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"The Old Castle's Secret" is a 32-page
Disney comics Disney comics are comic books and comic strips featuring characters created by the Walt Disney Company, including Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Scrooge McDuck. The first Disney comics were newspaper strips appearing from 1930 on, starting with t ...
adventure/mystery/horror story written, drawn, and lettered by
Carl Barks Carl Barks (March 27, 1901 – August 25, 2000) was an American cartoonist, author, and painter. He is best known for his work in Disney comics, Disney comic books, as the writer and artist of the first Donald Duck stories and as the creator of ...
. It was first published by
Dell Publishing Dell Publishing Company, Inc. is an American publisher of books, magazines and comic books, that was founded in 1921 by George T. Delacorte Jr. with $10,000 (approx. $145,000 in 2021), two employees and one magazine title, ''I Confess'', and ...
in ''
Four Color ''Four Color'', also known as ''Four Color Comics'' and ''Dell Four Color'', is an American comic book anthology series published by Dell Comics between 1939 and 1962. The title is a reference to the four basic colors used when printing comic ...
'' #189 (June 1948). Characters include
Scrooge McDuck Scrooge McDuck (occasionally stylized as $crooge McDuck) is a cartoon character created in 1947 for The Walt Disney Company by Carl Barks. Appearing in Disney comics, Scrooge is a Scottish-born American anthropomorphic duck. Like his nephew, Do ...
,
Donald Duck Donald Fauntleroy Duck is a cartoon character created by the Walt Disney Company. Donald is an Anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic white duck with a yellow-orange bill, legs, and feet. He typically wears a sailor suit, sailor shirt and cap with ...
, and his three nephews. The story is about a treasure hunt led by Uncle Scrooge through an old castle in
Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
. This is the first of Uncle Scrooge's comic book treasure hunts, and the cover is Barks' first. The story has been reprinted many times.


Plot

Scrooge McDuck, in his second appearance, recruits his nephews to search for a family treasure back in Dismal Downs, the old
castle A castle is a type of fortification, fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by Military order (monastic society), military orders. Scholars usually consider a ''castle'' to be the private ...
of Clan McDuck, built in the middle of a swamp in
Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...
. The treasure once belonged to Sir Quackly McDuck, but both the treasure and its owner disappeared during the siege of 1057. The Clan has been searching for the treasure for centuries but Scrooge, the last McDuck, believes he can locate it thanks to an
X-ray An X-ray (also known in many languages as Röntgen radiation) is a form of high-energy electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength shorter than those of ultraviolet rays and longer than those of gamma rays. Roughly, X-rays have a wavelength ran ...
machine that can examine through the castle's walls. Finding the treasure proves to be the easy part of the mission, but they have to face a mysterious ghost who steals the treasure from them and repeatedly tries to dispose of any pursuers. They can't see it but they can see its shadow, that of a
skeleton A skeleton is the structural frame that supports the body of most animals. There are several types of skeletons, including the exoskeleton, which is a rigid outer shell that holds up an organism's shape; the endoskeleton, a rigid internal fra ...
. During this, Scottie, the caretaker of the castle, seems to have been murdered by Sir Quackly, while Scrooge, Donald, and the Nephews find themselves trapped in a locked battlement. The Nephews escape by swinging across into the surrounding
moat A moat is a deep, broad ditch dug around a castle, fortification, building, or town, historically to provide it with a preliminary line of defence. Moats can be dry or filled with water. In some places, moats evolved into more extensive water d ...
, but can't get in. However, remembering the tale of Sir Swamphole McDuck who sealed the
dungeons A dungeon is a room or Prison cell, cell in which prisoners are held, especially underground. Dungeons are generally associated with medieval castles, though their association with torture probably derives more from the Renaissance period. An o ...
(due to the high cost of running a dungeon), they locate a secret passageway into the castle's dungeons through his fake grave site (his skeleton was inside his armor). Scrooge and Donald remain on the battlement, until Scrooge reveals he has a gun which can shoot the lock and unlock the door. Scrooge, embarrassed, tells Donald to give him "a good, swift kick!". While in the dungeon, the Nephews find the treasure box, but are nearly attacked by the ghost and discover another way out of the dungeon; the pillar upon which Sir Swamphole's armor is resting is actually a door. Scrooge, Donald, and the nephews find an invisibility spray before giving chase to the ghost, now covered in mud and no longer invisible, through the swamp. The nephews and Donald tackle him to the ground and retrieve the treasure box. The ghost is revealed to be a thief who was impersonating Scottie (who had died of old age years before) using a special spray-like formula that made him invisible, but didn't prevent his skeleton from casting a shadow. Donald then takes all the nephews' credit, claiming they hadn't known the invisibility spray even existed. Enraged, the nephews then trick Donald into thinking the spray is a
mosquito Mosquitoes, the Culicidae, are a Family (biology), family of small Diptera, flies consisting of 3,600 species. The word ''mosquito'' (formed by ''Musca (fly), mosca'' and diminutive ''-ito'') is Spanish and Portuguese for ''little fly''. Mos ...
repellent, where they then make him completely invisible save for his tail and legs.


Production

Uncle Scrooge had been introduced in " Christmas on Bear Mountain", published in December 1947; this story was the character's return. Asked in a 1962 interview if Barks had received favorable comments about Scrooge, Barks said, "Not a word, but I kind of liked old Scrooge and he filled a gap. We needed somebody to help Donald out." Wanting to use Scrooge again, Barks wrote this story to explain where the character came from.


See also

* ''The Old Castle's Secret'' served as the title story to ''
Fantagraphics Fantagraphics (previously Fantagraphics Books) is an American publisher of alternative comics, classic comic strip anthologies, manga, magazines, graphic novels, and (formerly) the Erotic comics, erotic Eros Comix imprint. They have managed sev ...
'' The Complete Carl Barks Disney Library Vol. 6 - Donald Duck: "The Old Castle's Secret" * List of Disney comics by Carl Barks


References


External links

*
''The Old Castle's Secret''
in Carl Barks guidebook {{DEFAULTSORT:Old Castle's Secret Disney comics stories Donald Duck comics by Carl Barks Scrooge McDuck 1948 in comics Comics set in Scotland Comics set in castles Comics about treasure hunting