The 1940s Justice Society Of America Were A Surprisingly Progressive Bunch

A few weeks back we learned that Wonder Woman’s background role as the secretary of the Justice Society in the 1940s wasn’t some sort of patriarchal, sexist scheme.  Instead, it was actually about William Moulton Marston wanting complete control of his character.  Today we’ll gain an even better appreciation for the people behind All-Star Comics.  Not only were they not sexist jerks, there were also some really impressive messages of tolerance in the book.

All-Star Comics #22 begins with Dr. Midnite strolling to the Justice Society headquarters when he comes across some ruffians beating up another boy.  He asks them what their problem is, and then straightens them out after they explain:

For the rest of the issue, various members of the Justice Society get sent through time to fight prejudice in various historical eras.  They all return to the present, keen to teach others the importance of understanding your fellow man.  The entire Justice Society goes to a local school to spread their message and tell the kids that bullying others because they’re different is anti-American, and they all say the Pledge of Allegiance together:

SIDENOTE: You may have noticed that the phrase “under God” wasn’t included.  That’s because it wasn’t part of the original pledge.  It was added in the 1950s when everyone was all fired up about the godless commies, around the same time America put “In God we trust” on their money and legislated other religion-based empty gestures.  So if someone ever tries to point to “under God” as an example that America is a supposedly Christian nation, show them this issue of All-Star Comics!!  Separation of church and state, ya’ll!!

Anyway, after the school says the Pledge of Allegiance, Wonder Woman pops up with this impressively open-minded aside:

“Regardless of RACE, COLOR, or RELIGION!” is a pretty huge thing to say in 1944.  I mean, Catholic/Protestant was still a big divide, as evidenced by the beginning of this comic, much less hot button issues like race!!  It’s fitting that Wonder Woman is the one to point out the inclusionary nature of “liberty and justice for all”, seeing as equality and fairness were common themes in her own comics, and it’s nice to see them echoed in All-Star Comics as well, what with its different creative team.  Marston was a hardcore feminist, but Gardner Fox had some progressive ideas too!!

Then in ­All-Star Comics #27, we learn about another group that we need to treat fairly.  Covering race and religion wasn’t enough… the Justice Society is also all about helping people who are physically disabled:

The issue ended with the Justice Society writing a pledge that disabled individuals aren’t to be shunned or pitied but rather should be treated equally.  The pledge page also showed a series of physically disabled people who accomplished great things:

The Justice Society was REALLY into equality.  Regardless of your color, religion, or physical disability, the Justice Society had your back and considered you a friend.  It was an impressively progressive message for the early 1940s, and one I was surprised to find.  There’s a lot of bad stuff in Golden Age comics, and it’s really cool to see such positive messages.  It’s no wonder that the new Justice Society in Earth 2 has a gay Green Lantern… the team’s been tolerant and open-minded for ages!!

Science Experiment Fun With Wonder Woman!!

Continuing on in my recent “fun things I read in All-Star Comics” vein, here are a few science experiments you can do with Wonder Woman.  In the last couple years before All-Star Comics was cancelled, every issue a member of the Justice Society would suggest some science experiments for the kids to try at home.  These are Wonder Woman’s ideas, from All-Star Comics #50:

I love that the suggestion for making a semi-convex lens is to use an ash tray.  You can tell this comic is from 1949.  And I’m pretty sure they don’t mean lime the fruit with that dissolving experiment… it sounds like it’s lime the potentially harmful substance.  That might have ended badly for a few kids. 

Regardless, these are still cool experiments.  Potentially hazardous, perhaps, but still cool.  I like this idea.  We need more comics with science experiment ideas in them.  Safer science experiments, of course.  Oh, and we’d need more comics for kids too.  Regular readers of Wonder Woman are likely grown-ups who aren’t terribly interested in lighting a fire with a double-convex lens made of ice.  Except for me… I really want to try that.  So yeah, we need a) more kids comics, and b) fun science experiment suggestions in those books.  Get on it, DC!!  You’ve got a good start with all of these old All-Star Comics issues to draw from.

Wonder Woman Teaches Us About Waste Paper Salvage

I’ve been reading through All-Star Comics lately, and while Wonder Woman doesn’t do a whole lot in the book, she does have some fun sporadic appearances.  In this one page strip from All-Star Comics #24, illustrated by H.G. Peter, Wonder Woman teaches her incredulous mother about the importance of saving paper.  Hippolyte thinks that saving paper is just silly, but Wonder Woman soon straightens her out:

World War Two propaganda is such a good time.  Even the informative ones.  While Axis-bashing propaganda with its evil Nazis and racistly depicted Japanese soldiers gets most of the attention, all of the propaganda about war bonds, paper salvage, and other ways to help the war effort is fascinating too.

