The Pulps were the midwife to the comics. Nowhere was this more evident than at DC Comics. The big editors, Julius Schwartz and Mort Weisinger had been fans and then Pulp editors then finally turned to comics. Many of the authors who created the classic characters and situations for Superman, Batman and The Flash had written for Pulps first, like Otto Binder, Edmond Hamilton, Manly Wade Wellman, Alfred Bester and Gardner F. Fox. It is no surprise that many Pulp themes were re-imagined in the comics.
One of these ideas was the super ape. There is an unsubstantiated rumor that Julius Schwartz believed a gorilla on the cover equaled higher sales. It would explain all the gorilla covers as well as the creation of Grodd, DC’s super ape villain. (Seen a few years ago on The Flash TV show.) Now, gorilla monsters are not new, even in the 1950s. Rider Haggard had two such creatures with Hendrika the baboon woman and Heu Heu the monster. These in turn inspired the ape monsters of Robert E. Howard in his Conan series with Ghak in “Rogues in the House”, the winged ape in “Queen of the Black Coast” and the unnamed gorilla in “Red Shadows”. But it was probably Edgar Rice Burroughs and his 1927 Barsoom novel, The Mastermind of Mars that had the greatest effect. Here ERB combines the idea of apes with brain transfers (again an old idea!) to create the character of Hovan Du, a human fighter whose brain resides in the body of a vicious Martian ape. Burroughs wrote the novel for Hugo Gernsback’s Amazing Stories Annual, and as such it was a widely read story in SF circles.
Not surprising, four years later in 1931, in Astounding Stories of Super-Science, Harry Bates’ new SF adventure Pulp, we see gorillas on the cover and mind transfer. The story is “Manape the Mighty” by Arthur J. Burks. It would be followed by a two-part sequel, “The Mind-Master” in January and February 1932. (That last title is a simple reversal of Burroughs’ ‘Mastermind’.)
Burks was one of the “million-words-a-year” writers, Pulpsters who wrote dozens of stories a year. Burks’ wrote mostly for the detective and shudder pulps, but he also penned supernatural tales for Weird Tales and Science Fiction for Hugo Gernsback and Harry Bates. Burks’ background was military, having been a Lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps in World War I.
Frank Gruber described his first meeting with Burks (circa 1934) in The Pulp Jungle (1967): …I had visualized a lean, hard-bitten young man. Instead of the John Wayne-type man I had visualized, Arthur turned out to be a rather short man, weighing well over two hundred pounds and wearing thick glasses. He was thirty-six or thirty-seven. He was an amazingly fast typist and could compose stories as fast as he could type.”
Much of Burks’ horror work features the Caribbean and jungle settings. “Manape the Mighty”, from Astounding Stories of Super Science, June 1931) is such a piece, combining weird situations (Science Fictional in the end) and danger filled jungles.
The story begins when the Bengal Queen is sunk. Rich playboy, Lee Bentley escapes death to wind up on a deserted African beach with another lost sole, the beautiful, Ellen Eastabrook. After some very dated titillation about scanty clothing, the pair discover they are not alone on the coast. The jungle is filled with savage apes that surround and threaten. They are rescued by a wizened old man named Caleb Barter, a famous surgeon and scientist. Barter takes them to his compound and shows them a gigantic ape in a cage that he calls Manape. Barter’s evil laugh, his whip and his unknown plans all smack of Dr. Moreau. But unlike Moreau, Barter isn’t turning animals into men but transferring the brains of men into the bodies of apes. Bentley, despite his actions to protect himself and Ellen, is stymied, for Barter knocks them out with gas and places Bentley’s brain inside the giant ape.
Dr. Barter’s terrible experiment is to let Apeman (ape brain in human body) carry Ellen out into the jungle where many other apes are. Thinking he is still an ape he wants to fight the attackers but is only a mere human physically. Barter also releases Manape (human brain in an ape body) to rescue them. Bentley as Manape is a killing machine, armed with an anthropoid body and human cunning, as well as a knowledge of jujitsu and boxing, slaughters the apes that try to take the girl.
Bentley/Manape follows the trail. Ellen faints when she sees him. Manape knocks out Apeman. Now that Lee has both of them he ponders what Barter’s next move is. They sleep for the night in a tree, only to wake up to find themselves surrounded by apes. But no harm comes from this because Manape had been their leader and is again.
Apeman’s body is raked with fever. A she-ape takes him under her care and tends to him. She chases Ellen away so she spends more time with Manape. Lee spends pages stewing about what to do but finally picks up a stick and writes “I am Lee” in the dirt. Ellen quickly figures out that Bentley and the ape have switched brains.
