Slam Bradley

Slam Bradley
First appearance of Slam Bradley, from Detective Comics #1, March 1937. Art by Joe Shuster.
Publication information
Publisher	DC Comics
First appearance	Detective Comics #1 (March, 1937)
Created by	Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster
In-story information
Alter ego	Samuel Emerson Bradley
Species	Human
Team affiliations	Gotham City Police Department
Abilities	Extremely good bar-fighter known to take down several opponents at once; excellent detective

Samuel Emerson "Slam" Bradley is a fictional character that has appeared in various comic book series published by DC Comics. He is a private detective who exists in DC's main shared universe, known as the DC Universe. Created by Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster (the latter two also created Superman), the character is a hard bitten, tough private eye who loves working for dames, but prefers the platonic company of his sidekick, "Shorty" Morgan (bearing in mind a target audience of 10-year-old boys). Slam was one of the first stars of Detective Comics, debuting in #1 (March, 1937) a year before Superman first appeared and two years before Batman would make the title his home.

Slam Bradley was originally outlined by Wheeler-Nicholson in a May 13, 1936 letter to Jerry Siegel, which stated: "We need some more work from you. We are getting out at least one new magazine in July and possibly two. The first one is definitely in the works. It will contain longer stories and fewer. From you and Shuster we need sixteen pages monthly. We want a detective hero called 'Slam Bradley.' He is to be an amateur, called in by the police to help unravel difficult cases. He should combine both brains and brawn, be able to think quickly and reason cleverly and able as well to slam bang his way out of a bar room brawl or mob attack. Take every opportunity to show him in a torn shirt with swelling biceps and powerful torso ala Flash Gordon. The pages are to run the same size as New Comics but to contain eight panels a page instead of six."

Detective was originally an anthology comic; Slam's adventures continued despite Batman's debut in #27, through World War II and beyond, finally ending in Detective Comics #152 (October, 1949). The feature was replaced by Roy Raymond, TV Detective. Bradley would not make another significant appearance for over 32 years and his sidekick Morgan disappeared completely.