My Life With Comic Books: Part # 126

The current cast of characters:
Paul Howley: age 44
Mal Howley: my wife
Adam Howley: my son, age 18
Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 14
Kevin Burns: a friend and former customer

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP-Part 126

“Adam and I take a three week trip to California”

As part of the requirements for Adam to graduate from his high school, Lexington Christian Academy, he needed to “intern” somewhere in a field of interest for him. Adam had a serious interest in acting so he asked my friend, Kevin Burns, for the opportunity to intern for Twentieth Century Fox Studios in California. Kevin, a vice president there, was in charge of producing most of the A+E Biography television shows and he agreed to allow Adam to work there. Since Adam was too young to rent a hotel room or car, I decided to go out to California with him. On one hand, this trip could be a disaster because Adam and I didn’t always get along and it could be a nightmare being stuck in a small hotel room together for almost three weeks. On the other hand, it could be a good opportunity for Adam and I to get closer as father and son, especially since he’d be moving away to go to college soon.

I had no real idea of how much money to bring on a long trip like this, but since I don’t like to use my credit card, I brought what I thought would be enough cash to cover most of our expenses including food, gas, and some entertainment. We packed our suitcases, said goodbye to Mal and Cassy, and flew to Los Angeles. After we landed and got our rental car, we drove around Los Angeles until we located the office that Adam would be working in so we wouldn’t get lost and be late for his first day of work. Adam thought that this was a waste of time but he knew this wasn’t open for “discussion.” I liked to be prepared. With that detail out of the way, we headed to our hotel.

Elsa, my favorite travel agent booked us into a reasonably priced hotel about twenty miles from the Fox Studio’s lot where Adam would be working. I wrongly assumed that this would require about a half-hour of commuting time each morning. Although the hotel was very close to the major highway that we’d travel on, it ended up taking us anywhere from one hour to one and a half hours to make the trip each way because of the heavy traffic. It was one of the biggest inconveniences of “living” in Los Angeles. One of the nice conveniences was the selection of restaurants available to us. The tiny town where we lived in Massachusetts had no such dining options. Adam and I were not gourmet eaters (we preferred quantity over quality) so we frequently chose to eat at “Taco Bell.” In fact, one day, we ate there three times!

When we arrived (on time, of course) at Fox Studio for Adam’s first day of work, Kevin Burns had left authorization with the guard so that we could get inside the studio lot. We were directed past the soundstage where the television show, “N.Y.P.D. Blue,” was filmed (a short distance from Kevin’s office bungalow) but I was disappointed that the year’s episodes were already all filmed so the soundstage was empty. Kevin introduced us to his assistant, Scott, and his secretary. This was the only staff that Kevin employed to work with him in this office but he had many more employees at his much larger offices on Van Ness Boulevard in Hollywood. Adam spent his first day on the Fox Studio lot working mostly with Scott. Rather than just hang around, I drove around the city of Los Angeles, checking out the local comic book stores. Most of the stores had weak inventories of vintage comic books and collectibles but mainly focused on new product. This new stuff didn’t interest me much because I had access to all of same material at my own comic book and collectible stores, “That’s Entertainment,” in Massachusetts. I was hoping to be able to buy some old comic books that my customers needed to finish their collections but I had no luck at the retail comic stores in Los Angeles. I would get luckier on my first weekend in California.

Next chapter: Adam and I find a local flea market and make a great “connection.”

My Life With Comic Books: Part # 125

The current cast of characters:
Paul Howley: age 43
Mal Howley: my wife
Adam Howley: my son, age 18
Cassy Howley: my daughter, age 13
Pat Donley: A former employee and a friend

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP-Part 125

In 1998, my tenant, Gary, who rented out part of my commercial building in Worcester, the owner of “The Halloween Outlet,” decided to buy a small retail plaza in Woonsocket, Rhode Island. He bought it at a reasonable price but several of the stores were empty. The plaza wasn’t in a particularly good location and it was hard to see from the main roads that went through the neighborhood. He jokingly suggested that I open another comic book and collectible store in one of his available storefronts. I politely declined his offer.

At about the same time, I got a phone call from Pat Donley, a former employee and a friend. He had left “That’s Entertainment” many years ago and had opened a comic book and collectible store in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Pat wanted to get married and raise his family near where most of his relatives still lived. I certainly understood. But after running his store during the “lean years” of the comic book industry, Pat was interested in earning more money to support his wife and children. He contacted me and asked if I would be interested in finding an opening in our organization for him. After some thought, I called him back and asked if he’d be interested in opening and running a new store in Rhode Island. Pat quickly sold his store to an interested party and convinced his wife to uproot the family and come back to New England.

