July 1957: Ghosts Who Walk, Poor Little Rich Boys

At Halloween in the late 1950s, for some rather sweaty fun, you could dress up as a plastic and vinyl Phantom in a Ben Cooper costume that cost $3.

If you were lucky, you might even run across a Harvey Hits Phantom comic book. They were rather odd-looking repackaged newspaper strips. Eight Phantom issues were published sporadically, beginning in 1957.

Harvey Hits was a tryout title, but the Phantom hardly needed to audition. Created by Lee Falk in 1936, the Ghost Who Walks was well known worldwide, and had been featured in a 1943 Columbia movie serial and a 1944 hardcover novel.

The Phantom fought criminal conspiracies in the jungle and worldwide without the aid of the super powers possessed by his comic strip “brother” Mandrake, although he pretended to have them to give himself a mysterious edge. Really the 21st in his line of champions, the Phantom posed as being an immortal who’d lived since 1536.

After the first Harvey Hits issue featuring the Phantom, Harvey tried out two “RR” characters — the now-forgotten Rags Rabbit and a boy who appeared in a backup feature in Little Dot since 1953, and who is not now forgotten.

Comics historian Don Markstein noted, “In 1957, the publisher decided to try Richie (Rich) out for his own comic, and devoted the third issue of Harvey Hits (November, 1957) to him. (Harvey Hits, like DC's Showcase, functioned as a proving ground, where series could be tested before receiving their own comics.) The experiment was repeated six issues later, but it seems not to have been a wild success. Those were the only comics Richie starred in during the 1950s.

“With the November 1960 issue, however, the publisher finally gave Richie Rich his own comic — and he went on to become their biggest star.”

“It’s possible that Richie Rich has appeared in more individual American comic books than any other character. (The only other credible candidate for the distinction is Archie.)”

February 1936: The Ghost in the Funny Papers

That masked, purple-clad champion, Lee Falk’s Phantom, appears to be a cross between Batman and Tarzan.

Created in 1936 as a newspaper comic strip, the Ghost Who Walks became popular worldwide, inspiring a 1943 Columbia movie serial and a 1944 hardcover novel.

In the 1950s, at Halloween, you could dress up as a plastic and vinyl Phantom in a Ben Cooper costume that cost $3. 

If you were lucky, you might even run across a Harvey Hits Phantom comic book. They were rather odd-looking repackaged newspaper strips, and eight Phantom issues were published sporadically, beginning in 1957.

“The Phantom was the first fictional hero to wear the skintight costume which has become a hallmark of comic-book superheroes, and was the first shown in a mask with no visible pupils (another superhero standard),” Wikipedia notes. “Comics historian Peter Coogan has described the Phantom as a ‘transitional’ figure, since the Phantom has some of the characteristics of pulp magazine heroes like the Shadow and the Spider, as well as anticipating the features of comic book heroes such as Superman, Batman and Captain America.”

The Phantom fought criminal conspiracies in the jungle and worldwide without the aid of the super powers possessed by his comic strip “brother” Mandrake, although he pretended to have them to give himself a mysterious edge. Really the 21st in his line of champions, the Phantom posed as being an immortal who’d lived since 1536.

Tough, durable and admirably optimistic even when the odds were against him (which they often were), the Phantom was a pulpish character. 

In fact, like the Lone Ranger and the Black Hood, he could have headlined his own pulp magazine.

The Phantom did finally get his pulp adventures, beginning in 1972 in a series of 15 Avon paperback novels written by Lee Falk and Ron Goulart. The handsome covers were by George Wilson, who’d previously produced similar paintings for the covers of the Phantom comic books published by Gold Key.