The first appearance of Batman:
Note that the idea behind Detective Comics was that it would feature different detectives every issue, maybe with some reoccurrences. It’s now 86 years later and Detective Comics is still around…and publishing pretty much nothing but Batman stores.
Bob Kane, the artist, had obviously been on a rooftop or two as he got the little details right: the pipe on the far right with the conical top, and the similar pipe in the distance above the orange hat, are the drain vent pipes you will find on any ordinary building of that era and most today. The little penthouses sure look like stair bulkheads. The building on the right, past Orange-Hat’s right hand, has a bracketed cornice that, in the New York of 1939, would most likely be painted tin on a wood frame, although it might be all wood. Similarly, the other little details – like the high decorative parapet on the left, next to Blue Hat, or the skylight next to Orange Hat’s gun – are all really common.
Obviously there are different building types possible. Warehouses are popular destinations for thugs in Batman stories, for example. But one little detail tells us exactly where we are: the tripod to the left of Orange Hat is the support for a clothesline, which is running left until hidden by the high parapet. These are tenements.
That raises one last question: where is the top of Batman’s rope tied off?
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