Anti-Racist Propaganda in Comics: True Comics 39 - "There Are No Master Races!"

During the 1940s, True Comics, of what might be called a true life, factual, or educational genre, promoted the humanist viewpoint of publisher George J. Hecht. A nice article about the series can be found on the Virginia Commonwealth University website. Quite a number of complete issues can be read in the Digital Comic Museum. Hecht used the comic to disseminate anti-racist propaganda that flew in the face of Nazi claims of racial superiority and inferiority, and of Aryan supremacy. True Comics 39 (Sept-Oct 1944) featured an overtly anti-racist piece entitled "There Are No Master Races", which presents practical reasons in support of racial equality. This story (and the whole issue) is available in the Digital Comics Museum, but the scans presented below are of higher resolution and are 'cleaned up'/edited with image editing software.

This story was also distributed as a propaganda pamphlet - I've seen one for sale on eBay for a considerable sum. I like this issue of True Comics because it shows that, while segregation was still a reality in American society at the time, there were people working to change things, and Hecht was one of those people. Little by little things did change, and comics played their part in the emergence of a more civilized world.

Crossing the Divide: Jesse Owens

Some time back (Feb 17, 2011) Out Of This World featured a Jack Kirby Losers story where Kirby introduced an African American soldier, Mile-a-Minute Jones, who was based on the real life African American athlete Jesse Owens. The Catholic comic book Treasure Chest vol. 7, #20 (June 5, 1952) featured a biography of Jesse Owens in which his undermining of Aryan supremacy in Hitler's Germany at the Berlin Olympics of 1936 is recounted, as is his subsequent recognition by post-Nazi Germany. The scans here are low resolution:

The Ziff-Davis title, Bill Stern's Sports Book Vol. 2 #2, doesn't have a sequential art story about Jess Owens, but does have a 2 page illustrated text feature that is an interesting read:

Of all American sports personalities, Jesse Owens and Joe Louis, by virtue of their direct confrontation with, and victory over, Aryan supremacists, were at the forefront of the intellectual challenge to the racist philosophies of the Nazis.

Crossing the Divide: 'Sugar' Ray Robinson

Another of the many stories in Bill Stern's Sports Book Vol.2 #2 (Ziff-Davis, Winter, 1952) features 'Sugar' Ray Robinson, whom many consider to have been the greatest pugilist of all time. Robinson was another boxer who fought in an age when successful African American sports personalities were seen as ambassadors of their race. Their success was seen as 'proof' of racial equality, in a society that was struggling to impose intelligence over the animal instinct that saw and feared difference. Robinson was friends with Joe Louis, and during WWII these two boxers played a significant morale-boosting role in the armed forces. Ironically, although in 1952 Robinson is praised highly, on the first page of this story, for sound management of his earnings, by the end of his life he was existing in poverty.

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Social History in Comics: Our Fighting Forces 159 - "Mile-a-Minute Jones!"

A Jack Kirby Losers story in Our Fighting Forces 159 (Sept 1975) features a one-off appearance of Mile-a-Minute Jones, an African American soldier. Kirby appears to have played on Bob Kanigher's idea of making Jackie Johnson a world heavyweight boxing champ like the real life Joe Louis from the mid-20th century, by modeling his character on Jesse Owens, the Olympic champion athlete who won golds at the 1936 Games in front of Adolf Hitler, much to the Fuhrer's annoyance.

Jesse Owens starts the 200M at the Berlin Olympics in 1936

The story begins with a group of Nazis coming across an American truck that's been blown up. They check for survivors, anticipating there to be none, but the reckoned wrong. Henry Jones, star track athlete, makes his break for freedom, eluding all of his would-be executioners save one, who also shares his fleet-footedness. Turns out this mercurial Nazi is none other than Henry's old opponent in the Olympic Games, Bruno Borman. Also like Kanigher's Easy Co. story, in which Jackie Johnson slugs it out on the battlefield with his old opponent from the boxing world, here two more old sporting opponents meet in battle in WWII.

Bruno's link with Henry is that strong that he plans to make sure the other Nazis don't kill him. Whether he would have succeeded or not, we'll never know, because it's at this point that The Losers intervene, rescue Jones, and capture Borman, who happens to be holding the map his comrades need for their mission.

The Losers have a plan to capture the Nazi general, and they succeed. The other Nazi soldiers are left imprisoned, while The Losers seek to escape the area with their more valuable prize. Those Nazi troops escape, however, and the speedy Bruno catches up with The Losers and sprints across an open field to tip off the German paratroop patrol he spots in the distance.

