The Mexican Wold Newton Universe
1801-1899

In 1801 Dr. Carlos Frankenstein, a distant relation of Victor von Frankenstein, imitates his infamous cousin’s methods and creates a creature, Orlak, from corpse parts. Frankenstein’s henchman, Jaime, uses Orlak to kill Jaime’s enemies. [28]

In 1806 Don Diego de la Vega takes up the heroic mantle of Zorro for the first time. (Readers interested in a complete account of the events in the life of Don Diego de la Vega and his heroic should consult Dr. Matthew Baugh’s “Legacy of the Fox.”)

Shortly after Don Diego de la Vega becomes Zorro, another Spanish nobleman in California began imitating him. Don José de la Torre, of similar temperament and in imitation of his ancestor, the Count of Seville [29], also puts on the distinctive mask of Zorro and began calling himself by that name. As “Zorro” (hereafter Zorro (II)) de la Torre fought for good and for the poor against the depredations of the powerful. [30] It can only be speculated why de la Torre was content to let his acts be credited to the persona which de la Vega created rather than taking on his own, individual heroic identity; perhaps de la Torre felt that posing as Zorro, who was primarily investigated elsewhere, protected his secret identity all the more?

In 1809 Don Cesar Vega, the son of Zorro, meets the descendants of Athos, Porthos, Aramis, and D’Artagnan. [31] The descendants of the Musketeers are unaware of their ancestors’ meeting with an earlier Zorro [32] and no mention is made of it.

In 1815 Zorro (II) is imprisoned by his enemies. [33]

In 1833 the two daughters of Zorro (II), now grown into beautiful women, follow in their father’s footsteps and become Zorro themselves, making sure that those in power continue to fear Zorro. [34] For safety’s sake, the daughters’ biographers change their names in the fictional versions of their exploits. They see to it that their father is released from jail.

In 1834 Zorro (II), now sure that California is in good hands with his daughters fighting for justice, visits the court of Spain during the chaos of the Carlist War. [35] For safety’s sake, his biographer changes his name in the fictional version of his exploits there, which include freeing a group of imprisoned aristocrats from jail and killing a crooked police chief. [36]

In 1835 the Hungarian vampire Count Karol de Lavud, a.k.a. Count Duval, terrorizes the Welter family in Serra Negra in Mexico before being killed. [37]

One of the daughters of Zorro (II), still posing as Zorro, gains notice for her exploits against a crooked Don. [38]

In 1836 a band of graverobbers unwittingly disturb the grave of Count Duval. He is resurrected and transforms the graverobbers into zombies, who he sends out to capture beautiful women for his pleasure. [39]

In 1838 much of Mexico and southern California is terrorized by a criminal known as the Vulture, who commands a powerful gang and is in league with local witches. His reign of terror is finally ended through the efforts of government agent Captain Mauricio Rosales. [40]

In 1839 Zorro (II) visits England and defeats a corrupt agent of the Crown. As Don José de la Torre he charms Queen Victoria. [41]

In 1840, following the British extermination of the Kali-worshiping Cult of Thuggee, another group of Kali-worshipers invest a man with an array of psychic powers and martial training and send him out into the world as an instrument of justice. They call him “Kaliman,” and he is the first of the line of Kalimen to fight evil across the decades. [42] Given the true nature of Thuggee and Kali, as seen in the massacre of the royal Rundjee family [43], their attacks on English civilians in India [44] and on civilians in Paris, [45] their conflicts with the American adventurer Frank Merriwell [46], the American detective Old Sleuth [47], the French adventurer Rocambole [48], the Malaysian pirate Sandokan [49], the Anglo-Indian mesmerist Felix Stahl [50], the Anglo-Indian heiress Olga Trevelyan [51], the Italian policeman John Mauri [52], the German aviator Hans Stark [53], and the mystic Tahara [54], it is likely that the individuals behind the creation of Kaliman were not true Kali-worshipers and Thugs, but rather agents of the organization of Mr. Am [55] who had infiltrated the Kali cult in order to subvert it and turn its energies toward good and away from evil. Given the personal history of the fifth Kaliman (see 1963 below), this is likely.

