FantaCo Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

November rambling: we’re in trouble

notable books

A great cover illustration by Walter Molino, repurposed by Jan Strnad, and used with Jan’s permission

Democracy and the Press: We’re in Trouble

Revisiting the fascism question

Liz Cheney’s new book blasts GOP as ‘enablers and collaborators’ of djt

Why Georgia Republicans Are Protecting the D.A. Who Indicted Trump

In the wake of the Voting Rights Act ruling, North Dakota to appeal the decision that protected tribes’ rights

ProPublica reviewed 12 of the nation’s strictest abortion bans. Few changed in 2023, as state lawmakers caved to pressure from anti-abortion groups opposing exceptions for rape, incest and health risks.

Dollar Stores: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

The Remarkable Biden Economy

You Cannot Rely on the Government to Protect You From Bad Charities

FTC Authorizes Compulsory Process for AI-related Products and Services

Rosalynn Carter, Outspoken Former First Lady, Dies at 96

Chuck Miller: A big toe named Elise Stefanik

NYPL service was impacted due to City budget cuts, including ending Sunday service at the vast majority of locations that currently offer it.

About 8.2 Million People Moved Between States in 2022

Of special interest to me

Finally — a PROFESSIONAL Comics Magazine! COMICS SCENE 1, January 1982. At this point in the video, there is a discussion about a FantaCo ad. Tom Skulan noted that the ad wasn’t particularly successful, whereas the ads for horror items in Fangoria magazine were much more profitable.

New York Times: 100 Notable Books of 2023, one of which was written by an author I actually know

Obit for Bob Maye, who grew up not far from my house in Binghamton, NY

Consumer Value Stores

Boston Globe: CVS pharmacists are at a breaking point, imperiling the company’s reinvention plans. The link may be behind a paywall, but basically: “There are not enough pharmacists in the pipeline, and the ones the company employs are reaching a breaking point. The company… has spent billions remaking itself into a sophisticated healthcare conglomerate. A key goal is turning its thousands of stores into community clinics where pharmacists, doctors, and nurses work together to improve patient health. But none of this works if the company can’t hire or retain its pharmacists. ‘Pharmacists are burned out,’ said a former CVS executive.”

Plans

Warner Bros. Reverses Course on ‘Coyote vs. Acme‘ After Filmmakers Rebel. I don’t understand how a studio makes money scrapping a film it’s completed.

The people who ruined the internet

The Boy Who Captured JFK From His Parents’ Basement

John Oliver – Finding a Place for Satire & Immigration as a Comedian | The Daily Show

Do You Want to Build a Movie? An Oral History of Frozen

How TMZ Became Hollywood’s Grim Reaper

Frances Sternhagen, a two-time Tony winner and television and movie actor, Died at 93. I’ve seen her on The Closer, ER, Sex and the City, Cheers, and the movie Misery, among many other roles.

What Is the Value of a Scenic View?

Medical Malpractice On Law & Order, episode 1, Ft. Legal Eagle

Mark Evanier bankrupted his grandmother in Monopoly, and in life

Greg’s long, strange trip of collecting comic books

There is no such place as Wyoming

Now I Know

How Fake Fish May Save Coral Reefs (And You Can Help!) and Cops of Coffee and The Very Expensive (and Not Very Nice) Surprise Party and The Man Who Bought (And Returned?) Stonehenge and

The Hole in a Swiss Citizenship Application

MUSIC

Peter Sprague Plays Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You featuring Rebecca Jade

Tray Wellington: Crooked Mind

Mr. Big Stuff – Jean Knight, who died recently at 80

The Highwomen: Crowded Table

Jake Blount: Didn’t It Rain

Rhiannon Giddens: You’re The One

Coverville 1465: The XTC Cover Story II and 1466: The 20th Annual All-Beatles Thanksgiving Cover Story

Amythyst Kiah: Hangover Blues

Our Native Daughters: Black Myself

On The Beautiful Blue Danube by Johann Strauss II

Rina Sawayama : Chosen Family

Kara Jackson: Pawnshop

Rossini: L’italiana in Algeri – Overture

Michael Pollack accompanies Billy Joel on “New York State of Mind”

You Were Meant For Me – Gene Kelly and Debbie Reynolds

Notation Must Die: The Battle For How We Read Music, which starts with ten minutes about chess notation

Another sighting

lookalike

Roger.cartoon There was another sighting.

I was waiting for a bus on Northern Boulevard, across the street from Memorial Hospital. A guy comes up to the bus kiosk and sits next to me. I told him the #182 bus would arrive in about ten minutes.

We get into a conversation about the value of mass transit. He said something I’ve expressed to my wife, that he would HATE being isolated outside of access to bus lines. I noted my support for public transportation.

It was a pleasant simpicato conversation. We both got off at Washington and Lark. He introduced himself, and I told him my first name. Then he said, “You look just like…” I get that a lot. It’s often a former teacher at Albany High School.

Bingo!

He said, “You look just like a guy who worked at a comic book store.” Ha! I said, “You mean the comic book store that was over there,” pointing in the general direction of 21 Central Avenue.

