Real
Name: Richard Grey Junior
Black Condor
Real
Name: Richard Grey Junior
Identity/Class: Human mutant
Silver Age Human mutate
Occupation: Senator
Affiliations: Uncle Sam,
Neon the Unknown,
Quicksilver, the
Ray, Red Bee, the
Spider, Wendy Foster (fiancee), Dr. Foster,
Father Pierre (deceased)
Silver Age Freedom Fighters
Enemies: Ali Kahn, Jaspar Crow, Eagle Battalion, the Ear, Sihn Fang, the Great Yaho, Kite-Men, Lung Wuo, Sophisticated Lady, Spinning Death
Known Relatives: Richard Grey (father, archaeologist, deceased), unnamed mother (archaeologist, deceased)
Aliases: Senator Thomas Wright
Base of Operations: U.S.A.
First Appearance: Crack Comics #1 (Quality, May 1940)
Powers/Abilities: Able to fly. Uses a "black ray" gun, capable of stunning people or bludgeoning through inanimate objects.
History: (Crack Comics #1 "Origin of the Black Condor", ga) Richard Grey Jr. was only an infant when his parents' archeological expedition to Mongolia were all killed in an ambush. The sole survivor, Richard was raised by giant black condors local to the region. Studying his condor foster parents, the child learned to fly.
When he reached adulthood he befriended a hermit monk, Father Pierre, who convinced him that he should use his unique attributes to do good, before he too was killed. Richard travelled to America, where, as luck would have it, he learned he had an exact double, the recently murdered Senator Thomas Wright. He took the identity of the recently murdered Senator (and the dead man's fiancee Wendy, for good measure), and created the costumed persona of the Black Condor, which he used to fight evil.
(Crack Comics #2 "The Adventure of Ali Kahn", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #3 "The Black Condor in America", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #4 "The Menace of Sihn Fang", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #5 "The Eagle Battalion", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #6, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #7, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #8, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #9, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #10, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #11 "The Coming of Jasper Crow", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #12 "Jasper Crow and the Miners", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #13 "General Korn", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #14 The Condor's Double", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #15, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #16, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #17, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #18, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #19, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #20, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #21, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #22, ga) Dr.Foster developed a food supplement formula which could be distilled in pill form, to be used to aid famine stricken areas of the world. Jaspar Crow, the Black Condor's arch enemy, stole the formula, but luckily the Condor swiftly retrieved it.
(Crack Comics #23, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #24, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #25, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #26 "The End of Jasper Crow", ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #27, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #28, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #29, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #30, ga) No synopsis
(Crack Comics #31 "Elmer Briggs - United States Senator", ga) No synopsis
(Uncle Sam #2 "Revolt of the Villains", ga) No synopsis
Comments: Created by Louis K. Fine.
Got to love the Golden Age characters. Being raised by birds will teach you how to fly (in the 1940s origin he gains the ability simply by watching the condors he grows up amongst [which is why I have him down as a mutant] - later retcons added a radioactive meteor to explain this power, but to me that simply adds another layer of unbelievable coincidence to his character). A child raised in the wilderness by animals is not only, by sheer luck, the double of an influential Senator, but when said Senator dies, no one notices that he has been replaced by a person whose upbringing should give him the social grace of Mowgli.
When D.C. revived the character, they made him part of the WWII Freedom Fighters, alongside other former Quality heroes. In the modern era he has been seen as a ghost, watching over his namesake successor.
CLARIFICATIONS: Not to be confused with
any other Black characters
Any Additions/Corrections? Please let me know.
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