As the only one fast enough to have a chance of catching Borman, Jones sets off in pursuit.

Jones relives the experience of being out on the track against Bruno. Just as in the 1936 Olympics, Jones again feels the urgency of undermining the Nazi claim of white racial superiority by running faster than Borman. He gains on Borman, but it reaches the point where he has to make his move if he's going to stop him in time. He leaps, but falls short. The paratroopers are alerted.

As the Nazi paratroopers turn in pursuit of The Losers, they get a deadly surprise - somehow Bruno and Henry had sprinted across a minefield unharmed, but the paratroopers are not so fortunate.

The engineer's tape that had marked the only safe route across the field had also acted as a kind of lane marker for Henry as he ran.

The Losers' ride out of this danger zone arrives. But despite escaping, Henry feels sadness due to the loss of his competitor, who lies dead on the battlefield. There will be no more contests on the track between Mile-a-Minute Jones and Bruno Borman.

The story, written by Jack Kirby, as students of Kirby's work will know, lacks that dimension Stan Lee gave to their collaborations. Nevertheless, this one is quite readable compared to some of his Fourth World material, which gets so convoluted that it often ceases to make sense. This tale is straightforward, and makes a simple point. Along the way we've seen the Nazi assumption of racial superiority again exposed. Although little was made of it at the beginning of the story, the American truck that had been blown up was manned by an African American segregated supply unit, by the looks of it, again bringing into the picture the paradox of segregated America fighting to defeat Nazi racists in an anti-racist war.

Social History in Comics: Sgt. Fury 90 - "The Chain That Binds!"

This August 1971 issue of Sgt. Fury features an anti-racist story written by Al Kurzrok. Al was a writer for Harvey Comics, and then worked for Marvel mostly as a letterer but did write some 1960s and early 70s stories, including 5 issues of Sgt. Fury. Kurzrok didn't get to pen too many Marvel books. He clearly did his homework on this title, though, because stylistically in many ways it reads like a typical Sgt. Fury book. Although it has an anti-racist message, however, it doesn't deliver this with the same kind of punch that Robert Kanigher or Stan Lee would give a similar story. Given the rarity, even by 1971, of comics taking a stance against racism, it is noteworthy, and should be added to that elite list of anti-racist books. Let's take a look at it. Of course the story highlights Gabriel Jones, and it's another tale, like that in issue 56, that has Gabe on a journey to meet up with the rest of the Howlers. This one starts with him being captured by a Nazi officer on the orders of Hitler himself, who wants to use Gabe as bait in a trap for the rest of the Howling Commandos. Right from the start we're reading racist remarks from the Nazi, and he doesn't let up. The Nazi is motivated by his expectation of considerable reward from the Fuhrer should he succeed in his mission.

As with previous Sgt. Fury anti-racist tales, Southerner Rebel Ralston exhibits the greatest concern for Gabe, continuing the disconfirmation of the 'all southern whites are racists' stereotype that we've seen in anti-racist books in the 50s and 60s.

Gabe meanwhile has to put up with the racist rantings of the Nazi, but handles it well. When their plane gets shot down, they parachute into the snow below. The tables are not quite turned, but circumstances have evened things up a little.

But even Gabe can be pushed too far...

Even though an American patrol passes nearby, Gabe is thwarted in his attempt to get their attention and regain his freedom.

Chained together the two men, complete opposites not because of their respective races but because of their differing world views, continue to battle for the upper hand.

The back and forth dialogue between the Nazi and Gabe has, throughout, exposed the ludicrous yet sinister nature of white supremacist beliefs.

The difference emerges when it becomes clear that the troops they've spotted are American. The Nazi has no qualms about killing Gabe with his knife, and Gabe has to shoot him in order to defend himself. The Nazi's dead after all that, and Gabriel is back with the G.I.'s and will presumably find his way back to the Howlers.

I think this story could have been intended to be allegorical, the chain representing perhaps the institutions in American society that have bound African Americans to racist overlords. If so, then the abrupt ending suggests the racial conflict that had erupted in the Civil Rights era with African Americans pushed to the limit by racist whites unwilling to surrender their assumed superiority. I think that the story seeks, and to some extent succeeds, in ridiculing the racist way of thinking. All that Aryan supremacy stuff. By 1971 people had had enough of their hopes for progress being smashed - assassinations of key leaders, and still no real equality of opportunity in a lot of ways.