Forgotten Books: The Green Hornet

The first Green Hornet Big Little Book, published in 1940, featured art by Robert Weisman. Fran Striker is believed by some to be the author. Values on these seem to fluctuate between $25 and $300, depending on where they are offered for sale and how bad somebody wants one.

Neither author nor artist has been positively identified for this second book, from 1941. All three BLBs featured the page-flipping gimmick described below, which was a primitive sort of animation.

The Green Hornet Cracks Down, 1942, features art by Henry Vallely. Once again, though clearly based on the work of Fran Striker, its uncertain whether he actually wrote it.

As I learned from Randy Johnson the other day, Richard Wormser was responsible for this 1966 TV-tie in paperback, writing as "Ed Friend." It was apparently penned before the series aired and based on early screen treatments, so many of the details differ from the actual show, and Kato is largely ignored. 

The Whitman hardback below, also from 1966, was a kid's book, but is by all accounts a better read than the paperback. Author Keith Brannan also did an I Spy book and couple about The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

Patti Abbott has the usual round-up of Forgotten Books at pattinase. Next week, when she's away, I have the honor of being guest host.

Tomorrow: "Skyler Hobbs and the Magic Solution," my entry in John Kenyon's Fairy Tale Crime Fiction Challenge. Come on back, y'all.

Review: The Green Hornet Chronicles

The Green Hornet has been on my radar since the 60s, when the Van Williams/Bruce Lee series was spun-off from Batman. Some years later I was heavy into cliffhanger serials. Then it was Old Time Radio. And round about 1990 I was reading a cool series from Now Comics.

But I didn’t fully appreciate the character - didn’t come to feel I really knew them - until I read this Moonstone book, The Green Hornet Chronicles. Now, at last, I’m more than a casual listener, viewer, or collector. I’m a fan.

For that, I owe a debt to editors Joe Gentile and Win Scott Eckert. They assembled a fine group of writers and put together a collection of stories that draw the reader into the Hornet’s world as never before. We finally get inside the heads of Britt Reid and Kato and see what makes them tick.

The book transports us back to the 60s, where folks are trying to come to terms with Flower Power and the Vietnam War. We ride along in the Black Beauty on a tour of Detroit’s mean streets. We see the Hornet and Kato through the eyes of other characters. Over the course of the book, they emerge from the shadows of The Lone Ranger and Tonto - and Batman and Robin - and stand as distinct and compelling heroes in their own right.

I enjoyed all nineteen tales. Here’s the complete line-up, with brief comments:

The Night Car - Will Murray
- If Lester Dent wrote a Hornet story, it might go just like this!
I Had The Green Hornet’s Love Child - Greg Cox
- A floozy claims to have the Hornet’s baby - and everybody wants it.
Weakness - C.J. Henderson
- Can the Hornet coerce a crooked politician into going straight?
Topsy-Turvy - James Chambers
- A phony guru gives pipe dreams to naïve hippies.
Nothing Gold Can Stay - Richard Dean Starr
- The lowdown on how Kato the boy became Kato the man.
Just a Man - Thom Brannan
- An ex-marine sniper challenges the Hornet as The Green Viper.
The Cold Cash Kill - James Reasoner
- Britt Reid gets a shock - as dirty deeds are going on under his nose at the Daily Sentinel.
Flight of the Yellowjacket - Howard Hopkins
- When Reid meets a babe named Cavendish, you just know she’s bad.
By Scarab and Scorpion - Mark Ellis
- The curse of an ancient Egyptian queen plagues Detroit.
You Can’t Pick the Number - Rich Harvey
- A tale of redemption involving a crooked cop and the numbers racket.
Eyes of the Madonna - Ron Fortier
- Cold War antics with Russia and Cuba, with Detroit’s Crime Lord headquartered in a building called The Pulp Factory (Hey, isn‘t that the name of a blog?).
Stormy Weather - Patricia Weakley
- A lady private eye who speaks Texan goes on a Hornet hunt.
The Auction - Terry Alexander
- A nod to the radio show. When the Hornet’s domino mask is lost, he gets his old-style mask out of mothballs.
Go Go Gone - Robert Greenberger
- A clandestine treasure hunt, with clues hidden in books!
Mutual Assured Destruction - Bill Spangler
- A bout with white slavers brings Britt’s feelings for Lenore Case to the surface.
The Crimson Dragon - Mark Justice
- The Hornet faces a brutal new adversary, while Kato is hardpressed by two martial arts masters.
Fang and Sting - Win Scott Eckert
- A trip into delves into radio history, with a villain from the Manhunter show. (Manhunter was a Striker & Trendle production that gave its life, and its time slot, to make way for the Green Hornet show. Mike Axford, in fact, was a Manhunter character who made the jump to the new program.) This one’s also a Wold Newton treat, reminding us that Kato and the Hornet inhabit the same fictional universe as such folks as Doc Savage, James Bond and Fu Manchu.
The Inside Man - Matthew Baugh
- A Native American trying to escape reservation life is caught between two evils - and one of them is the Hornet.
The Soul of Solomon - Harlan Ellison
- In which it is revealed that Mr. Ellison is at once both an old man and a seven-year-old geek-boy. Heck, he always has been. That’s why he’s always been one of my literary idols.

