Thursday, May 9, 2024
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One Fateful Meeting...
Roger Hill, In the Limelite this week, was born and raised in Wichita, KS, where he lives and works for a video production company that produces commercials for television and local radio. From the beginnings of organized fandom in the 1960s to the present, he has been involved in efforts to organize, document, and celebrate the legacy of a wide array of entertainment media - including, of course, comics.
With 1950s comics and original EC artwork at the center of his collection, other important components of his holdings include complete runs of monster magazines from the '60s through the present, space-related toys from the '50s up, movie posters, lobby cards, and pressbooks of all kinds, with a special interest in horror and science-fiction from the '20s to the '70s and runs of horror, science-fiction and fantasy pulps from the '20s to the '60s. Hill also maintains a large collection of sheet music and paperbacks, gum cards that he began buying as a kid in the '60s, and an extensive collection of reference books on comics, movies, illustrators, and other areas of collecting.
"The first thing I started collecting when I was a kid was Famous Monsters during the late 1950s," says Roger Hill. He and his brother had discovered the magazine on the newsstand with issue #5. "Then, I graduated to Gold Key and Dell comics during the early 1960s when titles like Magnus Robot Fighter and Space Family Robinson were introduced."
The Famous Monsters purchase turned out to be quite fateful, as it introduced him to an entire world of collecting and a pivotal group of fellow collectors.
"Through Famous Monsters I began collecting early monster fanzines, and eventually met [Famous Monsters] Editor Forrest J. Ackerman when he made his famous 3,000-mile coast-to-coast trip to meet his fans. He came to Wichita to meet a group of us who gathered together over at Jerry Weist's house," he says. (Weist was then one of the early EC fanzine pioneers and now heads up comics and comic art auctions for Sotheby's - check him out in this week's Auctions/Prices and Off the Presses.)
"Jerry was cranking out a little mimeographed fanzine called Movieland Monsters at the time, and I was impressed with that. We started talking about putting out our own fanzine. Through Jerry, I became exposed to EC comic books. Jerry had just been introduced to them himself. Soon after, I was trying to buy all the ECs I could get my hands on. They were very cheap back in those days. You could buy most of them for $1.50 to $3.50 each. Phil Seuling in New York was our biggest supplier of old comics then, followed by Bill Thailing in Cleveland."
The meeting with Ackerman itself, as much as the content of that meeting, influenced Hill significantly. Ackerman's collection was already famous by that point, and his house was famous for its rooms filled with horror and science-fiction memorabilia. "It was pretty incredible for me, and I guess you could say it was the first time in my life that I had ever met a professional like Forry. And ... in some respects, you could say this was a first 'mini'-convention for me, because all these other kids were there, too, talking and comparing notes on their likes and dislikes about monster movies, magazines, and comic books.
"Ackerman and his wife, Wendayne, were late in arriving that evening. When they finally showed up, around 9:00 p.m., we all rushed out to meet them as he pulled into the driveway. Almost immediately, he pulled the original wax head that was used in the film The Picture of Dorian Gray from the backseat, contained in a special sealed plastic box. We all just fell over with envy. Then, after we got inside the house, he pointed out Bela Lugosi's Dracula ring that he was wearing, and we just stood there gasping for air. It was too much!"
Just how much did the meeting influence the young collector?
"I am sure this was one of the biggest influences on me to become a rabid collector of so many different things," Hill says, "and is probably why today, my house now is crowded with memorabilia, almost as bad as Forry's."
Like many other collectors in the early days of organized fandom, he not only worked on fanzines, but he also read them voraciously. He discovered the Rocket's Blast-Comic Collector [RBCC] fanzine being published by G. B. Love. It was loaded with ads from other collectors looking either to buy or sell comics, pulps, paperbacks, movie posters, records, trading cards, magazines, and so on. Through this fanzine and others, he was soon buying ECs and other horror and sci-fi comics from various collectors and dealers around the country.
"I think this was where I connected with a young professor of physics out of Adel, IA, who I started buying and trading ECs from," Hill says. "His name was Russ Cochran, and within a year or so, when I was only 16, I made my first plane trip to visit this fellow for the weekend. Russ had all kinds of neat original artwork and duplicate ECs in his collection. When I arrived, he had just bought a complete mint-condition collection of New Trend ECs from a guy who advertised them in the RBCC. I think Russ had paid something like $350.00 for the complete mint set. At the time, that was a fortune to me!"
He came back from his visit with Cochran with an armload of EC comic books and original art.
