The man who saved New York

The Story

Ray, a writer struggling to craft a compelling plot, finds his mundane life interrupted by the sudden arrival of Porky Jenks. Once a healthy college student, Porky has transformed into a haunted, sweating figure of anxiety. He confesses to Ray that he is suffering from a bizarre, involuntary phenomenon: his "ego" has developed the unsettling ability to detach itself from his physical body and take total, coercive control of any stranger he happens to observe. Fearing he has lost his mind, Porky describes a series of incidents, including taking over a stranger’s body to ignore a difficult wife and, in a moment of meddlesome empathy, hijacking a woman’s personality to force her into a domestic confrontation.

Ray’s daughter, Lisbeth, and their friend Baldy, a cartoonist, join the conversation just as Porky prepares to prove his claims. He focuses on an unsuspecting, elderly woman near the street corner. Before their eyes, the woman undergoes a sudden, radical shift in temperament, transforming from a hesitant pedestrian into a commanding, imperious traffic director. As local authorities descend, Porky abruptly pulls his consciousness back into his own body. While the witnesses are stunned, Baldy immediately begins to calculate the potential for fortune, while Ray—a man of vivid imagination—sees a much grander, patriotic utility for this strange, volatile gift.

Ray proposes that they use Porky’s ability to win the ongoing war. He reasons that if Porky can inhabit a stranger, he can certainly take over the mind of a Nazi submarine commander lurking off the Atlantic coast. The plan is simple: Porky will possess an enemy officer, steer the vessel into the shore to destroy it, and then instantly "withdraw" his consciousness back to the safety of his own body on the beach. Despite Lisbeth’s vocal protests that the mission is a suicide run for the man she has begun to favor, Porky eventually agrees to the plan, driven by a desire to prove his courage and the pressure applied by his older, more cynical companions.

The group gathers on a dark, secluded stretch of beach as the moon emerges behind leaden clouds. Porky lies down, enters a trance, and effectively leaves his body behind. Suddenly, the ocean erupts. A towering, grotesque green giant, hundreds of feet tall, rises from the waves. As Nazi bombers roar overhead to initiate a raid on New York, this colossal entity begins to swat the aircraft from the sky like insects. The giant destroys the invaders with boulders and sheer brute force, eventually sinking beneath the waves after being struck by torpedoes. In that moment of crisis, Porky’s body on the sand shudders and wakes, leaving the mystery of the green giant—and the success of his intervention—as an impossible event to explain to the authorities.

Following their success, the group makes ambitious plans to travel the coasts, systematically dismantling the Axis threat. Ray and Baldy draw up tactical charts, treating the war as a puzzle to be solved. However, when the group reconvenes for their next mission, Porky and Lisbeth arrive with news that changes everything. They have fallen in love and are engaged to be married. More importantly, Porky announces that his "gift" has vanished. He is, for the first time in months, entirely and contentedly tethered to his own body. Lisbeth confirms this, declaring that Porky’s ego no longer needs to roam because it is finally at home. Ray is left to accept that his grand plan for victory has been thwarted by the simple, grounding power of human connection, effectively ending their secret war effort before it could truly begin.

The People

• Porky Jenks: A 4-F hardware salesman who starts as a vessel for a terrifying, uncontrollable psychic power. He is initially defined by his fear and his desire to be "normal," but he finds his true purpose—and a reason to stop his wandering consciousness—through his affection for Lisbeth.
• Ray: The narrator and self-appointed strategist of the group. As a writer, he views the world through the lens of dramatic potential. He is quick to weaponize Porky’s affliction for the sake of the war effort, displaying a detached, utilitarian attitude toward the safety of others.
• Lisbeth: Ray’s daughter, who possesses both beauty and a sharp, independent mind. She is the moral anchor of the story; she is the only one who consistently voices concern for Porky’s physical safety and eventually becomes the catalyst for his return to a quiet, private life.
• Baldy: A cartoonist who represents the opportunistic streak of the group. He is the first to see "fortune" in Porky’s condition, constantly looking for ways to monetize or militarize the power, and he is the most vocal in his disappointment when the "gold mine" dries up.

In Its Own Voice

The narrator reflects on the strange, detached nature of his friend’s condition:

Porky’s ego wouldn’t stay in his own body, and that, believe it or not, was what saved the city!

Porky describes the unsettling, sudden nature of his psychic displacement:

I was sitting in the chair all right--I knew that. But also I was a man walking down the street past my window.

Lisbeth explains the finality of Porky’s transformation after they decide to marry:

He belongs to me now, Lisbeth added. His ego doesn’t want to go adventuring.

What It's Really About

At its core, this story is a brief, speculative look at the conflict between the individual’s desire for a quiet life and the societal pressure to perform in a time of total war. During the early 1940s, the concept of the "civilian hero" was common in popular culture, yet this narrative subverts that trope by portraying the hero as a man who is actively being used by those around him. Ray and Baldy represent a detached, intellectualized form of patriotism. They are eager to sacrifice Porky’s psyche and potentially his life because they view his power as a resource—a tool to be deployed rather than a burden to be managed. The "Green Giant" serves as a physical manifestation of the sheer violence required by such a war; it is a monstrous, unnatural solution to a global crisis.

The book also explores the idea of human agency and the "self." Porky’s involuntary excursions represent a loss of self-determination, a terrifying state where the boundaries of the individual are blurred. His healing, therefore, is not found in mastering his power or winning the war, but in the voluntary surrender of his autonomy to a romantic partner. By choosing to be "tied up" with Lisbeth, Porky regains his humanity. The narrative argument is that true stability and peace are found in local, personal bonds rather than in the service of abstract, global causes.

There is a gentle cynicism in the narrator’s voice regarding his own failure. He admits that he is "sorry" he couldn't personally win the war, yet he remains entirely focused on his own disappointment at losing his "plot." This highlights the psychological distance between the observer and the subject. The book questions whether it is better to be a hero who acts as an instrument of destruction or a person who simply opts out of the chaos to find happiness in a small, private existence. Ultimately, the story sides with the latter, suggesting that the "war effort" is a poor substitute for the messy, grounding reality of human love.

Why Read It Today

Readers who enjoy mid-century science fiction will find a unique, brisk story that captures the anxieties of the 1940s—the fear of air raids, the obsession with U-boat activity, and the pervasive sense that the war was a problem needing a "miracle" solution. It is a snapshot of how the era’s pulp writers integrated the grim realities of world conflict into the framework of the uncanny. The prose is conversational and direct, reading like a late-night confession in a dimly lit room.

The primary difficulty for a modern reader may be the period-specific attitudes regarding gender and the casual, even jarring, way the characters discuss the potential "suicide" of their friend for the sake of a strategic advantage. Ray and Baldy are not particularly likable characters; they are self-absorbed and pragmatic to a fault. However, if one approaches this as a character study in how ordinary people can rationalize cruelty in the name of a "higher cause," the story becomes quite compelling.

What lingers after the final page is the image of the Green Giant—a sudden, violent, and surreal disruption of a mundane beach scene. It captures a specific sense of wonder and horror that defined the pulp era. The story does not strive for profundity, but it succeeds in providing a strange, slightly unnerving look at a man who wanted to be a hero, only to realize he preferred being a husband. It is a quick, imaginative read that serves as a fascinating piece of literary history, reminding us that even the most "supernatural" of problems often have very human, grounded resolutions. For those who enjoy stories that blend the domestic with the apocalyptic, this brief tale offers a satisfying, if somewhat haunting, conclusion.