Africa found itself a helmeted loinclothed champion of mammals when Scribe Bob Haney and artist Mike Sekowsky presented B'wana Beast. After his plane crash landed on Mount Kilimanjaro, Mike Maxwell drank mysterious cavern water that granted him great strength. He also befriended the Gorilla Djuba, who gave Maxwell a helmet that enabled him to communicate and control animals and actually fuse them together into a chimera.

As B'wana Beast, Maxwell protected Africa against the likes of Hamid Ali, an immortal poacher who used robotic monstrosities to do his dirty work. Having thwarted Ali during his two consecutive issues of Showcase, B'wana Beast conquered a loyal following among DC readers.