Unpublished Phantom lady Splash

I have been a fan of the golden age Phantom Lady for a while. The character is an enigma, of sorts, in that she is like Clark Kent/Superman as she is unrecognizable in public although she wears no mask and people can clearly see her face. Next, she is an interesting view into the Comics Code authority with regard to publishers, costume, and censorship. While Phantom Lady was a product of the Iger shop, she appeared Quality Comics Police Comics, moved to Fox with her own title, and finally to Ajax-Farrell.

In the beginning, Phantom Lady wore what looked like a yellow 1940s one-piece swimsuit with a green cape and pirate boots. Moving to Fox, Matt Baker became one of her artists and made her costume blue and red (primary colors) and far more revealing; a loose, low-cut halter top, short-shorts, red cape, and heels on a very buxom woman. While that garnered the attention of young boys and soldiers at war, it also disturbed mothers worrying about comics corrupting their children. When the character moved to Ajax Farrell, the Comics Code took over and while the basic costume remained the same, the character was less well-endowed and the halter top was replaced by a far less revealing t-shirt, basically, that was less form-fitting and revealing than even the original costume.

The character was then acquired by DC, and a whole new iteration of costumes was prepared.

The fact remains that very few originals from any of the series, Quality, Fox, or Ajax remain. I have only been able to find the cover of Ajax's Phantom Lady 3... until now. I was lucky enough to track down a complete 6-page story of which this is the splash. This is from an unpublished story (well, published by Bill Black in AC comics and in later in a collection of Phantom Lady stories). The previous owner and my guess are that this comes from about 1956 (the date of the last Ajax-Farrell issue of PL). He bought it from Jim Ivey years ago. A real find, I think.

I will note that one of the curiosities here is that when the story appeared in AC comics, the page was edited to make her more busty. Looking at other Ajax issues of PL I don't think that Sandra Knight was this top-heavy.