“Funnies” comes from my dad. He never referred to them as Comic Books.
Growing up, it was kind of a tradition; my mom would buy Superman and a Batman/Robin comic books for my brother and me when they were available. They were right at the checkout at the grocery store. Like everything, they cost more over times – I’m not positive but the price of 10 or 12 cents comes back to mind for some of the earliest ones.
We would devour these when they arrived, including the bizarre products and services that were offered via advertising. We archived them in a chest my grandmother had left to us and had a really nice collection. They weren’t in pristine condition like you see the big sellers on Pawn Stars but we kept them well. That is, until one visit from our cousins who went through and ripped them all for some reason.
Today, when I go to a book store, I’m overwhelmed by the new “Funnies” who have grown up to be Graphic Novels. There is more of a story to things now and they’re less predictable than the ones I fondly remember. Whatever happened to the Fortress of Solitude or the Batcave? Today, they are definitely more violent and even the good guys have an evil element to them.
It only makes sense that there’s some sort of storage place for old comics on the internet. One that I enjoyed poking around at is Digital Comic Museum. Like any good museum, it challenges what you think you know with its collection.
I really enjoyed looking through the collection which the site claims is copyright free and in the public domain.
Long before the computer generated characters of today, I appreciate the craft that generated the stories; how the important parts are all bolded; and how all the captions were made from capital letters! You have to ask why, I suppose, but these techniques set the standard and all the companies adhered to the rules.
You’ll need to create an account to download entire copies but the free preview was enough for me to regain an appreciation for the creators of the past. I know that there are many educators that use graphic novels these days; they might be interested to see where it all started.
doug --- off the record 
Hi Doug,
What a great story once again – apart from the point where the cousins ripped all your comic books 😞
That’s a great museum! I’ll share it with my niece Maggie who loves comics and action figures and designs some as well. Now she belongs to the Minecraft fandom as she says 😉
Have a great day,
Vicky
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I agree with Vicky! I really appreciated the storytelling nature of this post. While I never got into comic books, I loved the comics in the newspaper. Saturdays were the best for this! When I taught Grades 1, 2, 5, and 6, I used to bring in the newspaper comics and sports sections for kids to read. Some of my more reluctant readers were actually excited to read. It’s like the power of graphic novels now. Thanks for the unexpected trip down memory lane … and not even on a Sunday. 🙂
Aviva
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Thank you ladies. After I wrote the post, I started to think more about comics these days and how I really appreciate a well crafted editorial cartoon. It’s one of the categories in my Flipboard reader. Comics always seem to give the artist a bit of a pass of actual facts in order to get their commentary across.
I suspect there will be a lot of this over the next 35 days as we work our way through an election.
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Oh yeah! You’re right, Doug – there will be a lot of material with the upcoming elections! I hope everything goes well for Canada. Premature elections are something I am used to from Greece ; )
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The graphic novels section has been the most popular and fastest growing section of our library collection for the past 5 years. It’s interesting as an adult reader who didn’t really read many comics (maybe just Archies!) growing up to try to read a graphic novel now. I tell kids all the time that I am a beginner reader as I forget to look at the pictures often and miss part of the story.
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