I went back to my tenant, Gary, and told him that I was reconsidering locating a new store in his Rhode Island plaza. He offered me a reasonable rent on the space and I made it clear that I’d rent it on a month-to-month basis and I was not interested in making any long-term commitment. Gary was very easy to deal with and we shook hands on our agreement. No written contracts were necessary because we trusted each other. It was a refreshing way of doing business.

Before Pat arrived in Massachusetts my employees sorted through our massive inventory of back issue comic books and made a decent stock for our upcoming new store. They also selected lots of toys, trading cards and movies from our overstock. We had extra display racks and shelves available so we wouldn’t have huge initial set-up costs. By the time Pat arrived he sorted through hundreds of expensive “display” comic books and chose an assortment that would cover one of the walls of the new store. He also had to concentrate on finding an apartment for his family to live in partway between Woonsocket, Rhode Island and Worcester, Massachusetts. Pat found a convenient location, close to a small “downtown” shopping area, and with all of these details taken care of; we opened our Rhode Island store in early 1998.

I trusted that Pat could handle all of the assorted details that come up when you run a store since he had successfully opened and managed his own store in Pennsylvania. I had enough stuff going on in my “personal” life, so I knew I couldn’t be much help to Pat. My son, Adam, was halfway through his senior year in high school and there were lots of details to complete before his graduation. One of the graduation requirements was that all seniors had to “intern” for two weeks somewhere in a field of interest to them, preferably in the type of job they wanted to go into after college.

Mal and I discussed the many possibilities with Adam and we all decided that it might be fun if Adam could intern for my good friend, Kevin Burns. Kevin used to be a college professor in the Boston area and he had moved to California to take a job at Twentieth Century Fox. Over a period of a few years, Kevin moved up the corporate ladder and he was now a Vice President at the studio. Adam’s strong interest in theatre and acting seemed to make this a wonderful opportunity. Adam wrote to Kevin, offering his services for the two-week period. Kevin called Adam and discussed the details and soon agreed to let Adam work directly for him. Adam was very excited about this trip to Hollywood. Adam couldn’t really go out there alone because he was too young to rent a hotel room or rent a car, so I decided to go along. I hadn’t seen Kevin in quite a while so I knew that part would be pleasant. I did, however, have my doubts about Adam and I getting along for two weeks in a hotel room together.

Next chapter: The California trip.

My Life With Comic Books: Part # 49

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP - Part 49

In 1987 my wife, Mal, and I went on our first real vacation without our two kids. We were on a seven-day Carnival cruise to the Caribbean and we both thought that we’d have a great time without Adam and Cassandra. We were surprised to find that we couldn’t stop thinking about them. We kept thinking about how much fun they’d have in the swimming pool and on the water slide. We knew they would love the great food because they both enjoyed trying different things. We watched young kids playing and actually wished that our children were with us! When we got home we immediately booked a cruise for the whole family and six weeks later we were cruising to San Juan, St. Thomas, and Bahamas. We didn’t book this trip through AAA because we were unhappy that they charged us “full brochure price” for our first cruise. We found a travel agent who got us a price for all four of us that was cheaper than the first cruise was for just Mal and I. Our kids loved this vacation. They got involved with the supervised kids program that Carnival offers and each morning they were excited to get together with all of their new “friends.” They would play all day and we would all get together as a family for lunch and dinner. When the ship would dock at an island we’d tour old forts and historic sites, swim in the ocean, and go shopping together. Cruising is a great family vacation. For years, even though we all loved to go to Disney World, when we’d ask the kids what they’d like to do for a vacation, they’d chose a cruise. (Usually we’d go to Disney World each year too!)

In the last chapter I told about the beginning of my comic book publishing of The Man From Uncle. What I neglected to mention were the other comic books I published. Two customers from my store approached me with an idea for a three issue “mini-series” titled “Forever Now.” Chris Coleman and Dan Courtney had previously written and drawn some issues of our “in-store” amateur comic book of “Insect Man” and I liked their style so I agreed to publish this new series.

David M. Lynch and Skip Simpson had an idea for a comedy super-hero series called “The Bird.” I loved David’s writing and I knew that Skip was a very talented cartoonist so I agreed to publish this comic book.

My cousin, Steven, introduced me to Mark Marderosian. Mark was a writer and artist who had come up with an idea for a new comic book series that would feature a strong female character named “Delta Tenn.” She was a big city policewoman whose adventures were set ten years in the future. Mark was very talented and professional and he offered to present me with a new issue all ready to be printed once every two months. It required almost no work on my part so I agreed to be his publisher.

