Entry #6

Other DC Comics with a January 1940 cover date:

Action Comics #20
Adventure Comics #46
All-American Comics #10
Detective Comics #35
Double Action Comics #2
More Fun Comics #51
Superman #3

Flash Comics #1

FIRST STORY

(Origin of the Flash) (15 pages)

Synopsis:

Jay Garrick, student at Midwestern University, is involved in a lab accident and inhales the fumes of hard water gas. The fumes cause Jay to develop tremendous speed, enabling him to move and think at super-human rates.

Jay graduates from college and moves to New York to become an assistant professor at Coleman University. There, he begins a career as the Flash, a super-hero who battles gangsters.

Jay’s college sweetheart, Joan Williams, visits Jay and enlists his help in locating her missing father. Joan’s father, Major Williams, has been kidnapped by the Faultless Four, a group of scientists working for a foreign power. Jay rescues Williams from the villains who want the secret of the Atomic Bombarder. In the process, the Four are all killed, leaving Williams safe.

THIRD STORY

(The Origin of Hawkman) (12 pages)

Synopsis:

Weapons collector Carter Hall receives an Egyptian dagger from his friend, Jim Rock. Touching the dagger causes Hall to relive his former life as Prince Khufu in ancient Egypt.

Khufu and his love, Shiera, are both killed with the dagger by Khufu’s longtime enemy, Hath-Set. At the moment of his death, Khufu promises to be reincarnated in order to avenge his own murder.

Carter awakens from the experience with knowledge of his previous unknown life. Soon after he meets Shiera for the first time fleeing a subway accident. Shiera has been plagued by dreams of her previous life as well.

Carter then fashions wings and a belt of ninth metal, an anti-gravity material with special properties. He also dons a hawk-shaped headpiece to appear as the Hawk-God Anubis. As Hawkman, he sets out to find the source of the subway disturbance.

Hawkman soon locates the laboratory of Doctor Hastor, electrician extraordinary. Hall realizes that Hastor is the reincarnation of his ancient foe, Hath-Set.

After a short battle, Hastor summons Shiera using a strange hypnosis to use against Hawkman. The winged hero throws a protective sheet of ninth metal over Shiera to protect her, then shoots Hastor with a crossbow. Hastor appears to die and the laboratory is destroyed. Finally, Hawkman returns Shiera to her home.