Comic Title: Brave and the Bold #43
Publisher: DC (National Periodical Publications, Inc.)
Address: 575 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY
Cover Date: Aug/Sep 1962
On Sale Date: June 21, 1962 Copyright Date June 21, 1962
Source: Library of Congress, Periodicals 1962

Frequency: Bi-monthly
Cover Price: $0.12
Page Count: 32
Editor: Julius Schwartz

Title: "The Masked Marauders of Earth"
Pages: 25

Feature(s):
Hawkman (of Earth-1)

Writer: Gardner F. Fox
Artist: Joe Kubert

Reprinted In:
DC Special Series #19 (1979)
Hawkman TPB (1989)
Hawkman Archives Vol. 1 HC (2000)
Showcase Presents Hawkman Vol. 1 TPB (2007)

Feature Character(s)

• Hawkman (last appearance in Brave and the Bold #42; next appearance in Brave and the Bold #44)

Supporting Character(s)

• Hawkgirl (last appearance in Brave and the Bold #42; next appearance in Brave and the Bold #44)
• George Emmett (last appearance in Brave and the Bold #36; next appearance in Brave and the Bold #44)
• Mavis Trent (last appearance in Brave and the Bold #36; next appearance in Brave and the Bold #44)
• Andar Pul (last appearance in Brave and the Bold #42; next appearance in Hawkman #1)

Villain(s)

• Manhawks (a race of interplanetary thieves; next appearance in Hawkman #18)

Other Character(s)

• Paran Katar (Katar Hol’s father; an ornithologist of planet Thanagar, and inventor of the anti-gravity belt and wings worn by Thanagar’s police force; appears only in flashback to Hawkman’s origin; no further appearances)
• Inhabitants of planet Thanagar (no further appearances)
• An unnamed Midway City Police Department dispatcher (last appearance in Brave and the Bold #35; no further appearances)
• Three research scientists, Midway City police officers, employees of the House of Jewels, and a radio operator of planet Thanagar (no further appearances)

Flashback Appearance(s)

• Hawkman (earliest chronological appearance; next appearance in Brave and the Bold #42)

Cameo Appearance(s)

• Kalmoran (a folk hero of planet Thanagar; appears only as a statue)

Comments:
Katar Hol appears in a flashback in this story which occurs preceding the flashback in Brave and the Bold #42. This is Hawkman’s chronologically earliest appearance.

Synopsis:
Giant hawks wearing manlike head-masks arrive on Earth, and steal an entire jewelry store to acquire a pair of rubies which they plan to use in revenge against Thanagar. Advised of this, Commissioner Emmett contacts the planet by subspace radio, and Katar Hol immediately recognizes the description of the Manhawks, a galaxy-wandering race which had introduced theft to his home planet ten years before, and thus caused the creation of the winged police force.

Hawkman’s father, Paran Katar, had created an anti-gravity belt and artificial wings to aid them in their study of ornithology, and when the Manhawks introduced crime to his planet, such was his rage that Katar used the wings to infiltrate their ranks disguised as a hawk. Stealing one of their masks, he deduced its weaponry, and he and his father created a neutralizing device for the enemies’ deadly eyebeams – the hawk helmet, equipped with radiation jammers. Using a pressure gun, the new Hawkman changed the jeweled eyepieces from coal-based filaments to harmless diamonds, and aided by others equipped with belts and wings, rounded up the aliens and imprisoned them.

However, the notion of stealing for the thrill of it was now spread across the planet, and in order to combat this new groundswell, the planetary government established a police force based on Paran Katar’s inventions, in honor of him and his son.

Hawkman and Hawkgirl return to Earth, planning to again use the pressure guns on the birds’ eye filaments. The Manhawks, however, have planned for this contingency with a new element in their masks, and the attack is ineffective. They make another threat against Thanagar. Probing their memories of all Earth knowledge, the Halls recall that rubies are necessary for the construction of a laser beam, so when they track down the Manhawk’s ship, they firebomb it, then cause a black chemical rain to fall on their enemies, obscuring their eyeslits, and preventing the amplification of light necessary in lasers.

With the villains captured and incarcerated on Earth, their masks are studied, and it is determined that their invisibility beams actually teleport objects or beings to a future limbo, several minutes ahead, in which nothing has yet occurred.