"I got the lower half of a [Burne] Hogarth Tarzan Sunday page for something like $7.00. I think I had traded him a stack of Prince Valiant Sunday pages. I'll never forget Russ showing me his original Haunt of Fear #18 cover art by 'Ghastly' Graham Ingels, which he got from Bill Gaines. It was a masterpiece, and today hangs on my wall here in the living room."
Hill says he's always retained his fondness for ECs. Unlike many collectors who drifted away from comics only to return, he's never left. "I may have slowed down in collecting EC memorabilia at various points over the years, but I never abandoned it. I was lucky very early on to be involved in several EC fanzines that were being published in the mid-to-late-1960s.
"Also, I think meeting and becoming friends with Bill Gaines early on helped keep my interest, too. Several of us traveled to New York City in 1967 for the World Science-Fiction Convention, and it was there that Jerry Weist and I first met Bill Gaines. He was always the biggest EC fan around and he loved to talk about the old days of producing those comic books. We had arranged to meet up with Bill, who showed us his closet full of 12 copies each - mint - of every EC New Trend comic he had ever published. He took us out for an evening on the town, driving us around in his big gold-colored Cadillac. It was a wonderful experience, and after that, anytime I went back to New York City, I'd always call up Bill, and get together for dinner. He loved to eat and we'd always wind up in one of the better restaurants in New York."
As Hill's interest continued to grow, he attended conventions in Oklahoma City and Tulsa, and also some of Phil Seuling's shows in New York. He enjoyed the smaller shows such as the Oklahoma City show where he met artists George Evans and L.B. Cole, but he describes his favorite convention ever as the EC Fan-Addict Convention held in New York in 1972.
"Almost all of the EC artists were in attendance, and the place was just jammed with EC aficionados everywhere," Hill says. "I got to meet most of the EC artists who attended, and got autographs on various things. It was a magic moment for me."
As a fan who collects many different items, why does he think the ECs still have such a hold on the attention of comic book fandom?
"Without a doubt, you have to acknowledge the stories," Hill replies. "The incredible way that Al Feldstein could arrange words so that a story flowed along. And they were intelligent stories, not really written for kids. Written for adults! I think that's what made EC so different from the other comics on the newsstands during the 1950s. And they started up the fan-mail pages and communicated with their fans. They started up the EC Fan-Addict Fan Club and sent bulletins and membership stuff out to their readers who joined. It was a combination of art and story that came together in a perfect blend that makes EC the greatest.
"Think about it: The only complete series of comics ever put out by one publisher, and they've all been reprinted over and over and over, and the demand continues to grow. What does that tell you? It's never been done before or since."
Among the many items from his collection, EC original art holds a special place. He didn't hesitate to name his favorite covers: Haunt of Fear #18 by Graham Ingels, Tales from the Crypt #34 by Jack Davis, Tales of Terror Annual #1 by Al Feldstein, Vault of Horror #23 by Johnny Craig, and Shock SuspenStories #5 by Wally Wood.
His favorites, though, aren't limited to EC. He enjoys his Universal Horror one-sheets and pressbooks without singling out a particular title, and his complete run of Famous Monsters. And after such a long time in the business, he hasn't lost his enthusiasm for collecting.
"The satisfaction is bringing together complete runs of books, comics, or magazines and wonderful original artwork that relates to it all," Hill says. "It's a challenge for me today to track down and find things that I've wondered about for over 30 years. I will never give it up. It's an obsession that I expect to continue until my last breath. It never ends. Forry Ackerman is still going at the age of 86. I'll be around in this field for a long time yet, I hope."
Roger is currently in the final stages of completing work as Art Director on the upcoming Wally Wood book from Two-Morrows Publishing. This is the book that Bob Stewart wrote over twenty years ago, and solicited written contributions from many of Woody's friends and other professionals who worked with him during his prestigious career working in comics.
He got involved in the project to insure that most of the art in the book was shot from the originals, so as to insure the finest reproduction possible. Of course, he has collected the original art of Wally Wood, and other EC artists, for over thirty years now, but what he didn't have, he simply went out and found in the collections of others. Many have been kind enough to let him photograph their originals for the book, so it should prove to be one of the finest presentations of artwork by an artist who worked in the comics and illustration field.
Roger is also currently editor of the CFA-APA (Comic and Fantasy Art Amateur Press Association) which is an organization of original art collectors spread across the U.S. who contribute articles about the artists and artwork they collect and appreciate in a quarterly mailing. Aside from his contributions to the CFA-APA Roger also writes for Russ Cochran's Comic Book Marketplace and Roy Thomas' Alter Ego publication. He can be reached at: ecfanaddicts@lycos.com.
