Though he shared some aspects in common with Marvel's more famous Ghost Rider, The Blazing Skull was on the scene decades earlier, fighting for the innocent and frightening the wicked with his creepy appearance. However, his powers were not a gift from the devil, but rather a product of tribal magic. According to Wikipedia:

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"Foreign correspondent Mark Todd, assigned by his newspaper to cover the Second Sino-Japanese War, is forced to take refuge in a cave during an artillery bombardment by the Japanese. There he meets the Skull Men, a strange race with burning skulls for heads. They inform him he has been chosen by the forces of destiny to be the champion of freedom, and they begin his training, which grants him abilities such as invulnerability to fire.