Billy Cramer

(Full name: William F. Cramer) Superboy's roommate during his Junior year in college. Though they never met previously, Billy Cramer was from Smallville and was told to look up Clark Kent when he got to school. They became great friends, and Clark eventually revealed his secret identity to Billy and gave him a supersonic whistle in case he ever found himself in trouble.

Billy Cramer knew Lori Lemaris during Clark's courtship with her, and also had the opportunity to meet Pete Ross. Both Pete and Billy covered for Clark's sudden disappearances, and each suspected that the other knew his secret identity. When Clark and Lori were having relationship troubles prior to the discovery that she was from Atlantis, Billy used his supersonic whistle to summon Clark and force him to talk about it. This angered Clark and they parted ways.

Tragically, Billy died while trying to save a baby from a burning building. Superboy, while saving an entire island nation from a tsunami, heard Billy's whistle and saw that he was in trouble, but was unable to help. Billy died thinking that Superboy was ignoring his whistle because he had misused it earlier.

Following Billy Cramer's death, Superboy was plagued by guilt and went into a self-imposed exile for nearly three months.

(Source: SSY No. 1-4, Feb-May 1985)