PLUS, the stories are sandwiched between an Introduction by TV Hornet Van Williams and an interview with TV Black Beauty designer Dean Jeffries. AND, each story features a full-page illustration by Ruben Procopio. How cool is that? Very.

And there’s more good stuff to come. Editors Gentile and Eckert are already assembling a follow-up collection called The Green Hornet Casefiles.

The Green Hornet: Cliffhanger Serials

The title role in the first Green Hornet serial, released in 1940, went to a guy named Gordon Jones. Jones had appeared in about 30 films in the previous nine years of his career, but this was probably his biggest break. Unfortunately, it wasn't much of a career changer. He was replaced in the second serial, and went on to small roles in various films and TV episodes for the next 23 years. His main recurring film role was as Splinters McGonagle in a half dozen Roy Rogers flicks, and he later had guest shots on Maverick, Wyatt Earp, the Rifleman and most other westerns (and non-western dramas) of the day.

More interesting was the casting of Keye Luke as Kato. Luke had already appeared as Charlie Chan's No. 1 son in several films with Warner Oland, and later filled the same role with Sidney Toler. In 1972 he provided the voice of Charlie himself for an animated TV series, and began a recurring role as Master Po in TV's Kung Fu.

For The Green Hornet Strikes Again, made later that same year, the lead went to Warren Hull, who had appeared in previous serials as The Spider and Mandrake the Magician. He later made one more Spider serial and appeared in a handful of other films and series, but these heroic leads would appear to be the high point of his career.

Wade Boteler, who played Mike Axford in both films, is unknown today, but enjoyed a long career, appearing in over 400 films.

The Green Hornet: Old Time Radio

The Green Hornet roared across the radio airwaves from 1936 to 1952, courtesy of George Trendle and Frank Striker, the same guys who brought us The Lone Ranger. As most folks know, the Hornet's alter-ego was Britt Reid, son of the Ranger's nephew Dan Reid.

I've read in numerous places that this relationship was intended right from the start. But according to a new book by Martin Grams and Terry Salomonson, that ain't exactly so. Online excerpts from the book The Green Hornet: A History of Radio, Motion Pictures, Comics and Television (2010, OTR Publishing), state that the idea was not introduced to listeners until the episode "Too Hot to Handle" in November, 1947. In fact, the authors tell us, Britt's father Dan Reid first appeared on The Green Hornet in 1936, six years before nephew Dan Reid showed up on The Lone Ranger. When Striker and Trendle actually got the idea is unknown, but it seems mighty unlikely it was there from the beginning. The misinformation now in print seems to stem from differing recollections of Trendle and Striker, and flat-out mistakes by Trendle's one-time lawyer, Raymond Meurer.

