Miss America
Personal information
Real Name: Joan Dale
Residence: New York City
Occupation: Reporter, adventurer, FBI Agent
First Appearance (Golden Age): Military Comics #1 (Augusta 1941)
First Appearance (Post-Golden Age): All-Star Squadron #31 (May 1984)
Character History
Nothing is known of the life of Joan Dale before she was a female
reporter for the New York office of the Daily Star in 1941, One day the
young reporter was day dreaming on a park bench overlooking the Statue
of Liberty. She wondered what it would be like to embody the power of
the Statue of Liberty. Drifting into sleep, she dreamed that the
Statue of Liberty spoke to her, conferring upon her power and purpose as
America's defender. Awakening, she thought it all a dream until she
commanded a tree to disappear and the tree indeed disappeared.
Late
for work, Joan boarded a ferry where she saw an old man exhorting
democracy beset by a gang of thugs. Again marshaling her new powers,
she turns the thugs into doves. The rescued man claimed that she wasa
true American spirit and called her Miss America, a name she took for
herself. As she disemarks, she hears of a bombing of a factory in
Newark and using her press pass, gets to the scene. Dismissed by local
investigators, she finds a piece of the explosive and commands it to
show her it's origins. It reveals a stately manor and she resolves to
investigate it herself.
Arriving Joan sees the owner of the
factor, Mr. Grost, lecturing a group of men. Joan overhears plans to
bomb another plant but when she alerts the FBI, she encounters Grost
again and the agency dismisses her as crank. Resolving to save the
plant, she races there, turning thugs into trees when they attempt to
stop her. When she sees Grost's men planting a bomb, she causes the
explosive to take flight and pursue them. As they speed up the road,
the bomb enters the car and explodes.
Having saved the plant,
Dale returns to Grost's home but the traitor is prepared and meets her
with a gun. She quickly uses her powers to pull the gun to her and the
cowardly Grost offers to write a full confession if she spares him. She
leads him to the FBI where he runs inside, begging to be arrested and
free from Miss America (Military Comics #1).
From there, Miss
America becomes an ardent foe of the American home front. She helps a
naturalized citizen evade saboteurs attempting to recruit him (Military
Comics #2) and breaks up a racket counterfeiting defense bonds (Military
Comics #3). Craving respect which she never gets at the Star, Dale
quits and joins the New York office of the FBI. In her first case, she
exposes a "patriotic band" that join the army but is actually using
music to provide codes for saboteurs. She also adopts a uniform with a
stars and bars motif in her guise as Miss America (Military Comics #4).
The
following year, case work continued as she worked to make a name for
herself. She exposed a ring of saboteurs sinking ships off the New
England coast, using a "haunted house" as a cover (Military Comics
#5). She thwarted a gang of Nazi agents operating under the guise of a
"anti-crime" club for youth that actually committed crimes (Military
Comics #6). She later put an end to the criminal career of the Moth, a
gangster specializing in silk thefts who is killed attempting to escape
Miss America (Military Comics #7).
Shortly thereafter, Miss
America's power and zeal attracted the attention of Uncle Sam, the
living spirit of America, who was organizing a group of "Freedom
Fighters" to intervene on Earth-X, a parallel Earth where Nazis were
gaining ground far faster than on Earth-Two. Miss America agreed and
while initial victories were won, the group was ambushed by a group of
Japanese zeroes who bombed the boat they were on, seemingly killing them
all but Uncle Sam. Hourman was later
revealed to have survived but the fate of Miss America is not
revealed. As the most powerful member of the group, it seems likely she
may have lived but whether she returned to Earth-Two or remained on
Earth-X is not known.
Powers and Abilities
The nature of Miss America's abilities in the Earth-Two timeline are unclear but in any case appear vast. She has the ability to manipulate matter extensively - telekinesis to move it, transmutation of one substance to another and transmogrification of objects into other objects. She could track objects by coaxing details about their origins and exposures from them. She had some powers of flight, tho the full extent of physical powers is unclear.
Weaknesses and Limitations
While vastly powerful, Miss America appeared to have at least mortal limits in that she could be bound, gassed or injured by sufficient blunt force or explosive trauma. Given her brief documented history, her exact limitations remain unclear.
Multiversity
The early life of Joan Dale is thought to be largely similar to her Earth-Two counterpart. While she was present at Uncle Sam's first gathering of the Freedom Fighters, she survived that event and later learned the her hallucination of the Statue of Liberty was in fact the result of an initiative known as Project M that had experimented on her and gave her powers (Secret Origins Vol. 2 #26). She was later liberated by the Young All-Stars and joined the Justice Society as Secretary (Young All-Star #12-14, Annual #1).
She participated in some JSA casework, replacing Wonder Woman in stories parallel to casework on Earth-Two. The exact extent of participation and which cases involved her, rather than Hippolyta or the Golden Age Fury is not clear. At some point after the war, she married her paramour Derek Trevor and retired from adventuring. When the Golden Age Fury became pregnant with a daughter Lyta, she entrusted her to the Trevors' care to raise as their own. When Lyta eventually married and was later widowed, she returned to her parents home (Infinity Inc #48-50).
After Derek Trevor died, Joan re-emerged, revealing that as a result of Project M's manipulations, she no longer aged and had appeared to do so as a comfort to her mortal husband. She reclaimed her identity as Miss America and joined the modern day version of the Freedom Fighters (Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters Vol. 1 #5-8,Vol. 2 #1-8).
Her final fate in this timeline is unknown.
Prime Earth
A version of Miss America is known to exist in the this timeline and had two juvenile sidekicks, Betsy Ross and Molly Pitcher (Stargirl and the Lost Children LS). How much of her history mimic other timelines is unknown.
Earth-22
The Joan Dale of Earth-22 is thought to have a similar history as the Earth-0 version up until the 1950's. At this point, she became the lover of Tex Thompson, U.S. Senator and secretly the Ultra-Humanite. Dale learned the truth and the further truth that the Ultra-Humanite had implanted the brain of Adolph Hitler in the body of Dan "the Dynamite" Dunbar. As a gathering of heroes designed to allow the Ultra-Humanite to consolidate his grip on his pursuit of the presidency, Dale revealed the truth but was murdered by a de-humanized Robotman before she could reveal the full truth (The Golden Age LS).