The Flash #108

This volume is issue #108 of DC's The Flash Vol. 1 (launched in 1959), with a cover date of September 1959—an early single issue of the Silver Age Barry Allen Flash. It contains two standalone stories. "The Speed of Doom!": Barry Allen is on a picnic with his girlfriend, reporter Iris West, when she notices that the tree stump they usually sit on is gone. Barry then recalls an encounter from a few days earlier: he accepted an invitation to "test the Flash's top speed," only to fall into a trap set by Ki Felag of the world Mohru; struck by a radiation beam beneath his feet, he is forced to run nonstop and only breaks free by accelerating past the speed of light. He then discovers that several pieces of fulgurite struck by lightning have been stolen in succession; tracking the super-speed thief and breaking through the dimensional barrier into Mohru, he learns that criminals there gain super-speed by absorbing residual energy from Earth's lightning strikes, and ultimately helps local police capture the thief. "The Super-Gorilla's Secret Identity!": Gorilla Grodd escapes Gorilla City in a telepathic four-wheeled vehicle, uses an evolution device to elevate himself to a "higher evolutionary stage than humans," assumes the identity of stock-market tycoon Drew Drowden, controls objects with his mind, and is selected as a Man of the Year candidate. The Flash investigates strange phenomena at Drowden's factory and, when Grodd reverts to gorilla form and his mental powers fail, destroys the evolution device and returns him to Gorilla City. This issue has been collected in Flash Archives Vol. 1 and Showcase Presents: The Flash Vol. 1, among other collections.