In the 1840s a Spanish Don, clearly inspired by the exploits of the various Zorros, puts on a mask, makes himself expert with the whip, and begins to fight injustice as El Latigo. [56]. Among his other enemies are a band of devil worshipers and the supernatural being they worship, which claims to be “the devil.” [57] Later in the decade Latigo is assisted by the time-traveling luchador Tinieblas in a conflict with a band of murderous, reanimated mummies. [58]

In 1841, in Spanish-controlled California, Doña Chonita Iturbi y Moncada, the daughter of an old Castilian family, falls in love with the Don Diego Estenega, the scion of the Moncada’s hated rival. Don Diego kills Doña Chonita’s brother, and Doña Chonita, who is known to the local peasants as "The Doomswoman" because of her supernatural abilities, ends up in a convent after killing a rival through a curse.[59]

In 1849, in the aftermath of the Mexican-American war, Raphael Rejon, “the Lion of Mexico,” and his sister Buena Rejon, “the Maid of the Chaparral,” wage a guerrilla war on the hated invading Americans. The love of an American man and his sister reforms the Rejons, who eventually foreswear further violence against the United States.[60]

In 1857 Sir William Clayton travels to Mexico City as a military advisor to the Mexican Army. While there he marries Angela Bridget and fathers a daughter on her.[61]

Beginning in the late 1850s the beautiful Texan rancher Elegra Douglas is force to defend her family land by a succession of evil ranchers, thieves and “Montezuma cultists.” So she takes on the identity of the masked outlaw the Mexicans call “Señorita Scorpion.” As Señorita Scorpion Douglas robs banks and attacks those who invade her land, all while trying to find the Lost Santiago Mine. [62]

The years after the American Civil War were the first of extensive interaction between American and Mexican adventurers, both on the American frontier and in northern Mexico. Heroes like the aging Indian fighter Old Scout [63], the German cowboy Bill Cnox [64], the second Cisco Kid [65] [E], the frontiersman known as the “New Leatherstocking” [66], the scout “Texas Jack” Omohundro [67], the wandering English vigilante known to the native peoples as “Eagle Eye” [68], the cowboy and amateur detective “Hashknife” Hartley [69], the wandering cowboy “Buckshot” McKee [70], the Spaniard, Mexican, and Portuguese adventurers known as the Three Good Men [71], the trio of adventurers known as the Three Mesquiteers [72], the German-American cowboy Bob Hunter [73], the German hero known as “Old Shatterhand” [74], and the Texas Ranger Tex Willer [75]—these men all saved innocent maidens, fought outlaws, wild animals, “witches” and “wizards,” and discovered cities of “Gorilla Men” [F] in the late 1860s, l870s, and 1880s.

In 1865, with Maximilian of Austria ruling Mexico, foreigners and Europeans begin relocating to Mexico. One of these is the vampire countess Mayra. She and her followers terrorize Mexico City before being killed by the latest El Santo. [76]

In 1870 the current El Santo fights a match with a luchador named “Satan.” El Santo defeats Satan, but Satan makes an unholy deal with a supernatural force calling itself “the devil,” to return in a century and fight El Santo again. [77]

Some time in the 1870s the Mexican masked vigilante known as “The Black Cowboy” stopped an attempt by an insane doctor to use cadavers to discover the secret of immortality. [78] In that same decade five teenagers in the town of Los Alamos, Mexico, set aside their rivalry for the hand of a beautiful woman and becomes the masked Cinco Halcónes, enforcing the peace in Los Alamos and the lands around it. [79]

