It was early 1973. Architect Mike Brady announced some good news to his wife Carol, his three sons Greg and Peter and Bobby, his wife’s three daughters Marcia and Jan and Cindy, and their housekeeper Alice.

“So that’s the deal,” said Mike, “I’ve been approached by a brilliant scientist and asked to design a factory for him to house the machinery being used to design and test his unique inventions.”

“What is it?” asked Peter.

“Well you know how the septic tank in the bathroom ices up in winter when the water freezes?” asked Mike, “My company’s client is perfecting a device which will heat up the water in the septic tank, without damaging the tank, and without being damaged itself by the water. He needs a lead lined factory to test the device safely. If he manages to perfect it, the Loo-Thaw device will be warming up toilets all over the country before you know it. So important is the lead lined factory, that the client has offered us not only an initial fee for the factory design, but a percentage of the profits from the first two years’ sales of the Loo-Thaw device.”

“Do you think they could give us one of the first ones produced instead?” asked Alice, “I’ve had a rather cold seat at times myself.”

“I’ll ask them,” said Mike, “In the meantime I’ll have to spend extra hours there consulting with the client and working on the factory. I hope you’ll all understand.”

Greg Brady in particular was pleased to hear the news that his father would be around less in the evenings. Greg had been cultivating a secret aspiration, ever since he and the other Brady kids and the school librarian Miss Prince had accidentally time traveled to Ancient Greece. Miss Prince kept her dark hair in a bun, wore a pleasant skirt and cardigan and had really captured Greg’s heart. Greg Brady had just cut removed the wide growth of his hairstyle, making it as neat as it had been at the time of his father’s marriage to Carol. He decided that now was the best time to act.

The very next day, he went into the library during lunch hour and presented Miss Prince with a red rose.

“Why thank you, Greg,” said Miss Prince, “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“I was hoping you might like to go skiing and  ice skating with me, Miss Prince,” said Greg, “I never really had the chance to do much skiing or skating that time when I lost the race bet to the cheating Chuck. I thought we could go up into the mountains together on the weekend and … “

“I’d look forward to that, Greg,” said Miss Prince.

“Where can I pick you up?” asked Greg.

“How about the far side of the park?” said Miss Prince.

So the two began dating, and a budding romance blossomed between them. For Miss Prince, the age difference only served to heighten the sweetness of Greg’s interest in her, and she admired his courage in asking her out in the first place. To Greg, the appeal of having overcome the potential difficulty in asking out an adult member of the school staff made him appreciate her affection all the more.

Meanwhile, Fred, Velma, Daphne and Shaggy had parked the mystery machine by the sea shore and taken a hired yacht out to a group of islands. They planned to camp out on one island, and investigate the rumours of a giant penguin being seen on the next island.

While Fred and Daphne steered the yacht, and Velma navigated their journey, Shaggy and Scooby applied their considerable expertise in consuming inordinate quantities of food, specifically hamburgers and biscuits.

They reached their destination island, and unloaded their camping supplies, pitched their tents and left Scooby sleeping by the dimly burning campfire for the night.

The following morning, they made their way toward the next island on their yacht, and snuck ashore in an area with plenty of bush cover. To their surprise, they were now able to get a clear look at what was indeed a giant penguin. However, it was not a real penguin, but a cleverly designed submarine docked on the island. Loading supplies onto it were three people. They recognized the first two from their previous encounters with Batman and Robin.

“The Penguin and the Joker!” hissed Daphne.

“But who’s the third one!” said Fred.

“Like, he’s got green skin and red jewels on his head. He must be the Ghost of the Bermuda Triangle!” said Shaggy.

 “Oh come on, Shaggy. There’s no such thing as ghosts, only all the criminals we’ve unmasked,” said Fred.

“Look,” said Velma, who had just noticed a smaller craft parked beside the huge artificial penguin, “I think that’s a flying saucer.”

“It must belong to the third guy, the one we don’t know,” said Fred, “I guess there’s lots of characters in the Dynamic Duo’s rogues gallery that we’re lucky not to have met yet.”

“Look!” said Daphne, “They’re going aboard, and there’s no way we can stop them or follow them.”

“Not on our own,” said Fred, “But I think it’s time we use that radio given to us by Batman and Robin after the time we helped them save Professor Flakey’s flying suit.”

