Last weekend was a pretty busy weekend for me. In addition to taking my 2 year old triplets to my local comic book store for the first time, The Windy City Pulp & Paperback Convention was held in the Chicago area over the entire weekend. It was looking to be a great weekend for me because I don't get that many opportunities to participate in fun stuff like this as much as I used to, but I had a few curveballs thrown my way and they caused me to some last minute scrambling just to get a little bit of everything in.The triplets did real well going to get their comics; no messes, no meltdowns, and best of all, nothing was broken or tossed about! It was definitely the highlight of the weekend for me. The were so excited that they wanted to read their comic books in the car on the way home. Once home, they spent a good hour doing nothing but "reading" the books and pointing out words, characters, and objects they knew and could identify. It was comic book dad heaven!
Unfortunately my wife got sick and I wasn't able to attend the Windy City Pulp Convention afterwards, so I had to wait and catch it on the last day. Since my wife didn't feel good, I decided to go later on Sunday so she could sleep in and rest up. When I finally got to the show, all but a small handful of vendors and exhibitors (maybe 5 or 6) had packed up and left a few hours before I arrived. It was incredibly sad because I am just now getting into the Pulps and I was looking forward to learning a lot and getting a good feel for what was out there.
That being said, I still had a great time in the 90 or so minutes I was able to spend there. I met a couple of friendly and helpful vendors who were very willing to answer my questions, make suggestions, and to just help me get a better understanding of Pulps in general. It was more than I would have hoped for even if the place was packed.
Despite only a handful of vendors still selling despite being in various stages of packing, I soon discovered that this is a hobby I will never be able to seriously be involved in because the average price for the books were about $80-$85 dollars, with many going for $200 or more. Ouch! That is such a shame too, because I was told that there are fantastic stories out there that you can't get any other way than to buy the actual Pulp it appeared in. Luckily the first guy I was able to talk to at length was a man by the name of John Gunneson who publishes and sells reprints of Pulps that are a fraction of the price of what they currently are. With it being late, I was also able to get some older reprints (old being from the 1950's) and other books that were in less than stellar condition for bottom level prices. In all I bought 4 books and spent about $31. I was able to get the following:
- Roscoes In The Night: A Bookful of Dan Turner Stories by Robert Leslie Bellem for $14
- Other Worlds Science Stories, June 1952 for $2.oo
- Weird Tales, Vol 47-#4, Summer 1974 for $5.00
- Amazing Stories, March 1945 for $10
The heroes and characters that appeared in these stories, especially those from the early 1930's, have either influenced creators and heroes of the Superhero Genre in comic books, but many of them crossed directly over into comics. Heroes like The Shadow, Doc Savage, The Phantom, and Conan the Barbarian were already established characters in the Pulps long before they found their way into the 4 color world of comics.
Even though things didn't go the way I'd have liked them to last weekend, I still had a good time and I'm looking forward to slowly devouring all these stories so I can savor the fun. From time to time I hope to talk about them here and share what I learn.
Speaking of sharing, look for at least a small hand full of reviews starting tomorrow.
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