Jor-El
Jor-El. The father of Superman, and the foremost scientist of the planet Krypton prior to its destruction. A "scientific genius" (S No. 65/3, Jul/ Aug 1950: "Three Supermen from Krypton!") with a fertile, wide-ranging intellect, he conducted far-reaching experiments in rocketry, invented a matter-transmitter and numerous other marvels, and discovered the Phantom Zone. It was Jor-El who predicted to an unbelieving population "that Krypton would explode from gathering atomic pressure at the core of the planet" (Act No.182, Jul 1953: "The Return of Planet Krypton!"), and it was Jor-El who, when the doomsday came, dispatched the infant Superman toward Earth in an experimental rocket, remaining hehind with his wife Lara to perish in the cataclysm.
Described repeatedly in the texts as "Krypton's greatest scientist" (S No. 53/1, Jul/Aug 1948: "The Origin of Superman!"; and others), "Krypton's foremost physicist" (Act No. 329, Oct 1965: "The Ultimate Enemy!"), and "the greatest scientist on Krypton" (Act No. 149, Oct 1950: "The Courtship on Krypton!"; and others), Jor-El was born into a family with a centuries-long heritage of achievement in the fields of science, statesmanship, and exploration. His ancestry teemed with such men of lasting distinction as Val-El, an explorer and discoverer who was the moving force behind Krypton's great Age of Exploration; Sul-El, the inventor of Krypton's first telescope; Tala-El, the author of Krypton's planet-wide constitution; Hatu-El, a scientist and inventor who discovered the nature of electricity and devised Krypton's first electromagnet and electric motor; and Gam-El, the father of modern Kryptonian architecture (SF No. 172, Aug/Sep 1975; and others).
When Jor-El was still an infant, his own father succeeded in journeying to Earth and back in an experimental spacecraft of his own design (S No. 103/1, Feb 1956: "The Superman of Yesterday"), and although knowledge of the craft's construction had apparently been lost to Kryptonians by the time Jor-El reached maturity (Act No.158, Jul 1951: "The Kid from Krypton!"; and others), there can be little doubt that his father's achievement served to inspire his own explorations into the then-infant sciences of rocketry and space travel.
Little is known of Jor-El's early life, but by the time he reached college he had begun to gather about him a coterie of young intellectuals destined to make great names for themselves in the annals of Kryptonian science. His college roommate was Professor Kimda, who, years later, would befriend Superman in the bottle city of Kandor and help him thwart the schemes of the villainous Brainiac (Act No. 242, Jul 1958: "The Super-Duel in Space"). Jor-El also befriended Ral-En, whose career as a "brilliant scientist" was ultimately warped and destroyed by dictatorial ambitions fostered and encouraged by his father Mag-En (S No. 154/2, Jul 1962: "Krypton's First Superman!"). Other colleagues included his friend Nor-Kan (S No. 158, Jan 1963: "Superman in Kandor" pts. I-III-"Invasion of the Mystery Super-Men!"; "The Dynamic Duo of Kandor!"; "The City of Super-People!"; and others) and Lon-Es, who worked for a time as his assistant (S No. 154/2, Jul 1962: "Krypton's First Superman!").
During this period, two of Jor-El's brothers—his identical twin brother Nim-El, and another brother named Zor-El—also embarked upon distinguished careers in science, but they appear to have limited themselves to the fields of weapons science and climatography, respectively, and to have displayed none of their brother's capacity for brilliance and creativity in a breathtaking array of scientific disciplines (S No. 146/1, Jul '61: "The Story of Superman's Life!"; and others). Indeed, in the course of a brilliant career that was terminated by the destruction of Krypton, Jor-El applied his great genius to virtually every aspect of Kryptonian life, not only to every facet of science and invention, but also to the problems of war and peace (Act No.216, May '56: "The Super-Menace of Metropolis"), transportation (S No.134, Jan '60: chs. I-III—"The Super-Menace of Metropolis!"; "The Revenge Against Jor-El!"; "The Duel of the Supermen!"), and the humane administration of criminal justice (S No. 65/3, Jul/ Aug '50: "Three Supermen from Krypton!"; and others).
