Joan Dale (New Earth)

Joan Dale was the war-time superhero Miss America, powered by the spirit of the Statue of Liberty itself. She was a member of the All-Star Squadron and the Freedom Fighters.

History

Origin

In the late spring of 1941 on Liberty Island, reporter Joan Dale had a dream that the Statue of Liberty came to life and granted her the power to alter the nature of matter. She creates a colorful costume and becomes Miss America, one of America's first heroines. In truth, she had been abducted by the top-secret government agency, Project M, and her powers were actually the result of a secret experiment. They believed the experiment to be a failure and had returned her to whence she had been taken, leaving her none the wiser.^[1]

Later that year, the Japanese plotted their attack on Pearl Harbor. Uncle Sam learned of the attack and assembled a group of heroes called the Freedom Fighters (with Hourman, the Invisible Hood, Magno, Neon the Unknown, and the Red Torpedo) to prevent it. The mission was doomed and all but Uncle Sam seemingly perished in the fight. Sam later discovered, however, that three of his allies had survived: Miss America among them. After the mission, she was reclaimed by Project M.^[2]

When Robotman and the Young All-Stars visited Project M, they discovered that Miss America was indeed alive, albeit comatose. A battle with the Ultra-Humanite broke out, which awoke Joan from her coma. She promptly returned to the defense of her country and in late May 1942, she joined the Justice Society of America as the group's secretary.^[3]

Retirement

Eventually, Joan Dale's powers apparently faded and she retired as Miss America. She married Admiral Derek Trevor, and eventually they become the adoptive parents of Hippolyta "Lyta" Trevor Hall, who became the modern-day Fury in Infinity, Inc.

Lyta became pregnant with the child of her teammate and lover Dr. Fate, however, Hector soon died. She moved back home with her adoptive parents, Joan and Derek Trevor, and was soon reunited with Hector, who had become the new Sandman. Learning that Hector could only exist one hour outside the Dream Dimension, Lyta and Hector married and Lyta joined Hector in the Dream Dimension. Joan and Derek Trevor attended the wedding.

One Year Later

A much older Joan Dale returned, to confront a youthful impostor bearing the mantle who had, under the orders of Father Time, managed to neutralize and capture the new team of Freedom Fighters.

Joan revealed that she never lost her powers, but used them to create the illusion that she had aged in order to retire and live a normal life with her husband. Now that Derek Trevor had passed away, she lets the illusion slip and resumes her youthful, heroic guise to aid Uncle Sam and his new team. While fighting the impostor Miss America, Joan discovered that she is in fact an android and destroyed her.^[4]

Later Red Bee, mutated into an alien-insect creature, mind-controlled Joan into absorbing Human Bomb's explosive energy and taking it into space. Joan then exploded, presumed to be dead.^[5] Unbeknowst to her allies, Joan managed to keep her consciousness alive, rebuilding a new, young body from extant space materials. Evolved into a new form of life, she discardd her Miss America identity to claim her new moniker: Miss Cosmos.^[6]

Months later, Joan returned to aid the Freedom Fighters again as Miss America, explaining that her cosmic power upgrade proved temporary and that since her boosted powers faded she is now actually weaker than she was before.^[7]

Powers and Abilities

Powers

• Elemental Transmutation: Miss America has the powers of transmutation on a molecular level. Her own inexperience with the physical sciences initially limited her use of the powers early in her career, when she used it for simple changes that were not permanent. There appeared to be an upper limit to the size of matter, and the duration of its transmutation, but this was not ever made specific.

Abilities

• Journalism

Notes

• Although this character was originally introduced during DC's Earth-Two era of publication, their existence following the events of the 1985–86 limited series Crisis on Infinite Earths remains intact. However, some elements of the character's Pre-Crisis history may have been altered or removed for Post-Crisis New Earth continuity, and no longer apply.
• In the pre-Crisis timeline, Miss America died helping Uncle Sam fight the Japanese on Earth-X (as shown in All-Star Squadron #32). In the post-Crisis reality, that battle did not happen. It was replaced by the pre-Pearl Harbor battle shown in Secret Origins (Volume 2) #26, which she did survive (barely).
• In Post-Crisis continuity, the original Golden Age Wonder Woman's adventures have been erased from existence and Miss America replaces her in many of the JSA's adventures. However, following a time travel story in Wonder Woman (Volume 2) #128, several months after Miss America joined the JSA, a different Wonder Woman debuted on the scene and also joined the JSA. It is still unclear how this Wonder Woman's membership affected Miss America's status with the JSA, if at all.^[8]
• Miss America also replaced the Golden Age Wonder Woman in the parenting of Hippolyta Trevor, the Infinity, Inc. member who was the modern-day Fury, at least in the sense of adopting Lyta and also marrying a former military person with the last name of Trevor. (Lyta's original father in pre-Crisis Earth-Two history was General Steve Trevor, the husband of Princess Diana of Paradise Island.) Lyta's actual birth mother in the New Earth reality was Helena Kosmatos, the Golden Age Fury.
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Trivia

• In addition to replacing the Golden Age Wonder Woman as a member of the JSA (at least temporarily) and as the (adoptive) mother of Lyta Trevor, JLA: Year One writer Mark Waid said in an interview that Miss America was also suggested by Keith Giffen as a replacement for Wonder Woman as a founding member of the JLA in Post-Crisis continuity. In the proposal, Miss America would have died during the team's first and the Justice League's name including "of America" would have been retconned as an homage to the late Miss America. The idea was ultimately rejected because Waid felt it would have been a gratuitous death and particularly out of place in a story set at the beginning of the Silver Age JLA.^[9]

Related

• 43 Appearances of Joan Dale (New Earth)
• 15 Images featuring Joan Dale (New Earth)
• Quotations by or about Joan Dale (New Earth)
• Character Gallery: Joan Dale (New Earth)

Footnotes

This page uses content from Wikipedia. The original article was at Miss America (DC Comics). The list of authors can be seen in the page history. The text of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Freedom Fighters member This character is or was a member of the Freedom Fighters, a team of American super-heroes who fight threats to the nation and its ideals under the leadership of Uncle Sam. This template will automatically categorize articles that include it into the "Freedom Fighters members" category.

Justice Society of America member This character is or was a primary member of the Justice Society of America in any of its various incarnations. This template will categorize articles that include it into the "Justice Society of America members" category.

All-Star Squadron member This character is or was a member of the All-Star Squadron in any of its various incarnations. This template will categorize articles that include it into the "All-Star Squadron members" category.