THE DEATH OF ALFRED AND THE STORY OF AUNT HARRIET
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ONE LESS BELL TO ANSWER Dick Grayson’s Aunt Harriet joined the Batman mythos not from a creative spark, but as a mother of necessity. Frederic Wertham, the infamous psychologist who torchlit a destructive wildfire through the comics industry in the mid-1950s by penning his scathing indictment against comic books, Seduction of the Innocent, pegged the Dynamic Duo Alfred’s valiant rescue of his Masked Masters, from Detective #328. as gay (not that their true names of “Bruce,” a homosexual stereotype, and “Dick,” which needs no explanation, helped this new character, Schwartz got the notion to off loyal Alfred the defend their heterosexuality—nor did their live-in manservant). As butler and insert in his place Dick’s previously unseen relative. And new-Bat-editor Julie to do the dirty deed and revamp the Wayne family dynamic for a Schwartz surveyed his new generation, the editor called upon the writer who had scripted just-inherited Gotham Batman for the previous generation: Bill Finger. City, he elected to dispel Finger’s “Gotham Gang Line-Up!,” by the uncredited Moldthis insinuation, once off/Giella art team, concerns gangsters jockeying for the privilege and for all. “I decided to of executing the captured Batman and Robin. When faithful Alfred bring a woman into the discovers the Dynamic Duo’s predicament, without regard for his household,” Schwartz own safety he rallies to their aid (on a motorcycle, no less), shoving recalled in his Man of Batman and Robin out of the way of a falling boulder, being crushed Two Worlds autobiogto death as a result. Finger scripted a battle sequence featuring a raphy, “a spinster aunt fury unseen since Batman’s earliest days: “Like avenging angels,” a of Dick ‘Robin’ caption reads, “the crime-fighters charge into their hated enemies!” Grayson, who could Alfred (who had yet to receive the family name “Pennyworth”), a part possibly be seen as a of the Batman comics since his introduction in the Golden Age’s sort of chaperoning Batman #16 (Apr.–May 1943), is no more. In his late butler’s memden mother.” ory, Bruce Wayne establishes the Alfred Foundation, “a charitable To clear a path for organization that will contribute to the benefit of all mankind!”
TM & © DC Comics.
armine Infantino and Joe Giella’s striking “Gotham Gang Line-Up!” cover for Detective #328 (June 1964) presented another of ace cover artist Infantino’s patented How will our heroes escape this mess? images. However, the cover offered no hint at the shocking—and later, lamented—event about to transpire inside.
CHAPTER IV
GOOD HELP IS HARD TO FIND
THE BATCAVE COMPANION
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