Year of the Cheetah: Priscilla Rich in The Golden Age

Episode #20

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Frank returns after another year & a half's sabbatical to find... the Wonder Woman: Warrior for Peace podcast had returned from its own year of absence. To celebrate our both running again, Angela has an opening cameo to foreshadow her continuing appearances in a series of Cheetah-centric episodes to tide you over while Wonder Woman 1984 keeps being delayed. I bet Warner Brothers wish they'd just released the sequel back in November of 2019 as originally planned. But we're more interested in prequels today, as we travel back to the earliest stories of the original incarnation of the Cheetah. We cover every one of Priscilla Rich's published Golden Age stories set on Earth-Two, including Sensation Comics #22 & 36, Wonder Woman #6, 28, 196, & 230, Comic Cavalcade #11, Crisis on Infinite Earths #5 & 9, and DC Special #3. Most especially, we survey the Wonder Woman newspaper strip from November 20, 1944-March 30,1945, the most exhaustive and involved version of the initial Cheetah saga.

We don't have a Magic Sphere, so if you want to communicate with us about the podcast...

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Wonder Woman in Sensation Comics #1 (January, 1942)

Like the crash of thunder from the sky comes Wonder Woman, to save the world from the hatreds of men in a man-made world! ...Who is Wonder Woman? Why does she fight for America? To find the answer, let us go back... to that mysterious Amazon isle called Paradise Island!

Having won the right to return the yet unconscious and bedridden Captain Trevor back to his home country to complete his mission, the Amazon maiden named Diana flew across the ocean in her silent transparent plane. Trevor briefly stirred, and saw Diana as a beautiful angel smiling at him. Diana was already smitten, and the compliment was well received. Landing in Washington D.C., Diana hid her transparent plane in a barn, then swiftly carried Steve Trevor on foot to Walter Reed Hospital. Diana informed the staff the the Captain was with Army Intelligence, then fled the scene.

"Now what do I do with my time? Hm-m! Mother told me so much about styles of American women that I'm dying to see them!" Diana began window shopping, but was called a "brazen thing" and a "hussy" with "no clothes on" by a pair of old maids. A male onlooker chided, "Ha! Sour grapes sister, dont you wish you looked like that!" He wasn't the only man taking in the view, as Diana attracted a lot of attention from both genders.

Suddenly, screams and gunshots filled the air as robbers raced from a hold-up. Diana leapt across a street to stand between the bandits and their car. When the hoods began firing on her, the Amazon deflected all their shots with her swift bracelets. "It's fun to be playing 'Bullets and Bracelets' again!" Diana continued the games, playing "catch." Diana's hand clamped around the wrist of a burly thug like a steel vice, disarming him before flinging him at his partners like a sack of potatoes. The police arrived, and although Diana didn't quite know what a "hold-up" was, her foot on the mound of thieves suggested she was aware her right had made might. The coppers had questions, but "Some other time, when I'm on the 'Quiz Kids' program!" Clearly, the Amazons were not so isolated that they couldn't be taught sarcasm through the Magic Sphere.

An opportunist chased Diana down in his car as she again raced from the scene. 35-- 60-- even 80 miles per hour wasn't enough to quite keep up, but Diana was finally convinced to stop by a shouted business proposition. "My name is Al Kale! I book acts for theaters! Now I don't know what your racket is and I don't care. All I know is that those speedy legs of yours, or that 'bullet' trick could net a fortune!" Diana realized that she would need money, and she still had "to kill time till Steve recovers," so she agreed with a handshake.

"Bullets and Bracelets" was a hit with audiences, selling out the Bijou Theatre. The entertainment press dubbed "Wonder Woman" a smash, at least according to the "Daily Blade*." Kale wanted to carry on, but once the papers reported that Captain Trevor had finally recovered from his "brain concussion," Diana lost interest. Unable to hold her without a contract, Kale tried to steal all the show's earnings for himself. Diana caught on quick, jumping from a fifth story window to catch and hold Kale's car by the bumper. Wonder Woman left Kale dangling from a telephone pole while she reclaimed her share of the loot.



