cancombkheroes

The Canadian comic book heroes of the early forties are the hardest to find. Their fame was short-lived. They appeared between 1940 and 1945. The War Exchange Conservation Act was passed in 1940 and it prevented the importation of British and American comic books, which had dominated the market (and continued to dominate after the act was repealed). But perseverance pays off and the retired comic book heroes slowly begin to reappear as aged retired heroes in the wood engraver's imagination.

Thunderfist was actually Randy Steele, an inventor who created devices he could wear which would give him superhuman capabilities to battle the evil forces of the Axis. He invented a device which he could fasten to his gloved hand which allowed him to punch through solid objects. He invented a bulletproof helmet, a portable television set which revealed distant scenes and a "bulletproof uniform charged with hundreds of electric volts powerful enough to kill a dozen men at once". Not to mention his secret footwear which gave him the power of flight!

Koliak the Mighty, king of the Northern Lights, had a daughter with a mortal woman of the Northern people and the daughter's name was Nelvana. When danger loomed Nelvana became invisible by absorbing her father's powerful ray. She protected the arctic people of her mother by using her magical powers to thwart the evil Ether People. She managed to survive the arctic cold wearing nothing but a cape and a skin tight dress that ended above mid thigh and she was always in the company of a huge Great Dane.

(JoJo is the one on top.) Here's a hero that takes the prize as the most bizarre of all the Canadian comic book heroes from this era. Major Domo lost his arms at Arnhem during WWII. The Major teamed up with a leg-less dwarf named JoJo who rode on Major Domo's shoulders as his assistant (and his arms). They became one under a trench coat and went throughout Europe bringing saboteurs and evildoers to justice.

Mr. Totem was an expert on totem poles, an academic, as well as a super sleuth of the supernatural. He had a way of picking up clues about crimes by communing with totem poles. Even though totem poles were a tradition with the natives of the northwest coast of North America, this comic book hero studied the totem poles from "all over the world"!

(two prints left in the edition)

The problem of identity plagued the Canadian retired comic book hero series. It seemed important to introduce the world to some of these characters by creating a print with individual panels for each hero, so here they are. The texts are quotations (for the most part) directly from the comic books. The portraits of the retired heroes, of course, come from the imagination.

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