My agreement with each of these creators was a fifty-fifty split on all profits. I would handle all of the marketing, printing, shipping, and billing. They needed to deliver their work on time and they all did. Especially Mark Marderosian. Mark also helped me with my “main” comic book series, “The Man From Uncle” by doing the mechanical layout of many of our front covers. Beginning with issue number seven of The Man From Uncle we started using photographs from the old television series and Mark hand-colored old black and white photos for us. This was before computers made this an easy task! He was a great guy to work with.

We worked with a lot of writers and artists on our Man From Uncle series and most of them were able to meet their deadlines. We would always ask them to set their own schedule. Some artists could draw an entire issue in thirty days but other artists worked a little slower or were doing this while they worked a “real” full-time job so they would agree to finish their issue within sixty days. I was agreeable to the artist’s time schedule because I had several writers and artists working on issues all at the same time so I could wait and publish their work when it was finished. Things were going fine until I hired a good friend of mine to draw issue number five.

Kevin Burns was a customer of my comic book store and he was a lot of fun to be around. We’d spend hours laughing together when he’d stop by the store. He was a serious toy collector and had a love of old classic television shows including “The Munsters” and “Lost In Space.” He worked full time at Twentieth Century Fox and he was a very busy man but he assured me that he could draw the entire issue within sixty days. He drew the cover first and I was “blown away” by it! It was (and still is) my favorite cover for the entire series. He perfectly captured the look and style of Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin that we wanted for our series. They looked like the original actors but with a slightly updated sense of style. I now knew that Kevin was capable of turning in our best issue yet.

With his repeated assurance of completing the project on time I paid Kevin in advance and eagerly waited for the finished artwork. I sent in the information and a picture of Kevin’s gorgeous cover artwork to all of the distributors so they could begin the two-month process of getting the orders from the retailers. When the order came in it was for only 10,000 copies but I knew that when the retailers saw the finished comic book they would be encouraged to order more of our future issues because the quality had improved so much. I also knew that the Man From Uncle fans would love Kevin’s work. But for some reason, Kevin was unable to deliver the artwork on time. Months went by. Finally the comic book was so late that the distributors required me to cancel their original orders and resolicit new orders. When the new order came in it was for only 8000 copies.

After about five months I received the artwork from Kevin and it was great. I was proud to publish this and I thought it was our best-looking issue to date. It was our lowest selling issue so far but the fans loved it and we got quite a few complimentary letters. I learned a lesson with this experience. I would no longer assume that artists could reasonably predict how long it would take them to complete the project so I’d just wait until it was completely done before I would solicit orders from the retailers.

I decided to go to “Spy-Con,” the biggest television and movie spy-related convention in the United States. I flew to Chicago and spent three days mingling with friendly Man From Uncle fans and spent some time promoting our comic book series. I wanted this publishing venture to be successful. I even ran advertisements in the major comic book retailing publication offering hundreds of free copies of our publications to try to stir up interest. I hoped that if the retailers gave these free copies to their customers, a portion of the readers would enjoy the series enough to buy the new issues. This publishing idea was part of my plan to accumulate enough money so that I could retire before I was forty years old. Despite my efforts, sales did not increase enough.


Over the two-year period that I published The Man From Uncle comic book series I worked with several writers and artists. Issues #1-2 were written by David M. Lynch and Skip Simpson and drawn by Ken Penders. Issues #3-4 were written by Stan Timmons and drawn by Ken Penders, Larry Juliano, and Tom Cuda. Issue #5 was written by Glenn A. Magee and drawn by Kevin Burns. Issue #6 was written by Glenn A. Magee and drawn by Ronn Sutton. Issue #7 was written by Stan Timmons and drawn by Paul Daly. Issue #8 was written by Skip Simpson and drawn by David and Dan Day. Issue #9 was written by Paula Smith and drawn by Wayne Reid. Issue #10 was written by David M. Lynch and drawn by Ken Penders, Bruce Meservey, and Edwin Brady. Issue #11 was written by Paula Smith and drawn by David and Dan Day. Every issue was profitable but when it came time to renew our contract with MGM-Turner, they wanted to double the fees so we sadly made the decision to stop publishing the series. It was fun for a while but the profits from the sales of the comic books were now too small and it wasn’t “worth” the time, energy, and stress to continue.

Next chapter: Hollywood buys the option to produce a movie based on our comic book series, “Delta Tenn!”

Picture: The Cover of The Man From Uncle comic book # 5, drawn by Kevin Burns