Super BB - 1978

A few months ago, we talked about Super A, a Wonder Woman-centric educational "kit" dispensed to schools that used comics to help kids learn how to read.

Now F.O.A.M. member Kyall Coulton, who sent Super A, has sent the Shrine another kit, called Super BB, which also features an Aquaman story specificially modified for this set. Here's the cover:

Aquaman, Wonder Woman, and Bobo would make for quite the team-up book!

Anyway, here's the story reprinted and amended:

Like with Super A, this is an old Aquaman story that's been re-lettered and re-titled. Even the character of Dr. Mitsuma has been renamed from the original, making it difficult to figure out which story this originally was (any Aqua-Fan have an idea?).

Its clearly drawn by Ramona Fradon (with some changes by what looks like Joe Kubert), which makes it from some 1950s issue of Adventure Comics, like the one from Super A was.

Unlike Super A, though, this kit also came with some other Aqua-material, like these puzzle and learning pages:

If you want to learn more about these Super A kits, head on over to Kyall's superb WonderWomanCollectors.com site. Thanks Kyall!

Super A - 1977

This is the super-spiffy box for Super A, a motivational reading kit designed to help students learn how to read. In the kit was a poster, a teacher's manual, some "task cards", and four full-color comics featuring reprinted stories re-dialogued.

The kit mostly focuses on Wonder Woman, but one of the comics does feature an Aquaman story, presented below:

This story confounds me a little bit--okay, a lot: I have no idea what comic its from! I did a search for this story on both the GCBD and Mike's Amazing World, and came up with nothing. Since the dialogue has obviously been rewritten, I guess its possible the title was, too, but that seems unlikely, not to mention pointless.

Also, the art: clearly its by the great Ramona Fradon, but there are panels--like, say, panel 2 page 7--that don't look like Fradon's work at all, leaving me utterly baffled.

You can learn more about this book and the whole Super A kit over on F.O.A.M.er Kyall Coulton's awesome WonderWomanCollectors.com site, and it was Kyall who sent me some of this material in the first place. Another F.O.A.M.er, Chip Cataldo, just happened to send me the rest of the story almost around the same time--clearly something educational was in the air. Thanks guys!