Manic Monday Bonus--Superboy Already Did It!!

Remember that episode of the Simpsons where Lisa discovers that beloved town founder Jedidiah Springfield had really been vile pirate Hans Sprungfeld, mortal enemy of George Washington?

Well, Superboy already did it. Decades earlier.

OK, Superboy actually did the opposite, sort of, but they were clearly in that territory first! Hang on for a wild ride!

It's time for a special class at Springfield High!

Lana, it turns out, has a pretty swanky pedigree. But Clark Kent...?

OMG!!

Well, sure, kids will talk and gossip. But surely the adults of Smallville are more mature, and above such pettiness, right?

Of course not!

Well, Smallville is actually Jerk Town, USA. And it ain't blowin' over any time soon!

It gets so bad, that...

...oops, wrong story.

No Pa Kent is bummed, but his solution: flee the cruel, cruel people of Smallville!

Well, Superboy goes back in time, has some piratey adventures, and discovers that...

So the person we thought was an evil pirate really was a hero!!

But there's still one dilemma:

Remember how Lisa was able to prove the truth of her Springfield/Sprungfeld theory because of a message scrawled on the back of a piece of a portrait of George Washington? Well...

36 years before Lisa The Iconoclast, Superboy did the exact same story (except the Simpsons flipped the "evil guy found to be really good" idea). Revolutionary-era pirate, portrait of Washington hiding secret letters, jerky townsfolk...

So remember, when people say, "The Simpsons Already Did It," well, Superboy did it even earlier!

From Superboy #79 (1960), as reprinted in Superboy #146 (1968)