As I have noted, I’m not one much for nostalgia. I don’t long for the “good old days.”
Also, I used to think in terms of time being linear. You do this; this is over. You do that; that passes. On to the next thing. I’m more likely now to see things as parabolic, with events somehow coming back to re-inform one’s life periodically.
I do have a sense of history, though. That is why my friend Steve Bissette and I tried to fix some of the more egregious errors on the FantaCo Wikipedia page a few years ago. I worked at the comic book and film paraphernalia store/publisher/mail order/convention place at 21 Central Avenue in Albany from 1980-1988; Steve wrote and drew and edited some publications in the late 1980s.
It’s been an interesting summer for me. I was putting together a part of a bibliography of FantaCo publications from 1979-1988. It’s not that someone else couldn’t have done it, though I am hard-pressed to identify who. Except for owner Tom Skulan, no one else was present during that period.
It was surprising to me to discover that I had many of the publications in my possession. A set of the comic-related stuff had gotten damaged in a flooded basement, but as I explored my attic, I came across items I did not know I owned, mostly the horror film stuff that didn’t especially interest me, yet I still had copies. When my friend Bill Anderson was seeking covers to scan, I was the one with easy access to Splatter Movies; in fact, I had two copies.
What were initially harder to find included items I actually was involved with: magazines about superheroes, namely the X-Men Chronicles, Fantastic Four Chronicles, and Spider-Man Chronicles, all of which I edited and contributed to.
This bibliography was not just an exercise, though. It will be part of the program for FantaCon 2013, which will be taking place Saturday and Sunday, September 14 & 15, 2013 at the Marriott Hotel on Wolf Road in Colonie, NY, near Albany. You’ll meet tons of guests, including the aforementioned Bissette. There are some two-day tickets available for a couple more days, or you can get the one-day tickets through the opening day.
Also taking place that week are three nights of horror films at the Palace Theatre in Albany, September 12-14, with the outgoing (in both senses of the word) mayor of Albany, Jerry Jennings, kicking off the opening night activities.
Here from YouTube are some scenes from previous FantaCons:
MEDIA ZONE FANTACON 1990 Screamin Models Comic Horror
MEDIA ZONE FANTACON 1990 Kane Hodder Jason Friday 13th
MEDIA ZONE FANTACON 1990 KNB Effects Group Walking Dead
Horror Convention Fantacon 1988 clip with Forry Ackerman