Roger Hill, In the Limelite this week, was born and raised in Wichita, KS, where he lives and works for a video production company that produces commercials for television and local radio. From the beginnings of organized fandom in the 1960s to the present, he has been involved in efforts to organize, document, and celebrate the legacy of a wide array of entertainment media - including, of course, comics.
With 1950s comics and original EC artwork at the center of his collection, other important components of his holdings include complete runs of monster magazines from the '60s through the present, space-related toys from the '50s up, movie posters, lobby cards, and pressbooks of all kinds, with a special interest in horror and science-fiction from the '20s to the '70s and runs of horror, science-fiction and fantasy pulps from the '20s to the '60s. Hill also maintains a large collection of sheet music and paperbacks, gum cards that he began buying as a kid in the '60s, and an extensive collection of reference books on comics, movies, illustrators, and other areas of collecting.
"The first thing I started collecting when I was a kid was Famous Monsters during the late 1950s," says Roger Hill. He and his brother had discovered the magazine on the newsstand with issue #5. "Then, I graduated to Gold Key and Dell comics during the early 1960s when titles like Magnus Robot Fighter and Space Family Robinson were introduced."
The Famous Monsters purchase turned out to be quite fateful, as it introduced him to an entire world of collecting and a pivotal group of fellow collectors.
"Through Famous Monsters I began collecting early monster fanzines, and eventually met [Famous Monsters] Editor Forrest J. Ackerman when he made his famous 3,000-mile coast-to-coast trip to meet his fans. He came to Wichita to meet a group of us who gathered together over at Jerry Weist's house," he says. (Weist was then one of the early EC fanzine pioneers and now heads up comics and comic art auctions for Sotheby's - check him out in this week's Auctions/Prices and Off the Presses.)
"Jerry was cranking out a little mimeographed fanzine called Movieland Monsters at the time, and I was impressed with that. We started talking about putting out our own fanzine. Through Jerry, I became exposed to EC comic books. Jerry had just been introduced to them himself. Soon after, I was trying to buy all the ECs I could get my hands on. They were very cheap back in those days. You could buy most of them for $1.50 to $3.50 each. Phil Seuling in New York was our biggest supplier of old comics then, followed by Bill Thailing in Cleveland."
The meeting with Ackerman itself, as much as the content of that meeting, influenced Hill significantly. Ackerman's collection was already famous by that point, and his house was famous for its rooms filled with horror and science-fiction memorabilia. "It was pretty incredible for me, and I guess you could say it was the first time in my life that I had ever met a professional like Forry. And ... in some respects, you could say this was a first 'mini'-convention for me, because all these other kids were there, too, talking and comparing notes on their likes and dislikes about monster movies, magazines, and comic books.
"Ackerman and his wife, Wendayne, were late in arriving that evening. When they finally showed up, around 9:00 p.m., we all rushed out to meet them as he pulled into the driveway. Almost immediately, he pulled the original wax head that was used in the film The Picture of Dorian Gray from the backseat, contained in a special sealed plastic box. We all just fell over with envy. Then, after we got inside the house, he pointed out Bela Lugosi's Dracula ring that he was wearing, and we just stood there gasping for air. It was too much!"
Just how much did the meeting influence the young collector?
"I am sure this was one of the biggest influences on me to become a rabid collector of so many different things," Hill says, "and is probably why today, my house now is crowded with memorabilia, almost as bad as Forry's."
Like many other collectors in the early days of organized fandom, he not only worked on fanzines, but he also read them voraciously. He discovered the Rocket's Blast-Comic Collector [RBCC] fanzine being published by G. B. Love. It was loaded with ads from other collectors looking either to buy or sell comics, pulps, paperbacks, movie posters, records, trading cards, magazines, and so on. Through this fanzine and others, he was soon buying ECs and other horror and sci-fi comics from various collectors and dealers around the country.
"I think this was where I connected with a young professor of physics out of Adel, IA, who I started buying and trading ECs from," Hill says. "His name was Russ Cochran, and within a year or so, when I was only 16, I made my first plane trip to visit this fellow for the weekend. Russ had all kinds of neat original artwork and duplicate ECs in his collection. When I arrived, he had just bought a complete mint-condition collection of New Trend ECs from a guy who advertised them in the RBCC. I think Russ had paid something like $350.00 for the complete mint set. At the time, that was a fortune to me!"
He came back from his visit with Cochran with an armload of EC comic books and original art.
