Who's Batman?

Who's This? You tell me. The guy dressed as a blue bat on page 12 of Who's Who vol.II.

The facts: This obscure Golden Age character first appeared in Detective Comics #27 (1940), an obvious rip-off of the pulp character The Black Bat "created" by one Bob Kane, and he seems to have lasted until at least the late 50s, according to my research. He shared that book with a number of more illustrious detectives, like Roy Raymond and the Manhunter from Mars, who are still relevant today. When his entry was published in Who's Who, I  remember readers being peeved that he got one [whole] page.
How you could have heard of him: There's a chance he appeared after his entry in Who's Who, but if so, I seemed to have missed it.
Example story: Detective Comics #260 (1958) "The Mystery of the Space Olympics"

Admittedly I don't know all that much about Batman (THE Batman? Bat-Man?) or his sidekick Robin (a ridiculous character who doesn't wear anything remotely close to his "parent" superhero), but judging the strip on the story I ferreted out, they appear to be heroes of a Flash Gordony future. One day, someone invades their cave-like home on Earth - it's the Venusians bearing an invitation.

That's right, Batman is going to be Earth's champion in the "Universal Olympics". Not sure why the Venusians are sponsoring Earth's athletes, but then, I also don't know how these Olympics can be called "Universal" when it's just for our Solar System.

Whatever. It's not like this hero is trained in any of the events, so maybe Venus just wants some weak competition in the mix. Except Batman does really well in the first (racing) event, and then again in the skeet shooting competition. It's almost uncanny...

...especially considering that, according to my research, Batman swore off guns because his parents were killed in a hail of bullets. After an anti-grav boxing match against a Jovian where Batman once again does too well to be believed, the judges discover he's been cheating in every event. All the equipment's been tampered with!

The Plutonians are pretty peeved because they lost a couple medals to this flying rat (DOES he fly? ah, no, he's rappelling down a wall later). Batman and Robin escape in a Plutonian saucer, but decide to head back to the Olympic village to confront the Venusians who are the number one suspects in the case. Except it wasn't them:

Given the book is called Detective Comics, and the story is a "Mystery", I was expecting a lot better from this cowled sleuth than being told the solution and answering "that figures". So the next day, he and his boy partner try to get to the judges and explain their side of it, but are soon on the run from angry Olympians of all stripes. When the Plutonians catch up to them though, they blurt their guilt out like rubes, and...

Don't do that when you don't know who's listening! Now, if the Space Police look like Martians, I'm afraid they're not. We see a Martian earlier, and he's kind of pink, not green. Looks like Batman's stories might not have been canon exactly. After all, the more famous J'Onn J'Onzz also has a strip in this issue and he's both green AND the last of his kind. Unless Mars was repopulated with another species by the Batman's era?

I'd have to do a lot more research to find out. Maybe someone can reprint these stories some day - Kickstarter could help? - but I wouldn't be in any hurry. The bat motif just seems an ill fit for space cadet-type adventures.

Who's Next? Back to our regularly scheduled dissection of Who's Who vol.XXVI.