chunk: The main character and the narrator in Armageddon 2419 A.D. is Anthony Rogers, who later appears in the various comic strips, radio shows, and film serials that follow as "Buck Rogers". Rogers recounts the events of the “Second War of Independence” that precedes the first victory of Americans over Hans, in which he plays an important role.
  Born in 1898, he was a veteran of the Great War (World War I) and was by 1927 working for the American Radioactive Gas Corporation. He was investigating reports of unusual phenomena in abandoned coal mines near Wyoming Valley in Pennsylvania. On December 15, while investigating one of the lower levels of a mine, there was a cave-in. Exposed to radioactive gas, Rogers fell into "a state of suspended animation, free from the ravages of katabolic processes, and without any apparent effect on physical or mental faculties." Rogers remained in “sleep” for 492 years.