It was 50 Years Ago Today…
By Philip Schweier
October 10, 2024 - 12:35
On October 10, 1974, I was in the 4th grade in Decatur, Indiana, and because I lived only a block from my school, I was permitted to go home for lunch if I wished. Sometimes I did, preferring a bowl of Cap’n Crunch to the warmed-over Salisbury steak trucked in from an off-site kitchen. But this particular day, I had other reasons.
It was my 10th birthday; the big One-Zero. Double digits. It would be life-changing in ways I never imagined.
On the way to the house, I hoped the mailman had already come and gone, leaving behind birthday cards from various aunts, uncles, cousins and casual acquaintances containing a modest fortune. In those days, a mere $5 was an immeasurable windfall to a kid my age.
Reaching the porch, I could see my fondest desire realized – mail had come – but alas, no cards. The only thing addressed to me was a brown manila envelope, return address: Bloomington, Indiana. My sister Janet (11 years older than I) had sent me something from college. How nice.
Janet
was a student at Indiana University, where future film producer Michael Uslan
taught perhaps the only accredited college course on comic books. It had been
in the papers, making waves throughout the Hoosier state, and I hoped to
someday take the course myself, being a young fan of super-heroes. A couple of
years prior, I’d discovered the Adventures
of Superman TV show, and shortly
after that bought my first comic book,
Legion of Super-Heroes #3 (April/May 1973). Together they set me on the
road to fandom. 
Opening the manila envelope, I was all too happy to discover a copy of Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes #205. Superboy! The Legion! In a 100-page super-spectacular! Not cash money, but maybe the next best thing. There was also a letter, explaining that a friend of hers had taken the comic book class, and knowing I’d be interested, she asked her friend for the comic book when he was done with it. I happily showed my sister’s gift to my mom, though she seemed hardly impressed. I chalked it up to typical motherly disinterest.
I
didn’t have time to read it during my 30-minute lunch break, and Mom wouldn’t
let me take it to school. But at 3:00, I hurried home to enjoy my new treasure
– a new Superboy/Legion story, "The Legion of Super-Executioners," (and hey, it’s Lana Lang’s birthday, too), a vintage Superboy solo story, and an epic Legion adventure from the 1960s. But wait!
There’s more! Lore of the Legion, featuring facts about the members, and a
single-page profile of the Legion’s new artist, “Iron” Mike Grell.
Mike Grell's self-portrait from his introduction in Superboy/Legion #205
I’d never really paid close attention to comic book art before; it seemed as if everyone had a “house style.” Certainly all the Archie and Richie Rich titles looked the same, but so did the super-hero titles I favored. Superman’s appearance seldom varied, thanks to Curt Swan’s pencils, and Dick Giordano’s inks brought a consistency to Batman’s adventures. But this Mike Grell guy, he was different. He had a distinctive style that immediately hooked me. And Grell’s profile told me that as a comic book artist, I could “work two or three days a week, and make a million bucks a year.”
(Mike Grell was quoting an aspiring cartoonist, and we both later realized the man was ill-informed.)
That
night after dinner, I enjoyed cake with my family and opening my
presents,
during which Janet called long-distance to wish me happy birthday. I thanked
her for the comic book, but she said it wasn’t my “real” gift. Instead, she told
me to look in the bottom drawer in the den, where we kept the mittens and
scarves. Empty! Mom had already put it with my other loot, but with Janet still
on the phone, I unwrapped her other gift to me: The Great Comic Book Heroes by Jules Feiffer. Required reading for
Uslan’s comic book course at IU, it introduced me to some of the Golden Age
characters I had yet to discover.
An embarrassment of birthday riches, which obviously still resonates 50 years later. My copy of The Great Comic Book Heroes lost its dust jacket decades ago, but it gained a Jules Feiffer’s autograph, and a replacement dust jacket was discovered in an obscure Salt Lake City bookstore in 2003. Superboy/Legion #205 has also been well-loved, and although replacement copies have been plentiful, Mike Grell signed my original copy during a convention appearance. After he left Superboy/Legion, I followed Grell to original creations such as the Warlord and Jon Sable, but the Legion remained a mainstay of my comic book reading well into adulthood.
I
never did make to into Michael Uslan’s course at IU, which was okay. He had
surrendered his teaching position in favor of a movie career. Meanwhile, I enrolled
at the Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD) to pursue dreams of comic
book stardom. However, being “the art guy” in a small Midwestern high school
doesn’t measure up
when you’re surround by hundreds of other students from
across the country who are every bit as good as you, if not better. But as my
college days wound down in 1988, Uslan brought Return of the Swamp Thing to be filmed in Savannah.
Michael Uslan, the boy who loved Batman, the man who gave us Batman movies
Nor did I become a comic book artist as I once dreamed. Instead, a more sustainable career in printing/publishing became necessary, which opened the door to an increasing amount of journalism over the years. This led to published interviews with comic book pros – including Mike Grell and Michael Uslan.
And my sister Janet? She and the rest of my family have all seen our share of joy and misery, victory and loss. Through it all, my siblings and I share the love and support our parents instilled in us. Therein lies the true embarrassment of riches on my birthday.