My Life With Comic Books: Part # 130

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

MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP-Part 130

“We make a “crazy” decision.”

My son, Adam, was preparing for his high school graduation from Lexington Christian Academy and he still wasn’t sure which college he was going to attend in the fall. He had been offered a decent academic scholarship for the University of Cincinnati but he had not yet been accepted into the musical theatre program. He would need to audition for the theatre department and his confidence had been shaken because of a few unsuccessful recent college auditions. This university was recognized as one of the top schools in the country for theatre and Adam was seriously considering going there even if he didn’t make it into the theatre department. He figured that once he was there, he could keep trying until he got into this exclusive department. He was also offered a generous theatre scholarship to attend Eastern Nazarene College in Massachusetts, based on his credentials as a good student and actor as well as a good recommendation from his high school drama teacher, Chris Greco. Adam wanted a change and really didn’t want to go to a private Christian college, so he declined the offer. He also didn’t want to be separated from his girlfriend, Meridith, who had already been accepted at The Boston Conservatory in Boston, Massachusetts. With a last-minute audition and a recommendation from Adam’s private voice teacher (who was also a teacher at The Boston Conservatory) Adam was accepted into this highly acclaimed school. When we asked Adam how much the tuition was, he admitted that he had no idea. It never occurred to him that it might be more than we could afford. Our agreement with both of our children was that we would pay for half of their college expenses and the other half would be their responsibility. Any scholarships that they earned would be deducted from their half of the cost of the tuition. This seemed fair to us because any scholarships would be the result of their own hard work. Unfortunately, since Adam had waited so long to apply to The Boston Conservatory, there were no scholarships offered to him. He was just to consider himself lucky to be accepted.

My sister Sharon’s daughter, Emily, was graduating from a small, private Christian school in Laconia, New Hampshire a week or two before Adam’s graduation and we were invited to attend the graduation ceremony.

Emily was supposed to be born a few weeks before Adam but since Adam was born seven weeks prematurely, he was born first. Emily and Adam ended up in a good-natured “competition” during their youth. Who would walk first? Who would talk first? Who would start school first? Who would get their drivers license first? Now, Emily was graduating high school first.

We noticed some unusual things as we listened to the speakers at the graduation ceremony. The “special guest speaker,” Bill Broughton, was a teacher from the school and although he was a quiet, soft-spoken man, his message was an encouragement to all of the students and the audience. The principal of the school, Dave Borchers, (also known as Mr. B.) introduced each of the twenty graduates to the audience. He shared some of his personal thoughts about each student and then listed some of each student’s accomplishments and aspirations for the future. My wife and I were surprised that this principal seemed to really care about these students and personally knew so much about them. The other thing we noticed was something that didn’t impress us. It seemed as if most of these students had rather unspectacular life-goals. One girl hoped to become a secretary. One boy hoped to work in his family’s excavation business. Some expressed interest in some form of missionary work. Several students were planning to go on to college after graduation but none were accepted into prominent “Ivy League” colleges. Those that were going to go to college had chosen small private Christian universities or state schools. I wasn’t very impressed.

The next week we went to Adam’s graduation from Lexington Christian Academy. The ceremony was a formal affair with all of the “pomp and circumstance” you’d expect from a serious college preparatory school with the outstanding reputation of Lexington Christian Academy. Many of the teachers and administration proudly wore their robes adorned with sashes indicating their educational credentials. The list of colleges and universities that Adam’s classmates were going to attend included Harvard, Yale, Princeton and other top schools. Very impressive indeed. This school had certainly prepared these graduates for the next part of the educational process. If I’m not mistaken, every student in the graduating class was attending a four-year college the following fall. That is quite an accomplishment for both the school and the students. But after experiencing Emily’s graduation ceremony and comparing it to Adam’s ceremony, we couldn’t help but notice a significant difference. At the time, it was hard to put my finger on exactly what the difference was, but I knew that I wanted my daughter, Cassy, to be a part of the small school in New Hampshire instead of the school that Adam had attended. Cassy had been put on a “waiting list” at Lexington Christian Academy but we weren’t comfortable waiting any longer for a spot to open up for her. We needed to make a decision. Only half seriously, I made a crazy suggestion.

In the unlikely event that a spot did open up for Cassy at Lexington Christian Academy, we’d be paying about $10,000 per year for tuition. We loved my sister Sharon and her whole family and we’d enjoy being closer to where they lived. When Adam went off to college in Boston, the rest of us could move to the Laconia, New Hampshire area so that Cassy could attend Laconia Christian School. The tuition was so low (about $2800 per year) that we could rent an apartment or condo and pay the tuition for less money than just the tuition for Lexington Christian Academy. I was rarely needed at my comic book stores because I had a good staff of competent employees. We could keep our home in Bolton, Massachusetts, just in case this situation didn’t work out. If it didn’t work out, we could just move back to Massachusetts.