During that decade Jimmy Ryan, an American cowboy living in Mexico, discovers that the cattle on his ranch are being eaten by a giant Allosaurus. [80] That decade also sees the appearance of El Látigo Negro, a man who is hanged for a crime he did not commit and then seemingly returns from the dead to destroy evil. [81] The Látigo Negro goes on to destroy his evil, supernatural opposite [82] and a gang of thieves. [83]

During that decade El Zorro Escarlata, a scarlet-masked wandering hero, fought crime across Mexico, aided by his sidekick Pascual. [84] His enemies were quite varied, including a witch whose son is reanimated, after his death, into a creature similar to Victor von Frankenstein’s creation. [85] (Zorro Escarlata was forced to fight the undead creature a second time before finally defeating him. [86]). Some of his other enemies were equally unnatural. [87]

During the 1880s the Colmans, a family of Mexican vampire-slayers, wipe out all but one of the Subotai [G] clan of vampires. [88] One of the Subotai clan not killed by the Colmans becomes a gunfighter who gains his supernaturally quick draw by killing his victims and draining their quick-draw talents; the vampire is nonetheless killed by another gunfighter. [89]

Two sisters become the masked vigilantes Hermanas X to fight a gang of land thieves. [90] In the Calaveras Mountains a masked cowboy calling himself Charro de las Calaveras avenges the murder of his parents by killing the werewolf, vampire, and Headless Horseman responsible for their murder. [91]

In 1881 Dona Luisa Villena, a Mexican noblewoman, and her father Don Manuel Villena, become “Lady Jaguar” and “El Alacran,” two widely feared outlaws of the black chaparral of northern Mexico, while searching for the means to avenge themselves on the man who killed Leon Villena, Luisa’s brother. They achieve this vengeance with the help of an American traveler. [92]

In 1882 a supernatural spirit, in the form of a ball of fire, appears to the natives of a Mexican village to warn them about a coming conflict involving water rights. [93]

In 1883 a kind-hearted witch, a possessed ventriloquist’s dummy, and the witch’s horseman friend help clear a rancher who is framed for murder. [94]

In 1885 the wandering, lighthearted cowboy adventurer Lauriano encounters Gamma and Beta, two female, humanoid aliens. Gamma is an evil vampire; Beta is part robot, and falls in love with Lauriano. Gamma and Beta claim to be from “Venus” [H] and are accompanied by a strange array of creatures, including a cyclops, a disembodied brain, and a walking skeleton. Gamma, Beta, and Lauriano explore the solar systems around Earth until they are stranded during a return to Earth. [95] (Nothing further has been discovered of “Gamma” and “Beta,” and it is suspected that the pair died soon after being stranded on Earth).

In 1888 a Mexican engineer, Pedro da Luz, creates a train engine (known only as “the Engine”) which gains a form of sentience and after da Luz’s death begins attacking other trains and all humans. Despite numerous traps being set for it the Engine is never captured. [96]

In 1890 a young woman, Luisa, arrives in Mexico City via time travel from 1968. She encounters one of Dracula’s soul clones, [97] who transforms Luisa into a vampire, but before she can begin preying on other humans she is returned to 1968. [98]

In 1891 Gaston, a lighthearted wandering cowboy, and Dr. Morales, a scientist, find, in Mexico, an aquatic humanoid. [99] In his article in Journal of Unusual Biology (later the Journal of Meteoric Studies) Morales names the species “Brazilopithecus rlyeh.” Gaston’s description of the humanoid matches that of the creature found in the Amazon in 1953. [100]

In 1894 the American adventurer Brisco County, Jr. transports Emma Steed, a British spy, to Mexico as part of a prisoner exchange. [101]

In 1899 the vampiric Countess Frankenhausen, the wife of Count Frankenhausen, [102] is killed by Count Valsamo de Cagliostro, the descendant of Count Cagliostro. [103]

Introduction.
Prehistory-1785.  
1801-1899.
1901-1950.
1951-1966.
1967-1972.
1973-2005.
Endnotes.
Bibliography.

Some Unknown Members of the Wold Newton Family Tree.