All Star Comics #7
August 25, 1941
($1,000,000 for War Orphans)
This is going to be a brief look at Batman's brief appearance in a thinly disguised anthology book. The comic is called All Star Comics and yet it deals with the Justice Society of America, the precursor to the Justice League of America. Each issue, the members of the League would solve some mystery or crime by splitting up and pursuing individual clues in separate stories. They would then meet up at the end to rap up the story.
Essentially, the League was made up of heroes who appeared in other anthology books and who didn't have their own comic series. This explains why Batman doesn't appear in each issue, but is rather an "Honorary Member". The same holds true for Superman and the Flash. Plus, at the end of this issue, Green Lantern becomes an Honorary Member as he was getting his own series starting the next month.
This story basically deals with Green Lantern returning from war torn Europe and wanting to help the people there by raising one million dollars. Each of the eight members commits to raising a hundred thousand, save for Johnny Thunder who says he will raise three hundred thousand as a way of making up for his mistakes in recent issues.
The comic then proceeds to tell the tales of each hero as they work to raise the money. The reason I say this is more like an anthology is that with each installment of the hero, the artist who draws them in the other anthology book does the art here as well. As much as I love the artwork for Hawkman, it is a little jarring to read what is supposed to be one complete tale and then have the art vary.
