Credits
Colorist(s):
?
Letterer(s):
typeset
Subject Matter
Character(s):
Dean Haslam (a teenage American boy); five dozen blue foxes; Mom (referenced); a swarm of Japanese soldiers on the beach; Lieutenant Birch (U.S. Navy, mosquito boat skipper); Mr. Hardy (Dean Haslam's father); mosquito boat crewmen; Japanese seamen in the water (survivors of their sunk destroyer); Wilson (mosquito boat crewman killed by Jap bullets)
First Line:
Offshore where the fog curled in gray streamers over the water, Dean Haslam cut the catboat's motor and hoisted the sail.
Synopsis:
While setting the blue foxes out to forage for themselves on Tubal Island, Dean spots enemy Jap vessels. He alerts Lt. Birch back at the dock, who radios for support. Upon his offer, and with his dad's permission, Dean guides the mosquito boat through a secret pass. They engage the enemy until the Navy cruiser arrives and sinks them. Dean is emotional that he has briefly been one with with his country's real fighting men, accepted by them, sharing their victory.
Reprinting
Reprint Notes:
Miscellaneous
Pages:
2
Notes:
Du Bois writer and Ely artist identifications by David Porta, November 2021.
Du Bois identifiers:
The first Du Bois identifier is that The Five Ws (who what when where why) are established in the first two paragraphs, five sentences.
Then, there's a cornucopia of nautical terminology from former Coast Guard seaman Du Bois (who also wrote three "Don Winslow U.S. Navy" novels, and "The Hurricane Kids on the Lost Islands" novel). Whenever Du Bois wrote a story that could use nautical terminology, he used it.
Likewise, abundant references to nature and natural features (there among the islands) appear in the story; it's another Du Bois identifier.
Animals usually play a significant role in a Du Bois story. Here, blue fox farming is a crucial plot point. "With the wind behind him, he spared a glance at the five dozen blue foxes that cowered in the crates up forward." Dean Haslam's taking the foxes out to a uninhibited Tubal Island is how he happens to spot the Jap vessels.
Compare the appearance of the blue foxes here to another Du Bois WWII story set in the Aleutian Islands, "Attu Caverns," The Fighting Yanks 6 page comic story in Red Ryder Comics #19 (May June 1944) on-sale 1944-04-14, in which a blue fox points the way. It follows the Little Beaver text story written by Du Bois.
It may be noted here that it was apparently editor Oskar Lebeck's policy, in assembling a comic, that a Du Bois text story was immediately followed by a Du Bois comics story, (if Lebeck had assigned Du Bois a text story and a comics story for the issue, which he usually did).
In this case, an episode of the Du Bois "Cyclone" strip follows on the feet of this Du Bois text story.
An unusual story element here tallies with Du Bois's own personal life:
Without explanation as to the differences in their last names, Mr. Hardy is introduced in the narrative as Dean Haslam's father.
On her Amazon author page, Du Bois's daughter, Miriam DuBois Babcock, writes of Du Bois (her second step-father), "In 1937 my mother married Gaylord DuBois (1899-1993), who immediately adopted me."
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