteen years I’ve been doing my Deck Log, I’ve covered quite a bit of Thanksgiving territory.  I explained how Thanksgiving became a national holiday, thanks to the efforts of the same lady who wrote the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb

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Deck Log Entry # 243 The Silver-Age Challenge---Speedsters . . . Answers!

 

And at the wire . . .

 

The results of my Silver-Age challenges pose a conflict of interest for me.  I’m always impressed by you, my fellow Legionnaires, when you ferret out the correct responses to the most difficult, Google-resistant questions I can

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Deck Log Entry # 242 The Silver-Age Challenge---Speedsters!

 

Summer’s here, and once again, it’s time for that annual event.  No, not the yearly Justice League/Justice Society team-up.  I wish it were.  No regular comic-reading experience of the Silver Age was more eagerly awaited by me than those dual Earth

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Deck Log Entry # 240 Requiem for a Son

Eleven years ago, I wrote how my wife was a woman of steel in dealing with the death of her father.  As painful as it is, that’s the way of the world.  A child burying a parent is the natural order of things. 

 

The reverse, however, is not.  One doesn

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Deck Log Entry # 239 Happy Thanksgiving 2022!

From Cheryl and myself, to all of you, our fondest wishes for a Happy Thanksgiving Day, and many more of them!

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Deck Log Entry # 241 Merry Christmas 2022!

Next year, I'll be back to writing my usual Thanksgiving and Christmas entries, I promise.  But this time around, I'm leaving it to someone who did a far, far better job of it than I ever could---the incomparable Milt Caniff.

It's more personal this

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Deck Log Entry # 231 A Forgotten Gem: Superman # 172 (October, 1964)---Part One

"The New Superman"

 

Editor:  Mort Weisinger   Writer:  Edmond Hamilton   Art:  Curt Swan (pencils), George Klein and Sheldon Moldoff (inks)

 

 

By 1964, the Superman mythos constructed by Mort Weisinger was complete.

 

The very idea had been novel.  Before

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Deck Log Entry # 237 The Silver-Age Challenge---the Cape and Cowl Contest

When I was a lad, there were certain events you could count on happening every year, no matter what.  The annual showing of The Wizard of Oz on television.  The arrival of the Sears Wishbook in the fall.  Checking the new calendar in January to see w

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Deck Log Entry # 238 The Silver-Age Challenge---the Cape and Cowl Contest . . . Answers!

O.K., pencils down!

 

This quiz proved more challenging to you folks than I thought it would.  You see, Jeff of Earth-J’s instincts were spot-on when he said that the question about Hawkgirl’s earrings was familiar.  I had mentioned it before---but not

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Deck Log Entry # 235 Happy Thanksgiving 2021!

It was about fifteen years ago.  The last week of November was near, and the Good Mrs. Benson and her sister were bemoaning the approach of Thanksgiving.  They were, after all, the ones who were inevitably stuck with the grunt work of the holiday, th

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Deck Log Entry # 233 The Silver-Age Challenge---DC Edition IIII

"Life," said comic-strip writer Allen Saunders, "is what happens to us while we are making other plans."  (Yes, I know that line has been attributed to others, most often, John Lennon, but the January, 1957 issue of Reader's Digest credits it to Saun

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Deck Log Entry # 236 Merry Christmas 2021!

Seven years ago, I told you the story of the Christmas Truce of World War I.

 

This is the other World War I Christmas story.

 

By the time of America's entry into the Great War, A. C. Gilbert was an accomplished man by any yardstick---physician, Oly

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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 31 A Real Pal

Philip José Farmer once wrote, “It’s lonely to be a superman; it’s far more lonely to be a superboy.”

 

He was speaking of Clark “Doc” Savage, Junior, but that sentiment would have also applied to another Clark---Clark Kent. 

 

Superman, of course, had t

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Deck Log Entry # 234 The Silver-Age Challenge---DC Edition IIII . . . Answers!

Three . . . two . . . one . . . time's up!

 

Every time I put one of these quizzes together, I try to determine which question will cause you guys the most trouble.  Believe it or not, most of the time, I'm wrong.  The one I think will be the stumper y

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