The Scarlet Pimpernel

Few literary heroes made the leap to Golden Age comics with as much swashbuckling panache as The Scarlet Pimpernel, whose four-color debut arrived in 1950's Stories by Famous Authors Illustrated #1, adapted from Baroness Orczy's beloved source material by Dick Davis and Jim Lavery. This master of disguise and daring rescue — one of fiction's great champions of the imperiled — found a natural home in the illustrated page, his exploits spread across titles like Classics Illustrated and his own eponymous series over a remarkable publishing span stretching nearly five decades to 1998. Collectors will note he shares his pages with Sir Percy Blakeney, keeping distinguished company indeed. A true Golden Age rarity with crossover appeal for both comics historians and fans of classic adventure literature, The Scarlet Pimpernel is a character whose catalog presence is small but whose cultural footprint is enormous.