The Man in Black # 1 Pg. 1

Back in my comic collecting heyday of the 1980's-1990's I sought out cheap reading comics by artists noted in the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide. Bob Powell was one of the artists whose style I really liked and most of the books he drew were affordable.

Once I gravitated from collecting comic books to collecting comic book artwork, I started collecting a few examples of artists from the 1950's and 1960's that I admired. Bob Powell was on my radar but I was not able to find an example of his work other than Daredevil pages. The Daredevil pages were cool, but were not of the vintage I was looking for and they were also a bit pricey!

Flash forward to a couple of years ago and I began trading comic art with peerless Paul Handler who lives fairly close to me. Paul had this page in his collection and kindly agreed to trade it to me. It checks all of the boxes I was looking for... heavy use of black ink, a cool and mysterious main character, and a pretty girl!

I believe this page was first printed in The Man in Black # 1 in 1957 and was reprinted in Thrill-O-Rama # 1 in 1965. Given the size of the original board (15" x 22") I wonder if it originally appeared in an earlier comic, such as Green Hornet Comics where the character first saw print. If anyone out there can provide additional information about this page, please contact me with details and I will update this description.