Special thanks to Mary Kay Johnson, granddaughter of Green Hornet creator George W. Trendle, for sending along these photos of items exhibiting at the San Diego Fair (formerly the Del Mar Fair) at the Del Mar Fairgrounds in California. The theme of this year's fair is "Heroes Reunite!", and how appropriate it is to include the Lone Ranger and his nephew, the Green Hornet. The fair is going on now through this weekend.
G. W. Trendle (1884-1972) owned the first radio station in Michigan – WXYZ “the last word in radio” and knew children needed heroes so he created some: The Lone Ranger (1933), The Green Hornet (1936, descended from the Lone Ranger's brother who owned a silver mine and made The Lone Ranger’s bullets), and Challenge of the Yukon (1938, which became Sgt. Preston of the Yukon on TV in 1955).
The Green Hornet was
also made into serials for movie theaters in the 1930’s. The Green Hornet’s car
– The Black Beauty – was the first super car with radar, a drone, and rockets.
Ned Jordan Secret Agent (1939)
was an undercover FBI agent.
Bob Barclay - American Agent (1950)
was a CIA agent in Europe with the cover of a newspaper reporter. But the U.S.
government asked that the program be discontinued when newspaper staff in Europe
were arrested by governments who thought all the stories were true and all newspaper
correspondents were spies!
In 1949 The Lone Ranger became a TV
series, followed by Sgt Preston in 1955, and The Green Hornet in
1966.
The message in all of these is “one person
can make a difference.” At a time in history when only Caucasians were
portrayed in stories, these scripts had major characters that were of other
ethnicities: Native American, Asian, , Eskimo, Irish, and Black.
Photos courtesy of April Johnston and Mary Kay Johnson; please do not copy without permission.
