Read more about Atom (Al Pratt) at: Wikipedia Official Site: DC Comics Al Pratt is a character in the DC Comics Universe, the original hero to fight crime as the Atom. He first appeared in All-American Comics #19 (Oct. 1940). He initially had no superpowers; instead, he was a diminutive college student and later a physicist, usually depicted as a "tough-guy" character. The character of the Atom (Al Pratt) would seem to be influenced heavily by the life story of Joe Greenstein, a Coney Island strongman known professionally as "the Mighty Atom". Both the real-life Greenstein (at 5' 4" and 140 pounds) and the fictional Al Pratt were unusually short and had self-trained at boxing and bodybuilding to overcome poor health during childhood. Initially a proverbial 98-pound weakling, bullied at school and unable to impress the girl of his dreams, Mary James, the 5' 1" Al Pratt was trained to fighting condition by ex-boxer Joe Morgan (the same man who trained Pratt's fellow mystery men, Wildcat and the Guardian). Pratt soon became a founding member of the Justice Society of America, appearing in the team's various stories during their original Golden Age appearances. In All Star Comics #3 (Winter 1940) the Atom describes himself to his fellow JSAers as "Al Pratt, a quiet sophomore at Calvin College." He later became a founding and active member of the All-Star Squadron. During World War II, Pratt served as a tank corpsman in the United States Army. In 1948, the Atom gained super strength as a result of the latent effects of his 1942 battle with the reluctant supervillain Cyclotron (after whose costume Pratt redesigned his own). It was later revealed that he had taken partial custodianship of Cyclotron's daughter Terri.
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Atom (Al Pratt)
