The Mexican Wold Newton Universe
1901-1950

In 1901 a Wild West Show passes near the "Forbidden Valley." A paleontologist, Sir Horace Bromley, and a cowboy, Tuck Kirby, venture into the Valley and discover that it is the home to a vast array of dinosaurs. [104] It is clear that the Forbidden Valley is the same location which Jimmy Ryan discovered in the 1870s. [105]

In 1902 an American scientific expedition into the Chiapas section of Mexico discovers a lost tribe up Mixtecs high up in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas north of Pijijlapan. The expedition is slaughtered, with only one infant surviving. The tribe’s prophecies state that one day the “predestined ruler of Karnux” (the prophesied future Mixtec empire) would arrive, being fair, with a “skin of burnished silver,” and rescue the tribe. The infant was raised as one of the Mixtecs for the next twenty years, given the name “Ozar,” and assigned the task of “fulfilling the Five Sacred Commands of Mexlitl, the Sun God.” [106]

In 1903 the American philanthropist and adventurer Frank Merriwell discovered a gold mine in Mexico. [107]

In 1904 the American cowboy and military hero Ted Strong travels to Mexico accompanied by his Rough Riders. [108]

In 1905 the pseudonymous German detective “Detective Nobody” investigates an unusual case in Mexico City. [109]

In 1906 the teenaged American adventurers known as the “Motor Boys” discovered discovered the underground ruins of a lost city of Mixtecs buried centuries ago in an earthquake. [110]

In 1908 the German adventurer (and agent of the organization of “Mr. Am” [111]) Sir Ralf Clifford battles an occult menace in Mexico City. [112]

In 1911, during the Mexican Revolution, an enchanted magic talisman brings good and evil to those who wear it, depending on their innate natures. [113] The Mexican general Pancho Villa hides a Mixtec treasure with the intention of using it, after the Revolution is over, to benefit the Mexican people. He writes the location of the treasure on five bullets. [114]

The cowboy vigilante Zorro Escarlata and the luchador Sombra Vengadora team up to help the revolutionaries. [115] This is the first recorded incident of Sombra Vengadora traveling in time, although given the familiarity demonstrated between Zorro Escarlata and Sombra Vengadora, this was clearly not their first encounter. [I]

In 1912 the teenaged American adventurer Tom Swift discovered a “lost” Mixtec city in Mexico, the first of several he would find. [116]

In 1914 the Mexican general Pancho Villa began series of several years of adventures and exploration, in which he fought not just invading American forces but also Japanese spies and native witches. [117]

Gustavo, a killer with psychic powers, is finallly captured and sentenced to death. But he uses his powers to put himself into suspended animation after he is buried alive. [118]

In 1915 Pancho Villa fights the American group of teen adventurers known as the “Broncho Rider Boys,” although the results of this clash were portrayed much differently by the Broncho Rider Boys’ biographer than reality justified. [119]

In 1916 the American mercenaries known in Mexico as the “Gringo Legion” began operating along the U.S.-Mexico border, in Tijuana and Mexicali, chasing thiefs and performing “muscle work” for the highest bidder. [120] That same year the gentleman thief Sebastián began his well-known exploits in Mexico City and environs. [121]

In 1917 the Mexican assassin known only as “the Hairless Mexican” has the misfortune to become involved with the espionage work of the English spy Ashenden. [122] That same year the French boxing champion Marcel Dunot fought German spies in Mexico City and the Panama Canal. [123]

In 1918 the German aviator Hans Stark battles Mexican Communist rebels in the deserts south of the U.S.-Mexico border. [124] 

In 1919 the German big game hunter Jack Bowden defeats a plot by a group of Mexican Communists in Mexico City. [125]

In 1920 the rule of Damballah, a voodoo priest, over a small Caribbean island is finally broken through the efforts of two policemen. [126]

In 1922 the American crime-fighting teenagers known as the “Radio Boys” fought Mexican bandits along the U.S.-Mexico border. [127]

