Diversity in Comics: TV Adaptations - Room 222

Running from 1969 through 1974, the TV series Room 222 was set in an inner-city school. Lead African American characters in the series were played by actors Lloyd Haynes (as Pete Dixon) and Denise Nicholas (as Liz McIntyre). The comic book series ran 4 issues, from January 1970 through January 1971, but issue 4 was simply a reprint of issue 1. There are two stories in issue 4, both with art by Jack Sparling. Below are six pages from the second story, "Tarnished Star", in which an athlete just about blows his chance to get into college by letting his grades go to pieces, but the teacher helps turn things around at the last minute. This series is one of a number published by Dell that brought African American characters into mainstream comics, TV and movie adaptations being one of their specialties.

 

 

Diversity in Comics: TV Adaptations - I Spy

The first American TV drama to feature a black actor (Bill Cosby) in one of the leading roles, I Spy ran from 1965 through 1968. It was adapted for comics by Gold Key, the first issue having an August 1966 publication date. The comic book series lasted 6 issues (to September 1968). Set in the East, the team of agents (Cosby, and Robert Culp) use the identities of a tennis player (Culp) and his trainer as their cover. Cosby won three consecutive Emmy awards for outstanding lead actor in a drama series for each of the three seasons of I Spy. In the comic book he is in no less of a prominent role. The first issue has some decent artwork by Alden McWilliams, and was written by Paul S. Newman. Putting this series into the context of the introduction of diversity into comics, the Black Panther was introduced in Fantastic Four 52 (July 1966), so Gold Key with I Spy were right up there in terms of setting the pace for integration and racial equality in comics.

(Above) on p.8 the two spies are lured into a trap, which results in Kelly being captured. On p.18 Scotty (Cosby) sets off in search of his buddy, Kelly (Culp), in the streets of Hong Kong, but finds himself out of his environment then in a spot of bother.

 

This wasn't Cosby's only contribution to comics (here as the character upon whom this series is based). Stay tuned for more Cosby and comics in future posts on Out of This World.

Diversity in Comics: TV Adaptations - Star Trek

One of the routes by which diversity was infused into comic books was via adaptations of TV shows which themselves had taken steps towards inclusion. One of the most famous of these shows was Star Trek, the first series of which began airing on September 8, 1966. Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry addressed many pertinent issues during those early series, and significantly can claim one of the first inter-racial kisses (it is certainly widely cited as the actual first) on television (Nichelle Nichols and William Shatner in "Plato's Stepchildren", an episode in the third season of Star Trek (the original series) first broadcast November 22, 1968). Star Trek was adapted for comics by Gold Key, the first issue having a publication date of July 1967. Lieutenant Uhura (Nichelle Nichols) was one of the first non-subservient black characters in television, and Ms Nichols was even personally encouraged by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to continue with the series, as he considered she was an important  role model for African American girls and women and a pioneer in breaking the race barrier. Regular black characters were uncommon in comics in 1967, so Gold Key's adaptation of Star Trek is something of a ground breaker in the medium. There are several other television series adaptations, mostly published by Dell, Gold Key, and Whitman, that feature black characters in non-demeaning portrayals, and it is hoped to feature some examples here on Out of This World in the coming weeks and months. For this post, here's a couple of pages from Whitman's Star Trek 26 (July 1974) that feature Uhura. The story is titled "The Perfect Dream", and touches on genetic engineering, cloning, euthanasia, aspects of social Darwinism, etc.:

(Above) on p.10 of "The Perfect Dream" Uhura and Kirk begin to wonder about the mechanisms underlying this apparently perfect world. On p.15 (below) Uhura speaks out against the abominable extermination policies that maintain the 'perfection' of the population on this planet.

Crossing the Divide: Jesse Owens

Some time back (Feb 17, 2011) Out Of This World featured a Jack Kirby Losers story where Kirby introduced an African American soldier, Mile-a-Minute Jones, who was based on the real life African American athlete Jesse Owens. The Catholic comic book Treasure Chest vol. 7, #20 (June 5, 1952) featured a biography of Jesse Owens in which his undermining of Aryan supremacy in Hitler's Germany at the Berlin Olympics of 1936 is recounted, as is his subsequent recognition by post-Nazi Germany. The scans here are low resolution:

The Ziff-Davis title, Bill Stern's Sports Book Vol. 2 #2, doesn't have a sequential art story about Jess Owens, but does have a 2 page illustrated text feature that is an interesting read:

Of all American sports personalities, Jesse Owens and Joe Louis, by virtue of their direct confrontation with, and victory over, Aryan supremacists, were at the forefront of the intellectual challenge to the racist philosophies of the Nazis.

Crossing the Divide: The Harlem Globetrotters (2)

The Hanna-Barbera TV cartoon series of the Harlem Globetrotters aired from Sept 1970 through Oct 1971. In July 1971 Gold Key published Hanna-Barbera Fun-In 8 featuring an adaptation of the cartoon show. The Globetrotters were again featured in issue 10 of Fun-In. The Harlem Globetrotters cartoon show then had its own 12-issue Gold Key comic book series that ran from April 1972 through January 1975. Here's issue 7, from October 1973. Some of the early issues were actually adapted straight from a cartoon story, but I don't know whether this is one of those. It certainly reads like it could be a kids' cartoon. The artwork is rather nice, but the artist is not credited. The Globetrotters cartoon show was the first to feature predominantly African American main characters, and the comic book was one of the earliest also. It would be interesting to know what the thinking was behind giving the Globetrotters a white granny as a manager. It speaks to the Globetrotters incredible appeal as entertainers that they ended up being used as characters in a kids' cartoon show and comic book series.

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