The pair are about to lead the apes against Professor Barter when disaster strikes. Nets falls from the trees and the shrewdness of apes (that’s what a group of apes is called!) are captured by a tribe of black warriors. Lee suspects it is part of Barter’s experiment. Burks indulges in some period racism, portraying the Africans as cruel and subhuman. They throw the apes into a cage that was built for them.
Lee, using his human mind, forces his ape fingers to untie his bonds. He frees the other apes and they crash out of their prison when Lee hears Ellen calling for help. The apes tear through the villagers. Burks indulges in some gruesome description before Lee finds Ellen. She is about to “face a fate worse than death”. Lee kills the rapist but suffers a mortal spear wound. The race is on now. Bentley, carrying Apeman, followed by Ellen, must get to Professor Barter for the reverse operation. Manape collapses on Barter’s floor.
Lee wakes to find himself in his human body. Ellen and Lee declare their love for each other. Barter interrupts them so he can get Lee’s experience of the experiment. His manuscript now finished Barter plans to return to civilization to be a famous success. The apes that followed Lee and Ellen back to Barter’s camp attack, killing the doctor. The leader of the apes confronts Lee but backs down when he recognizes he was once Manape. Ellen takes Barter’s manuscript of the entire experiment and burns it with Lee’s approval. The story ends much like the one that inspired it, Wells’ The Island of Doctor Moreau.
Burks’ story frustrates me not because the idea of brain transfer is silly but because of his style. I can enjoy the ape-brain thing. (I did when I read it in The Mastermind of Mars. F. Douglas McHenry did it even earlier in Weird Tales, November 1925 with “The Seventh Devil”. Arthur J. Burks appeared in that same issue.) The way AJB tells the story is slow, wasting long paragraphs on virtually nothing, filled with endless questions about what will happen. It was like he knew Clayton paid two cents a word so use lots of them. The story is a novella but could easily have been half as long.
“Manape the Mighty”, despite its flaws, must have been a crowd-pleaser because Burks wrote an even longer sequel. (“The Reader’s Corner” produced a few comments: “Manape the Mighty is a mighty good story,” wrote Jack Darrow. “I just had to write and tell you what a thrill “Manape the Mighty” gave me,” said Marianne Ferguson.)
This second tale (Astounding Stories of Super-Science, January– February 1932) begins with Lee and Ellen exiting the ship that has taken them to New York City from Africa. (Like Steven Spielberg and his dinosaurs, the author figures the same action in the big city will be an even better draw!) During the drive from the docks, Lee reads in a newspaper that a strange villain calling himself “the Mind Master” has threatened to show his power by kidnapping a list of important men. The letter also says someone from the Flatiron Building at a prescribed time will die by the Master’s hand. It just happens they are driving past that very building and a man stumbles out. Lee sends Ellen home while he checks the man out. The dying man says “….ind…aster….” before he dies. Clutched in his hand are the hairs of an ape.
Feeling bad because he has taken the hairs, Lee goes to the police. He tells Detective Thomas Tyler everything when the phone rings. It is for Lee. No one knows he is at the police station. It is Caleb Barter, who is now calling himself the Mind Master. He tells Lee he must become his assistant in turning all mankind into human-ape hybrids like he had been. Lee refuses and Barter tells him that he and Ellen will die.
We cut to Barter, who has a new accomplice, the Japanese scientist, Naka Machi. The man is brow-beaten by Barter but does his bidding. This time it is to set two men loose who have ape brains inside their skulls. (Sadly Naka Machi is added only to increase the “yellow peril” silliness of this story. The Mind Master’s note to the police is filled with similar “white race” malarky.) He also acts as a foil for Barter who prattles on about his plans to save the white race.
Barter uses his mind-controlled man to kidnap the wealthy Harold Hervey. Bentley and Tyler surround Hervey’s house, hoping to capture the man who will deliver the ransom note. Instead, Hervey walks in, missing his brain pan. The henchman escapes in a limo. Lee calls Ellen’s house. The Hervey kidnapping is largely a distraction because Barter has lured Ellen out of the house, disguising his voice. Lee figures the call to the police station was to help in the impersonation.
Bentley and Tyler pursue the limousine through Manhattan, as the driver callously runs over people. The police finally create a blockade with two patrol cars but the limo driver’s mind is abandoned by Barter. The driver reverts to his ape-self and climbs up on the car roof as the vehicle slams into the cops in the patrol cars. Murder and mayhem. The only good news is that Tyler’s men have secured Ellen and she is safe though a little frightened.
Tyler and Bentley go to the second man on Barter’s list, Saret Balisle. Balisle allows the men to surround him with gunmen in his office on the fourteenth floor. How can Barter possibly get at him? The answer is an ape that grabs him through the window. The monster carries him down the side of the building and throws him into a limousine from the second floor. The limo drives away, an accomplice of Barter’s. Cops chase the car but most go after the ape who ducks back into the building.
