Spies have always been popular in fiction.
Girls have always been popular in fiction.
So, it stands to reason that girl spies would be popular in fiction, right?
Not quite...
With the notable exception of Modesty Blaise, female secret agents have not been able to hold the spotlight, despite several high-quality attempts to crack the glass ceiling of spydom!

In comics, the short-lived 1950s Undercover Girl series from Magazine Enterprises was probably the best of the femme-spy genre.
Featuring art by luminaries like Bob Powell, Gil Kane, and Dick Ayers, the series detailed the adventures of government agent Starr Flagg against spies, saboteurs, and criminals.
Starr could shoot and fight (And, as you can see from the art, ride a motorcycle, one-handed yet!) as well as any male agent, but could play helpless and innocent to throw the baddies off-guard until she could kick serious butt!
You can read some of her adventures HERE!

Since she has no super-powers or outlandish gimmicks, we at Atomic Kommie Comics™ titled her "The Heroine ANY Girl can be!™" and made her one of the feature characters in our Heroines™ line with three different covers, as well as her classic retro-style logo on a variety of goodies including tops, shirts, mugs, and many other tchochkies.
What grrrl from 6 to 60 wouldn't want to find something featuring Undercover Girl under her Christmas tree or in her stocking?

The splash page of the story is the inside cover of the comic, with only two colors.

"America comes first, even before Dad!"--Phantom Lady's Words to Live By!
Doctor Crime (not to be confused with The Crime Doctor), despite being the first supervillain the Fox incarnation of Phantom Lady fought, never returned.
When this story from Fox's Phantom Lady #15 (1947) was reprinted as the cover feature in IW's Great Action Comics #8 (1958), the splash page was left out, because the reprint publisher didn't have the cover printing plates, only the interior plates for this issue!
As a result, the editor retitled the story "The Zombie".
The new cover was a combination of two redrawn story panels and a badly-rendered (and mis-colored) Phantom Lady.
The new cover art is attributed in the Grand Comics Database to Jack Abel and Sol Brodsky.


featuring goodies emblazoned with cover art that Fredric Wertham railed against in Seduction of the Innocent.

Cover art for the 1985 reprint by the late, great, Dave Stevens

Page 1 of the story is the book's 2-color inside cover.

More Matt Baker "good girl" art in the first of three stories from Phantom Lady #14!
Enjoy!
When this story was reprinted as the cover feature in Daring Adventures #12, the splash page was left out, because the reprint publisher didn't have the cover printing plates, only the interiors for this issue!
FYI: Covers (on slick paper) and insides (on newsprint) are printed on separate presses and combined later.
Because the splash page was missing, the reprint editor didn't know the original title, and renamed the story "The Great Stamp Robbery"!
The splash page above is blue and black, not four-color, because, until recently, inside covers of comics were either b/w or 2-color, with the second color being either cyan (blue, as in this case) or magenta (pinkish-red).
Since the plates for the cover weren't available, a new cover by Joe Simon was commissioned, which was nowhere as nice as the original Matt Baker cover, and features Sandra Knight's boyfriend Ted being much more heroic than in the actual story!
You can see one of Matt Baker's 1950s romance stories at our sister blog True Love Comics Tales.
For those interested in writer Ruth Roche and / or artist Matt Baker, the books below will be of interest.

Classic "good girl" cheesecake art by Matt Baker.
The writer is probably Ruth Roche.
The other feature in this issue was a Blue Beetle story.