February is Black History Month, so Geek.com is taking the time to appreciate the history of comic book’s black characters (i.e., Static Shock, Black Manta). Today, we’re resharing our article about Isaiah Bradley. This African-American hero is not only one of the many characters who have used the title of Captain America but he’s also a potentially major plot point in the first upcoming Disney+ Marvel streaming show The Falcon and the Winter Soldier if rumors are to be believed.
Created in 2003 by writer Robert Morales and artist Kyle Baker, he made his debut in the Marvel Comics’ miniseries Truth: Red, White, and Black. Based on the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, a 1932-1972 real life clinical study in which the U.S Public Health Service partnered with Tuskegee University in Alabama to study the effects of untreated syphilis on black American men. The Truth mini-series took this concept and applied it to the story of Captain America, as a scientist experiments on black soldiers during World War II in an attempt to recreate the Super-Soldier Formula that empowered Steve Rogers.
via Marvel Comics
Professor “Reinstein” experimented on over three hundred black American soldiers in his attempts to recreate the formula. His failures were covered up by the U.S. government, as the men that had been tested on were executed in secrecy. Isaiah Bradley was one of five men to survive the experiments, which were dubbed “Project: Rebirth,” and the only one of them to survive the war. He goes the entire course of the war being snubbed by the U.S. military, considered by them to be less of a hero and more of a thug due to the systematic racism. Despite this, Isaiah never stops fighting the good fight, which eventually leads to him being captured and tortured by Nazis. A prisoner of war for many years, he is eventually rescued and pardoned of his “crimes” by President Eisenhower.
Isaiah goes back home to be with his wife, Faith, who would go on to tell his story. Isaiah suffered brain damage during the war, in events that mirrored Muhammad Ali’s real life, as it leads to Isaiah’s physical and mental deterioration alongside his Alzheimer’s later in his life. Eventually, his story is discovered by Steve Rogers, who had recently been thawed out of the Artic. Steve would go on to learn that Isaiah was just one of many experiments, tied into the same Weapon Plus program that created Wolverine, Fantomex, and many other characters in the Marvel Universe.
via Marvel Comics
Despite the tragedy of Isaiah’s life, his legacy lives on all throughout the Marvel Universe. His wife, Faith, recounts his story to Steve Rogers and makes sure that it is known. Isaiah and Faith’s genetics were used by the government in an attempt to recreate the effects of the serum yet again, and their son was born to a surrogate mother. The boy grew up to be Josiah X, a Muslim minister who fought in the Vietnam War and followed in his genetic father’s footsteps. Isaiah’s grandson, and Josiah’s nephew, Elijah Bradley would later join the Young Avengers under the title Patriot, eventually receiving a blood transfusion from his grandfather that imbued him with the Super Soldier Serum.
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