{"id":645,"date":"2009-04-18T21:26:32","date_gmt":"2009-04-19T02:26:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/goldenagecomics.org\/wordpress\/?p=645"},"modified":"2009-04-19T09:03:24","modified_gmt":"2009-04-19T14:03:24","slug":"the-year-of-the-bat-70-years-old-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/goldenagecomics.org\/wordpress\/2009\/04\/18\/the-year-of-the-bat-70-years-old-today\/","title":{"rendered":"The Year of the Bat – 70 Years Old Today!"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s April 18, the 70th Anniversary of Batman’s first appearance in the pages of Detective Comics<\/em> #27.\u00a0 The introduction of this masked adventurer\u00a0by Bob Kane and Bill Finger, with later major contributions by Jerry Robinson, Sheldon Moldoff, Dick Sprang, Gardner Fox, George Roussous and many, many others kicked off not only a new addition to the ranks of the superheroes, but a character\u00a0who would become a cultural icon.\u00a0 Indeed, Batman is one of the most recognized fictional characters, and is seen around the world in comic books, television, cartoons, movies, novels and merchandise galore!\u00a0 Who knew 70 years ago that this short story entitled, “The Case of the Chemical Syndicate” would lead to so much.\u00a0\u00a0 What will the next 70 years bring?\u00a0\u00a0I imagine that my grandchildren will be reading the adventures of Batman and his alter-ego, Bruce Wayne.<\/p>\n

\"Detective<\/a>

Detective Comics #27 (May 1939)<\/p><\/div>\n

There is so much that I could write to celebrate the 70th anniversary of my favorite Golden Age superhero.\u00a0 In fact, I’ve already written or podcasted about almost every aspect of the\u00a0Caped Crusader’s life,\u00a0family, friends, enemies and his great gadgets.\u00a0 So, instead of going on and\u00a0on in this\u00a0post about things that I’ve already covered over the years, let me point you in the direction of what I’ve already done in honor of this great crime fighter.<\/p>\n

My first\u00a0attempt at collecting information about\u00a0the Golden Age Batman took the form of\u00a0 The Golden Age Batman Site<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0 This started as a way to showcase some Golden Age Batman comic book covers, but evolved into a resource with indexes of all of Batman’s Golden Age appearances along with reprint and other information.\u00a0 I’ve enjoyed making Bat-friends over the years that this site has been up and running.\u00a0 While it’s not the most dynamic site on the web, all of the basic information is there.<\/p>\n

In 2005 when I started the Golden Age of Comic Books Podcast, I naturally had to spend several episodes talking about the Golden Age Batman.\u00a0 In the sixth installment, I first covered Batman, Robin and Alfred<\/a> and their Golden Age history.\u00a0 A couple of episodes later (episode #8) I talked about the origins and life of two of Batman’s arch-enemies, Catwoman and Two-Face<\/a> (Well, Catwoman wasn’t always an enemy!)\u00a0 This was followed in episode #9 with a discussion about none other than the Joker and Penguin, the two villains who appeared most often in Golden Age Batman stories<\/a>.\u00a0 A few months later in episode #27, I tackled one of my favorite Golden Age Batman topics, the “origin trilogy”<\/a> written by the great Bill Finger.\u00a0 I also wrote an article about this same topic in the pages of Comics Now!<\/em> magazine in my “Comics Then” column<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While this was not really about the Golden Age Batman, in October of 2006, I recorded a guest spot for Bruce Rosenberger’s Komics Kast, featuring the Silver Age Ace the Bat-Hound<\/a>.\u00a0 In August of 2008 (episode #58), I again focused the Golden Age of Comic Books Podcast on Batman, and featured the team-ups of Batman and Superman<\/a>.\u00a0 Last but not least, on March 14, 2009, I appeared on the Comic Geek Speak Podcast <\/a>where we generally discussed the history of Batman in the Golden Age and his 70th anniversay.<\/p>\n

Whew!\u00a0 I’ve said a lot about the Golden Age Batman, but I’ve written a lot too, and within the pages of this blog, you’ll find the following posts about the Golden Age Batman:<\/p>\n