Recently, over in the JSA" thread, we've been discussing Golden Age stories vs. modern retellings citing Adventure Comics/Sandman Mystery Theatre and Captain America Comics/Invaders as examples of comic book stories that "really happened." In it, Captain Comics said: "Maybe some... stories just don’t fit, and have to be quietly ignored. Maybe others can be mildly amended. Maybe some stories can be considered the 'comic book version,' and the 'truth' fits better. Deciding what works and what doesn’t is part of being a comics fan." Regarding whether or not Golden Age Captain America stories specifically actually "happened," I have three main criteria:
- Being mentioned in the modern era
- Being reprinted in the modern era
- Being retold in the modern era
All of the Simon/Kirby Caps are in continuity AFAIAC just as a matter of principle, but most of them were reprinted in the '60s...
...some were retold...
...and many of them were mentioned in the "Album Issue" (when Cap was presumed dead).
For Captain America, I like to think that the Department of War had an arrangement with Timely Comics and that someone in the War department was tasked with supplying the publisher with plots for morale/propaganda purposes. Some of them were more-or-less true, some were fictionalized, while others were clearly fiction. In Invaders #10, for example, Captain America himself refers to the story "Captain America Battles the Reaper!" (Captain America Comics #22) as "a basically accurate account" of a previous case, although "some of the hard facts of that caper are still classified."
As an example of a "fictionalized" adventure, Captain America first encountered the vampire John Farnsworth (a.k.a. "Baron Blood") in 1942, but it didn't make it into print until a year later, as "The Vampire Strikes!" (Captain America Comics #24). The details surrounding that case were finally declassified in 1976.
The covers of Captain America Comics kept stateside readers appried of the missions Captain America and Bucky undertook between adventures with the Invaders, but any stories which place Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes at Camp Lehigh after the beginning of 1942 are either made-up or leftover inventory (and it goes without saying that the MU versions of Timely comics would not have revealed their secret identities).
Replies
There was also Invaders Annual #1 (1977) which took place in 1942 that had the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner talk about their earlier battles with the Hyena and the Shark, respectively that hadn't been published yet in the comics.
In the comics, the Hyena and the Shark didn't appear until the late 40s.
And Captain America's foe, Agent Axis was mentioned in a Tales of Suspense story but he was actually a BOY COMMANDOS villain! I guess Cap was reading DC Comics during the war!