The Lone Ranger #9
The Lone Ranger #9 (Dell, April 1949) is a representative early issue of what became one of the longest-running licensed Western comic book series of the Golden Age — a 145-issue run that helped establish the template for adapting radio and newspaper-strip heroes into dedicated comic book titles. At this point in the series, all Lone Ranger content consisted of reprints from the Fran Striker–written, Charles Flanders–drawn King Features newspaper strip, making issues like #9 primary documents of how that strip's artwork translated to the four-color comic format. The issue also carries the 'This is a King Features' emblem on its cover, a detail that reflects the careful brand-licensing infrastructure the Lone Ranger property had built across media. Its cover image — Silver leaping a chasm to outrun a gang — proved memorable enough to be reprinted as a promotional piece inside issue #12, an early example of self-promotion within the Dell Lone Ranger line.
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The Dell Lone Ranger series was produced by Western Publishing and distributed under the Dell imprint, launching in January–February 1948 after the character had already appeared in multiple Dell Four Color one-shots beginning in 1945. Through at least issue #37, the books reprinted strips from the King Features daily and Sunday newspaper comic, which Fran Striker wrote and Charles Flanders drew — Flanders having taken over the strip's illustration duties in 1939 and remaining with it until his retirement in 1971. Issue #9, published in April 1949, was assembled within this reprint-driven editorial framework, with backup material — including the 'Young Hawk and Little Buck' frontier-youth stories scripted by Gaylord Du Bois — providing original filler content that coexisted with the Flanders reprints from early in the series' run.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Published April 1949 by Dell Publishing Co., Inc., as the ninth issue of the ongoing Lone Ranger series that ran from 1948 to 1962 for 145 total issues.
- The issue's main Lone Ranger stories — including 'The Lone Ranger and the Boy Sheriff' and 'The Lone Ranger and the Silver Bullets' — feature art by Charles Flanders, reprinted from the King Features newspaper strip.
- Lead story 'The Lone Ranger and the Boy Sheriff': after his father is murdered by outlaw Buck Santos, a sheriff's son must overcome his fear of guns to take up the job.
- Second lead story 'The Lone Ranger and the Silver Bullets': an unknown killer commits murders and plants silver bullets at the scenes to frame the Lone Ranger for the crimes.
- The cover depicts the Lone Ranger jumping Silver over a chasm to escape a pursuing gang — an image later reprinted as part of a subscription-promotion page inside Lone Ranger #12.
- The cover carries the 'This is a King Features' emblem, reflecting the formal licensing relationship between Dell/Western Publishing and King Features Syndicate.
- Backup story 'Buffalo on an Island,' scripted by Gaylord Du Bois with art by Tom Hickey, follows young frontier characters Young Hawk and Little Buck — part of an original filler feature that ran alongside Flanders reprints in the early issues.
- The issue is a 52-page, full-color comic, consistent with the standard format of the Dell Lone Ranger run through this period. All Lone Ranger strip content at this stage was reprint material; original Lone Ranger stories by Paul S. Newman and Tom Gill would not begin until issue #38 (August 1951).
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Reprints
Reprinted in El Llanero Solitario #330 (1974)
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