The next day, Diana found a nurse crying on the steps outside the hospital. "...Today my fiance just got a job in South America, but he can't send for me because his salary is too small." Diana was sympathetic, but couldn't help but notice how much she resembled the nurse with her glasses off. Diana offered to buy the nurse's credentials and identity in exchange for money enough to start her new life in South America. That way, both could stay with the men they loved, and "No harm done, for I'm a trained nurse, too..." In an amazing coincidence, the nurse was named Diana Prince, "and you'd better remember that last name-- because it'll be yours from now on."

Steve was still calling out for his "beautiful angel" in his sleep as the disguised Diana tended to him. Steve liked Nurse Prince well enough, but he had things to do, and snuck out of the hospital. The doctor blamed the nurse for allowing Trevor to escape, as "over-exertion" might kill the captain.

Nurse Diana Prince managed to deduce Trevor's whereabouts from a newspaper article about a threat to bomb Camp Merrick with a new poison gas, and uncovered her transparent plane. "Inside the barn, the girl transforms herself from drab Diana Prince to the exciting Amazon maiden... WONDER WOMAN!" It felt "grand" to be herself again.

Captain Trevor reported to his commanding officer, and patrols were set up to look out for the bomber, but Steve knew that wouldn't be enough. Captain Trevor took to the air, and was confronted by a flying fort his plane's guns couldn't even dent. Trevor's only recourse was to crash his plane into the bomber, which did the trick, but his ripped parachute seemed likely to spell his end. However, Wonder Woman was also on the scene, and setting her "robot control pilot," managed to catch Trevor in midair while dangling from a ladder. Steve was pleased to be reacquainted with his beautiful angel, or as Diana put it, "A guardian angel is more like it!"

An enemy pilot parachuted to safety, but caught the Amazon's eye, so Diana had Steve fly her toward the foe. The pilot tried firing on her, but bracelets and a sock to the jaw settled any argument. The pilot was fatally wounded during the crash, but declared more bombers would succeed where he failed. Trevor expected as much, having once found the enemy's secret base, which had been moved during his convalescence. "Good thing I anticipated this and had mother look up this secret base in the Magic Sphere before I left Paradise Island!"



The pair landed at a secret island base, then ambushed a guard patrol. Wonder Woman then burst through a wooden door, and tossed about half of it at the first soldier to get in her way. Steve passed Diana a gas mask, then fired on a canister of poison. The enemy was dying in numbers, but their leader tried to take the heroes with them to the great beyond through an explosion. Wonder Woman easily got clear, but Steve was buried under debris, and had to be saved yet again. "Are you hurt, Steve? Why didn't you jump like I did?"
"Jump like you? What am I-- a kangaroo?"

Trevor's leg was broken, so back to the hospital he went. Both the doctor and the general congratulated Trevor's magnificent work, but he insisted a beautiful angel was responsible... "Wonder Woman!" Nurse Prince questioned Steve about his "delirious" talk, but Trevor was adamant in his admiration for Wonder Woman. Prince tried to point out that Trevor was in her care now, but Steve let her down semi-gently, as no regular woman could hold a candle to this new flame. "So I'm my own rival, eh? That's funny... if mother could only see me now... as a very feminine woman... a nurse, no less, in a world full of men, and in love too- with myself for a rival!"

And so ends the
first full episode of
Wonder Woman
Alias
Diana Prince,
Army Nurse!

Follow her exciting adventures as she bests the world's most villainous men at their own game every month in
SENSATION COMICS

My best guess at the local paper's name was the "Daily Blade," but the calligraphy on the second word was pretty rough, so I'm open to other interpretations. Might as well have been the Daily Bugle, because I found it amazing how this spectacular tale seemed more like Spider-Man origin that how most people recall Wonder Woman's. I loved revisiting this story, because it really puts the lie to the "naive" take on the character. Diana is an educated woman who drops pop culture references and recognizes the need for scratch on her mission to Man's World (while waiting to indulge in missionary with her worldly man.) Maybe the reason no one can sell Wonder Woman is because they don't bother to go back to the one era where she had a wide comic book audience and realize she's been mischaracterized for sixty years. Unlike most Golden Age heroes, Diana has yet to escape the shadow of Doctor Frederick Wertham to return to Doctor William Moulton Marston's original interpretation.

