World's Finest Comics #16

July 28, 1944

"The Mountaineers of Crime!"

Oh joy, another story set away from Gotham. And like the last story, it's one where Gotham's criminal element comes and sullies the innocence of the land. In the mountains somewhere outside Gotham City (not near the desert though), Bruce and Dick are traveling to a factory that makes lens for the war effort. Bruce needs to negotiate a truce between the longtime feuding McKees and Chatfields. The Chatfields have been working at the plant and swear the McKees are responsible for the thefts and sabotage that has been happening at the plant.

The two are forced off the road by an explosive which they manage to survive. The masked men who set off the explosion find that Bruce and Dick are not the person they are looking for, so they ride off. The two change to Batman and Robin and find themselves attacked by moonshining Chatfields. They disarm them and find that the reason the McKees are suspected as one of them was called out during a recent raid.

On the walk to town, the two encounter Sneeves, an archeologist in a car similar to theirs. He is looking for evidence of a prehistoric creature whose prints he discovered in caves nearby. They are attacked by the masked riders, but the Duo manage to send them running.

Once settled in town, Bruce and Dick visit the factory and learn that one of the lens grinders was stolen. The robbery was successful as the workmen, most of them Chatfields, were spooked by the ghost of the first McKee that was ever killed in the feud. That night, the masked riders raid the factory, but Batman and Robin are waiting for them. The two are knocked out by one who makes a verbal error in using slang that only a city person would know. It tips Batman off that the McKees may not be the ones involved in the raids.

They race to find Sneeves as they determine the caves he was exploring was where this city crook is hiding out. They find Sneeves shot, but alive. With him out of commission, they need to find another way to the caves. So they take the road he usually road with a dummy of Sneeves appearing to drive the car. The car is attacked and the Duo surprise the gang. In the end, it turns out that the gang was made up of other mountaineers who were lured by the ways of easy money by the city criminal who knew that the feud would make perfect cover for their crimes.

I am on the fence as to whether this is worthy of a World's Finest Comic. It certainly is a layered story that is elevated beyond what I was expecting, but I am getting tired of stories not set in Gotham. Is that a fair argument against it? Not really, especially since it works, so we'll say this one squeaks by as a World's Finest.

And what's next, Citizens? We're back to the daily newspaper strip of 1944 leading into 1945.