So, if you have been following the posts, I tried to base them on different genres and variety of publishers, to fulfil that dream. And I was thinking that I was doing a fair job so far on that account. But, the reality was about to strike.
We were all eager to experience our first encounter with a real Computer, but our Teacher had other ideas. “How many of you know Typewriting?”, He asked. After seeing the mum faces, he added “How do you expect to learn something which was invented a decade back, when you haven’t learnt the one invented centuries ago?”. There is no much difference between the question then and now.
In both cases, the fact which comes to fore is that we can’t talk or try to learn about something without exploring its roots. Just like when we talk about costumed superheroes and their impact on Comics on a whole, we can’t skip past the first-ever in their lineage, long before The Shadow, Superman, and the likes, the legendary Phantom.
The No-Show of Phantom on Comicology, could be attributed to many reasons, top of which is that there are no publications which are actively publishing Phantom in India, at present. But, does that really make you forget the legacy of Phantom. Oh No!. I for one, who was mesmerised by this comic character, right from my childhood, can’t think so at the least. So, let me try to make some amends with a series of exclusive posts on the Phantom, as a Tribute to the legendary creator, Lee Falk. I agree it’s ambitious project in its own rights, but let me make an attempt to do it with all its merits.
Right from his school days Falk is known to have a likening towards writing, as he used contribute stories, articles and poems for his school and college newspapers. His extreme command over English, even let him dream to become an English Professor, something which he never pursued later. After completing the education, he started his career as a copywriter for a local advertising agency in early 1930’s.
The 1920s and 1930s, which is often referred as the pre-television era, saw an enormous amount of newspapers released worldwide. In New York city alone, there were two dozen thriving newspapers – The New York Times, Herald-Tribune, Post, 
It was such a craze that they even dedicated 36 pages to it on Sundays, which was famously termed as Comics Section. This enormous need meant that these were also lucrative times for syndication companies, who were involved with providing comic strips, cartoons, and special features. These syndicates paved way for many great comic creators to come on the horizon in 1930s, which included legends like - Alex Raymond (Flash Gordon), Al Capp (Li’l Abner), Chester Gold (Dick Tracy), and Chick Young (Blondie).
In the same year, Falk successfully negotiated a deal with King Features Syndicate, and the comic strip featuring an unlikely hero in the form of a magician, went on to become a huge hit, prompting the syndicate to ask Falk into creating another comic series for their line-up. In reply, Falk first proposed a concept featuring King Arthur and his famous knights, but King Features was reluctant to feature a medieval age series that time.
Phantom & His Early Secret Identity: The Original Idea of Falk, was to portray the character of The Phantom, as an secret identity to a Rich playboy by the name of Jimmy Wells. This is how the character eventually made its debut in “The Singh Brotherhood”, the first-ever Phantom Daily Strip on Feb 17, 1936.
He leaves enough clues for the readers to diffuse the link between the mysterious Phantom and neat-cloth Wells. But Falk took utmost care as to not reveal this openly in any of the strips.
Falk continued to draw Phantom for a couple of weeks from his debut, but then recruited artist Raymond Moore, who was then an assistant to Phil Davis in Mandrake strips, to don the Phantom artist role. But you could still see the style of Falk, as he continued to do the layout for the strip for several weeks, before handing over the complete artistic duties to Moore, deciding to concentrate his fledgling writing career, which had touched further medium like Theatres, and Novels.
Mid-way through the first Phantom comic strip adventure, The Singh Brotherhood, Falk decided that he would like to position Phantom away from a city background. Little did he know that at the time of this thinking, his original concept of running the daily strips for a couple of years, was about to be turned into a legendary character in the comics business.
The fact that he didn’t reveal Jim Wells, as the man behind Phantom’s mask, helped him to concentrate on rewriting the origin, which saw Phantom being moved the African jungles. The character of Jimmy Wells was about to be forgotten for ever.
Now that he had rebooted the origin, he then explained in the following day’s strips, where Dr. James Dodd, explains his childhood stories having encountered Phantom 70 years back, only to be later ascertained him to have a legacy as old as 400 years. The seeds for a fascinating story was laid in fruition with these scenes of the first Phantom adventure.
