FACTOID
FROM THE BOG
Is Rip Hunter, Time Master related to Dan Hunter? Adam "Omega" Arnold explained to me:
In the post-crisis timeline, Dan Hunter is Rip's rich cousin who finances Rip's time research after the
Metropolis Research Center booted Rip and Jeff after a bomb took out their department. From the events
in the now out of continuity TIME MASTERS mini-series (blame ZERO HOUR for that) Dan was sent by Rip Hunter to discover some information about the Illuminati (no relation to Marvel Comics' ILLUMINATI) in the year 1770. During his first mission he meet up with Tomahawk and he ended up falling in love with a Native American girl and refused to return to the present.
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BRANCHING OUT:HISTORY OF THE BATCAVE
DETECTIVE COMICS #205 (1937), tells the story of how Jeremy Coe used a wilderness cave as a secret base to fight "indians" in 1753. That cave would later become the Batcave. The story is reprinted in the trade paperback SECRETS OF THE BATCAVE.
In the original Batman lore, Bruce Wayne bought the property that is now Wayne Manor and accidentally discovered the cave beneath the barn. In contrast, in post-Crisis continuity, Bruce grew up at Wayne Manor and would have at least suspected the existence of those caves after he fell into a bat-infested tunnel there as a child.
The story is told, in SHADOW OF THE BAT #45 (1995) by Alan Grant, of brothers Solomon and Joshua Wayne buying the manor house in 1858 from the estate of the late Jerome K. Van Derm. This seemed to contradict SWAMP THING #86 (1989), which showed the manor owned by Darius Wayne under construction in 1800. In BATMAN AND ROBIN #12 (2010), writer Grant Morrison sets this right, as we learn that the manor was commissioned by Darius Wayne in 1795 to be built by Nathan Van Derm. Thus we might assume that the Van Derm family somehow took ownership of the manor they built and the Wayne family bought it back in 1858. Morrison's RETURN OF BRUCE WAYNE mini-series (2010) and subsequent Batman stories further probed the mystical history of the Wayne property.
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1:2 ST met Sgt. Rock during WWII in issue SWAMP THING #82.
1:3 ST met Enemy Ace (Hans Von Hammer) in issue SWAMP THING #83.
2:1 The Time Sphere is manned by it's creators: Rip Hunter (first appeared in SHOWCASE #20, 1959) and Jeff Smith. In issue #5 of the 1990 TIME MASTERS series, Rip finds slimy residue on the Time Sphere as a result of this collision. The TIME MASTERS miniseries involves the Holy Grail which is a key element in SWAMP THING #87 and the aborted Jesus story.
4:1 "Manifest Destiny" was the U.S. philosophy of expansion which actually didn't become popular until a decade or two into the 19th century, when Mexico won independence from Spain.
4:2 Gotham is, of course, Batman's city.
4:3 Tomahawk (a.k.a Tom Haukins) and Dan Hunter first appeared in STAR SPANGLED COMICS #69 (1947). In 1953, Tomahawk became a regular in WORLD'S FINEST COMICS. He got his own series in 1950, which ended in 1972, so the character was in print for a total of 25 years! Although Wikipedia currently credits Joe Samachson and Edmund Good with creating Tomahawk, the credits page of this issue gives that credit Fred Ray, who handled his series until the last ten issues. I asked Rick Veitch (the writer) about this, and he responded "I'm pretty sure I got my info about who created Tomahawk from DC but they might have discovered later it was other guys." Miss Liberty (a.k.a. Bess Lynn) first appeared in TOMAHAWK #81 (1962). In TOMAHAWK #110, we learn that she secretly loves Tomahawk, but they were not "betrothed" in that series, as is suggested here.
4:4 Quebec was ?????????
5:5 Although Tomahawk says that Dan "died tied to a tree - - skinned like a varmint", this may conflict with the story in TIME MASTERS #1, in which Dan apparently survived to an unnaturally old age (a possible side effect of his time traveling), long enough to read A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court, which was published in 1889.
5:6 Except for the boots, that actually is the way Miss Liberty looked in the old TOMAHAWK series.
6:1 The actress is identified as "Sarah". I don't think she's appeared in comics before.
6:3 Lord Gerald Shilling first appeared in TOMAHAWK #28 (1954). The British spy was a master of disguise and Tomahawk's arch-enemy. After successfully completing an undercover mission, Shilling would leave behind a coin with a hole in it as his calling card.
6:6 "The play's the thing" - a quote from Shakespeare's Macbeth.
7:1 "Stanhope House" is a real blues club in New Jersey.
7:3 Tom's not the only one down on his luck, as we see by the American Indians here.
What's Dan talking about - Bess' "secrets"? Is he referring to her secret identity as Miss Liberty? I wrote to the writer about this, and he only said: ...While I was writing that issue of ST, there was a Tomahawk mini-series being planned by someone else. So the name discrepencies and references to "secrets" probably alluded to that. Don't think that series ever materialized though.
7:4 Transvaal was a province in South Africa. Johannesburg was it's largest city.
Stovepipe prepares to pull victory out of
his hat in TOMAHAWK #110 by Fred Ray |
7:5 "Thorne's House of Glamor" is a reference to Frank Thorne, who was artist on the TOMAHAWK series when Tomahawk's son Hawk was introduced and the series was retitled HAWK, SON OF TOMAHAWK..