“I was around 12 when I went there!” He went to the store when Matt worked there, so in the 1983-1988 period. While I understand why people thought FantaCo was great, I’m surprised anyone remembers me. I only worked the front when the new comics arrived, the store was busy, or covering lunch periods. Mostly, I was in the back room doing the mail order, balancing the checkbook, or writing.

I conveyed this story to someone at choir rehearsal, where I was heading. “That can’t happen too often,” someone said. “You’d be surprised,” I replied.

About a year earlier, I was at the Readers’ Theater, sponsored by Wizard’s Wardrobe, taking place in the new Capital Repertory building. A guy helping set up said, “You used to work at FantaCo!” This was not a question but a statement.

I suppose it helped that my hairline hasn’t appreciably changed. The picture of the duck represents my look in 1983.

It’s so weird. Pleasant but weird.

The Raoul Vezina Chronicles

I am calling these the Raoul Vezina Chronicles because these are bits and pieces about the life of Raoul Vezina. He worked at Crystal Cave on Main Street in New Paltz, NY which I frequented, in the mid-1970s. He was working on New Paltz Comix and other artistic and musical pursuits.

Then he worked at FantaCo at 21 Central Avenue in Albany, NY from 1978 until his untimely death in November 1983. He co-created Smilin’ Ed Comics, made the store signs, and other creative work. Not incidentally, you can find Smilin’ Ed Comics: da complete collection on Amazon.

I had sometimes a great notion of creating a Wikipedia page for Raoul, but I now realize, after a decade of trying on and off, that wasn’t going to happen soon, if ever.

Still, I have gathered a lot of material from several of his friends. In honor of Raoul’s passing 40 years ago, here are some bits, in no particular order except being the oldest in my email. There will be more pieces soon. I will try not to replicate what I wrote here or elsewhere. (Most of my links here still work.)

Here’s Naturalist At Large, a book by Don Rittner and Raoul.

Raoul created cover art and/or lettering for some records. here’s his comics bibliography.

Bio

The bulk of this will come from Raoul’s younger sister, Maria, the Chief Nursing Officer at a major hospital and a keeper of the Raoul flame.

Raoul Francis Vezina was born on January 12, 1948.

His father was Raoul E. Vezina MD (1913-1975), a General Practitioner physician in Troy NY. He grew up in Springfield, MA. He went to The College of The Holy Cross in Worcester, MA, and Tufts School of Medicine in Medford, MA.

His mother was Elizabeth Pitaro Vezina (1912-1999) was born in Calabria, Italy and came to the United States when she was 12 years old, settling in Troy, New York. She graduated as an RN from the Samaritan School of Nursing in Troy, NY, in 1935. [I really liked Betty.]

Raoul went to St. Peter’s Grammar School, graduating in 1961, and Catholic Central High School in Troy, NY, graduating in 1965. He drew and sketched his way through school, always leaving behind many notebooks filled with original artwork rather than schoolwork.

He attended Le Moyne College in Syracuse, NY, in 1965 and then transferred to the State University of New York at New Paltz, majoring in art. Raoul was a naturally born artist and musician who never formally trained in art or music.

Art

Once the front of 279 Fair street in Kingston, NY, owned by the late Bruce Talbott, of New Paltz. Provided by Jim Abbott.

A natural born artist , as a young child, Raoul used to draw on the TV set at home during “Squiggle Time” for the rabbit Freddie Freihofer on the “Bedtime Stories” TV show hosted by Uncle Jim Fisk. Later, as an adult, Raoul drew advertisements for the Freihofer Bakery in Lansingburgh, the northern section of Troy, New York. In 1987, Friehofers was sold to General Foods.

Raoul was fascinated by animal art and super heroes and science fiction early in life while composing many sketches of Mighty Mouse and Superman at a very young age. Never taking any art or music lessons, Raoul had a natural inborn talent for both art and music.

Raoul’s art matured to cartoons and political satire, publishing “Naturalist at Large” environmental cartoon with Don Rittner. Raoul admired Lenny Bruce, a social critic and satirist. Watching That Was the Week That Was (TW3), Laugh-In, The Twilight Zone, and the Smothers Brothers in the 1960s became his weekly favorite TV shows. Raoul’s early childhood exposure to animal art influenced his original creation of Smilin’ Ed Smiley, the rascal rodent who became the mascot for FantaCo.

Music

Raoul played electric piano and harmonica for several local bands in upstate New York, including Love’s Ice Cube with Paul “Piper” Rafter, John Randall, Paul Sadowski, and Gary Grimaldi. Original Art showcasing this band’s logo, designed by Raoul, was last seen in the River Street Beat Shop in Troy, New York.

He also performed with Witz End in New Paltz, NY, writing original music and jamming with many local musicians, again playing electric piano and harmonica. He became an early music aficionado of blues and rock n roll admiring Bob Dylan, The Band, The Byrds, Theolonius Monk, Randy Newman, Paul Butterfield, Mopy Grape, Canned Heat, Spirit, and local upstate band -NRBQ, to name a few.

