Thursday, July 16, 2015

A Quality Writer Comes to DC

BH 108--Mutiny of the Red Sailors

When DC buys Blackhawk from Quality they take over publication without a pause; Quality's final issue, 107, is cover-dated December, 1956. Dick Dillin and Chuck Cuidera become DC artists when they come over with the book. Also coming along is Robert Bernstein, the sole writer on the final batch of Quality issues.

The writers already at DC assigned to the feature at this point include Jack Miller and Dave Wood; possibly Dick Wood too, who had worked on it into 1955 at Quality. I'm still working out the authorship of the individual non-Bernstein stories.

It would seem that the only completed story art done at Quality that DC received in the deal is "The Mutiny of the Red Sailors" in 108; the letterer is whoever worked on the title as of 107. "The Threat from the Abyss" may have been passed along to DC as a script; it too is an anti-Communist story of the sort that DC didn't much do on their own (and it's the final story in which the Blackhawk song appears at the end). My opinion is that Bernstein wrote most of the stories here directly for DC; he's moved to Aquaman, Green Arrow, and Congo Bill by the end of 1957.

Robert Bernstein
Blackhawk Scripts at DC


Jan/57 108  The Threat from the Abyss
The Mutiny of the Red Sailors
Feb/    109  The Avalanche King
Blackhawk the Sorcerer
Mar/    110  The Mystery of Tigress Island
Apr/    111  The Perils of Blackie, the Wonder Bird
Trigger Craig's Magic Carpet
Aug/    115  The Tyrant's Return
Blackie Goes Wild

3 comments:

  1. Excellent discovery Martin. I'm adding Bernstein's credits to the GCD and crediting you as always.

    The lettering may be the work of Sam Rosen, although I don't see any credits for him at Quality.

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  2. Nick, years ago in APA-I someone asked me if any writers came over from Quality with Dillin and Cuidera. At that point I hadn't seen many of these early DC stories at all; I said I didn't think so. It's good to set the record straight!

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  3. Love the bit in #108 where Blackhawk tells Chop-Chop that when Chop's head hit a pipe, it made a hollow sound.

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