The Light

The Light first appeared in " Adventure Comics" #62. He had the typical motivation for mad scientists. His theories were rejected by the scientific establishment, thus the Light swore revenge on them and turned to crime. His first invention of note was a "diminishing ray" which could shrink human beings to the height of 12 inches.

His first victim was Dr. Daniel Selby, dean of the Scientific Institute and ,incidentally, the Light's former boss. He just left the miniature Selby behind and moved on to other plans.When Woodley Allen of the FBI questioned Selby and started looking into the case, Light was somehow informed. He made a threatening call to Allen's office and offered Allen the chance to join Selby as a miniature. Allen decided the Light was out of his league and assigned the case to Starman/Ted Knight.

Allen and Knight met in a secret location to discuss plans. The secrecy was useless as the Light had a planted a transmitter on Allen. Not only he heard the entire conversation. He had the two men videotaped and the  image broadcast to his advanced television screen. He was next seen aboard a spaceship of his own design. He abducted Allen and allowed the Starman to board the ship through his own efforts. Knight was surprised to see Doris Lee, his love interest, already captured and shrank. The Light appeared and pointed Starman to Allen, also shrank. Knight then fell unconscious, overcome by a strange mist. He awoke to find himself having joined Lee and Allen as human miniature.

The Light then started explaining his plans in typical supervillain style. He planned to shrink world leaders and experts of every field to miniatures and press them into his service. He would rule the world and head his own Master Race. The Light then left the prisoners in the care of a henchman. The fool decided to have some fun with Starman and lifted him up. From there it was easy for Starman to regain control of his normal-sized control rod and have the terrified henchman reverse the effect. The Light returned only to find all three captives having returned to normal size. He tried to use his ray again but it backfired. The Light received a much higher dose of its energy and shrunk until no longer visible to the human eye.

The Light returned to normal size by unknown means and met the Starman again in "Adventure Comics" #65. He had developed his own advanced submarine and used it to create a pirating organization, known as the League of the Octopus. His modus operandi was simple. The submarine would travel across the Atlantic Ocean and select targets among the various merchant marine vessels sailing its waters. Then it would fire missiles filled with knockout gas against said targets. With the crew members all unconscious, it was easy for the foot soldiers of the League to board them and take over the controls. Within a few months 30 ships had been captured.

When the case was officially assigned to Woodley Allen, Allen yet again let Starman deal with it.. Knight boarded S.S. Beaver undercover as a common sailor and waited for an attack. The ship was indeed targeted within hours of sailing from port. Starman flied above and observed the fate of the ship as its cargo was stolen, the crew taken prisoner and the ship destroyed. He then entered the Light's massive submarine. Knight had to face a giant octopus assigned guard duties and a small army of human guards. He managed to slay the octopus and was struggling with the guards when Light himself had the honor of knocking him out with a blow to the head.

Knight awoke to find Light wielding his gravity rod. Light intended to slay his foe with the weapon usually wielded by said foe. Unfortunately, the Light had no idea of how to properly use his new weapon. He effectively knocked himself out. It was easy then for Starman to release all the prisoners and have them overwhelm the various lesser members of the League. The Light was taken into federal custody and his submarine ended up an object of research for the United States Navy.

Light returned yet again in "Adventure Comics" #71. This time he did not rely on his own technology alone. Juniper Grimm, a fellow scientist, had created a time machine which would allow the users to travel thousands of years into the past or the future. The Light had his henchmen assist him in stealing it. He traveled 2000 years into the future and returned with the designs of an electro-cannon, a powerful weapon of that era. "A single shot from this cannon unloosed a cloud of powerful thunderbolts that ignited over it's target." The Light created a copy of the weapon and started using it to destroy oil facilities around the United States.

Woodley Allen had Starman investigate. He witnessed the effects of the weapon and managed to track it down to its location. The Light' s henchmen were easy opponents for him. But the Light escaped by use of the time machine. Knight decided to wait on the same spot for the machine's eventual return. The Light did return ... but in company of warriors from the future. Starman was defeated and the "Futurites" went waging war around the city. With the gravity rod having exhausted its energy reserves, Knight was in the mercy of the Light.

The rod needed the light of the stars to recover its energy. But it was day, the Sun had come out and there was no star to draw energy from. (The fact the Sun is a star apparently had escaped the writer of the story). But a solar eclipse allowed the stars to appear on the sky and the rod to replenish its energies. Knight thus easily knocked out the Light. But he had to content with the Futurites next , his rod no match for their technology. Butt the Futurites all wore protective suits. When Starman removed the top of one of the suits, its user suffocated. The air of the future was rarefied and the Futurites could not breath the polluted air of the 20th century without suffocating. Desperate to escape that fate, the rest of the Futurites used the time machine to return to their era. Starman and air pollution had saved the day.

The Light made no further appearances.