(Captain Marvel Adventures (Fawcett) #137) - Billy Batson showed up at work, thrilled with his job when Sterling Morris announced he was cutting his salary as well as the salaries of everyone at WHIZ so he could keep all the money for himself. Billy was bummed and stopped at Doc Quartz’ for a soda, but Doc said he hated his customers and kicked him out. The dejected Billy visited Dexter Knox, to find the boy genius sleeping instead of working on science experiments. King Kull, the Beastman, was lobbing sin bombs around Fawcett City, unleashing the Seven Deadly Sins in the hearts of mankind. Billy changed into Captain Marvel. Kull shoved him out of the way, fleeing back to his hideout underground in Evil Olympus. Marvel consulted Shazam, who told him the Seven Deadly sins were evil gods he’d long ago turned into stone and kept at the rock of Eternity. King Kull used a life-ray to bring them back to live, and the Sins were the ones producing the sin bombs. Kull started dropping sin bombs from a helicopter, and Billy was at WHIZ when he was hit. Full of hatred he almost attacked his boss before fighting off the effects of hatred and changing into Captain Marvel. Marvel confronted Kull in Evil Olympus, defeating him and using his life-ray to turn the Sins back into stone statues.

(Shazam! I #7) - During the mayor's celebration of the Marvel Family, the Sivana Family caught them and all their friends in attendance, including Doc Quartz, in a globe of suspendium. They were in suspended animation circling the sun for decades until the Marvel Family revived and freed them. New tenants moved into the house Billy Batson rented a room in, and Ma Potter told Billy they kept to themselves. The renter were Mr. Grump and his boss, who despised Captain Marvel because he'd broken up his gang. He considered Marvel such bad luck that he forbade Grump from speaking his name, and Grump balked his boss knocked him out. Ma Potter overheard the end of their conversation, and when the boss told her his friend had a fainting spell she became convinced that saying "Captain Marvel" really was a jinx. She told Pa Potter, who thought she was being superstitious. On his walk to the store he passed Freddy Freeman, who was listening to Billy's WHIZ broadcast about a crack in the Rockaway Dam, and Freddy said the magic words Captain Marvel to turn into Captain Marvel Jr. and save the dam. All Pa saw was the boy say "Captain Marvel," get struck by lightning and disappear, so he was now convinced Ma was right. He ran into Doc Quartz at the drugstore, and told him about what he saw. Doc started gossiping, and as the story kept getting retold and exaggerated people started believing that saying Captain Marvel's name would cause doomsday. Sterling Morris caught wind of the gossip and told Billy he could no longer say "Captain Marvel" on air. Even Billy was wary about saying his own name, suspicious that Sivana put a jinx on him. As Captain Marvel he visited Sivana in jail, and Sivana assured him he wasn't currently plotting against him. Even Sivana refused to say Marvel's name, telling Marvel that he wanted to rule the universe, not destroy it. Marvel returned home, and overheard the boss living next door fencing an expensive cane "capped in marvel"ous silverwork. The world didn't end, so Marvel realized the new superstition was baseless. He apprehended the boss, and scoffed at himself for having believed the rumor the boss inadvertently started. The boss was headed to jail, so he was still convinced the name "Captain Marvel" was a jinx.

(Shazam! I #11) - Billy Batson and Cissie Sommerly went on a date at Doc Quartz’ drug store and after finishing off his colossal burgers Doc gave them his latest concoction, super-energized gelatin, as a free desert. Billy and cissie found that as much as they ate the gelatin kept replenishing itself, and started filling up the drug store. Doc Quartz realized he’d made a miscalculation when he made the gelatin, he energized it too much and it was growing like yeast. He implored them to help him eat it before the entire city was covered in gelatin. Billy changed into Captain Marvel to eat more, but even his mighty appetite was no match for the gelatin, so he gathered passer-bys and people in stores to chip in. Sterling Morris helped out, and said he couldn’t eat another bite, but praised the gelatin’s melt in your mouth texture. Marvel realized that the gelatin didn’t expand in their stomachs after being melted, and stoked every furnace in Fawcett City to cause a heat wave that melted the gelatin. Doc Quartz praised Marvel for averting a disaster, and asked him to try out his man-sized World’s Mightiest Hero Sandwich, but Marvel had enough of eating for the day.

Doc Quartz was originally published by Fawcett Comics, which DC obtained the rights to in 1972.

Doc Quartz' appearance in  Captain Marvel Adventures (Fawcett) #137 was reprinted in Shazam!: A Celebration of 75 Years.

All characters mentioned or pictured are ™  and © DC Comics, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Please visit The Official DC Comics Site at: http://www.batman.com