Crown Comics #7
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeCrown Comics #7 is one of the earliest appearances in an ongoing series of Voodah, the jungle hero created by Matt Baker — widely cited as the first Black protagonist in American comics — making every issue of Crown Comics that features the character part of a historically significant run. The issue also documents the early collaborative work of Matt Baker and Al Feldstein at one of the Golden Age's smaller but artistically notable publishers, at a moment when both artists were near the very beginning of careers that would each leave distinct marks on the medium. As a quarterly anthology from a minor house, Crown Comics #7 represents the grassroots, multi-genre texture of wartime Golden Age publishing, mixing adventure serials, humor strips, and aviation features under a single ten-cent cover.
Crown Comics #7 is an anthology issue containing multiple stories. One story features Marty Brian, a police officer who encounters a dead man dumped from a car and pursues the killers, eventually discovering that a supposed statue of Mr. Grant is actually a criminal trap set for him and Tom Higgins. Another story involves a costumed hero battling through swamps and reeds to escape enemies and reach a boat to make his escape, invoking the name Voodah during the action. The issue also includes a humorous cartoon strip titled "Dogs" depicting slapstick antics among anthropomorphic canine characters.
When F.B.I. agent Clue Kelly arrives at a snowy mountain resort to investigate a counterfeiting ring, his partner Chubby stumbles upon a frozen corpse—a wanted criminal—buried in the snow. As the case unravels, a mysterious figure begins hunting them across treacherous slopes and icy runs, forcing Kelly and Chubby into a desperate chase through the mountains. Clue Kelly must track down the killer before he strikes again in this spine-tingling winter mystery.
Hubert gets caught up in the chaos and comedy of the annual dog show, where things go hilariously wrong in the best possible way. With barking, brawling, and prizes on the line, this Frank Little story proves that dog shows are anything but civilized events. It's a wild six pages of pure animal antics that'll have you howling.
Reid Tomka tells a journalist the strange history behind his grotesque drum: years ago, his search for the legendary drum priest Skolla in the African jungle led him into a dark confrontation between Skolla, who violates sacred taboos by fashioning drums from human skin, and Voodah, the mysterious lord of the wilderness who guards the jungle's forbidden laws. Caught between the two forces and their escalating battle, Tomka witnesses a brutal reckoning that leaves him with a drum he can never bring himself to play.
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Crown Comics was published by McCombs (whose indicia publisher was Golfing, Inc.), a small outfit that produced only 19 issues of Crown Comics and the first two issues of True Love Problems and Advice Illustrated before exiting comics entirely. Art credits for the series were painstakingly reconstructed decades later by scholars Alberto Becattini and Jim Vadeboncoeur Jr. in their Matt Baker checklist, published by TwoMorrows, since original credits were rarely printed in the issues themselves. Baker, who had broken into comics at the Jerry Iger Studio in 1944, was one of the series' primary cover artists throughout its run, while Al Feldstein — later famous as EC Comics' editor — contributed interior inking and story art during the mid-run issues including #7.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Published in 1945 by Golfing, Inc. / McCombs, a small Golden Age publisher that released only 19 issues of Crown Comics in total.
- Cover penciled by Matt Baker, one of the first successful African American artists in the comic book industry and the creator of Voodah.
- Contains an untitled Voodah story, penciled by Clarence Ramon — a continued appearance of the character widely identified as the first Black protagonist in American comics, who debuted in Crown Comics #3.
- Features a signed Mickey Magic story by Al Feldstein, confirmed by the Grand Comics Database via research by Jim Vadeboncoeur Jr. — representing early career work by the artist who would later edit the entire EC Comics line.
- Also includes an 'Ace of the Newsreels' story penciled by Matt Baker, the series' adventure strip about a photojournalist.
- Interior anthology also features 'Adventure of the Black Pearl,' art by Gerald Altman, and 'Backfiring Badness,' a humor strip by Ann Young starring Master Marvin.
- Art credits for the issue were not printed in the comic itself; they were reconstructed from Jerry Bails' Who's Who and 'The Matt Baker Checklist' by Alberto Becattini and Jim Vadeboncoeur Jr. (TwoMorrows Publishing, 2012).
- Crown Comics stories, including those from around this issue, were later reprinted in Gwandanaland Comics' 'The Complete Voodah' and 'The Complete Crown Comics' anthology volumes.
Full credits
Reprints
Reprinted in Gwandanaland Comics #1737 (2018), Gwandanaland Comics #1361
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