Some time back I did a posting on all four of Lester Dent‘s “gadget heroes,” the final one being Clickell “Click” Rush. But at the time only a handful of the 18 stories had been reprinted. Now, finally, Steeger Books is doing a complete reprint of the stories in a series of collections, the first one, Talking Toad: The Complete Adventures of the Gadget Man, Vol. 1, is out, reprinting the first six stories. So we’ll need two more volumes. And I can now do a more complete review of the stories.
This series was published in Street & Smith’s Crime Busters pulp in 1937-39 which was intended to be a sort of tryout pulp to highlight characters who could be spun off in their own pulp magazines (kind of like DC’s Showcase comic book). In addition to Click Rush, there was Walter Gibson’s Norgil the Magician, Carrie Cashin, and others. But none were that successful. Click got 18 stories in the 24 issues of the pulp (later renamed Street & Smith’s Mystery Magazine, which is actually where the final story ran). He was also adapted into stories in S&S’s comic books as well, for a total of three. I don’t think I’ve seen those.
As a “gadget hero,” Click is quite different from the others, necessary, what with Doc Savage around. Click has invented many gadgets to catch crooks and has come to New York to interest the police in them. They decline his offer. Then he meets Bufa, a large paper-mache toad sitting on half a $10,000 bill (yes, they exist). A mysterious individual uses Bufa as a radio receiver to give Click instructions to solve crimes, and if he does so, will get the rest of the $10,000 (the same fee for each crime he solves). Similar to the mysterious woman, the Tocsin, who sent Jimmie Dale out on missions as The Gray Seal. Unlike the Gray Seal, Click does this very unwillingly, and there is no hint of a romance. This, plus the madcap humor of the series, is what sets Click Rush apart from the rest. He (and we) never figures out who is behind Bufa. Did Dent himself work that out?
As noted, we get the first six stories here. Only the first three have been previously reprinted, so for most reading this book some of the stories will be new. There is also a new intro by Will Murray on the series and how it fits in with the rest of Dent’s works.
The series starts out in New York City, of course. The first case he looking into a matter of a missing shipment of stainless-steel frogs. In the next case, Rush has bought a boat and moved himself and his equipment there. This time he gets involved in a matter when he is asked to take control of a shipment for reasons he doesn’t accept. In the third case he is still in New York but now has set up in a travel trailer with plans on heading down south when he gets pulled into a case involving a man with no nose who has cut off the noses of three other men. When one of the three comes looking for Rush, he is shot.
With the fourth case, we find Rush down in Savannah with his travel trailer when a strange man comes to sell him a plantation. Things get stranger when the man pulls a gun on him, and he later meets a pair of queer people: a crazy woman and a doctor. In the fifth case, Rush has gone down to Miami. Again, Dent’s knowledge of the area comes into play. This time Rush is framed for a murder, and he has to work to figure out what is going on, as well as prove his innocence. And in the sixth case, Rush flies to Mexico City only to find that he is in El Paso, Texas. There he gets pulled into a matter of a man who has recently died.
The change of locations for the stories increases their variety. In many of them, Rush uses new items not previously seen. It’s also interesting that whoever Bufa is, he (I am pretty sure he’s a man) is able to get Rush involved in new cases. In at least two of the stories, it’s clear that whoever Bufa is, he was operating in disguise in that story.
Among the gadgets Click created are a portable x-ray device, phone-tapping equipment, a bulletproof vest, a repeating hypodermic needle that he used to deliver a knockout drug, exploding matches, knockout gas vials, containers of liquified tear gas, and a number of other gizmos that could have been created by Doc.
I look forward to the following volumes, and the next one is already out: The Devil Smelled Nice. This volume will kick off with a three-parter that has been reprinted, though the other three will be ‘new’. I have no idea if we’ll get a complete “deluxe” collection.
I hope we get a reprint of Lester Dent’s Ed Stone series (six stories), which also appeared in Crime Busters. I would love to see other series from Crime Busters such as Walter Gibson’s Norgil and Carrie Cashin, and Norvell Page‘s series, among others. Time will tell what we get.
