Paragon Super Heroes #1 [4th Edition]
Paragon Super Heroes #1 [4th Edition] is one of the earliest self-published superhero anthologies of the 1970s small-press era, representing Bill Black's determined effort to build an original universe of characters outside the mainstream. It gathers early appearances of Captain Paragon, the Scarlet Scorpion, The Girl from L.S.D. (later Silva Synn), and The Shade under one cover — characters who would go on to anchor AC Comics' long-running Femforce and Sentinels of Justice franchises. The very existence of multiple editions (at least four) of the same issue in a single year reflects the grassroots, hand-assembled nature of Paragon Publications and stands as a document of how independent superhero comics were born outside the New York mainstream in the early Bronze Age.
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Paragon Publications was founded by Bill Black in 1969, and by 1973 Black was personally handling nearly all writing, inking, and editing on the line — a workload that capped total output at roughly three issues per year across all titles. Captain Paragon himself grew directly out of a scrapped attempt by Black to revive the original Captain Marvel in a Marvel Comics style; after a friend and publishing mentor advised him of potential copyright problems with Fawcett Publications, Black destroyed that print run and rebuilt the character from scratch as his own creation. The 4th Edition designation of Paragon Super Heroes #1 reflects Black's practice of reissuing and re-assembling early material in revised formats, a hallmark of the Paragon era's hand-crafted production methods.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Published in 1973 by Paragon Publications (later renamed Americomics, then AC Comics), founded and run almost entirely by Bill Black.
- Features Captain Paragon, one of the company's flagship characters — a super-powered hero whose origin was deliberately crafted by Bill Black after abandoning an earlier attempt to revive Fawcett's Captain Marvel for copyright reasons.
- Includes The Scarlet Scorpion, a Blue Beetle-homage character first created by Bill Black in 1959, who would later become a founding member of AC's Sentinels of Justice.
- Features The Girl from L.S.D. (Silva Synn) and The Shade, two characters whose early Paragon appearances — including The Shade's original origin story — are preserved in this issue.
- The 4th Edition designation is one of at least four distinct printings/editions of Paragon Super Heroes #1 dated 1973, each physically distinct (varying covers and interior paper), reflecting the hand-assembled, self-published nature of Paragon Publications.
- Per GCD indexing, the 4th Edition reprints a Synesthesia (first appearance and origin) and Alizarin Crimson (first appearance) story originally from Paragon Illustrated #2, with a new illustration/caption added on page 1.
- The issue is a black-and-white publication, consistent with all of Paragon's early output, which the company itself acknowledged were cheaply produced small-press comics.
- Paragon Publications specialized from its earliest days in Golden Age superhero material and original characters inspired by that era, a mission that would define AC Comics' identity for decades through titles like Femforce.