Sabotage at the State Fair (Nickel Comics #8)

As tragedy hits the local state fair, Sgt. Kent is pressed into sending his uniforms into the site to keep the peace while looking for a mysterious menace behind the chaos. It seems that thus far six people have perished at the fair, indicating fowl play of some kind. Seemingly out of character, the police department's "test tube detective" Jim Barr protests Kents' decision to place his brothers in blue at risk. Sarge scoffs at this, while his daughter Susan tips off Jim to a suspect.

Packing away his good guys gear including his patent pending Gravity Regulating Helmet in a satchel, and journeys to the fair to investigate. There he spies the suspect "Ice" Craddock with some hoodlums, and enters a hall of wax figurines where they are meeting to find out details of the sinister schemes.

However, the anti-germ serum flowing through Barr's body doesn't give him the power of stealth, as his loud footsteps are heard by Craddock who orders his men to pursue him. Barr evidently is still not use to having a massive body since ingesting the serum, which due to added weight makes him mir noisy than his scrawny former self. Anyways, not wishing to reveal his identity, Jim dons a mask worn by one of the figurines, to... protect his identity!?! Huh? Since when?

Although the masked man overwhelms the henchmen, Craddock stabs Barr with the pointy side of his cane, with poison that would kill an ordinary man but simply knocks Barr out. Leaving his premumed dead body with his head underneath a gulliotine, the next morning Jim is jostled awake by a noisy crowd just in time before a fair employee attempted to demonstrate the deadly device on what he believes to be another wax figurine.

Donning his superhero spandex and helmet, Bulletman charges towards a bulldozer being steered into helpless fair attendees. Then, our hero saves the crowd from a dirigible set aflame. Meanwhile, the manager of the state fair is approached by a wealthy benefactor offering up his land for  the Fair since this site seems "cursed". Bulletman is able to extract an explanation from Craddock, that the crooks were hired by the wealthy benefactor who wanted the fairgrounds' land for oil reserves he learned it contained. With a poke of a giant statuette rod, Bulletman tapped the oil for all to see.

Bullet Buddies: Well whatever goodwill existed between Jim and Sgt. Kent previously has eroded into mutual content.

Rocketing Romance:  This tale finally reveals the reason... well, the *official* reason... for Susan Kent always being at the police station. She is the chief's secretary! Nepotism much?

Bedeviling Bulletman: Craddock with his elegant suit, top hat and cane is reminiscent of another Craddock who stuck in the craw of Hawkman in the Gentlemen Ghost.

Powerful Projectile:  Bulletman's strength holds steady from his previous forays, where not even bulldozers nor blimps seem to cause him to break a sweat. And perhaps, just perhaps, a side effect of the Gravity Regulator Helmet which manipulates physics is also the explanation as to why the mask less Bulletman is never recognized.

Fawcett Facts: The ad at the end of the tale promotes Nickel Comics #9, which will never be. Instead, Bulletman migrates to his new home in Master Comics.