Thursday, January 10, 2008

My First Comic

It may not look like much but this is the first comic I ever owned. I remember seeing a Dr Strange comic one time when I was with some kids over by the OC Fair but this was the first one that was mine. I don't think I bought it, more likely someone gave it to me. If it still had its cover, you would know that it was Where Creatures Roam #7 from July 1971.

Where Creatures Roam #7


The lead story is a Jack Kirby classic monster story The Glop. It runs 12 pages but in my copy only pages 6-10 remain. The book has 2 other stories, one of which is a great little Steve Ditko story. These great early 70's Marvel Monster comics were all reprints of earlier Atlas comics. These stories came from Journey into Mystery #72, September 1961.

Journey into Mystery #72


In the JIM version the Glop was known as the Glob and was less yellow and more orange and brown. Also a comic was 5 cents cheaper in 1961.

I can't say how many times I read this comic but it had a profound influence on me. I think it fostered my love of oddball sci-fi films and kooky monsters. I was also lucky in that I was able to track down a piece of the original Jack Kirby art for the story.

The Glob by Jack Kirby


It is a pretty humbling thing to own a piece of art that produced the first comic I ever owned. Thanks Jack for inspiring a 6 year old kid to grow up and produce his own comics.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Thanks. I lurrrvvvee scan of old comic books and baseball/football cards. Brings back to good old days.

Unknown said...

My first comic was an Archie Digest.
I am such a dork.

Todd Franklin said...

Great post! I loved these monster reprints as kid and I was happy to complete the sets once I started going to cons. Also, nice to see that original Kirby page!

Anonymous said...

Thanks Dan for the excellent tribute to the great Jack Kirby. He influenced so many of us from that time whether you're an artist, writer, filmmaker. Thanks for the share.

- Michael D

Dave said...

I never had any comics of my own because I always spent my money on Matchbox cars. So most of what I know were the old leftovers that were at our barbershop. Most of them were Casper, Archie, Sgt. Rock, Sperman, Batman and such like that. Seeing the scans of any old comic like this brings back a lot of memories though. thanks.
Dave