Once surrounded, Bentley shoots the silver ball off its head. This is part of Barter’s control mechanism. Unfortunately, all the other cops fill the ape with lead, mortally wounding it. Using the time he has, Bentley asks the dying ape if he is Harold Hervey. The ape can only nod yes. Using landmarks, Lee asks Hervey if the hideout is between this street and that street, narrowing down the area to search. The ape dies before he can get an exact location. Bentley surprises Tyler with his next move: he wants a surgeon, because he is going to become an ape again, to catch Caleb Barter! So ends the first half of this two-part sequel.
Burks resorts to a chain coincidences to prop up the next segment. The first is that Tommy Tyler’s dad is a great surgeon. Bentley’s plan is not to have his brain put in an ape body but to assume the identity of an ape. This is done when Dr. Tyler surgically attaches the skin from the dead ape onto Lee’s body. The second coincidence is that an explorer, Dr. Claude Jackson has just returned from South America with news of a man-like ape. It is this animal that Bentley will imitate in the hope that Barter will kidnap him.
The operation takes place in a lead-lined vault in hopes of surprising Barter, who seems to know their every move. Dr. Jackson spends several hours prepping Lee to impersonate his ape before he is taken out in a cage. The “Great Columbian Ape” is taken to the Bronx Zoo. Lee has to endure a day of sight-seers gawking at him, while feeling hunger. He is not sure he can keep his cover if he is seen eating. Another coincidence has random newspapers being left lying around so Lee can read about Ellen disappearing and the eighteen men Barter said he would kidnap disappearing too. That night two controlled men come to take Bentley. He rides in the back seat of the car wishing he could watch where they are going but doesn’t want to blow his cover.
We cut to Caleb Barter talking to Ellen Estabrook. Barter torments her when she asks where Lee is. Has she inadvertently fouled his plan? Barter says he might get around to experimenting on the female half of the human race. He threatens to mate her with the Japanese, Naka Machi. (More racism, bleh!) He also says he would experiment on their children. Finally he tires of her and hypnotizes her, and sets her about the housekeeping.
Bentley is brought into the hideout. His ape act is good until he sees Ellen Estabrook and his eyes scream murder for Caleb Barter. The professor says: “Good evening, Lee. I’ve been expecting you!” Lee attacks Barter but Naka Machi hits him across the neck with a karate chop. This blow makes Lee awake but unable to move. Machi removes the ape skin from Lee and places him against the wall. Barter has Lee watch his experiments as the police surround his compound. Barter is not worried about the cops because he threatens them with a dead hostage if they come too close. Lee is helpless and has to watch as Barter begins to do surgery on man after man, Ellen his hypnotized nurse.
When Lee is brought into the surgery, Barter shows him what happens to all the unwanted corpses. Taking the ape skin that was removed from Bentley’s body he burns it to ash with a handheld device that incinerates with the touch of a button. Slowly, as Barter operates, Lee feels his body slowly becoming unfrozen. Eventually he grabs the incinerator as his body falls to floor. From there he cuts Barter’s legs out from under him before destroying the rest of the madman. Naka Machi tries to dive in and stop him but is also burned up.
With the death of Barter, Ellen wakes up to see what she is doing, and promptly faints. Lee stands with the incinerator, trying to decide what to do next when one of the apemen steals the torch and burns up all the other apemen. He begs Lee to finish the job, by killing him too. Lee does, then kills all the men with ape brains. Taking the torch he burns a hole in the ceiling that will signal the police and the end of the story.
The last chapter of this tale presages a future part of Burks’ copious writing career, the Shudder Pulps. Stilted scenes of gore and madness were bread-and-butter for magazines like Horror Stories and Dime Mystery between 1935 and 1938. Along with Paul Ernst, Arthur Leo Zagat and others, Burks would be the star of these magazines. In this final piece he has a chance to learn the ropes for stories like “Slaves of the Blood-Wolves” (Terror Tales, December 1935) and “The Chair Where Terror Sat” (Horror Stories, June 1936).
Arthur J. Burks did not go onto a lengthy writing career after the Pulps. Ryerson Johnson, another Pulp giant, told in an interview with Will Murray in 1990, the odd fate of AJB. Johnson came across him in Chicago as Professor Burks, a spiritualist medium. “…But when I went to that meeting and here is old Arthur Burks up on the platform. He’s talking, talking, talking, and every once in a while he says ‘hello Johnny’ under his breath just to let me know that he knew I was there and don’t say anything to mess this up….” “The King of Pulps”, the amazingly fast writer of “Manape the Mighty” published only one book after the Pulps ended, The Casket (1970) which blended SF with metaphysics. Arthur J. Burks ended his career on the psychic circuit not the book circuit.
Other Pulps with Apes
