Lee and Kirby's first Silver Age hero, the RAWHIDE KID

Yep. A year before before THE FANTASTIC FOUR# 1, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby came out with the Kid in RAWHIDE KID# 17 August 1960. Like DC's Flash and Green Lantern, he was a new character with the name and abilities of an older one; the original tall blond Rawhide Kid had run for sixteen issues from 1955. The new one, short redhead Johnny Bart, was a basically decent guy who had been unjustly outlawed. He wandered the Old West aimlessly, always trying to do the right thing but getting into one fight after another (like the long-running Kid Colt, who had been appearing in stories since 1948).

Attached: 4 (2).jpg (524x467, 102.64K)

Johnny was visually a striking creation in his all-black outfit with the jacket that buttoned up with a front flap, and he looked different from other comics cowboys. He was little, for one thing, described as only five foot two in one story, and still a teenager (so, "Kid" made sense for him as a handle). Many stories had huge beefy cowboys picking fights with him exactly because he was so unimposing. ("Ain't you sort of a puny runt to be carrying around those man-sized guns, squirt?"). They found out, though, that Johnny was a wildcat in a fight. Like Doc Savage's aide Long Tom, the Kid was quick and aggressive and regularly beat the tar out of men a foot taller and a hundred pounds heavier than he was. (Kirby at his best choreography.) And that was before the guns came out.

Attached: 40 (2).jpg (420x333, 59.05K)

Attached: a 1.jpg (1024x1480, 610.24K)

Attached: a 2.jpg (1024x1504, 581.04K)

Attached: a 3.jpg (1024x1505, 610.36K)

Attached: a 4.jpg (1024x1495, 690.55K)

Attached: a 5.jpg (1024x1490, 601.19K)

Attached: a 6 (2).jpg (1023x1491, 651.38K)

Attached: a 7.jpg (1024x1502, 638.79K)

Attached: a 8.jpg (1024x1499, 705.75K)

Attached: a 9.jpg (1024x1495, 630.33K)

Attached: a 10.jpg (1024x1492, 598.35K)

Attached: a 11.jpg (1024x1508, 600.72K)

Attached: a 12.jpg (1024x1491, 590.56K)

Attached: a 13.jpg (1024x1503, 572.18K)

Attached: a 14 (2).jpg (1023x1476, 658.25K)

Attached: a 15.jpg (1024x1496, 583.52K)

Attached: a 16.jpg (1024x1506, 597.89K)

Attached: a 17.jpg (1024x1492, 669.71K)

Attached: a 18.jpg (1024x1505, 653.58K)

Attached: a 19.jpg (1024x1500, 622.9K)

Attached: a.jpg (1024x1555, 937.24K)

The Comics Code was in full vigilant force in 1960, the main reason why the Silver Age had such oddly bloodless action. Adecade earlier, Kid Colt would shoot dead three or four bad guys per page but by this time he (and now the Rawhide Kid) was using the unlikely tactic of shooting the gun out of their opponent's hand without hurting them. Seriously. And they would do this while on a galloping horse against another mounted man. This is so close to impossible as to be fantasy. Inflicting flesh wounds was also common, we would see the bad guys clutching a shoulder but there was never any blood shown or screams of pain. Catching a .45 slug in a shoulder could be fatal in itself from shock and bleeding, but the victims just grunted and acted annoyed. It all seemed weirdly harmless.

Attached: d 6 (2).jpg (462x547, 134.31K)

Attached: z 1.jpg (1024x1530, 915.13K)

Attached: z 1 a.jpg (1024x1472, 848.99K)

Attached: z 2.jpg (1024x1461, 924.83K)

Attached: z 3 (2).jpg (1023x1447, 749.64K)