Collecting Comics

[Martin Hash]

I got started reading comic books when I was 10, living in Huntington Beach, California, going to Circle View Elementary, named after the fact that the classrooms were in circular buildings, which was very avant-garde in 1968. At that time, I bought Harvey & Gold Key, the kiddie comics, while my younger brother bought DC & Marvel. My brother quit buying comics and I traded his cool comics for more kiddie ones. A few years later, when I was in junior high, I regretted those trades because I now liked DC comics too and started collecting “Action” (Superman). I would ride my bike to the grocery store, eagerly anticipating the new issue. That would have been the Silver Age, number 200 - 402. I had about half of all Silver age when I started my oldest son, Health, collecting comics when he was 8. We had a book showing all the covers of Silver Age Action Comics, and Heath would pick out one he wanted to get next and we'd look for it at a comic book show. We completed the Silver Age collection about the time Heath moved out after high school but we still went to comic book shows so Heath & I started buying Golden Age Action Comics. I put them in 2-sided glass frames and hung everything in what’s now affectionately called, “the comic book room.”

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I haven't bought a comic book to read in decades, and my collection, other than Action, was languishing in the attic, when I decided that I’d put them on display in binders in my office. I photocopied some of the covers to use a spine art, and put the comics into clear plastic pages. The binders are on shelves and I can see them from my desk so occasionally I take them out and fondle some of the comics inside, sometimes even open one up to see the fabulous artwork that reminds me of my youth. I get an actual flashback to my old room reading it, and the excitement & wonder that enveloped me at the time. If that feeling could be put into a pill and sell it, I’d be rich.

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