Lawrence "Larry" Lance
Residence: Gotham City
Occupation: Police Detective, later Private Investigator
First Appearance (Golden Age): Flash Comics #92 (February 1948)
First Appearance (Post-Golden Age): Brave and the Bold #61
History
Little is known of the life of Larry Lance prior to his introduction to
Dinah Drake. It is known that he started his career as a police
detective in the mid-1940's in Gotham City, where he was the periodic partner of Richard Drake, Dinah's father. It was Richard Drake who introduced Lance to his daughter as he was grooming her to join the police force and took her on patrol to learn from his practices. While Lance was initially dubious, he was convinced when a raid of a gambling den turned on the essential contribution of Dinah's ambush from behind. The two bonded during the case and became closer, especially after her father died of a broken heart when Dinah's application to the Police Academy was rejected (DC Special Series #10),
By 1948, Lance had left the police force to become the head of a private detective agency of his own and Dinah had abandoned dreams of joining the police force, opening a flower shoppe instead (Flash Comics #92). Still driven by a spirit of adventure and law enforcement, Dinah created the identity of the Black Canary and Lance's casework often provided access to the action, especially after he moved his office into her flower shoppe (Flash Comics #95). Initially Drake kept Lance in the dark about her dual life and indulged his fascination with her for at least the the next year. When Lance was clued in that Drake was the Black Canary is not clear.
In mid-1948, Black Canary joined the Justice Society and by 1950, she and Lance had wed. Black Canary was active member of the JSA when it disbanded in 1951 and shortly thereafter, she was pregnant with Lance's child. In early 1952, the Lance's welcomed a baby daughter that they also named Dinah but the Wizard, vengeful from his prior defeats at the hands of the JSA, had deduced Black Canary's identity and visited a terrible curse on the child. Whenever the baby cried, the sonic effect was magnified hundreds-fold in decibels and force. Unable to control the child, the Lance's reached out to Johnny Thunder, who attempted to remedy the child with the power of his Thunderbolt. No remedy took and the Thunderbolt offered to take the child into his home dimension, where she would grow to adult in a state of suspended animation, at which point a cure might be found or she might better be able to manage her sonic powers as adult, As a final mercy, the Thunderbolt caused all involved parties to forget that baby Dinah ever existed at least until she could be returned to Earth-Two (Justice League of America #219-220).
As a spouse of a JSA member, Lance enjoyed intimate access to the world
of super-heroes, including knowledge of their secret identities. The
Lances were particularly close to Ted (Starman) Knight and shared
casework with him when super-heroes returned to active duty in the
1960's (Brave and the Bold #61). In 1969, the Lances were paying a
house call on Ted Knight when, as Starman, he came crashing through a
large window. They were to learn that Starman had encountered Aquarius,
a stellar entity of enormous power that had once been a living star but
had been rejected by council of such beings. Weakened by exile,
Aquarius was able to regenerate himself with Starman's cosmic rod and
went out to wipe Earth-Two nearly out of existence until the Red Tornado
was able to attract the Justice League of America for assistance. When
the heroes of Earth-One arrived, Aquarius mind-controlled the JSA to
attack them and when the Black Canary targeted the Green Arrow, he used
an adhesive arrow to bind her to the ground. When Aquarius lobbed an
energy globe at the entrapped heroine, Lance sacrificed himself,
allowing the globe to slay him rather than his wife (Justice League of
America #73-74).
After Aquarius was defeated, Lance was laid
to rest in the Thunderbolt dimension and en route, Black Canary also
succumbed to the radiation released by Aquarius. Before she died, her
memories and life essence were transferred to her daughter, who was
reanimated and send to live on Earth-One. Years later, Dinah Lance
learned the truth about her parents and began a new life as a
independent adult (Justice League of America #219-220).
Earth-One
The Larry Lance of Earth-One is a criminal known as The Collector. When Black Canary attempted to find her deceased husband's counterpart, she was taken in by the Earth-One version until she and Batman deduced the truth. Lance attempted to kill Batman but instead fell on his own knife, killing himself (Brave and the Bold #91).
Prior Earth-0
The history of Larry Lance in the post-Crisis timeline is thought to be largely identical to the Earth-Two version, other than Black Canary did not die shortly after him and Dinah was never in the Thunderbolt dimension. Dinah Drake Lance and Dinah Laurel Lance both operated as heroines in their respective teams, tho the elder Black Canary retired largely after Lance's death. She eventually succumbed to cancer decades later (Secret Origins #50).
Earth-37
The Larry Lance of this timeline remains a member of the Gotham City Police Force until he is murdered while trying to solve a case of a new street drug. His wife Dinah becomes the Black Canary to avenge him (Thrillkiller '62 #1).
Appearances (not include re-told information or illusions)
Adventure Comics #399
Brave and the Bold #61
DC Special Vol. 1 #3
DC Special Series Vol. 1 #10
Flash Comics #92-104
Justice League of America #73-74
Justice League of America #219-220