Origin
Because of his deceptively awkward appearance, Jim’s American colleagues had nicknamed him “The Big Palooka”
Sergeant Jim Ransom was a Scotland Yard detective who was sent to the United States, initially New York, to learn American crime-fighting techniques. His appearance led his new partner, Sergeant Joe Rooney, to immediately write Ransom off as a “big palooka”, but Joe was soon proved wrong, as Ransom, an ex-Royal Marines Commando shooting instructor and war hero, was one of the sharpest, fairest and most fearless police men Britain had ever produced.
Creation
Jim Ransom debuted as “The Big Stiff”, the titular lead of a text series in The Wizard. At this point a Detective Sergeant in the British CID (Criminal Investigation Department), his initial series started in Wizard 1699 on 6th September 1958 and ended with issue 1715 on 27th December 1958. He returned for three additional series, The Big Stiff In Chicago (1960), The Hoods Are Here! Further exploits Of The Big Stiff (1962) and The Big Stiff In The Amazing Mystery ‘The Killers Of Kelmira’ (1962).
In February 1965 Ransom transferred to New York and to comic strip format, and gained a new nickname, the Big Palooka, as he joined The Hornet starting from issue 75. The first installment also revealed that he had been a British Commando during World War II, and, though only 18 at the time, had been a shooting instructor training newly arrived US forces.
Subsequent series would see Jim transfer to Chicago, and then back to London, where, promoted to Detective Inspector, he led a taskforce dealing with American gangsters who have set up shop in London. After Hornet merged into Hotspur, the series went back in time to Jim’s World War II exploits, showing his work as a training sergeant, then as a Commando, and finally depicting his recruitment into SIDAP (Special Investigation Dept Allied Powers), which led in turn to his police career.
With Jim’s adventures having run intermittently until the late 1970s, the start of the 1980s saw him now a Police Commissioner, and had his series replaced by a spin-off, The Son of the Big Palooka, starring (no surprises here) his son Detective Sergeant Dave Ransom, a member of elite Criminal Intelligence Unit C18.