Red Tornadoes

THE GOLDEN AGE RED TORNADO:

My relationship with the Red Tornado (both of them, actually) goes back to Justice League of America #110, specifically the double-page pin-up of the Justice Society of America by Murphy Anderson (which originally appeared in JLA #76). The main story (in which he got a new costume… although even then I thought it needed to lose about half of the yellow stripes) was a good introduction to the second Red Tornado, but it was really that pin-up that intrigued me.

I knew that heroes such as Green Lantern, Flash and the Atom were earlier versions of the heroes in the Justice League of America, but it would be many years before I learned that the old stories involving these characters were set on an entirely different Earth in an entirely different reality. What really confounded me was Robin’s costume. Why would he have changed his costume to the one shown, then (at some point) changed “back” to the costume I knew him to wear today. But I digress.

I really didn’t glean from the portrait that the original Red Tornado wasn’t an entirely “serious” character (nor did I glean that she was a woman). “He” had an intriguing look, however, one totally different from “his” successor. I don’t recall whether JLA #110 was released before or after the “treasury edition” which reprinted All-Star Comics #3 (before, I think), but I didn’t pick up from her cameo appearance there (in which she ripped her pants and left the meeting early) that she was a woman, either, or that she was strictly comedy relief. From what little I saw, she was at least as serious as Johnny Thunder, anyway.

It wasn’t until I was on my junior/senior trip to New York City and Washington, D.C. that I was to learn the full story. I bought a copy of A Smithsonian Book of Comic Book Comics in the Smithsonian’s gift shop, which reprinted her “origin” story from All-American Comics #20-24. Ma Hunkel was Scribbly’s landlady from Sheldon Mayer’s strip about a boy cartoonist. When Ma’s daughter Sisty and Scribbly’s brother Dinky were kidnapped, she donned a homemade “superhero” costume and set about rescuing them. That was in 1941. In #23 the feature’s name was changed to “Scribbly & the Red Tornado” which it remained through the end of the strip in 1944. All-American Comics #20-24 have also been reprinted in The JSA All-Stars Archives volume one-and-only.

You need to be a member of Captain Comics to add comments!

Join Captain Comics

Votes: 0
Email me when people reply –

Replies

  •  I didn’t pick up from her cameo appearance there (in which she ripped her pants and left the meeting early) that she was a woman, either, or that she was strictly comedy relief.

    Even though Hourman and the Flash referred to her as "her" and "she"?

    5045613696?profile=RESIZE_710x

  • I cannot tell you how much that pin-up enthralled eight-year old me! I never had a problem with Earth-Two at all at that young age!

    But I always wondered why the first Red Tornado was giving the second RT the stink-eye!

    All Star Comics #3 had the other heroes refer to the "Red Tomato" as "she" and "her". Too bad she never made another appearance!

    Of course, some have said that she was never a member of the JSA but she was on as many lists as she wasn't! But Ma Hunkel was depicted in Justice League of America #64 with the JSA remembering her fondly!

    5045786076?profile=RESIZE_710x

  • Calling someone "all brawn and no brain" is not "affectionate" in my book, Ted.

  • Especially considering that he wasn't even in All Star Comics #3!

    The Baron said:

    Calling someone "all brawn and no brain" is not "affectionate" in my book, Ted.

  • “Even though Hourman and the Flash referred to her as ‘her’ and ‘she’?”

    Oh. Well, I guess I had forgotten that.

    All Star Comics #3 had the other heroes refer to the ‘Red Tomato’…”

    Oh, yeah… “Red Tomato”… I remember that. Nevermind.

    “I never had a problem with Earth-Two at all at that young age!”

    It’s not that I had a problem with it; it’s just that I didn’t know about it. Had I known, I would have been much less perplexed by that pin-up.

    “But I always wondered why the first Red Tornado was giving the second RT the stink-eye!”

    Don’t know much about women, do you? :P

  • At 13 in 1961, when I bought Flash #123 off the stands and was introduced to the Jay Garrick Flash and Earth 2, I had already become familiar with other dimensions* with Mr Mxyzptlk and Bat-Mite. In 1963, when JLA #123 had the first crossover with the JSA I was immediately crazy about them, their costumes being looser and more colorful. Around that time I started taking the long-running fanzine Rocket's Blast/Comicollecter (RBCC) and read a lot of articles about the JSA. I knew about the Ma Hunkle Red Tornado around this time, before the Silver Age Red Tornado was introduced.

    *Like many, I think that the writers and editors used the excuse of the readers being confused to get rid of the multiverse so that they could freely (like Bob Haney already did) write stories teaming any characters they wanted.

  • The first of three Justice Society PVC sets and look who's included!

    Brings a tear to my eye, it does!

    5084367682?profile=RESIZE_710x

  • The Justice guards my 1940s set of the Harvard Classics:

    5088850284?profile=RESIZE_710x5088872054?profile=RESIZE_710x

  • Okay, here's a clearer view. Hawkman fell recently and I have to repair him:

    5098502852?profile=RESIZE_710x

  • It looks as though Hawkman is bowing to Wonder Woman, and asking her for the pleasure of the next dance.  And the broken-off head of his mace looks uncomfortably like a model of the Covid-19 virus!

This reply was deleted.