By the way, now that the two-part origin is complete, did you note the absence of an essential element? While creators have tried to bury the Invisible Plane since the mid-80s, even though it's prominent from the first full story, Wonder Woman won't begin using a lasso until Sensation Comics #6! Occasionally dubbed "Wonder Woman Arrives in Man's World," this untitled story was by William Moulton Marston and Harry G. Peter. This issue of Sensation Comics also featured the origins of Wildcat and Mr. Terrific.

Golden Age Day

• Captain Marvel in Whiz Comics #3 (March, 1940)
• Zatara in Action Comics #16 (September, 1939)

All-Star Comics #8: “Introducing Wonder Woman” (December-January, 1941)

At last, in a world torn by the hatreds and wars of men, appears a woman to whom the problems and feats of men are mere child’s play—a woman whose identity is known to none, but whose sensational feats are outstanding in a fast-moving world! With a hundred times the agility and strength of our best male athletes and strongest wrestlers, she appears as though from nowhere to avenge an injustice or right a wrong! As lovely as Aphrodite—as wise as Athena— with the speed of Mercury and the strength of Hercules—she is known only as Wonder Woman, but who she is, or whence she came, nobody knows!

To begin the story, a World War II era propeller plane sputtered out of gas and crash landed on an uncharted isle amidst a vast ocean. Two beautiful inhabitants spied the accident, and rushed to survey the scene. The blonde Amazon Mala was startled to find a male pilot, while her raven-haired princess pulled the man from the wreckage. The Princess rushed the pilot to the local hospital on foot, carrying the grown man through ancient Grecian streets as though he were but a boy. Toga clad Amazons looked on in disbelief that a man was on their island, and the Queen was alerted.

The doctor, wearing a fabulous skin-bearing white dress and squared diamond shaped eyeglasses determined that the pilot had a concussion, and could not be moved for days. Just then, Queen Hippolyte arrived, full of questions. The doctor explained everything up to the present, and provided her queen with documents found on the pilot’s person. The papers revealed him to be Captain Steven Trevor of the United States Army Intelligence Service. Hippolyte ordered Trevor’s eyes covered, so that he would learn nothing of the island on waking, and requested Trevor receive the best possible care. The Queen also ordered Trevor’s plane be repaired, so that he could leave the island as soon as possible.

The Queen’s only daughter remained at Trevor’s bedside, helping the doctor on fourteen-plus hour shifts to see to the pilot’s care. After a number of days, the doctor asked that the Princess be disallowed from the hospital due to her strange behavior around the ailing man, which Hippolyte recognized as love. “I was afraid of that! You are quite right, Doctor. I shall take steps immediately.”



The Princess was barred from the hospital, and begged her mother to explain why she would put up barriers between herself and the only man she could recall ever seeing. Queen Hippolyte explained that in Ancient Greece centuries past, their people ruled the foremost nation in all the world, Amazonia. One day, the demigod Hercules was taunted into landing an attack force on the Amazons’ shores. With the help of Hippolyte’s Magic Girdle, a gift from the goddess Aphrodite, the Queen defeated Hercules in combat. However, Hercules later used “deceit and trickery” to secure the Magic Girdle for himself, and enslaved the Amazons. Angry that her people had “succumbed to the wiles of men,” Aphrodite turned from the Amazons in their time of need. After submitting to the men for an unendurable time, Hippolyte successfully appealed to Aphrodite, and had the Magic Girdle restored to her possession. Empowered, the Queen and her Amazons swiftly turned the tables on their masters, and then sailed off on Hercules’ ships to a new shore. Aphrodite had demanded as a condition of their release that the Amazons take up residence on an isolated island bereft of men, and that they forevermore wear the liberated shackles of their former captors as bracelets, reminders “that we must always keep aloof from men.”

After some time on the seas, the Amazons located and settled on Paradise Island-- so fertile a land that there would never be cause for conflict amongst one another. Further, the island granted the Amazons tindeed a race of Wonder Women!” Such was the promise of Aphrodite, while the Goddess of Wisdom Athena graced the Amazons with a gift of her own just after they defeated the Herculeans. Through the Magic Sphere, an incongruously flat viewing portal to events across time and space, the Amazons were able to keep up with developments in the outside world “and even, at times, forecast the future! That is why we Amazons have been able to far surpass the inventions of the so-called man-made civilization! We are not only stronger and wiser than men—but our weapons are better—our flying machines are further advanced!” Hippolyte had also used the sphere to teach her daughter “all the arts and sciences and languages of modern as well as ancient times!”