8:2 Stovepipe (a.k.a. Leroy Johnson) first appeared in TOMAHAWK #97. He was one of Tomahawk's colonial "commando" team, the Rangers, and wore a stovepipe hat filled with small weapons, explosives, etc. According to a roster page in TOMAHAWK 110, he was the son of a colonial general who refused to be safely stationed back at rear headquarters. After the war, took care of his injured teammate, Big Anvil.
8:5 Tom should trust his instincts. He is indeed being "shadowed".
9:4 Jason Blood is the immortal Demon Etrigan.
9:7 Wise Owl first appeared in ALL-STAR WESTERN Volume 2 #2 (Nov, 1970) when he was responsible for giving the paralyzed Lazarus Lane the ability to turn into the athletic hero El Diablo (created by Robert Kanigher and Gray Morrow.) Published just one month later (December 1970), Wise Owl appeared in HAWK, SON OF TOMAHAWK #131, with his sister Moon Fawn's first appearance. She regularly appeared throughout the rest of the series. Wise Owl turned out to be a villain in the previous issue of SWAMP THING.
10:4 Where does the term "dingies" come from?????
IT TOLLS FOR MISS LIBERTY
Bess Lynn was a blonde colonial frontier nurse who organized the women's underground resistance against the British. (Readers of Y, THE LAST MAN know that a female spy agency, called the Culper Ring, actually did exist during the American Revolution.) She disguised herself to prevent vengeful actions against her brother who was a prisoner in England. At the end of her first appearance in the story "Miss Liberty - Frontier Heroine" in TOMAHAWK 81 (July 1962), Tomahawk and Dan Hunter agree that they suspect that Miss Liberty is Bess Lynn (a blonde colonial nurse they'd recently met) wearing a black wig and mask, but they would rather not know for sure. While only the readers are shown her donning the costume, it is not hard for our heroes to guess it is her.
Bess was popular with readers and appeared in issues 84 ("Miss Liberty's All-Girl Army"), 88 ("Miss Liberty Rides Again"), 101 ("Tomahawk: Enemy Spy"), 106 ("The Battling Ghost of Tomahawk"), and 110 ("Tomahawk Must Die".
Her character was not seen again until JLA 159 and 160 (1978) when she was plucked out of time as a pawn of the Lord of Time (along with various other heroes, dubbed the "Five Warriors from Forever".)
She next appeared in a flashback in ALL-STAR SQUADRON #45 (May 1985; by Roy Thomas), revealing that she's an ancestor of Libby Lawrence (a.k.a. the golden age Liberty Belle), mother of Jessie (Quick) Chambers. In a dream, Libby sees how Miss Liberty died while saving the Liberty Bell from Hessian thieves. (The Bell fell on her.)
While the Crimson Avenger and Doctor Occult are both often cited as the earliest DC masked hero, Miss Liberty may be the earliest one, chronologically.
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13:2 Fleet Street is a major street in London, historically famous as the location of many publishers. The legendary Sweeney Todd was the "Demon Barber of Fleet Street".
14:1 This cave under Wayne Manor will obviously become the Batcave. (See Factoid sidebar.)
14:2 Shilling's reference to his "later infirmity" indicates that he doesn't die in this incident.
17:4 "All the world's a stage" is a quote from Shakespeare's play "As You Like It".
19:6 Link to 20:1 "beget a son" / "pregnancy"
20:1 Liz read the book last issue.
20:2 We saw the tent with this sign in issue 81, page 4.
23:1 Moon Fawn's "other suitor" (wearing the wolf cap) is here called Grey Wolf, but in TOMAHAWK #137, that character was called Angry Wolf. In 2011, I asked the writer, Veitch, about this, but he couldn't recall this detail. A Cherokee called Grey Wolf previously appeared in 1970's TOMAHAWK #129. (Last issue stated that Hawk's mother, Moon Fawn, was of Cherokee descent. Other issues portray her as an Apache.) Even earlier, a villainous American Indian called Gray Wolf appeared (and was killed) in "Gray Wolf's Revenge" in WORLD'S FINEST COMICS #74 from 1955. Coincidence? Some Native American tribes referred to themselves as "Human Beings".
23:2 Echo Valley was indeed where Tomahawk's family lived in HAWK, SON OF TOMAHAWK. The previous issue of SWAMP THING took place there. Quartz mineral deposits really exist in the western states (among other places in the world?) and under rare seismic events can produce brief electrical charges.
23:4 Alec Holland did indeed catch a great explosion in ST's origin.
23:6 That meeting was shown in the previous issue.
23:1 Grey Elk appeared in HAWK, SON OF TOMAHAWK #137-138.
COMMENT: 1972's HAWK, SON OF TOMAHAWK #137 tells how Tomahawk and Moon Fawn fell in love, and thus takes place within the timeframe of this story. The original story depicts Tomahawk winning Moon Fawn's heart by saving her from a bear, but it can easily be incorporated into this tale.
COMMENT: Tomahawk appeared in another time-travel story -- FURY OF FIRESTORM #42 (December 1985), a CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS crossover.
COMMENT: Issues #82 and beyond have not yet been reprinted in a trade paperback.
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