New Adventure Comics # 20, October, 1937

 Note in this issues introduction below that FEDERAL MEN is described as "increasingly popular" which would. in theory, make Siegel and Shuster quite the big shots among the comics creators in these "all new" strips made just for this new medium. By the time they sold SUPERMAN, in other words, still more than six months away here, they were a known, proven commodity, not just a couple of hopeful kids from Cleveland.

 Do you poop out at parties? Learn to play harmonica!

Note the similarity of this opening scene from FEDERAL MEN to the strip's sole spot on the cover a fw issues back.

 What the heck is this below? Definitely not one of the Major's comics. A pulp, perhaps?

New Adventure Comics # 19, September, 1937

With the newly returned editorial message on the inside front cover of this issue, we note that this isV2, issue 7 as well as issue 19. Obviously, then, each set of 12 issues was considered a volume.

Another fun Flessel cover here. Not much new inside. There's a nicely drawn new two page humor piece called PLATO PSMITH signed with the distinctively stylized signature of co-editor Vin Sullivan.

Here's another sampling of the highly contrasting art styles of some of the many features in these early issues.

New Adventure Comics # 18, August, 1937

Another Flessel cover this time but not really that much of an adventure...unless surfing was considered adventurous in those days. Still quite a mix between humor and adventures trips with the few new ones this time being humor again.

   

New Adventure Comics # 17, July, 1937

Mr. Flessel continues on the covers but the important thing to notice this time is that finally, at long last, the official title of the book has become NEW ADVENTURE COMICS! A few old strips such as Alger's SAM THE PORTER are back. A few new ones, mostly by Bob Hermans, aren't bad but they're humor and humor is starting to become pretty much filler in this comic. 

Will Georgi's NADIR, MASTER OF MAGIC, debuts as one of the first of the soon to be many be-turbaned mystics in comics. 

 An open letter to comic magazine fans is actually just a clever plug for the still-new DETECTIVE COMICS magazine.

 As stated above, one Bob Hermans debuts several new funny single pages this issue.

By this point, though, more and more of the NEW ADVENTURE strips were looking like this. They were also getting more space than hey once had. 

STRAIGHT FROM HOLLYWOOD by Laidlaw is yet another one of the many such celebrity pages to appear in comics and newspapers in those days. Often containing the most absolutely trivial information (which may or may not even be factual), they helped satisfy the public's seemingly insatiable appetite for any and all info on their favorite stars. In the case of radio stars, these types of illustrated pages were often the first places fans could see what radio favorites look like. 

 

New Adventure Comics # 16, June, 1937

See what I meant? Not only is FEDERAL MEN back but the series makes the cover this issue, complete  with a major plug for the "Junior Federal Men Club."

FEDERAL MEN even moves up to the opening pages after having been way at the back for its entire existence. Note also the "Ming the Merciless" style character.

 Hey, look who else is back! DALE DARING...whoever she may be.

 No longer doing the covers, Ellsworth was given a new strip, the racist "TH' CUNNEL."

Below we see the almost ubiquitous Johnson-Smith ad, appearing on this issue's back cover. These things, which would continue in comics for decades, offered dozens of pointless novelty items that were so scrunched up and squeezed onto the page that the ad alone could take one hours to pore over!