It's All About the Comics!

This is COMIC EXPO week here in Cincinnati! In recognition of the art of comic creation, the next couple of posts highlight the efforts of two local artists who are finding their own way into the comic industry. And since one of my early interests in life was cartooning, today's post looks back 50+ years at 2 old comics that made a long-lasting impression.

Superman's first appearance, Action Comics #1, July 1938.

I could read when I was in kindergarten. Not real well, probably. But I must have learned basic phonics because I could read well enough to sound out the word "meteorite." Stretched out on the couch in our family's home in Akron, Ohio, that was the word I pronounced out loud from a Superman comic book. I didn't really know who Superman was, but I was intrigued by the fact that he could fly and that he could destroy space rocks with his bare hands.

My mother told me years later that the comic was one of several given to me and my sister in the early 60's by her younger brother. The comic is long gone and I only remember that one panel, so I have no idea which issue I was reading at the time. But if my uncle acquired his comics as a young boy in the 1940's -- or teen in the mid-50's -- I have to think I was probably holding a silver-age Superman.

This is my earliest memory of any book -- and it was a comic book.

Adventure Comics #334, The Unknown Legionnaire.

The first time I remember buying my own comic was about a year later. Our family was living in St. Clairsville, Ohio. It was the summer of 1965 and I had just finished the 1st grade. I remember being in this little local grocery store with my parents. Some comics on the bottom tier of the newspaper shelf caught my eye. One, in particular, interested me and I asked my father if we could buy it. It was Adventure Comics #334, Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes. The title, The Unknown Legionnaire, and the cover art fascinated me.

Even though my parents knew I didn't really understand all the words, Dad agreed to buy it for me. I had that comic for years. In fact, I believe that comic is still around, sans the cover, in a collection passed along to my son.

So, what's the big deal with comics, right? For me, at first, it was all about the heroes and their powers. Whether present-, past- or future-tense, these amazing stories of super-powered beings battling fantastic foes on far-off worlds opened up my imagination. Then, as I grew older, my taste in comics and comic strips changed. I adopted a real love for cartoon animation as a story medium. I grew to be a big fan of Schulz and Watterson because of their unique (and very different) takes on childhood and of Larson because of his unique take on just about everything. And I started following superheroes less in print and more on the screen.

But even as my tastes changed, so print and reproduction methods improved. Drawing styles changed. Short stories became graphic novels, and story arcs grew longer and more complex. Once again I felt drawn, first to the stories, then to the art form, then back to the stories again.

I've kinda' come full circle. The stories are much bigger than they used to be, the colors much bolder, the action more intense. But I realize (as we all did, eventually) that comics aren't drawn (or animated, or acted out) so much for the young as they are for the young at heart.

It amazes me that the comic industry (empire) was created, built, and run by adults for adults.

But what I find even more interesting than all the stories written over the last 80 years are the stories of their creators -- the ones who started it all -- and why.