In 1923, in the jungles of the Yucatan, the teenaged American adventurers known as the “Boy Adventurers” find a city which claims to be “El Dorado." [128] Later that year the German adventurer Jim Buffalo, while following the “Testament of Cagliostro,” encounters adventure in rural Mexico. [129]

In 1924 Ozar rids the Mixtec community of high priests and is acclaimed the ruler of Karnux.[130] Later that year a gang of desperadoes in a rural section of the country cut off the hand of a lone cowboy. The cowboy retaliates by haunting the gang as the “Headless Horseman.” [131]

In 1925 the German adventurer Kurt Gafran fights evil in Mexico City. [132] Later that year the American aviator Bill Scott fights a series of thieves and evil pilots along the U.S.-Mexico border. [133] That year the “Headless Horseman” goes after a gang of graverobbers targeting the head of Pancho Villa. [134]

In 1926 the American Harry Dickson discovered the Mixtec “god” Gurrhu living in a city underneath London. [135] That year the Mexican master thief Máximo Roldán began a two-decades-long career of thievery in Mexico City. [136]

In 1927 the insane scientist Dr. Forti begins a series of cruel and ultimately lethal experiments on patients. When his experiments become known, he flees, but continues his experiments in secret. [137]

In 1928 the American aviator Connie Kurridge discovers buried treasure in Mexico, later helping to prevent a Communist revolt in the nearby republic of “Anchovy.” [138] That year the German detective John Kling discovers an enclave of Mayans in the jungles of the Yucatan. [139]

In 1929 Ozar leads a native uprising in the Chiapas, using advanced technology to defeat the Mexican police and Army. The rebels march on the Mexico-U.S. border but are eventually defeated through the efforts of Jimmy Christopher, a.k.a. Operator 5. [140]. Christopher’s biographer alters key facts of the conflict so as to spare American and Mexican sensibilities.

In 1932 the teenaged American adventurer Don Sturdy discovered a lost Mayan city, still populated, in the Yucatan. [141]

In 1933 “La Llorona,” the ghostly “wailing woman,” makes an appearance in downtown Mexico City before being defeated by a heroic surgeon. [142] That year an American boy, tutored by an agent of Mr. Am’s organization [143], claims his destiny as the greatest mystic of a lost race of blue-eyed Aryans. The boy, calling himself “Tahara,” takes command of the race after defeating an evil race of immortals (possibly the agents of the Nine Unknown? [144]) operating from the ruins of Mixtec fortress in the Yucatan. [145] That year the lawman Pete Rice begins a long tenure of service enforcing the law in the remote town of Buzzard Gap, Arizona. [146]

1933 is also the year in which the adventurer Doc Savage came to the attention of the American public. [147] As is known to historians of the unusual, Savage was funded by a supply of gold located in a lost valley somewhere in Central America and guarded over by the descendants of the Mayans. What is not as widely known is a similar figure–tall, with bronzed skin, highly skilled and claiming to be the descendant of the “Mayan kings”–appeared at the same time in London. This man, who called himself “Sun Koh,” attempts to raise “Atlantis” from the ocean and to convert Greenland into arable land.[148] In this, however, he is only partially successful, even though his German biographers altered the facts to suit the sensibilities of the contemporary German audience. [149]

In 1935 Dr. Forti resurfaces, accompanied by his son. He is eventually caught. [150] That same year Dr. Eduardo Molina proves that the retina of the eye retains the last image seen by the eyes, even after death. [151] In Los Angeles Nevada Alvarado, a Mexican woman of Mixtec descent, gains renown in the Latino community of Los Angeles as the partner of detective Violet McDade. [152] In Mexico and the other countries of Central America agents of the United States fight subversion, whether from the U.S.S.R. or elements within the French and Japanese governments; one of the most effective of these agents is Anthony Hamilton. [153]

In 1936 another insane scientist, Dr. Del Vialle, kidnaps young women and lethally experiments on them as a way to keep his dying wife alive. [154] That same year another criminally insane scientist, Dr. Dyenis, performs a series of experiments designed to alter the brain chemistry and intelligence of the ape-like creature he has created. In this he is assisted by a Hindu servant, likely an agent of the Nine Unknown [155]. The ape-man eventually breaks free and kills Dr. Vialle. [156]

