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Monday, November 04, 2013

Number 1466: Jurassic Tomahawk

This past September I showed a story of frontier adventurers, Tomahawk and his young friend, Dan, fighting pirates. In Tomahawk’s era there would be a possibility he could meet a pirate...but not a dinosaur. Still, this story is about just that. Tomahawk and Dan wander into a lost valley full of prehistoric creatures.

When this story takes place (date given is 1769), dinosaurs had not yet been discovered as an extinct species. It would take another 80 years, according to “Early Dinosaur Discoveries in North America”, where it is said:  “It is generally accepted that the first discovery of dinosaur remains in North America was made in 1854 by Ferdinand Vandiveer Hayden during his exploration of the upper Missouri River.” To be fair to the Tomahawk writer, one caption mentions dinosaurs, but Tomahawk never calls them that. Still, he does know that the giants are critters of another time.

It reminds me of the basic premise of Turok, Son of Stone. Turok and Andar were two pre-Columbian Indians who stumbled into the lost valley of dinosaurs, and couldn't find their way out. Who knows? Maybe it was the same valley.

From Star Spangled Comics #83 (1948). Drawn by Fred Ray.











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In later years Tomahawk encountered all kinds of crazy stuff: aliens, dinosaurs, supernatural creatures, etc. You can find an especially oddball Tomahawk story from the mid-'60s which I featured in 2010. Just click the picture.


3 comments:

Alicia American said...

OMG Pappy I think thoze dinos thyme-travalld 2 a place B4 peeps knew wat thay wer so as 2 hav sum privacy. Spking of witch, 2day is ELECTION DAY in NYC & Im runnering 4 Mayor: AliciaForMayor.com Its NOT 2 L8 2 register 2 vote in NYC if u go back in thyme @ leest 3 mnths & extablish redizency Yay! OMG We luv u Pappy!! XOXOXOXO

Pappy said...

Alicia, it's probably too late for me to get an absentee ballot sent to my home in the Rocky Mountains, but if I were in NYC I'd vote for you.

Gene Phillips said...

Thanks for printing this. I'd been trying to research, w/o much success, how often Tomahawk encountered SF/ fantasy topics in his early years. I was pretty sure DC wouldn't have avoided such topics entirely, even in a "realistic" series.