Fighting American

Fighting American
Fighting American #2 (July 1954), depicting the title character and his sidekick Speedboy. Cover art by Jack Kirby (signed "Simon & Kirby" for the writer-artist team)
Publication information
Publisher	Prize Group, Harvey Comics, Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Awesome Entertainment
First appearance	Fighting American #1 (May 1954)
Created by	Joe Simon (Writer) Jack Kirby (Artist)
In-story information
Alter ego	Nelson Flagg John Flagg
Partnerships	Speedboy
Abilities	Artificially enhanced strength, speed, endurance, and agility Master hand-to-hand combatant Longevity

Fighting American is the title character of a patriotically themed comic book character created in 1954 by the writer-artist team of Joe Simon and Jack Kirby. Published by the Crestwood Publications imprint Prize Comics, it was, contrary to standard industry practices of the time, creator-owned. Harvey Comics published one additional issue in 1966. One final inventoried tale was published in 1989, in a Marvel Comics hardcover collection of all the Fighting American stories.

Bitter that Timely Comics' 1950s iteration, Atlas Comics, had relaunched their hero Captain America in a new series in 1954, the writer-artist team of Joe Simon and Jack Kirby created another patriotically themed character, Fighting American. Simon recalled, "We thought we'd show them how to do Captain America". While the comic book initially portrayed the protagonist as an anti-Communist dramatic hero, Simon and Kirby turned the series into a superhero satire with the second issue, in the aftermath of the Army-McCarthy hearings and the public backlash against the Red-baiting U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy. Simon specified for a panel audience at the 1974 New York Comic Art Convention that the character was not so much inspired by Captain America as it was simply a product of the times.

Simon said in 1989 that he felt the anti-Communist fervor of the era would provide antagonists who, like the Nazis who fought Captain America during World War II, would be "colorful, outrageous and perfect foils for our hero." He went on to say,