A few days ago we saw George F. Worts' Singapore Sammy get a story named for him more than a year after he first appeared in print. That's nothing! Gordon Young's Don Everhard first appeared in 1917, and it took until this 1928
Adventure for him to get a story called "Don Everhard." Of course, this may only mean that Young or editor Anthony Rud couldn't think of a title for this latest story. This became more of a problem later; in both 1933 and 1936 Young published stories titled simply, "Everhard." Great claims are made for this character, namely that the reputedly emotionless Everhard is an important precursor to the hard-boiled detectives who began appearing in
Black Mask in the 1920s. I've probably read too little of Everhard to judge objectively, but from the fragments I've read I doubt that Young was much of a stylistic influence on Carroll John Daly, Dashiell Hammett, Frederick Nebel, etc. In fact, his style is as emotionless or stilted as his character. Young aside, this isn't exactly an all-star issue of Adventure. Its highlight for me would probably be Ralph R. Perry's short story "Bulldog," while the biggest name in it, apart from Young, would be J. Allen Dunn. The new serial this issue,
Dust and Sun, is by Clements Ripley. Whatever it was about, someone saw something cinematic in it, for in 1930 it became the early Humphrey Bogart picture
A Devil With Women. Ripley went Hollywood himself, eventually, contributing to the screenplays of Bette Davis' Oscar-winner
Jezebel and William Wellman's
Buffalo Bill. His novel
Black Moon was made into a still-underrated 1934 voodoo picture with Fay Wray. With that sort of CV, his
Dust and Sun could very well be very interesting....
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