Fred contacted the Batcave, and explained the situation to Robin, who soon had Batman’s assurance that they would head out in the Batsub.

Back at the factory, Mike Brady and his client Alex were making the finishing touches on the lead lined factory, unaware that Bobby and Cindy Brady had stowed away in their father’s car and snuck into the factory, fascinated to see the Loo-Thaw device undetected by either their father or his client. Hiding behind some machinery, they watched the proceedings.

“Can I see a demonstration of the device?” asked Mike Brady, “My curiosity is getting the better of me, I’m afraid.”

“Of course,” said Alex, and turned it on.

The two youngest Brady Kids could hear a boiling bubbling sound from the demonstration septic tank, and then to their horror, it suddenly exploded, blasting the entire toilet to smithereens … along with Mike Brady.

Cindy’s scream of horror was muffled by the sound of the explosion, and Bobby quickly muzzled her with his fingers, to stop her screaming again. He had seen a sinister look in the face of Alex.

As the two children remained hidden, they heard Alex making a radio call to someone else.

“Come in, B!” said Alex, “This is A.”

“This is B,” came a toneless voice, “What is your purpose in calling?”

“I have tested the fatal effects of the hot water fusion device. It will effectively dispose of our underwater opponent, but we’ll have to install it subtly and set it and then get out quickly. We don’t have long, before it goes off. It’s caused an unexpected death of my factory’s designer. I’ll have to head out and join you as soon as possible with the device. I can’t stay here now. Luthor out.”

“Luthor!” hissed Bobby, “So that’s who Alex really is! Dad didn’t know his client was Superman’s arch enemy.”

“Brainiac out,” said the voice on the radio.

The kids watched Luthor flee his factory, taking the only other working model of his Loo-Thaw device.

“We’ll have to use the signal watch that Superman gave me after he helped us expose Igor’s plan to rob the bank,” said Cindy, “I’ll call Superman, while you use the factory telephone to call our brothers and sisters.”

When Greg Brady got the call, he was busy kissing Miss Prince in his bedroom. She offered to come along as well.

“It could be dangerous,” said Greg.

“Then I’d better show you something I’ve been meaning to trust you with lately,” said Miss Prince.

She began to spin around, and her familiar clothes changed into the equally familiar costume of Wonder Woman. Her hair fell out of the bun and into a wavy extension, with the bun tie turning into a tiara.

 “No wonder you were both with us in ancient Greece,” said Greg, “At first I wondered if it was your younger Wonder Woman self at that time. You don’t age do you?”

“Not visibly,” said Wonder Woman.

She and Greg collected Marcia, Peter and Jan and headed for the factory, where they found that Superman already arrived and examined some of Luthor’s notes that he’d located with his x-ray vision in a locked cupboard that he’d then forced open.

“I’ve uncovered Luthor’s plot,” said Superman, “thanks only to Cindy and Bobby. I’d never have found him in this lead lined factory, if they hadn’t stowed away in their father’s car.”

“He killed my Daddy!” said Cindy in tears.

“I think it was an accident, but one caused in the pursuit of a criminal venture nonetheless,” said Superman, “I’ll bring Luthor to justice, Cindy. That’s a promise. I didn’t know you’d met Wonder Woman too.”

“We shared an adventure recently,” said Wonder Woman, “What’s Luthor up to?”

“It all started when the Joker escaped from Gotham Penitentiary and went deep sea diving, hoping to hide out from Batman in an underwater cave. Instead he came across the undersea city of Atlantis,” said Superman, “He wanted to rob it of its considerable wealth, but knew that its king Aquaman would be even more of a threat than Batman. So he sought to bargain with other criminals, and soon contacted Luthor, who had worked with Brainiac before, and his own former partner in crime the Penguin. They’ve made a deal. Penguin has supplied a submarine to take Luthor’s Loo-Thaw hot water fusion device to Atlantis. Brainiac will turn invisible, sneak into Atlantis and install the device undetected in Aquaman’s royal toilet. Aquaman will blow himself up as soon as he sits on the toilet. Then the Joker, Penguin and Luthor will be able to loot Atlantis of all its undersea treasure.”

“But what does Brainiac get out of it?” asked Wonder Woman.

