It astounded us late yesterday afternoon, during our search for information on Chuck Clayton of Archie Comics fame, to find that a little-known all-black comic book title featuring characters drawn uncannily like the Archies. In fact, on first glance, we assumed it was an Archie Comics title.

Not so. Fast Willie Jackson, published in 1976, was a Fitzgerald Periodicals title. The title character was an easy-going everyman in the Chuck Clayton vein (but without the basketball profiency) who had the hots for the neighborhood brickhouse, Dee Dee Wilson, and whose cronies included a JJ of Good Times fame look-alike named Jo-Jo, a militant named Jabar, Frankie Johnson, a jive-talkin' cool papa who falls just short of being identified as a pimp, and a weight-lifting strongman called Hannibal.

The events of the comic are set in Mo City USA, a predominantly black metropolis where "the bad, strong, fast, together brothers and sisters" are constantly throwing around terms like, "Can you dig it?" and "rock solid" and "sweet baby."

Only one recurring white character appears in the comic, a policeman called Officer Flagg, who Willie and the bunch refer to as "The Man." There's also a Latino bodega/soda shop owner, Jose Martinez, and an Asian man who owns a martial arts studio in Mo City.

This comic's kind of like a print version of the film, Five on the Black Hand Side.

In short, Fast Willie Jackson was the closest publication there is to a Blaxploitation comic. And we mean that in a good way.

It's a shame it only survived for seven issues, petering out once and for all in 1977. An eBay search let us know that the first issue of the book, unslabbed, has an average starting price of just $38.

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