After discussing this for a few days it started to seem like a real possibility. We called the school in New Hampshire and the school secretary, Judy Downing, arranged for us to come up for a mandatory student and parent information night and interview. After a brief interview we were asked to prayerfully consider whether this was the right move for us. Convinced that it was, we called a few days later and were told that Cassy would be allowed to attend this school. This meant that we needed to deal with a lot of major issues before the summer ended, like finding and renting a place to live in New Hampshire. But first, we were leaving on our huge family cruise soon!

Next chapter: The cruise.

My Life With Comic Books: Part # 93

The current cast of characters:
Paul Howley: age 39
Mal Howley: my wife
Adam Dean Howley: 14 years old
Cassy Howley: 9 years old


MY LIFE WITH COMIC BOOKS: THE HISTORY OF A COMIC SHOP - Part 93

The end of 1993 brought lots of change to my circle of friends and family. I bought our first real personal computer for my family and presented it to our kids as a “big” family gift. I think it was a Packard Bell system that operated at a whopping 66 megahertz for an outrageous $3,000. In “the olden days” these computer systems were a nuisance to get ready to use. All of the software had to be loaded using multiple floppy discs. Luckily, we had Adam to tackle this task. Even though he had never used a computer before, he had a knack for putting electronic equipment together. Within thirty minutes it was up and running.

Adam was halfway through the eighth grade at The Imago School and they did not offer a high school program there. We knew that we had no interest in Adam attending the local public high school. I had gone there twenty years earlier and it wasn’t challenging to me at all. It was “common knowledge” that the schools had only gotten worse over the past two decades so we began to consider our options. We had heard good things about Lexington Christian Academy, a college preparatory high school located in a suburb of Boston. The tuition was over $10,000 per year but we discussed this as a family and determined that we would “sacrifice” our big family vacations in order to afford this challenging school for Adam. Adam toured the school and scheduled an appointment to take the entrance exam.

As we were driving to the school on the day of the entrance exam, we realized that the almost one hour commute to and from school each day was going to be horrible. The only practical way to get there was by the major highway Route 128, also known as “Dead Man’s Highway,” because of the poor design and crazy drivers traveling at over 80 miles per hour! I was still working at my comic book store in Worcester on a regular basis so I couldn’t commit to helping Mal with the school commuting. She would have to deal with getting Adam to his new school and Cassy to her school each day. This drive wouldn’t be pleasant but it was worth the aggravation to provide the superior educational opportunities for Adam.

Adam took the test and got the highest score of any of the incoming freshmen so he was offered a spot for the next school year. His test score also allowed him to take another test to determine if he was eligible for the “Headmaster’s Scholarship.” His score on this test was the highest and he was the recipient of this distinguished award. This scholarship would have been for a full, four-year tuition at Lexington Christian School but since my income was deemed to be too high, Adam received an annual stipend of $750.00. Obviously, it’s not quite the same, but every little bit would help. Most importantly, we were very proud of Adam.

Business at my two comic book and collectible stores was still growing. Baseball cards and comic book sales had dropped a bit but we got lucky enough to find a product that would sell enough to make up the difference. It was called “Magic The Gathering” and a small company called “Wizards of the Coast” created them. This was a trading card fantasy strategy game that was also collectible because the manufacturer deliberately printed less of certain cards to make them “rare.” A customer had requested these cards a few months before they were released so I was probably aware of them before most of my local competitors. I ordered ten full boxes and we sold all of them within a few weeks. Demand for these cards became intense and the prices rose quickly on the “short-printed” cards. We were able to get a few more small shipments of these cards but we certainly couldn’t keep up with the demand. Luckily, we had a good relationship with numerous distributors and they took good care of us with “Magic The Gathering” cards. By the time the second series of cards were released, we were pre-ordering over fifty boxes that had a retail value of over $100.00 each. These sold out within one day. When the third series came out we sold over one hundred boxes the first week. My Fitchburg store co-manager, Richard Ortwein (who had recently returned to work there after a short time away), was smart enough to alert the local media about this amazing new product and the local newspaper ran a large story about these cards and our great second store.

This also was the year (1993) that two of my favorite customers, Paul Dinsdale and Christine Carelli, got married. This was a big deal for me since I was involved in “setting them up.”

Next chapter: Do you remember “POGS?”

Picture: Adam receives the "Headmaster Scholarship For Academics" at Lexington Christian Academy