The activities of the Turtle in the next two years are largely unknown.  Another obscurity is that in November of 1947, the Green Arrow and Speedy also faced down a criminal known as the Turtle, operating a sub to rob ships in Danger Channel.  This Turtle appears briefly in a shell costume similar to the one use by the criminal who battled the Flash.  Whether this criminal was the well-known Turtle in a transitional phase is not clear.

The Flash's next recorded encounter with the Turtle was 2 years later in December of 1947 and by that point, he had significantly up-scaled his modus operandi to include a costumed identity, custom armor based on turtle design and a new armament of slow-motion tactical gear.  In late 1947, he was shown to be regaling henchmen with films of his exploits against the Flash in his new armor but no records of these encounters exist.  Thus, casework exists in the 1945-1947 time frame in which the Turtle debuts his new ID.  The 1947 case involves the Turtle’s attempts to engage in a series of bizarre thefts.  It starts with his theft of rare plants and kidnapping the attending botanist aboard the Century Limited.  Unknown to the Turtle the Flash is a passenger on the train and attempts to stop the theft, only to be slowed down by the Turtle’s new “slow gas”, allowing the criminal to escape.

Shortly thereafter, the Turtle plotted to rob a dog race, moving slowly along the dogs so that the police could not shoot at him for fear of hitting the hounds.  With the Turtle creating a slow-motion distraction, his henchmen robbed the race office.  The Flash arrives on the scene only to see the Turtle take off in a slow-moving air balloon.  Hitching a ride on a stunt plane, the Flash jumped onto the balloon without looking, only to miss the Turtle floating away in a parachute with  the now-damaged balloon sinking to the ground.  Finding the Flash unconscious, the criminals bind him over a fire and leave him to a slow death.  Flash used fast motion to create smoke signals that would be recognized by a member of the Junior Justice Society, a junior benevolence operation operated by the American super-team.  As luck would have it, a local farm boy was a member and saved the speedster.

Days later, the Turtle got wind of a process of slowly making artificial diamonds perfected by Professor H. Salf.  Arriving to steal the jewels, the Turtle realized too slowy that the professor’s name spelled backwards was Flash and that he and his men had walked into a trap.  The professor unmasked, revealing the Flash who promptly sent the Turtle back to prison (Comic Cavalcade #24).

The history of the Turtle at this point becomes unclear. Someone saying they are Turtle re-appeared roughly a year later in December of 1948, where he appeared in a Turtle uniform during a parole board meeting.  This Turtle had been reported been in jail for 5 years and a model prisoner, raising the question of whether this was the same individual as the Turtle’s entire career up to that point would have occurred while this individual was in jail.  Since none of the Turtle’s cases have resulted in his being identified, it is possible this is a new individual stealing the original identity, especially as the costume appears different than previously seen. Alternatively, this is a tale set in the early 1950’s and 5 years had actually lapsed.