“Every time he’s tried shrinking people on the surface, to repopulate his planet Mega, I’ve known of it and stopped him,” said Superman, “But he counted on using Luthor’s device to get Aquaman out of the way, so that he could shrink the entire populace of Atlantis. We’ll need all the help we can get. You kids get into Wonder Woman’s invisible jet and seal the doors. I’ll fly after you and then carry the jet to Atlantis underwater. It’s not designed to move underwater, but it can under Superman power.”

So it was that Superman, Wonder Woman, the Brady Kids, Batman and Robin and the Scooby Doo team all converged on Atlantis, using the Invisible Jet and the Batsub.

Batman and Robin had not yet worked out the villains’ plan, but Batman’s infra red undersea goggles enabled him to see Brainiac, even after he’d turned invisible. Batman snuck in after Brainiac and sprayed him from behind, not enough to cover him, but enough to expose part of his back with bat-paint.

To his surprise, he saw Superman and Wonder Woman approaching too.

“Stop him!” said Batman, “He’s not fully invisible now.”

Superman lunged at Brainiac, snatching the Loo-Thaw device at super speed, leaving both of Brainiac’s hands free.

Before he could activate his force shield, Wonder Woman used her golden lasso to snare Brainiac’s hands, and tied them together.

Robin used the Bat-sonic gun and scrambled Brainiac’s circuits. While the four of them were occupied with this, Aquaman had caught an overconfident Luthor, Joker and Penguin about to raid the Atlantean vaults. The Joker was nimble and managed to outrun Aquaman, who had his hands full with Luthor and Penguin.

Joker made it to the open sea …

… until a giant sea horse grabbed the Joker by his diving suit and dragged him back to the door of Atlantis. Aquaman thanked Storm for his help.

Later, Aquaman swam to the surface and met up with the Brady Kids, the Scooby Doo team and the other four super heroes on the island.

“You have saved both my treasury and my toilet, not to mention my life,” said Aquaman, “And you did it by working together. Maybe we should form a team and work together regularly.”

“But what would we call ourselves?” asked Robin.

“Well the kids brought us all together,” said Wonder Woman, and then flashed Greg an apologetic look, as she realized that she had referred to her boyfriend as one of ‘the kids’, “It seems the four of us have come here as a result of having past friendships with kids and young adults.”

“Well Scooby Doo’s group found the island first,” said Jan, “How about calling your new team the Scooby Friends?”

“You need to trade on existing publicity,” said Velma, “Superman’s the most widely known of you. How about the Super Friends?”

They agreed on the name and decided to set their headquarters in Gotham City, as Batman and Robin had no super powers to enable easy travel to a headquarters.

Shaggy had gone missing, but they expected that he would turn up as soon as someone mentioned food. But Shaggy never did turn up, as far as any of them knew. He had actually tried to use Brainiac’s shrinking gun to reduce the follicles of his hair to an unnoticeable size. At first it had worked, shrinking his loose chin hairs out of visible existence. However, he’d left the ray turned on himself too long, and shrank his whole body to tiny size too.

Now clean shaven and miniscule, he climbed into the pocket of Marcia Brady while she was sitting down, and overheard Marcia inviting the rest of the Scooby gang over to her house, as they felt that they needed the comfort of their new friends at this time, with Mr Brady now lost to them.

Marcia unwittingly took Shaggy home with her, whereupon he took the opportunity to hide out in Cindy’s dolls house.

Greg and Diana Prince continued to date, but kept it under wraps, so that the Super Friends’ growing publicity would not affect the Brady Bunch. Alice married Sam the Butcher and moved out.

As the Scooby Doo team and the Brady Kids didn’t live anywhere near Gotham City, the Super Friends, nonetheless inspired by their child mascots in past solo adventures they’d had, took on two new junior members: Wendy and Marvin, and their Wonder Dog to replace Scooby and the other kids. All three were local Gotham City residents.

In time, Fred began dating the widowed Mrs Carol Brady.

Here’s the story of Super Heroes,

Who were bringing down two very nasty crooks.

Both of them wore red and blue and bits of yellow,

Just like in comic books.

Here’s the story of a famous Duo

Who were busy with their own persistent foes.

They had also teamed with kids and Aquafellow,

And soon came to blows.

Then came one day, when these heroes had a team-up,

And they knew that it was much more than mere trends,

That this group would form a League of Justice;

And that’s the way they all became the Super Friends.