"I got the lower half of a [Burne] Hogarth Tarzan Sunday page for something like $7.00. I think I had traded him a stack of Prince Valiant Sunday pages. I'll never forget Russ showing me his original Haunt of Fear #18 cover art by 'Ghastly' Graham Ingels, which he got from Bill Gaines. It was a masterpiece, and today hangs on my wall here in the living room."
Hill says he's always retained his fondness for ECs. Unlike many collectors who drifted away from comics only to return, he's never left. "I may have slowed down in collecting EC memorabilia at various points over the years, but I never abandoned it. I was lucky very early on to be involved in several EC fanzines that were being published in the mid-to-late-1960s.
"Also, I think meeting and becoming friends with Bill Gaines early on helped keep my interest, too. Several of us traveled to New York City in 1967 for the World Science-Fiction Convention, and it was there that Jerry Weist and I first met Bill Gaines. He was always the biggest EC fan around and he loved to talk about the old days of producing those comic books. We had arranged to meet up with Bill, who showed us his closet full of 12 copies each - mint - of every EC New Trend comic he had ever published. He took us out for an evening on the town, driving us around in his big gold-colored Cadillac. It was a wonderful experience, and after that, anytime I went back to New York City, I'd always call up Bill, and get together for dinner. He loved to eat and we'd always wind up in one of the better restaurants in New York."
As Hill's interest continued to grow, he attended conventions in Oklahoma City and Tulsa, and also some of Phil Seuling's shows in New York. He enjoyed the smaller shows such as the Oklahoma City show where he met artists George Evans and L.B. Cole, but he describes his favorite convention ever as the EC Fan-Addict Convention held in New York in 1972.
"Almost all of the EC artists were in attendance, and the place was just jammed with EC aficionados everywhere," Hill says. "I got to meet most of the EC artists who attended, and got autographs on various things. It was a magic moment for me."
As a fan who collects many different items, why does he think the ECs still have such a hold on the attention of comic book fandom?
"Without a doubt, you have to acknowledge the stories," Hill replies. "The incredible way that Al Feldstein could arrange words so that a story flowed along. And they were intelligent stories, not really written for kids. Written for adults! I think that's what made EC so different from the other comics on the newsstands during the 1950s. And they started up the fan-mail pages and communicated with their fans. They started up the EC Fan-Addict Fan Club and sent bulletins and membership stuff out to their readers who joined. It was a combination of art and story that came together in a perfect blend that makes EC the greatest.
"Think about it: The only complete series of comics ever put out by one publisher, and they've all been reprinted over and over and over, and the demand continues to grow. What does that tell you? It's never been done before or since."
Among the many items from his collection, EC original art holds a special place. He didn't hesitate to name his favorite covers: Haunt of Fear #18 by Graham Ingels, Tales from the Crypt #34 by Jack Davis, Tales of Terror Annual #1 by Al Feldstein, Vault of Horror #23 by Johnny Craig, and Shock SuspenStories #5 by Wally Wood.
His favorites, though, aren't limited to EC. He enjoys his Universal Horror one-sheets and pressbooks without singling out a particular title, and his complete run of Famous Monsters. And after such a long time in the business, he hasn't lost his enthusiasm for collecting.
"The satisfaction is bringing together complete runs of books, comics, or magazines and wonderful original artwork that relates to it all," Hill says. "It's a challenge for me today to track down and find things that I've wondered about for over 30 years. I will never give it up. It's an obsession that I expect to continue until my last breath. It never ends. Forry Ackerman is still going at the age of 86. I'll be around in this field for a long time yet, I hope."
Roger is currently in the final stages of completing work as Art Director on the upcoming Wally Wood book from Two-Morrows Publishing. This is the book that Bob Stewart wrote over twenty years ago, and solicited written contributions from many of Woody's friends and other professionals who worked with him during his prestigious career working in comics.
He got involved in the project to insure that most of the art in the book was shot from the originals, so as to insure the finest reproduction possible. Of course, he has collected the original art of Wally Wood, and other EC artists, for over thirty years now, but what he didn't have, he simply went out and found in the collections of others. Many have been kind enough to let him photograph their originals for the book, so it should prove to be one of the finest presentations of artwork by an artist who worked in the comics and illustration field.
Roger is also currently editor of the CFA-APA (Comic and Fantasy Art Amateur Press Association) which is an organization of original art collectors spread across the U.S. who contribute articles about the artists and artwork they collect and appreciate in a quarterly mailing. Aside from his contributions to the CFA-APA Roger also writes for Russ Cochran's Comic Book Marketplace and Roy Thomas' Alter Ego publication. He can be reached at: ecfanaddicts@lycos.com.
