Follow

    Speed Saunders

    Character » Speed Saunders appears in 98 issues.

    Speed Saunders was an adventurer and detective who was revealed to be a private investigator and later a member of the OSS. He is the grandfather of the current Hawkgirl, Kendra Saunders, and first cousin to the original Hawkgirl, Shiera Hall.

    Short summary describing this character.

    Speed Saunders last edited by KillerZ on 12/12/23 09:17AM View full history

    Cyril "Speed" Saunders was introduced in Detective Comics #1 (1937) as a two-fisted "ace investigator" who seems to have some weird, unspecified occupation that allows him to operate independently of the police, as a private eye would, and yet order them around.  He was presumed to be Federal agent. His first adventure had him called in to investigate the appearance of several bodies found floating in the bay, and credit for the story is given to E.C. Stoner (text) and Creig Flessel (art).  Saunders made his final appearance in Detective Comics in issue #58 (1941), Of some note, Speed Saunders is the first continuing original character to appear on the cover of Detective Comic with issue # 4.

    In 1999, 58 years later, he was sprung from comic book limbo, popping up a DC Comics one-shot called Sensation Comics, where he was revealed to be Hawkgirl's (Shiera Saunders) cousin.  Kendra Saunders, the current Hawkgirl, is his granddaughter.  According to his modern history, "during the 1930s, Cyril  was an ace police investigator for the River Patrol and in New York City, and was one of the best officers of his time.  Later, during World War II, he joined the Office of Strategic Service (O.S.S.), and was a frequent ally to the Justice Society of America.  He is the cousin of Sheira Sanders, the first Hawkgirl, and grandfather of Kendra Saunders, the current one (who is also the reincarnation of the original), whom he encouraged to train to become a superheroine when realizing that she's now inhabited by the original Hawkgirl, who entered her body as she lay in danger of dying from suicide when she was 17 years old.  Though probably in his 80s by now, Speed is still quite active and efficient as an adventurer, and helps out Hawkgirl and Hawkman on many of their own adventures whenever he can.

    sizepositionchange
    sizepositionchange
    positionchange
    positionchange
    positionchange
    bordersheaderpositiontable
    positionchange

    This edit will also create new pages on Comic Vine for:

    Beware, you are proposing to add brand new pages to the wiki along with your edits. Make sure this is what you intended. This will likely increase the time it takes for your changes to go live.

    Comment and Save

    Until you earn 1000 points all your submissions need to be vetted by other Comic Vine users. This process takes no more than a few hours and we'll send you an email once approved.