Kara Zor-El was born and raised in Argo City on the planet Krypton. The entire city survived the planet’s destruction, separating itself and floating to safety, but most of the inhabitants were soon felled by their homeworld’s remnants, now transformed into deadly Kryptonite. Kara’s father Zor-El sent her to Earth for her own protection, hoping…
Dinah Drake was born and raised in Gotham City, where her father Richard Drake was a detective with the Gotham City Police Department. He trained his daughter well, and when she was old enough, Dinah applied to the GCPD herself. She was turned down, however, and the disappointment crushed her father, who died a short…
John Sargent became fascinated with magic at an early age—and also gained fearsome powers. This was thanks to his discovery that his mother’s old ruby pendant actually contained the ancient artifact called the Ruby of Life, which let him control anything he touched. As he grew older, Sargent focused his attention on stage magic in…
Alfred Thaddeus Crane Pennyworth was born the son of a butler—his father, Jarvis, worked for the wealthy Gotham City family the Waynes. But the life of a domestic was not for young Alfred, and he fled as soon as he was old enough to strike out on his own. For many years, Alfred made a…
The Bruce Wayne of Earth-Two was born on April 7, 1915. A crook named Joe Chill robbed and killed Bruce’s parents in 1924, when Bruce was only eight years old. Bruce dedicated his life to avenging his parents’ deaths and protecting others from criminals and their evil deeds. After many years of training, Bruce donned…
Though not truly alive, Brainiac can date his creation to April 6, the day the Computer Tyrants of Colu created him. The green-skinned humanoid wreaked havoc across the galaxy, including shrinking several cities to subdue their populaces. One of those cities was Kandor of Krypton. Years later, Brainiac encountered the man who would become his…
Charles Foster "Chuck" Taine was an ordinary 30th-Century Earth boy who got a job running errands for a famous scientist. The scientist sent Chuck off one day to deliver his experimental super-plastic formula to the Science Council, but Chuck got distracted by a robot gladiator tournament and stopped to watch for a bit. During the…
Darrell Dane was a research chemist working on ways to chemically condense matter. When his fiancee Martha Roberts was kidnapped, Dane downed a formula he had just developed and shrank himself to six inches tall while retaining his full mass and strength. After rescuing Martha, he decided to continue his miniaturized adventures and donned a…
Born in Hibbardsville, Kansas, in the early 1920s, Jason Peter “Jay” Garrick had an uneventful childhood. It wasn’t until he went to Keystone City for college, studying chemistry and physics at Midwestern University, that fate singled him out for greater things. Garrick was a junior in 1940 and working on an experiment to purify hard…
Born in 1953, James Vance did not enter the comic book industry until he was 35, when Kitchen Sink published his comic book Kings in Disguise. The series earned a Harvey Award and an Eisner Award for best new series in 1989, and a second Eisner for best single issue or story. Vance wrote Neil…
An imp from the 5th dimension, Mr. Mxyztplk is an inveterate troublemaker and jester. Because he’s from another dimension, Mxyzptlk is not bound by our universe’s laws and can produce a variety of magical effects with a single thought. Shortly after arriving on our world, Mxyzptlk encountered Superman, and the the imp has delighted in…
On March 31, 1930, the Movie Producers and Distributors Association (the MPPDA) first instituted its Production Code, also known as "The Hays Code," because lawyer Will H. Hays headed the association. The code prohibited filmmakers from producing anything that did not show “correct standards of life, subject only to the requirements of drama and entertainment.”…