Hippolyte completed her history lesson for her daughter, then employed the Magic Sphere to see the events leading up to Captain Trevor’s arrival. Although his superior officer felt Trevor was Army Intelligence’s most valuable man, Steve insisted he alone be allowed to pursue a vital clue that could bring down a spy ring in the U.S.A. Trevor managed to get the drop on their Teutonic leader, Von Storm, but was knocked out by Fritz the driver’s crashing their vehicle into a tree. Trevor was then dumped in a robot plane which was used to launch an air strike against an American hanger. Trevor was roused early into the assault and wrested control of the plane, flying it in pursuit of an enemy bomber over the ocean. Pushing the plane to its limits, Trevor crashed on Paradise Island.

The Princess insisted Trevor must be returned to America to complete his mission, but the Queen needed to consult her goddesses first. The young lady thought, “It wouldn’t be any trick at all for me to fly him back myself, but mother would never hear of it.” Aphrodite and Athena bade Hippolyte to defend American liberty and freedom through her strongest and wisest Amazon, as the U.S. was the last citadel of democracy and equality in the world’s war against the forces of hatred and oppression. The gods had decreed the arrival of Captain Trevor to set the wheels in motion, and Hippolyte would call all but one of her Amazons to a tournament with which to determine their champion. Only her daughter was forbidden. “The winner must take this man back to America, and never return, and I couldn’t bear to have you leave me forever!”



The Great Day was upon the Amazons, as each wore a number and took part in tests to prove their speed, strength and agility. The final contestants were Number 12, the Princess’ friend Mala, and No. 7, the mysterious Masked Maiden. The pair’s final and greatest test would be “Bullets and Bracelets,” in which five shots would be fired from a handgun at each finalist. They would have to deflect every shot, or else be wounded and lose by default. The Masked Maiden defended herself against each shot, while Mala was fast, but not fast enough to avoid a strike to her shoulder. Queen Hippolyte congratulated Number Seven, and asked the Masked Maiden to reveal herself as the strongest and most agile of all the Amazons. Hippolyte “knew it—I felt it,” but still exclaimed “DAUGHTER! YOU!” Acknowledging it was too late to change the results now, “You’ve won and I’m proud of you! In America you’ll indeed be a ‘Wonder Woman’… Let yourself be known as Diana, after your godmother, the goddess of the moon! And here is a costume I have designed to be used by the winner, to wear in America!” The Princess exclaimed “Why mother, it’s lovely!”

And so Diana, the Wonder Woman, giving up her heritage, and her right to Eternal Life, leaves Paradise Island to take the man she loves back to America—the land she learns to love and protect, and adopts as her own!

Can you imagine being a boy in late 1941, reading 67 pages of Justice Society of America related stories in All-Star Comics #8, and finding this nine page gem stashed at the very back? A time when you could actually be misled into believing that Queen Hippolyte was perhaps this mysterious "Wonder Woman," given that the only other brunette is her unnamed lovesick daughter? How about all those girls in just brassieres and short skirts? Or the strip being interrupted two pages in by a couple of pages of heavy text with small illustrations, telling the history of these Amazons? What a trip! It even works both ways, as one notices the unnamed cameos (General Darnell, Dr. Althea,) the absence of Diana's birth legend or Lasso of Truth, and the only action being driven by Steve Trevor. I think the "Masked Maiden" alias is given more often than Diana's name, revealed only in the next-to-last panel in such a way it could lead one to wonder if it was also an alias. Heck, with all those Amazons vying for the title "Wonder Woman" over the years, you'd think at least one would have settled for "The Masked Maiden."

Regardless, the first appearance of Wonder Woman is an engrossing read, making up with some of William Moulton Marston's storytelling deficits with fascinating details and the uniqueness of the premise. Harry G. Peter's art is technically crude, but undeniably dynamic, and he packs a lot of story into some seriously tiny panels (some roughly and inch & a half square!) It's also worth noting that the Wonder Woman figure in the splash panel is nearly identical to the one featured on the cover to Sensation Comics #1, aside from a thicker outline and a thinner face for Diana. All in all, a most impressive debut!