Thursday, February 7, 2013

Reading Room: VOODAH "Justice of the Jungle"

When you hear the phrase "Lord of the Jungle", you visualize Tarzan or Thun'da...

...or some other White guy.
But, during the Golden Age of Comics, one such jungle lord was Black!
Debuting in Golfing/McCombs' anthology Crown Comics #3 (1945), Voodah was the first Black hero in comic books.
Illustrated by Matt Baker (who most fans know was one of the premiere Good Girl artists of the '40s-'50s, but don't know that he was one of the few African-American comic artists of the era), the idea of a non-White jungle hero seems obvious today, but was extremely-daring in the 1940s!
In fact, it was so daring that Voodah slowly became paler over the next few issues, eventually becoming just another White guy bossing the locals around!
But, before he went White, Voodah had some kool adventures, including battling a dinosaur single-handed!
We'll be presenting those tales later this month!
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