Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Pete Ross membership

Why is Pete Ross sometimes listed as a honorary Legionnaire?

I've seen references to him being made a member in Superboy #98. However, in that story he receives ?a pass to the Super-Heroes Clubhouse whenever the Legion meets?, and Pete remarks that ?some day I can attend a meeting of the Legion as an honored guest?.
A guest is not a member and he doesn't get a vote at the trial of Star Boy, while Jimmy Olsen does.

Was he declared a member in another issue or in some official (or unofficial) list? Or just a honest mistake since he does show up a couple of times?

Perhaps "honoured guest" changed over time, when they were looking to give the team structure, into honorary member?

Little did Pete know, but they don't use coins in the 30th century.Marla was just giving him a souvenir to be nice.

Superboy #98 was in 07/62
In 10/62, Pete meets Ultra Boy again in Superboy 100. Although Pete sees legion statuettes and records Superboy taking off through time for a Legion meeting, there's no mention of his Legion status.

By 08/64 Pete was considered an honorary member in the text (Adventure 323)

Didn't he get banned from honorary Legion membership for betting on baseball games?

Adding poignancy to the v4 issue where there's match fixing around Thom's baseball team. He felt the shadow of Pete Ross' walk of shame, even after so many years.

He attended a meeting/contest for Legion leader in Adventure #323 along with Jimmy Olsen. No explanation of how he got there, but he participated by faking a super-power, "mind-reading" to discover Superboy's secret identity.

Sometimes things happened off-panel, and Pete being named honorary member might have been one of them. Amazing World of DC Comics # 9 (The Legion Handbook) says he was made an honorary member because of his loyalty to Superboy in protecting the latter's secret identity.

Honorary members did not get to vote in the trial of Star Boy while reservists, such as Jimmy Olsen, did. It may seem like an arbitrary distinction, but that was the explanation at the time.

Except Jimmy was a honorary member at the time, not a reservist.

Now that my reviews have almost reached the end of the Adventure Comics run, I think I figured out what happened to Pete Ross. He's mentioned as a honorary member a few of times in the letters page, even if the "meet the Legionnaires" featurettes left him out. I believe that the writers wre misremembering what actually happened and just considered him a honorary member; in a way, it's almost an early example of headcanon making it into the official canon.
Unless I missed something, the first time he's explicitly mentioned as a member inside the story is the second part of the first Mordru storyline.
In-universe, of course, the Legion could've made him a honorary member at any point between storylines.

You're right about Jimmy being an honorary member, not a reservist. Thanks for the correction.

Seem to recall Pete and Jimmy voted against Star Boy during his expulsion trial in ADV 342...

Jimmy did vote guilty, but Pete doesn't show up in ADV 342. I was also sure that he did, until I looked through the issue for the retrospective.

Something I have been mildly curious about...did Superboy in the Legion's time know that Pete and Jimmy were honorary Legionnaires and the details around that?

It would be weird if he knew that Pete knew his secret ID and that Jimmy was gonna be one of his best friends but then forgot it all when he went home again....I mean I know that's his whole thing with Supergirl in the Legion's time but Kara forgot details when she returned to the past too so it still kind of works with Kal and Kara, but I don't think Pete or Jimmy ever had their memories suppressed, did they? So it's possible Pete and Jimmy had this whole convoluted double-sided friendship with Kal that he only knows one side of?

He definitely doesn't know that Pete knows his secret id. There are scenes where that info is explicitly kept from him, even in the 30th century.

Did Pete and Jimmy meet in the 30th century? At one of the weddings perhaps?

Jim: So, all the honorary members are over on this side for the photos?
Pete: Yeah. I like the purple costume, and it's bold being so upfront about your powers by having "Elastic Lad" written on it.
Jim: Thanks. It's to definitely show people I'm not a giant turtle.
Pete: Wow! You have lots of great powers.
Jim: Yeah, that's partly why they made me a honorary member. How did you become one?
Pete: Aw, it was nothing really. Just keeping Superboy's secret about him really being Clark Kent.
Jim: What?!

Thanks EDE! I mean I know he's Superman and all, but geez that's gotta be some discipline to not even give in to a little bit of curiosity about why these random 20th century kids are stinkin up the clubhouse occasionally

Also LOL at the Jimmy/Pete interaction...I could totally see that as a one page comic

Hmm. This is why Pete didn't vote in the Star Boy trial. The Legion never told him about the vote to prevent him and Jimmy from interacting.

A few days ago I was rereading Adventure Comics #293 "The Legion of Super-Traitors" aka the formation of the Legion of Super-Pets (which I had forgotten was the first appearance of Super-Horse even before appearing in Supergirl stories) and since two of the members were friends of Supergirl, namely Super-Horse and Streaky (even Super-Monkey first appeared in a Supergirl story) Saturn Girl made sure that they all were returned to their futures before Superboy regained consciousness from Kryptonite poisoning. He was very curious about how the Legion defeated the Brain-Globes and Pa Kent even suggested he could find out by overtaking light-rays from Earth as he had done previously to find out his own past, but Superboy declines insisting that there must be a very good reason why Saturn Girl wouldn't tell him. That's another super-power right there - Super-Discipline. Not sure I would have been that self-controlled.

It's especially impressive how much trust he places in the Legionnaires considering they just recently poisoned him with kryptonite while under mind control!

I mean... you'd think he'd just want to verify things to make sure this isn't part of some longer term scheme...

Possibly part of the post-hypnotic suggestion to forget details of the future included a curiosity damper.

Did adult Pete ever meet with Jimmy in Metropolis, have a few beers and talk about their Legion adventures?

Random thought: Since originally Superboy could only be hypnotized by another Kryptonian, I wonder what they would have done if they hadn't recruited *both* super-cousins?

Same way they mind wiped them in AC350: put Kryptonite inside his brain. Or if you want to be less insane, use the same device they used in the Mordru story that somehow did work on him.

Great question! Jimmy knows Lana Lang was Insect Queen and I'm pretty sure they have discussed Elastic Lad being a Legion member... but Pete shows up so rarely as an adult that I can't even remember if he had more than a single panel with Jimmy.

Now that I think about it, Pete is a strange case... Lana has all sorts of adventures as an adult, but I'm pretty sure Pete lives a relatively normal adult life. I'd say he peaked in high school but he's been shown as a millionaire as an adult, so it's relative :-)
At least post-Crisis he got to be President for a while.

I might be remembering this wrong but I think there were stories where Superman gave himself post-hypnotic suggestions so I guess he might have learned it when he was a kid?

I mean these days Saturn Girl would just bust out the ol' mindwipe I guess

I'm not remembering any specific examples of self-hypnosis, but it does sound plausible.

Having to implant kryptonite in his brain every time he returned to the past would be pretty drastic.

Other than the whole mental breakdown after his son is kidnapped by aliens bit.

It is weird that he doesn't make more appearances as an adult, though. Weirdly underused.

As far as I know, the whole "destined to use his knowledge to save Clark's life" bit was never followed up on, either.