LADY DANGER

Real Name: Valerie Vaughn

Class: Human

Occupation: Adventurer, society debutante, newspaper reporter

Group Affiliation: None

Known Relatives: Unnamed father

Aliases: None

Base of Operations: Mobile, 1940s era

First Appearance: Sensation Comics I #84 (December, 1948)

Powers: Lady anger was a proficient fighter and a fearless daredevil. She was armed with teargas pellets.

History: (Sensation Comics I #84) - Valerie Vaughn was a glamorous socialite bore with her idle existence so she sought out danger and adventure at every turn, including aviation, deep-sea diving and aviation. She earned the name Lady Danger and became a celebrity because of her exploits. She told her father she was running out of challenges, so he challenged her to find a real job. She applied for a job as reporter for the City Press, but the paper told her she had to prove herself by finding a story before she was hired. She visited her P.I. friend “Hardboiled” Grath to get a scoop, and found him threatened by goons trying to scare him off the George Greer murder. Danger and Grath fought off the hoodlums, but Grath refuse to involve her in the case. She went out on her own to see Greer’s niece Rita, who had a letter from Albert Leeds, the prime suspect in Greer’s murder. The letter confessed to the crime, but had a hidden clue that le Lady Danger to look inside Rita’s bust of Shakespeare. Inside was a note proving gambler Wolf Lucas was the real killer. AT Wolf’s club she helped Grath escape Wolf’s goons, and got Wolf to admit he framed Leeds, who made a perfect patsy because he’ stolen money from Greer in the past. With Wolf defeated Lay anger submitted her story to the City Press and was hired on the spot.

(Sensation Comics I #85) - Lady Danger met Captain Jack Owens, an old sailor who claimed to be dead when he was hit by a car and picked up by an ambulance. Danger was interested in him, and so was Grath, who joined her on the case. She learned that Owens was reported dead after his crew mutinied and stabbed him for his treasure of pearls. He dug up the stolen pearls, altering his crew that he survived, and they posed as ambulance drivers to kidnap him. When Lay Danger was hot on the trail of the crew they imprisoned her alongside Owens, who they were pumping for information on the pearls. Together Owens and Danger escaped and defeated the crew.

(Sensation Comics I #87) - Lady Danger covered a charity bazaar featuring a needle in the haystack contest. A man named Blake used a magnetized pole to find the needle, and skipped off with it without taking his prize. Anger followed him, and helped him fight of Chances and his gang. The needle was donated by Blake’s uncle and unlocked a jewelry box, and Blake was going to steal from his uncle to pay off a gambling debt to Chances. Chances wanted all of old man Blake’s fortune, which is why he tried to take the needle away from Blake. Chances tried to rob Blake’s house, but Danger an Grath defeated Chances and his gang.

(Sensation Comics I #88) - To boost the City Press’ circulation Lady Danger’s editor sent out a challenge, Danger would perform any hazardous job for the next 24 hours. She performed in a trapeze act, id underwater salvage and performed steeplejack work. Thug Soames tried to kill her during each job, but failed, and when she did steeplejack work she found where Soames had stashed a cache of stolen jewels months before. Danger brought Soames to justice and then went to a tropical island for a vacation.

(Sensation Comics I #89) - Lady Danger was assigned to interview famous stunt girl Carol Lang, but decided it would be more exciting to take her place, since they looked so similar. Carol agreed after being pressure by her “agent” Mr. Brown, actually underworld figure Lucky Kane who was holding her brother hostage and forcing her to help him in robberies. After finishing one stunt Danger recognized Lucky, so he knocked her out and put her next to a bundle of dynamite on a movie set. She escaped and foiled Lucky’s attempt to rob precious jewels from the Spirit of Diamonds at the diamond exposition. Afterwards the police free Carol’s brother from Lucky’s goons.

(Sensation Comics I #90) - Lady Danger was sent to cover a society piece to figure out if P.I. Grath ha a romantic interest at his new favorite nightspot Club Styx. She considered Grath her boyfriend an was eager to find out if he was dating someone else. Her story got interrupted when she saved banker Mr. Cort from committing suicide outside the club. Someone from the club was blackmailing him, so Lady Danger returned to Styx. Needles Rawson set up the club with surveillance devices and was using his guests’ conversations about their secrets to blackmail them. Grath was hot on his trail, which is why he was spending so much time at Styx. Danger and Grath defeated Needles’ goons and exposed his scheme.

(Sensation Comics I #92) - Lady Danger covered the story of policeman Ed Hart being fired from the force as being suspected of taking bribes from Mike Sligo, who ran the Golden Ghost gambling boat. She suspected Hart was innocent and asked Grath to help her get an invitation to the Ghost. Grath told Sligo that Danger had dirt on him, so he put $10,000 in her bank account. It was his M.O. to make the public suspicious of his detractors by making them look like they were on his payroll. Danger tried to give him his money back, so he had his goons throw her overboard. Grath saved her and together they fought off Sligo and his goons until the police arrived. With Sligo under arrest Hart was cleared.

(Sensation Comics I #93) - Lady Danger was doing a story on unusual businesses, and when she had her photog take pictures of Goren’s oriental tapestry shop she was surprised by a near hit-and-run that destroyed the camera. Teaming up with Grath she learned that Goren masterminded a burglary ring, and that he gave signals to his gang through the tapestries in his store’s display window. After robbing a ship Goren and his gang tied up anger and Grath an lit the fuse on sticks of dynamite to finish them off. The heroes escape, returned to Goren’s shop an apprehended him and his gang.

Comments: Created by Robert Kanigher  & Bob Oksner

In the pre-Crisis DC Universe Lady Danger lived on Earth-2. 

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