In 1938 the American adventurer Joshua Jones, while exploring the Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza, discovers the alien Element 155 and uses it to fight a Nazi plot as Captain Gravity. [157]

In 1939 the insane plastic sturgeon Dr. Ernesto Duarte injects his wife’s lover with a disfiguring virus and then mutilates her in an operation. [158] That same year the good-natured Mexican rogue Cantinflas helps stop insane museum curator Dr. Gallardo and his Mixtec cult from carrying out human sacrifices. [159] In Mexico City a beautiful and headstrong young woman, Adelita, meets and befriends a detective, Nancy. Together they begin a long series of adventures. [160] The German adventurer and explorer Frank Faber investigates a mystery in the jungles of the Yucatan. [161]

In 1940 Adelita and Nancy are rescued from a car crash by Superman. [162]

An insane scientist calling himself “Doctor Satan” (neither the first nor the last to go by that name, and not related, as far as is known, to the insane criminal who opposed consulting detective Ascott Keane in 1935 and 1936 [163]) attempts to steal various pieces of technology in order to build himself an army of androids and take over America. He is opposed by the masked vigilante Copperhead. [164]

Rodrigo Gaynor, an upper class Mexican-American is traveling through the American southwest when he discovers that the poor are being oppressed. So, modeling himself on the 19th century vigilante El Latigo [165], who he believes is his ancestor, Gaynor puts on a costume and becomes the crime-fighting El Castigo, or “The Whip” [166]. Although Gaynor thought he was imitating “Don Suarez,” who Gaynor believed was the civilian identity of the original El Latigo, that name has not been conclusively linked to the original Latigo.

In 1942 a Hindu prince, Abdul Pasha, while in the valley of Kalimantan, on the island of Borneo, finds a baby in a basket. Abdul Pasha adopts the baby. [167]

In 1943 the stage magician known as “Fu Manchu” begins a successful career in fighting crime. [168] Later that year he fights Germans spies and saboteurs as well as an evil ventirloquist. [169]

In 1944 the magician and vigilante “Fu Manchu” solves a murder on a movie set [170], solves a murder in a museum of crime [171], and exposes the men behind a supposedly haunted house. [172] That year the Mexican private detective Mariano Mercado begins work in Mexico City and on the Mexican side of the U.S.-Mexico border [173].

During the American push through France an infant is found in the arms of his dead mother. The American troops rescue the child and send it to an orphanage. [174]

In 1945 Fu Manchu clears himself of a murder charge. [175]

With the end of the war scientists from the victorious Allied countries begin looking ahead, forming various groups, independent and government-backed, in order to best influence and shape the post-war world. [176] The infant child found in France the previous year is adopted by one such group [J] and subjected to a variety of physical and mental exercises. [177]

In 1946 the five crime-fighting luchadores known as Los Hermanos Numeros begin fighting evil throughout Southern California. [178] That same year an old house in Mexico City is scheduled to be demolished to make way for a radio station. Unfortunately, the house is inhabited by a number of ghosts, including La Llorona, Samson, Don Quixote, Romeo & Juliet, Chopin, Paganini, Tutankhaman, and The Wandering Jew. The ghosts eventually accept the destruction of their home and begin haunting an apartment in a skyscraper. [179] Just before the end of World War Two, an American sailor is lost at sea. Several months later he washes ashore in Mexico, where after a series of misunderstandings he is put on a rocket to the moon by a brilliant Mexican scientist. The rocket misfires and lands in Mexico. [180]

In 1947 the appearance of La Llorona, and the ghost’s haunting of a family mourning the death of a loved one, prompts an investigation by a police detective. [181]

In 1948 Los Hermanos Numeros defeat El Diablo Robotico, a robot built by "the devil." [182]

In 1950 a psychotic killer is haunted by a man with no face. [183]

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

Some Unknown Members of the Wold Newton Family Tree.