Among other factoids gleaned from the article . . .
- For the first three episodes, the show was called The Adventures of the Hornet. Green was added in episode 4.
- Britt Reid was originally Britt Reed and Kato was Cato.
- Kato was originally Japanese. He was changed to Filipino in 1938 (not, as some sources have claimed, after the bombing of Pearl Harbor).
- The idea for the series was Trendle's, inspired by the pulp and novel character Jimmie Dale (aka The Gray Seal) created by Frank L. Packard. The details, like characters' names, weapons and the Black Beauty, were apparently provided by Frank Striker.

Here are links to several sites offering streaming or free downloads of the show. The first, Radio MickDanger, offers the greatest variety, with episodes ranging from 1936 to 1952. It also features the pivotal episode mentioned above, "Too Hot to Handle."

Radio MickDanger
OTR.Network Library
Old Time Radio Fans
Old Time Radio Downloads
Free OTR Shows
Botar's Old Time Radio

 

  

The Green Hornet: TV Collectibles

As Scott Cupp noted here yesterday, SyFy Channel is doing a Green Hornet marathon tomorrow. (Thanks Scott!) I haven't seen any of these episodes in a coon's age, so my VCR will be working all day.

Here in the Pacific Time Zone, the marathon runs from 10am to 11pm. I checked the SyFy site, and they list the same times for Eastern viewers. Do they stagger programming by time zone? Could be. Please don't trust me, though. Check your local listings.

The Green Hornet: Holyoke Comics

 

 

Do Some Damage CHRISTMAS NOIR Round-Up

 

The Do Some Damage Christmas Noir extravaganza has come to an end, producing an amazing 35 stories. In case you missed any, here's the table of contents, complete with links. I read them all, and there's some great stuff here. Some tales are violent, some touching, some funny, some wild and crazy. Some may even manage to touch all those buttons at once.

I think the DSD folks have the makings of a fine eBook here. You'd best act fast, and read them for free while you can!

Time and a Half by Byron Quertermous
The Christmas Spirit by Chris Deal
The List by Stephen D. Rogers
All Wrapped Up by Gerald So
Safe Passage by Albert Tucher
White Christmas by Julie Morgan
The Bell Ringer's Carol by Jack Bates
Santa Plugs a Leak - A Santa Noir Story by Daniel B. O'Shea
The Santa Con by Dave White
Grotto Joe by Richard Godwin
Portraits of Detroit: Peter Oberon by Patti Abbott
Lump of Coal by Seana Graham
Santa in a Red Dress by John McFetridge
Bravely Green by Ray Adam Latiolais
The List by Kieran Shea
Fatty and Tinsel-Toes Kill a Christmas Goose by John Weagly
Not So Calm, Not So Bright by John Kenyon
Now I Have a Staple Gun, Ho Ho Ho by Jay Stringer
The Gift That Keeps on Giving by Paul D. Brazill
Christmas Carole by Allan Leverone
Tonight's Episode: Murder-In-Law by Eric Beetner
United We Fall by Sean Patrick Reardon
Death by Shotgun by Matthew J. McBride
The Reindeer Incident by Nik Korpon
A Christmas Carol II (Excerpt) by Evil Wylie
Santa Must Die by Cormac Brown
Not Even a Rat by J. E. Seymour
Room at the Inn by R. L. Kelstrom
Jingle Nelle, Jingle Nelle by Absolutely*Kate
The Meek by Dan Lafferty
Snakes 'N' Ladders by Col Bury
The Right to Bear Arms by Skye Chase
Secret Santa by Alan Griffiths
A Christmas Surprise by J. F. Juzwik
Skyler Hobbs and the Yuletide Terror by Evan Lewis

I'd like to call special attention to Room at the Inn by R. L. Kelstrom. For several years, R. L. and I have been swapping advice in one of Portland's grooviest critique groups. After spending half a lifetime on the fringes of law enforcement, counseling killers, rapists, drug addicts and pondscum of every stripe, R. L. came to know the mean streets as no other outsider can. Watch for more great street stories, coming soon! R. L. blogs at The Wisdom of Zipper.