By night, a racket-buster, bringing justice to a crime-ridden metropolis.
BY ELLEN GOODMAN
Free Press Staff Writer
What happened to him? What happened to The Hero? What happened to that two-fisted, clean-thinking, sarsaparilla-drinking, two-gunned, truth-seeking archetype we used to know? James Bond?… Oh come on, now — you know what he’s thinking about
The change came sometime after the war, after the tube entered the living room, after the bomb, after the takeover by the worldwide psychoanalyst conspiracy.
It was then that The Hero ate the apple and Paradise was lost. He tasted the wine, kissed the ruby lips, shot himself in the leg trying to quick- draw his left gun, lost a fight to the neighborhood bully, found out that truth was a relative thing, picked up a copy of Playboy.
It was over. He was dead.
Of all the late lamented Heroes, the late lamented sarsaparilla-drinkers, there is none lamentably departed as our own Detroit special, the Green Hornet.
Back in the age of innocence, the Green Hornet was goodness-personified-twice-a-week. He was, after all (a moment of reverence), the grand-nephew of the Lone Ranger.
There in the heart of the crime-ridden metropolis, Britt Reid, newspaper publisher of The Daily Sentinel by day, racket-buster by night, waged a “one-man fight to bring law-breakers to his self-made justice.” And that’s the truth.
No obstacle was too great for the Green Hornet! He was The Hero before the fall.
No one told the Green Hornet to brush his teeth; his cleaning lady didn’t tell him to spray his underarms; he wasn’t smeared with greasy kid- stuff or plagued with dandruff and upset stomachs; his job didn’t depend on a sweet-smelling breath.
He was the Green Hornet, slayer of giants.
The Hero was born, full-armored-like Athena -from the heads of Trendle-Campbell-Meurer, the ruling triumvirate of radio drama. The Green Hornet was a logical side of a Lone Ranger- Sergeant Preston-Green Hornet triangle.
As George W. Trendle, the 81-year-old Detroiter who created all three shows, explains: “The Lone Ranger, the first one, was produced for the kids. The point was to teach the youngsters respect for the law. It was sensible enough to be popular with oldsters as well.
“Then I put on Preston for the teenagers, to teach them love of country and love for animals.
“The third one, the Green Hornet, was to appeal to a little older group, the young people about to become voters. I wanted to show them that racketeers and crooked politicians could succeed unless they were stopped.”
The Green Hornet Stopped Them. He was stronger than dirt.
The Green Hornet was only a breath away from being the Purple Bee or the Yellow Jack. Trendle was simply looking for a character that would sting racketeers.
Allen Campbell, who was in charge of selling the radio dramas, suggested, “Why not call him the Hornet?”
Legal partner Raymond J. Meurer, a former orchestra leader, demurred, “We’d never get a copyright on Hornet.”
Well, then, how about the Blue Hornet? No? The Pink Hornet? Good Grief! The Purple Hornet? Not Bad. The Orange Hornet? aaaaaarrrgghh! The Green Hornet? BINGO! JACKPOT! TILT!
Clearly the Green Hornet couldn’t walk around town green-gowned and masked. Somebody might start talking.
He needed a sidekick, a pal like Tonto or Sergeant Preston’s dog, King. He needed an exotic partner of few words (King could say “Arf” and an occasional “Woof”; Tonto could say “Ugh” and an occasional “Kemo sabe”).
The Green Hornet-Britt Reid character took on a faithful valet, Kato. Kato began as a faithful Japanese valet, but on Dec. 8, 1941, was magically transformed into a faithful Filipino valet. When the Japanese overran the Philippines, he became a faithful Korean valet.
Kato was the only valet (even during the Depression) with a college education. For, in the secret nighttime world of Green Hornetdom, Kato was an inventor, a science fiction designer. It was Kato who souped up Black Beauty into a 1930s version of Bond’s Aston-Martin.
THE BLACK BEAUTY was IT, the hottest thing on the highway. Nothing, but nothing could beat Black Beauty. It was as invincible, indestructible and undraggable as the Lone Ranger’s Silver. Pull away from a stoplight with the old Black Beauty and you were left in the green dust of the Green Hornet.
Together, the Green Hornet, Kato and Black Beauty began the good fight for king and country on January 31, 1936, over WXYZ in Detroit.
As a publisher, Britt Reid learned, according to Trendle-Campbell-Meurer Inc., “of graft and corruption in government; of criminals who stayed within the law; of enemy agents, parlor pinks, and reds who gnawed at the vitals of America.”
He fought them all, “fighting to the finish without rules or legal red tape.”
The Detroit Free Press, September 5, 1965