Powerhouse Pepper


Powerhouse Pepper is a character in American humor comic books published in the 1940s by Timely Comics, a predecessor of Marvel Comics. Created by writer-artist Basil Wolverton, the character was a dim-witted but big-hearted boxer with superhuman strength, who appeared in slapstick adventures. His titular feature debuted in the humor anthology Joker Comics #1 and would appear in many anthology titles in the 1940s. His final appearance came in Spring 1948.

Publication history

The feature "Powerhouse Pepper" debuted in Timely Comics' Joker Comics #1, and went on to appear in six- to eight-page stories in Joker Comics #2-27, 29-31 ; Gay Comics #1, 18-22, 28-29 ; Tessie the Typist #2, 4, 7-13 ; Rusty #14 ; and Millie the Model #9, as well as in his own series.
A single issue of that solo title appeared as Powerhouse Pepper Comics #1, featuring a slightly different character design than elsewhere. The series then went dormant for five years while the character's adventures were published in the aforementioned titles. It was revived, slightly shortened to Powerhouse Pepper, for four additional issues. Backup features there included the humor characters Goofy Giggles, L'il Louie, Squeeky, and Wolverton's detective Disk-Eyes the Dick.

Synopsis

Comics historian Don Markstein called the series star, a bald, super-strong boxer in a striped turtleneck,

Reprints

Modern-day Powerhouse Pepper reprints include the eight-page story "McClaw the Outlaw" in the hardcover anthology A Smithsonian Book of Comic-Book Comics. Additional reprints have appeared in New Media Publishing's black-and-white magazine Golden Age of Comics #5 ; publisher Kitchen Sink Press' adult-oriented Snarf #13 ; and Pure Imagination's 1993 all-Wolverton comic-book Intense! #1-3 and The Human Powerhouse #1.