> Devil - the Mountain wolf, which often accompanies Phantom in many of his missions as a trusted ally,
> The mysterious Skull Cave inside the deep jungle, the Home of Phantom, and
As the Singh Pirates story reaches its Climax, the readers get a glimpse of Phantom’s legacy, as 21st Phantom is shown explaining his origin, for the first time, to Diana Palmer, his lady-love.
A young noble, Sir Christopher Standish (which was later changed to Christopher Walker, the name which has remained ever-after, and said to have been born in 1516), charters on a ship down the Old Thames, in search of far more lands. He is accompanied by his old father, Christopher Sr.. In later stories, the origin was rewritten, which said that the Christopher Jr. was the ship-boy (to make him look younger), and Christopher Standish/Walker. was the Captain of the ship.
After many months of hard-ship and adventures their ships gets attacked by Oriental Chinese pirates (which was later changed to Singh Brotherhood) somewhere in the Bay of Bengal. Christopher sees his old father slain before his eyes, but their misery is put to rest, as a typhoon strikes and destroys both the ships. Christopher the sole survivor of the ships, then manages to sail with a make-shift raft travelling weeks and weeks to reach a remote shore. Which is what later known to readers, as Bengala.
He is then saved by the Bandars, a secret tribe of Pygmies, who had never seen a white man before. Christopher later discovers the body of a pirate being washed ashore, wearing his fathers attire. He then takes an Oath on the Skull of the pirate that he and his descendants will fight the Singh in particular, and Crime in general. Pygmies had an Prophecy, which stated that a White from the seas will free them of slavery, and believed that it was Christopher himself. The one which Christopher did accomplish, in the process teaching Pygmies the art of Poisonous Arrows, and the entire tribe and the men from the jungle, began referring him as ‘The Phantom’.
As this change-over happens in secrecy, the world outside sees and fears Phantom, as the single person who has wandered the world for all 400+ years, thus bringing him the famous nick-name “The Ghost Who Walks”. This centuries of fantasized living, earns Phantom a lot of Old saying or prophecies, one of which terms that anyone who sees the face of Phantom without mask, will suffer a terrible death. Something, which helps the Phantom to maintain his secrecy in in numerous battles.
The Singh Brotherhood, the first-ever Phantom comic strip, ran until November 07, 1936, a total of 38 weeks, thus easily making it one of the longest comic strip adventures of Phantom, ever. By the end of the first adventure Falk had taken the legacy of Phantom to a great level among comic fans.
He also confesses that he bought in some of the ideas of the Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Tarzan, which talks about a white-man of English origin living among the African natives, and learning their customs and mastery, by being one among them. But Falk had denied that he used the later Tarzan comic strips, to base his character, as he termed them as not the best adaptation to the legendary Tarzan novels. A fact I acknowledge to till date, after having witnessed many comics series, not being impressed of it so far.
But that was not all, Falk was still not convinced with the origin stories, even after a couple of years into the Phantom Daily strip, as he went about changing them one by one slowly. As per his early stories, The first Phantom was English, as was the 21st Phantom, obviously. He also says that he was educated in Oxford, further claiming his English origins. There were references to Bay of Bengal in many places, meaning that the remote land he referred to was most likely India.
.gif "Phantom Pistols (1911)")
The legend also meant that unlike other caped crusaders of his time, Phantom was not linked to one generation, thus giving the writers the freedom to base their stories with either the current 21st Phantom in the modern era, or choose to feature stories on the earlier Phantoms, who are often shown walking or being part of the historical events in the past.
The earliest success to the series also owes much to the art of Ray Moore, who had a classic touch of drawing the Phantom strips, which to date remains the best example for defining the Phantom to all the later artists, till date. Phantom comic strip, grew from strength to strength, even managing to appear in few collected comic book formats, albeit a few. But, the series success eventually managed to land it on the first colored strip on Sunday newspapers starting from May 1939.
What relations did Batman have with Phantom? What was the impact of Phantom Sunday Strips over the legacy of Phantom? Did Ray Moore continue to handle the artistic work for Phantom all the years single-handed?
Answers to them will be continued in our next review post of Phantom soon on Comicology: Lee Falk’s Phantom–2: The Colored Years, and the Competition.
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