Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Jun-Gal in "The Curse of the Seven Straws" (Rural Home;1944)

Jun-Gal received special powers from an exposed radium pit after she was abducted as an infant by tribesmen who had slaughtered her family. Why the tribesmen never received equal powers from living in such close proximity to the radium goes conveniently unexplained. Fortunately the natives brought "Mammy" along to care for the little girl. That being the case, there is no explanation as to why Joan (aka "Jun-Gal") wasn't raised speaking pigeon English too? Jungle comic books regularly featured insensitive, racist elements back in the day and all too often, for that reason alone, modern readers prefer to forget about them. This Jun-Gal adventure called "The Curse of the Seven Straws" is from Blazing Comics #3 (Sept. 1944); originally released by minor golden age publisher Rural Home Publications. Like the earlier Jun-Gal stories that I've posted, this tale is rife with racist stereotypes. The native Africans are depicted in standard black-face for that era. The artwork is credited to Harold De Lay. The Catacombs is grateful to Don "Zu-Gogo" Falkos for providing the scans for this story. Note: The copyright for this issue, its contents and artwork belong to the original publisher and/or creators and is reproduced here solely for entertainment purposes. Enjoy!

No comments: