Evildoers would flee in fear at the sound of the crack of The Whip!  Well, no … not really.  Unless you were a wealthy Mexican landowner who was abusing the locals, the crack of "The Whip" didn't really hold that much terror.  If The Vigilante was DC Comics' (then National Periodical Publications) version of the Lone Ranger, then The Whip was Zorro.  Actually, he pretty much was Zorro in every aspect except those that protect a company from copyright infringement.   And he was protected enough to last 55 issues of Flash Comics, beginning with the very first issue in January of 1940.  The character also appeared in the 1944 issue of Big All-American, as well as in a single story in Sensation Comics #43, but that was about it for the Golden Age of Comics for The Whip.

Like Zorro, The Whip was based on an old "legend" that gave hope to the Mexican people in the days of the Wild West, before the annexation of Texas.  Don Fernando Suarez was descended from the Grandees of Spain, and single-handedly fought for the rights of the poor in the guise of El Castigo, The Whip!  The legend tells of the day that the rich and powerful rancheros banded together and raised a small fortune to fight The Whip's efforts, but were waylaid by the hero as they were taking the treasure to the bank.  He defeated the rancheros and took the treasure, which was never seen again.

That was a hundred years prior to the opening of the first tale of The Whip.  In the modern day American Southwest, the landowners are up to their old tricks, harassing the poor and railroading workers into jail for minor offenses.  Meanwhile, Rodney Gaynor was living the life of a privileged dilettante when he decided to "see America" before taking a trip to the Orient.  He and his valet Wing (no relation apparently to the Crimson Avenger's partner) enter the town of Seguro for lunch and ended up staying when he met the lovely Marissa Dillon, daughter of the publisher of the Seguro Sentinel, the local newspaper.  She was dedicated to helping the poor workers in the area and stopping the vigilantes who are ruling the town with fear (and currently are planning to break poor Carlos out of jail and lynch him as an example to everyone else).  Marissa takes Rod with her to see the Padre of the local mission, who tells them of the legend of The Whip. 

That night, as the Sheriff allows the vigilantes into the jail, the horse of El Castigo leaps into the fray!  The Whip makes short work of the crowd with his whip and really bad accent and makes off into the night with Carlos.  The next morning, Marissa asks Rod where he was during all the excitement, and wonders if he had ever learned how to use a very long bullwhip ... hmm ... you don't think ...? 

The Whip was relegated to his adventures in Flash Comics, and basically sunk into complete obscurity after issue #55.  DC Comic's large-size Famous First Edition series brought him back into the limelight for less than his fifteen minutes, when it reprinted the first issue of Flash Comics, which I believe has been the only Whip adventure ever reprinted.  He again faded until Roy Thomas created the All-Star Squadron and began chronicling their adventures.  As did most mystery men from DC's Golden Age, The Whip joined the wartime group, though I don't believe he ever had a single word of dialogue in the entire series, or its sequel, The Young All-Stars, including appearing on the cover frame of #4.  In fact, I don't think he was seen in anything other than one of the many group pictures. 

The Whip was featured in Secret Origins (Volume 2) #13, in which his origin was altered slightly by Roy Thomas to give Rodney Gaynor a bit of a Mexican-American heritage to make the character (and hopefully, his accent) a bit more believable, as well as having the poor farmer Carlos framed for murder instead of just theft.  His horse was also given the name Diablo, but he may have already had this name in the strip. The Whip also garnered his own entry in Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe, and a whole page at that. 

Beyond another reprinting of Flash Comics #1 in the Millennium Edition series, The Whip has once again fallen into DC Comics' limbo, and unless he gets the Vertigo treatment, or Roy Thomas gets back in vogue at the company, that's where he's probably going to stay, deservedly or not.