He worked to develop a serum for prolonging life (S No. 78/1, Sep/Oct 1952: "The Beast from Krypton!"), carried on an intensive telescopic study of the planet Earth (Act No. 223, Dec 1956: "The First Superman of Krypton"; and others), and conducted archaeological research into the "marvels of a dead civilization that once existed at the bottom of the Great Krypton Sea!" (S No. 170/2, Jul 1964: pts. I-II—"If Lex Luthor Were Superman's Father!"; "The Wedding of Lara and Luthor!").
His inventions included a "petrifying ray" which turned people to stone as long as it shone on them, "levitation bombs" designed to reverse the pull of gravity and make objects fall upward, a "super-artificial lightning projector" for projecting bolts of artificial lightning, a magnet that attracted human flesh instead of iron, and an "invisibility-spray" which could make a person invisible by covering him with "a fine coating of light-refracting particles" (S No. 74/1, Jan/Feb 1952: "The Lost Secrets of Krypton!"); a "matter-radio," described as "a transmitter that can send all forms of living matter—even living people—across space by radio" (S No.77/1, Jul/Aug 1952: "The Man Who Went to Krypton!"; see also Act No.281, Oct 1961: "The Man Who Saved Kal-El's Life!"); a "dimension-traveler," designed to "project a person out of this dimension into a new one"; a "missile-projector," designed to deliver any object to any destination at supersonic speed; and a "nuclear fission tester," which "registers if any chain reaction is starting and shows the source" (WF No.69, Mar/Apr 1954: "Jor-El's Last Will!"); an "amazing growth ray for plants," capable of growing vegetables "100 times bigger" than their customary size (Act No.325, Jun 1965: "The Skyscraper Superman!"); and an all-purpose, mass-produced vehicle—capable of traveling on land, sea, or air, and even underground—which quickly came into such common usage among Kryptonian's that it soon became known as the "Jor-El," much as Henry Ford's creation became known as the Ford (S No. 134, Jan 1960: chs. I-III—"The Super-Menace of Metropolis!"; "The Revenge Against Jor-El!"; "The Duel of the Supermen!").
For these and other inventions and discoveries, Jor-El was awarded Krypton's coveted Science Prize, in the form of a statuette molded from rare illium metal (S No. 173/2, Nov 1964: "Tales of Green Kryptonite No.1"), and an honorary medal from the Kryptonian Science Society (Act No.182, Jul 1953: "The Return of Planet Krypton!").
Indeed, although Jor-El was still a young man at the time of his marriage to Lara, the lovely dark-haired young woman who, according to at least one account, was Jor-El's "assistant" during the period preceding their engagement (S No. 170/2, Jul 1964: pts. I-II—"If Lex Luthor Were Superman's Father!"; "The Wedding of Lara and Luthor!"), he was already a "famed scientist" engaged in top-level research at a Kryptonian "missile base" (S No.141, Nov 1960: "Superman's Return to Krypton!" pts. I-III—"Superman Meets Jor-El and Lara Again!"; "Superman's Kryptonian Romance!"; "The Surprise of Fate!").
But Jor-El was concerned with humanitarian matters as well as scientific ones. Because of his strong moral opposition to capital punishment, he devised a method whereby perpetrators of serious crimes could be exiled into space in a state of suspended animation inside specially constructed space capsules, a method first employed to safeguard Kryptonians against the power-hungry ambitions of Mala and his brothers. According to Superman No. 65/3, the space capsules were made of transparent plastic and shaped like rocket ships (Jul/ Aug 1950: "Three Supermen from Krypton!"), but according to Superman No.123 these so-called "prison satellites" were of a spherical shape. The criminals imprisoned inside them were placed in suspended animation by means of a special sleep gas, and chunks of a glowing crystalline mineral—capable of cleansing their brains of criminal tendencies in a hundred years' time—were placed on their foreheads so that ultimately, once their sentence was served, they might take up constructive roles in Kryptonian society (Aug 1958: chs. 1-3—"The Girl of Steel"; "The Lost Super-Powers"; "Superman's Return to Krypton").
