Perry White is Superman’s boss. He doesn’t necessarily know that, since Superman is the secret identity of reporter Clark Kent, but it’s true that the gruff editor White routinely yells at one of the most powerful people in existence. And though Franklin Stern is not so iconic a character as Perry, during the 1990s he was Superman’s boss’s boss. Realistically, Clark could probably get any job he felt like doing, so why does he deign to work for these newspapermen? Well, let’s look at a story that reveals more about these two:

“Sins of the Father”

SUMMARY

Issue: Superman: The Man of Steel #47, August, 1995

We start at the offices of the Daily Planet, where Perry’s young son Keith and a couple of his friends are visiting. They oversee Stern and White in a shouting match, arguing about the death penalty, which Stern feels would solve the problem of overcrowded prisons but White finds immoral. The kids are worried that Keith’s dad is getting in trouble, but Planet writer Ron Troupe assures them that, in spite of the yelling, Stern and White are actually very old friends and this is just how they interact.

Ron goes on to show the kids a Daily Planet headline from decades ago saying “Superman Plot Foiled” with Perry’s name on the byline. But how could this article be about Superman if it happened when Perry was a young man? Well, Ron goes on to explain.

Decades ago: Perry has gone to a small Southern town called Melonville to look into a string of murders and missing persons reports. There he meets Franklin Stern, a civil rights activist who has come to town because one of the missing persons is his cousin Craig. Melonville’s Sheriff Trent is also ostensibly looking into the crimes, but he’s no help to Perry and actively sics dogs on Franklin. Our investigative duo have to learn to rely on each other if they want to make any progress.

Before very long, Franklin is attacked by a group of men in red hoods and robes. Perry tries to help, but they attack him as well, displaying what seems to be superhuman strength as they do so.

Fortunately, the hooded men are chased off by a crowd of locals, giving the investigators a chance to recover and hear rumours of a hate group called the Aryan Brotherhood. Apparently white children have been telling Melonville’s Black kids that the Brotherhood has “Supermen” who are going to come kill them all.

The investigation leads the duo to a secret base hidden in a disused old iron mine just outside of town. They sneak inside and spy on a large gathering of the Aryan Brotherhood members as they watch the hooded members showing off their powers by bending steel bars and making general declarations about their plans to pass their superior fitness to their children.

While the Brotherhood is distracted with this rally, Perry and Franklin delve further into the mine to keep looking around. They find the corpses of the missing people, including Craig, and realize that the racists had been experimenting on them to refine their process of creating superhumans. With this evidence, our investigators intend to see the victims avenged, but before they can escape are discovered by the Brotherhood’s supermen. A chase ensues. Franklin starts a fire, both to serve as a distraction and destroy their research, and the duo steal some racist’s car to make a break for it.

But they can’t escape without a climactic showdown: One of the supermen, his robe burning off, leaps onto the car to attack and without the mask we learn that he is none other than Sheriff Trent (Franklin is not even slightly surprised). Perry drives under a closing door, which knocks Trent off the car, presumably to burn to death off panel.

The heroes have escaped. Perry writes a story (ensuring that Franklin gets full credit for his heroic acts) and the Feds arrive in Melonville to deal with the Aryan Brotherhood. While being arrested, Trent’s pregnant wife reveals that the sheriff did indeed die back there and she swears that her son will get revenge on Franklin and his kind. Franklin, meanwhile, decides that if he’s going to make a difference, he needs to be inside the system, so he accepts an offer to go to Harvard Business School.

Back in the present, the Stern and White have gotten caught up in the story Ron was telling. White feels like Stern has changed since those days, but Stern feels it was necessary to get where he is in life. Then he notes that White has not changed at all. White asks if Stern thinks he should. “Hell, no, my friend. The world has a great need for bullheaded newspapermen with silver tongues and a yen for the truth.” White says he intends to remind his boss of that during their next argument.

SUPERMAN VS BIGOTS

While this isn’t strictly speaking a “Superman vs.” there’s nothing wishy-washy about this one being “Bigots” for once. I don’t have to give the usual spiel about how the bad guys are generic Nazis and we have to bring real-world knowledge to get to the racism part. No, these are robe-wearing, cross-burning, racists of the kind that Superman fought on the radio show. At one point the Brotherhood spokesman says: “Our ‘victims’ were inferior. They were put on this Earth… given to us… to enable us to grow strong. We took their DNA! Their tissues! And experimented on them! As is our right! We are the master race.” And the experiments that empower the Brotherhood are explicitly connected to experiments in Germany, but the group isn’t necessarily one created by Nazis like the National Society for a Better America in the “Super Mann” episode of Lois and Clark. Here the Aryan Brotherhood seems to be an entirely domestic group, even including the police and other supposedly respectable folk. It’s unflinchingly about racism.

It’s also, I think, a useful answer to the question of why Superman might work for the Daily Planet. The answer originally given for Clark’s role as a reporter was that reporters are the first to learn about disasters, so it would help Superman to know when he’s needed. But I much rather the idea that Clark actually thinks that investigative journalism can itself be worth doing. And if he feels that way, it would make sense for him to think of Perry White as a hero and an inspiration and want to follow in his footsteps.

STRAY THOUGHTS

• There is more to the present-day framing sequence of the story, with Lois going to Stryker’s Island prison and learning of racial tension between the gangs there. One of those gangs is the modern incarnation of the Aryan Brotherhood and includes Sheriff Trent’s son. Thus, the title of the issue does actually make sense in a way not obvious from my synopsis above. Alexander Trent features in stories I am sure to cover someday on here, so we can ignore him for now.
• This story features three recurring Black characters of the era: Franklin, Ron, and Keith. All of whom were added in the 1980s or ’90s and, unfortunately, all of whom have basically fallen away since. I’m on the record as thinking Ron wouldn’t need much to be considered as important to the franchise as Jimmy Olsen, but Franklin is probably unlikely to ever get the traction needed to return. It’s seemingly the state of superhero stories these days that “normal people” are not good enough for a supporting cast, and instead the heroes must spend all their time hanging out with other superheroes. Even Jimmy and Perry are unlikely to show up on a regular basis now, so what chance has poor Franklin Stern got to be owner of the Daily Planet again? I suspect the creators feel it’s seen as more crowd-pleasing to have dramatic “shocking” twists like “Lex Luthor owns the Planet now” or shared-universe synchronicity fodder such as “Bruce Wayne owns the Daily Planet now” and maybe they’re right. Still, I’d take a return to Stern over any such gimmicks.
• As can be seen in the last image there, this is the era in which Clark has a ponytail. I will make no further comment on that.