Speed Comics #17
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeSpeed Comics #17 (April 1942) marks a pivotal transition for one of Harvey Comics' most enduring characters: it is the first issue of Speed Comics to carry a Black Cat story, effectively relocating that feature from the cancelled Pocket Comics series into Harvey's higher-profile anthology title, where she would appear through the run's end in 1947 before graduating to her own self-titled series in 1946. The issue also inaugurates the celebrated Simon and Kirby cover run on Speed Comics — a sequence of visually dynamic, patriotically charged covers that defined the look of Harvey's wartime line and stand today as a discrete chapter in the creative partnership's documented output. Together, these facts make #17 the issue where Harvey's Golden Age superhero universe cohered into its mature, recognizable wartime form.
In the glamorous world of 1942 Hollywood, star Linda Turner grows restless and suspicious of her German director, Garboil, whose true intentions may be far from artistic. Donning a mask and adopting the identity of the Black Cat, she sets out to uncover his secrets—only to find herself shadowed by Rick Horne, a sharp-eyed reporter and gossip columnist for the Los Angeles Globe, who’s after the same man. As their paths cross and suspicions flare, the Black Cat and Rick must set aside their doubts and join forces to stop Garboil’s dangerous schemes.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
After Alfred Harvey's experimental pocket-sized format folded with Pocket Comics #4 (January 1942), Speed Comics returned in April 1942 as a standard-sized, 68-page anthology. Harvey turned to Joe Simon and Jack Kirby — who were simultaneously producing work for DC — to supply covers beginning with #17, a collaboration that the Kirby Museum's Simon and Kirby blog has documented as running across fourteen Harvey covers through December 1942. Simon signed the cover under the pseudonym 'Jon Henri,' a practice corroborated by Grand Comics Database entries. The interior Black Cat story was scripted by Leon Harvey and drawn by Al Gabriele, the character's original artist from Pocket Comics #1.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Cover date: April 1942; published by Harvey Comics as a standard-sized (non-pocket) 68-page, four-color anthology at a cover price of ten cents.
- First issue of Speed Comics to feature the Black Cat (Linda Turner): the character's Pocket Comics origin story, originally drawn by Al Gabriele for Pocket Comics #1 (August 1941), was reformatted and reprinted here after Pocket Comics ended with its fourth issue.
- The Black Cat story in this issue is scripted by Leon Harvey and illustrated by Al Gabriele, the character's creator.
- Cover penciled by Joe Simon (credited under the pseudonym 'Jon Henri') with Jack Kirby contributing pencils — the first of a documented run of Simon and Kirby covers on Speed Comics spanning issues #17 through #21 and #23.
- Jack Kirby is also credited for art on the interior text feature 'The Story Behind the Cover,' a mandatory two-page text segment required by postal regulations, with the cover art and text story conceived as a unified narrative unit.
- The issue's regular story features include Captain Freedom ('The Case of the Fearful 4,' art by Arthur Cazeneuve), Shock Gibson (art by Cazeneuve), Pat Parker, Biff Bannon (script and art by Art Helfant), Ted Parrish, Speed Taylor, and Crash, Cork, and the Baron (art by Art Gates).
- Speed Comics #1–11 had been published by Brookwood Publications; Harvey's run began with #12, making #17 the sixth issue entirely under Harvey's editorial control.
- The Black Cat would continue in Speed Comics through issue #44 (1947) before launching her own self-titled series in 1946, which ran for 29 issues before converting to horror and western genres.
Full credits
Reprints
↩ Reprints Pocket Comics #1 (1941), Army and Navy Fun Parade #1 (1941), Army and Navy Fun Parade #2 (1942)
Reprinted in Divas, Dames & Daredevils #[nn] (2013), The Golden Age #1 (2025)
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