This is an impressively effective page.  Imagine you were seven years old, your country was at war, and you read this one page strip where your favourite superhero concisely explains why it’s important to collect and save waste paper.  You’d be ALL over it!!  I want to save my waste paper now, and the war ended more than six decades ago.

I really like how this strip is set up.  Hippolyte says what a lot of people were probably thinking: “What use is paper in a war?!”  Then Wonder Woman explains all of its uses, along with art showing the paper being used in war situations.  Hippolyte sees the importance of saving paper, and we get a nice, direct to the reader speech.  It’s really simple and really smartly done.  Good work, propaganda department!!

Wonder Woman was ALWAYS going on about ways to help out the war effort in the 1940s, but it was usually in the form of longer stories with a quick message at the end.  For example, Wonder Woman spent pages breaking up a milk racket so that we could learn that price gougers are bad guys and we should stick to our rations.  In another issue, Wonder Woman fought alongside American soldiers for the entire book to take down a Japanese base, and at the end we’re told to do our part and buy war bonds.  Those are fun stories, and effective, but I like the simplicity of this one page strip.  Getting right to the point is a nice change of pace.

So save your waste paper, readers!!  Every ounce counts!!

Wonder Woman: Secretary Of The Justice Society Of America

Way back in the 1940s, decades before the Justice League first appeared, DC’s premiere superhero team was the Justice Society of America.  The all-male team was always off fighting Nazis and other evildoers in All-Star Comics, but the most famous character to come from the book was Wonder Woman, who appeared for the first time ever in All-Star Comics #8.  She soon became an honorary member of the Justice Society, and some of you may have seen a version of this ad that listed her as the team’s secretary:

Some form of this ad appeared in several issues of All-Star Comics, and it’s been reprinted in various books and on several websites over the years, and the story behind Wonder Woman’s secretarial role is an unusual one.

In All-Star Comics #13, Wonder Woman fought alongside the team and so impressed her fellow members that they offered her the secretary gig for the team.  She was, of course, beyond thrilled to accept:

And here’s how the team was introduced the following issue:

All of the male heroes, Hawkman, Starman, Atom, Doctor Fate, Doctor Midnite, Spectre, Johnny Thunder, and Sandman, were listed, and then “as secretary to the Justice-Society” came Wonder Woman.  Her secretarial role was attached to her introduction for years to come.

Plus, she didn’t do much of anything.  Here she is later on in All-Star Comics #14, electing to stay behind while the rest of the team goes off to Europe to foil a nefarious scheme:

And this went on for a while.  Here’s Wonder Woman TWENTY issues later in All-Star Comics #33 staying behind yet again:

Damn patriarchy, right?!  You can’t have a woman be a full member of the team, she has to be a secretary.  And then anytime Hitler gets up to something, you have to leave the woman behind because it’s men’s work.  Those sexist fiends!!  Wonder Woman’s feminist creator, William Moulton Marston, must have been outraged!!

Well, he was outraged, but for completely different reasons.  When another author wrote Wonder Woman in one of her first Justice Society appearances, Marston was fairly irate.  He demanded to rewrite the story and wanted complete control of the character after that, which he was given.  But seeing as he and H.G. Peter were busy producing Wonder Woman stories for Wonder Woman, Sensation Comics, AND Comic Cavalcade, it ended up that All-Star Comics fell by the wayside.  The book had a couple Marston/Peter Wonder Woman stories over the years, but usually Wonder Woman just appeared in the first few pages, had a line or two, and then stayed behind while the rest of the team went off to fight the bad guys.

So the guys behind All-Star Comics weren’t actually patriarchal, sexist fiends.  Well, at least not in this regard.  Generally, chances are they were… it was 1940s America, after all.  But in this instance, Wonder Woman was relegated to the background because Marston wanted to be the only one to write her.  Ironically, the demands of Wonder Woman’s feminist creator led to Wonder Woman taking a very unfeminist role with the team. 

By the late 1940s, however, Marston had gotten very ill, and he passed away in 1947.  Around this time, Wonder Woman took a more active role in the Justice Society.  In fact, in All-Star Comics #38 it was Wonder Woman who brought in the Justice Society’s second female member, Black Canary:

Unfortunately, by the time Wonder Woman was able to do more in the Justice Society, All-Star Comics wasn’t long for the world.  The book was cancelled in 1951, and Wonder Woman was the only character whose solo series survived.  It would be more than a decade before most of the Justice Society would again appear in comics, but Wonder Woman stayed in print the entire time. 

So yeah, Wonder Woman was the Justice Society’s secretary, just not for the usual sexist reasons we’d expect.  There was no lack of sexism in 1940s comic books, but in this particular situation there were other factors at play.  Go figure!!