The practice of exiling criminals into outer space was terminated after Jor-El had discovered the Phantom Zone, a twilight dimension to which criminals could be banished—by means of Jor-El's own Phantom Zone projector—to serve out their sentences as disembodied wraiths. Indeed, it was Jor-El's testimony that resulted in the sentencing of many Kryptonian criminals to the Phantom Zone (S No. 153/3, May 1962: "The Town of Supermen!"; and others). He was the "leader" of the Kryptonian "justice council"—analogous to being the foreman of an American jury—that found Quex-Ul guilty and sentenced him to a term in the Phantom Zone (S No. 157/1, Nov 1962: "The Super-Revenge of the Phantom Zone Prisoner!"), and his testimony was undoubtedly influential in determining the guilt of the would-be dictator Ral-En (see Mag-En) (S No. 154/2, Jul 1962: "Krypton's First Superman!"). On at least one occasion he served as an undercover agent for the Krypton Bureau of Investigation to help thwart the sinister machinations of a would-be tyrant (S No. 123, Aug 1958: chs. 1-3—"The Girl of Steel"; "The Lost Super-Powers"; "Superman's Return to Krypton").
It is small wonder, then, that this brilliant and versatile scientist soon won a place for himself on Krypton's prestigious Council of Science (Act No. 223, Dec 1956: "The First Superman of Krypton"), also referred to as the Council of Scientists (S No. 146/1, Jul 1961: "The Story of Superman's Life!"). The precise role of the Council is hard to define. Action Comics No. 223 makes a clear distinction between the Council and Krypton's "highest officials," suggesting that the Council presided over scientific matters as distinct from political ones (Dec 1956: "The First Superman of Krypton"), but Superman No. 65/3 makes reference to "Krypton's ruling council, which consisted of the [planet's] ten leading scientists," and goes on to describe Jor-El as "the leader of the council," suggesting that the scientific establishment had jurisdiction over the political sphere as well as the scientific and that Jor-El occupied a position on the council which made him virtual head of state (Jul/Aug 1950: "Three Supermen from Krypton!"). According to Superman No. 53/1, on the other hand, scientists who heard Jor-El foretell the impending doom of Krypton were suspicious that he might be "trying to frighten Krypton's leaders away from our planet so that he may rule" (Jul/ Aug 1948: "The Origin of Superman!"), suggesting that although Jor-El was a "brilliant scientist" (Act No.158, Jul 1951: "The Kid from Krypton!") and "prominent Kryptonian (S No. 154/2, Jul 1962: "Krypton's First Superman!"), he was only marginally involved in political activity. On the planet Krypton, however, the scientific establishment exerted considerable influence on political and social policy, and so, whatever its precise functions, Jor-El's position on the Council of Science meant that he occupied a prestigious position in Kryptonian life.
At the time Lara gave birth to the infant Superman, she and Jor-El were residing in Kryptonopolis (SA No. 5, Sum 1962; and others), the city that had become the capital of Krypton following the theft of Kandor by the space villain Brainiac. According to Superman No. 75/1, the proud parents named their newborn son Jor-El, 2nd (Mar/Apr 1952: "The Prankster's Star Pupil!"), but an overwhelming preponderance of texts assert that they named him Kal-El (S No.113, May 1957: chs. 1-3—"The Superman of the Past"; "The Secret of the Towers"; "The Superman of the Present"; and others). By all accounts, the dark-haired youngster bore an "unmistakable" resemblance to his father (S No.77/1, Jul/Aug 1952: "The Man Who Went to Krypton!"; and others).
It was around the time of Superman's birth, while all of Krypton was busily engaged in preparations for the planet-wide pageantry scheduled to mark the upcoming anniversary of "the 10,000th year" of Kryptonian civilization (Act No. 223, Dec 1956: "The First Superman of Krypton"), that Jor-El made what was at once the most momentous and most calamitous discovery of his scientific career: the discovery that Krypton's uranium core, which for untold ages [had] been building a cycle of chain-reactions," was on the verge of unleashing a planetary cataclysm, that "soon every atom on [the] planet would explode like one colossal atomic bomb!" (S No. 61/3, Nov/Dec 1949: "Superman Returns to Krypton!").
It remains unclear why Jor-El, alone among his contemporaries, was able to forecast the impending
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