Raoul tragically died of status asthmaticus, a severe acute asthma attack, on November 13, 1983. He was 35 years old.

Comic book poll re: writers, artists

FantaCo connection

My buddy Greg Burgas commented on a comic book poll that ranked writers and artists. I’m not participating because I haven’t really followed comics since 1994, when I sold the bulk of my collection. There are several names I do not even recognize. I still have books such as the Marvel Masterworks, the Moore/Bissette Swamp Thing, a couple of Will Eisner titles, and the original Dark Knight.

The post got me reflecting on some of the people I’ve interacted with, though.

David Mazzucchelli and Denny O’Neill made a store appearance at FantaCo in 1985 during their Daredevil run. There’s a photo I lent to someone to digitize; it shows them, Matt, a couple of other people, and me in the store.

I never dealt directly with Bernie Wrightson except in short phone calls, but FantaCo published some of his work. When he died too young, I wrote about him here because he was so talented and a sweet guy in even those brief interactions.

In his Wikipedia page, [Greg] “Capullo’s first comic work was a publication called Gore Shriek, which was picked up and published by a comic book store in Albany, New York, called Fantaco Enterprises. Gore Shriek was a horror comic book specifically labeled Not Intended for Children because of the violent and graphic nature of it.” FantaCo didn’t “pick it up,” but whatever. I knew Greg, though not well.

Barry Windsor-Smith appeared in FantaCo pubs, but my dealings with him were meager.

Frank Miller created the cover for FantaCo’s Daredevil Chronicles, edited by Mitch Cohn, and also did a centerspread and interview. When I was going to edit a Spider-Man Chronicles, Miller agreed to produce the cover. But he bailed at the last minute, causing me quite a lot of stress.

Pre-Maus

Art Spiegelman used to come to FantaCo to personally deliver copies of Raw, the oversized and eclectic comics and graphics magazine he and his wife, Françoise Mouly, published in the 1980s. I remember hanging out with him during the 1988 San Diego Comic-Con; it’s probably recorded in my diary.

FantaCo was in discussion with Denis Kitchen about putting out a Kitchen Sink Enterprises Chronicles with a Will Eisner cover. I would have edited that issue; alas, it never happened. Except for asking him a question at a panel discussion during that ’88 Con, I never had any dealings with Eisner.

I bought a graphic novel from Jim Starlin at an Albany comics show in the 2010s. He autographed it, but he was very busy.

I told my Jack Kirby story here.

George Perez created the Avengers Chronicles cover for FantaCo, He was supposed to make the back cover for the Fantastic Four Chronicles but was problematically late.

John Byrne saved my bacon as an editor, not once but twice, as I noted here, re: Miller and Perez.

Fred Hembeck is 70

What the World Needs Now

I first met Fred Hembeck at FantaCo, the comic book store at 21 Central Avenue in Albany, NY, in February 1980. That was about three months before I would work there. The occasion was a signing for Hembeck 1980, published by FantaCo.

But I knew his work from the weekly strips that he did for the Buyer’s Guide to Comic Fandom. Here’s a brief review by former Marvel editor Tom Brevoort, who nails what I liked about his work.

“Hembeck was great–he had an appealing style, he didn’t take the subject matter too seriously (and simultaneously took it very, very seriously, a dichotomy I could appreciate), and he was a like a comic book archaeologist, digging through old issues to find weird and forgotten stories to spotlight.”

Fred created seven Hembeck magazines with FantaCo, He also made some spot illos for other FantaCo pubs, including the three FantaCo Chronicles I edited. We also became friends. A few years later, he moved from Rensselaer County downstate, and we lost touch for a while.

Then in 2004 – and I’ve mentioned this before – our mutual friend Rocco asked if I had read Fred’s blog. I had never read ANYONE’S blog. But I devoured his writings going back to January 2003.

Eventually, I would send Fred blog ideas or questions, and my name started appearing in his columns, starting in January 2005.

Around the same time, we exchanged CD mixes. His were more eclectic than mine, featuring discs of Andy Williams, Robbie Williams, and Beatles covers. His discs of 1960s tunes were epic.

In time, I decided that I’d start my blog. Fred plugged it. Moreover, I visited his extensive blog roster, checked out some of those folks, and commented on their blogs. That’s how I “met” Lefty, Gordon, Eddie, and even Greg.

Visit

Then my family started being in his general neighborhood once each summer. So from 2006 to 2013, my wife, daughter, and I would visit his family, a grand time in which Fred and I would philosophically muse about media.

He tends to stay with television programs he started with to the end, whereas I will give up. We were both describing the same song but remembering different parts: What the World Needs Now/Abraham, Martin, and John by Tom Clay.

These days, I tend to see him at the Albany Comic Con when I can make it, which was impacted by COVID. I should note that Fred does NOT have squiggles where his elbows and knees should be, though his comic book persona does.

So now Fred is older than I am, for about five weeks. Happy birthday, effendi.