Hawkman

Origin:  Carter Hall, an independently wealthy archaeologist, had recently obtained an ancient Egyptian knife. As a result he realised that he was the reincarnation of the ancient Egyptian Prince Khufu. Khufu had been murdered in his first life by a priest of Hath-Set, but vowed that he would avenged his death upon his murderer in another life. Dazed and confused by this realisation, Carter wandered the streets of the city. As he passed the subway he noticed a large number of people fleeing what had apparently been some sort of rail disaster. It was there that he met Shiera Sanders, the reincarnation of Khufu's sweetheart. The two investigated the subway only to discover that some one had sent an extremely high voltage of electricity through the tracks, thus causing the deaths of several passengers on the subway trains.

Determined to learn the culprit in this act of terrorism, Carter Hall put on a hawk's head mask, a pair of wings, and a belt made of Nth metal, a discovery Carter had made which could defy gravity. Eventually Hawkman learned that the man behind the subway killings was Dr. Anton Hastor, the reincarnation of Khufu's murderer. Hawkman attempted to apprehend Hastor, though the villain escaped. Hastor vowed that he would have his revenge on Hawkman for his interference

Hawkman returned home only to find Shiera missing. He grabbed a cloak made of Nth metal for Shiera to use, then returned to Anton's castle hideout. There Dr. Hastor was about to sacrifice Shiera to Anubis. Hawkman threw the cloak of Nth metal over Shiera to protect her and proceeded to do battle with Dr. Hastor once more. In the process they knocked over much of the equipment in Hastor's lab, setting the castle ablaze. At last Hawkman ended Dr. Hastor's life with a crossbow. He rescued Shiera and fled the burning castle.

It must be noted that in his origin, as in all of his later adventures, Hawkman showed a definite preference for using ancient and mediaeval weapons!

Eventually Shiera would also don a hawk mask, wings, and a belt of Nth metal to battle crime alongside Hawkman as Hawkgirl.

Powers: Through a combination of his wings and the Nth metal belt, Hawkman has the ability to fly. Hawkman is also a skilled combatant, particularly with various ancient and mediaeval weapons. Hawkman can also understand the speech of birds.

History:  According to a possibly apocryphal story regarding the creation of Hawkman, Gardner Fox was sitting at his desk in 1939 trying to develop characters for the All-American line's new magazine, Flash Comics. A bird then swooped down outside Fox's window, giving Fox the inspiration to create Hawkman. It must be noted that this incident resembles the origin of Batman to a large degree, who decided to take a costume resembling a bat after one flew through his window. It is quite possible that this is simply an appealing bit of fiction that has been passed down through the years. More likely is a theory expressed on the  The Golden Age Hawkman and Hawkgirl website, where  it is noted that it is perhaps no coincidence that All-American's new comic book, Flash Comics, shared its name with a popular science fiction comic strip hero, Flash Gordon, in which there was featured a race of aliens called Hawkmen.

Regardless, Hawkman was one of the first four superheroes created for the All-American line (the others were The Flash, Johnny Thunder, and The Whip). Created by writer Gardner Fox and artist Dennis Neville, Hawkman went on to become one of All-American's most popular characters upon his debut in Flash Comics #1, January 1940. Although he never earned his own magazine, Hawkman was featured on nearly half of the covers of Flash Comics. He also appeared in All-Star Comics and was a charter member and the chairman of the Justice Society of America. He is the only character to appear in every single Golden Age adventure of the Justice Society.

It was perhaps because of Hawkman's popularity that Shiera Sanders donned the hawk mask, wings, and Nth metal belt to become Hawkgirl in All-Star Comics #5, July 1941 (she would not appear as Hawkgirl in the pages of Flash Comics until issue 24, December, 1941). Hawkgirl was one of the earlierst superheroines. She predates Wonder Woman by nearly half a year.

Hawkman appeared in every single issue of Flash Comics until it ended its run with issue 104, February 1949. Although his solo comic strip ended, he would continue to be seen for two more years as the chairman of the JSA in All-Star Comics. As noted above, he was the only character to appear in every single issue of All-Star Comics and the only character to appear in every single Golden Age adventure of the Justice Society. Upon the JSA's final appearance in All-Star Comics #57, February-March 1951, the Golden Age Hawkman would not be seen until the JSA's appearance in Flash #137, June 1963.

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 Unless otherwise stated, all text on this site is © 1999 T. L. Canote