Superheroes may be fiction, but wonder if drugs are real.
Originally, in his first appearance in 1940, chemist Rex Tyler’s wonder drug Miraclo not only gave him super strength but boosted his personality from timidity to courage.
Meanwhile, an actual wonder drug was being developed at the Northern Regional Research Laboratory in Peoria, IL. With the U.S. entry into World War II, penicillin would be urgently needed for the wounded. In March 1942, the first patient was successfully treated for septicemia with U.S.-made penicillin. Half the total supply produced was used on that one patient. By June 1942, enough was available to treat 10 patients.
The antibiotic was first tested for military use in the spring of 1943, and by autumn doctors were using penicillin in combat zones.
“A closer analogy might be Benzedrine which was hailed as a way to boost productivity and alertness both for soldiers and civilian workers,” wrote Gully Foyled. “The German military was probably the biggest user of it but, for example, it was also included in survival kits for US sailors and aviators. It’s better known now by its generic name: Amphetamine Sulfate.”
The wonder drug was initially just an excuse to get Hourman hopping, but that element of his origin would be spotlighted in later stories. Dramatic updates written decades later can benefit from the knowledge of events that either weren’t known at the time or weren’t publicly discussed. This is one of the factors that made the TV series Mad Men so compelling.
The addiction angle in later Hourman stories was probably an inevitable evolution, given the social concern over drugs, but not everybody was a fan.
“And, of course, later writers couldn’t resist having Rex ‘Tick-Tock’ Tyler becoming addicted to his Miraclo pills,” wrote Joseph Lenius. “Gotta be ‘relevant,’ y’know, even if it’s as bad as ‘Denny O’Neil relevant’ — that genius boy, making ‘Speedy’ an addict. I’m surprised Wonder Girl didn’t become a hooker, but I guess the Comics Code wouldn’t have allowed that.”
Even light-hearted characters like Captain Nice, Mr. Terrific, and Underdog came in for criticism because they acquired their superpowers from drugs.
When scripter Roy Thomas, penciler Michael Bair, nd inker Mike Gustovich updated Hourman’s genesis in Secret Origins 16 (July 1987), they framed the story as a letter to his son, Rick Tyler, who’d become the second Hourman. That naturally focused the tale on concerns about addiction.
“I considered how best to cash in on my formula,” the chemist admitted to his son. “A drug that could increase a soldier’s strength by the power of 10 would have found a ready market in 1939, believe you me!”
Rex Tyler recalled that he’d never have thought about testing his breakthrough formula on himself if he hadn’t seen newspaper headlines about a super-powered mystery man called the Flash.
“All my life, Rick, I’ve failed to make Miraclo safe for my ose,” Rex concluded. “Maybe I failed because just my health wasn’t motive enough. But now, with your well-being at stake, as well, I’ve been working harder than ever.”
The letter was to be delivered to Rick by Charles McNider, Dr. Mid-Nite, after the first Hourman’s death.
“Wouldn’t have been much fun just to rephrase the old dialogue and nothing else,” recalled Thomas. “I tried to give the old stories a more modern feel… but without negating what had made them work in the first place.”
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