Later, the Black Marvel would relocate to California where he would take down the Order of the Hood, who were attempting to extort the United States into giving them massive amounts of money through acts of murder and robbery. Later, the Black Marvel would fail to prevent the murder of German-American scientist Dr. Eisenberg from Nazis operating out of a German Bund. Despite this failure, the Black Marvel managed to track down his killers and bring them to justice. The Black Marvel then clashed with a new criminal known as the Grinner. Upon killing the crook, he learned that the Grinner was Dr. Weem, whose only mistake was testing out a cure for pneumonia that transformed him into a ruthless killer. He then traveled to South America to investigate a supposedly haunted mine with a massive diamond that killed with a touch. He helped expose that it was all a hoax created by a con man named Ridley and his accomplice Baku, the local witch doctor who posed as the natives' god Vool-Kah. In his last recorded solo adventure, the Black Marvel protected reformed criminal Jerry Madden from the vengeful Longnails Legarya.