Fifty years ago this weekend, February 27th through the 29th 1976, it was my great pleasure to attend Super DC Con '76 in New York City. It remains the only large-scale con I've ever experienced, and it provided quite an enduring memory for this then-teen DC fan.
Alas, while the memory is enduring, the specifics are not. I wish I'd thought to take notes, to jot down...well, everything. I was caught up in the totality of the experience as it happened, and the details are a blur. But it's a happy blur, a lingering buzz of delight and warmth.
In 2018, I posted found images recreating the Super DC Con program book. You can see that post here. The post included this reminiscence:
"...I was 16 years old, and the Super DC Con was my first comics convention. It's still the only big con I've ever attended, and I wish I could find more coverage of that weekend somewhere. (And if anyone is aware of such coverage, please let me know!) A recent issue of Back Issue magazine included a brief retrospective of that convention, but I would surely love to read much, much more. Someday, I'll try to recreate my own memories of the con for posterity: of my Dad and I taking the train from Syracuse to New York--the trip was a present for my 16th birthday--and being informed upon arrival at the Hotel Commodore that a strike had moved the convention over to The Americana; of learning at con check-in that DC publisher Carmine Infantino had been replaced by a woman named Jenette Kahn; of Dad leaving me free to fully immerse myself in the entirety of the convention experience without a chaperone (and his amazement that I didn't even want to stop for lunch); of meeting other fans; of meeting Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Batman co-creator Bob Kane, my writer-artist idols Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams, and legendary editor Julie Schwartz, among others; of losing to Richard Morrissey in a trivia contest administered by E. Nelson Bridwell; of the treasures of the dealers room; of the cavalcade of DC superhero films screened, including a fragment of Kirk Alyn in Superman, a 1948 serial then thought to be lost; of wearing plain clothes in the costume parade, claiming I was dressed as writer Elliott S! Maggin, who had written himself into a Justice League of America story the previous summer (afterward, Maggin shook my hand, laughing, saying that Jenette Kahn had just been telling him that his JLA appearance meant that DC now owned his name and likeness); the panels; the giddy thrill of participating in something I loved, surrounded by others who loved it just as much as I did; the satisfied train ride back home to Syracuse after the enchantment ended. I really need to write about all of that.
"But for today, this program will serve as a souvenir. This scan came from that vast series of tubes we call the internet. But I still have my copy, covered with autographs from all of the comics luminaries named above, and many more. There's an autograph from Jenette Kahn, with the inscription, 'May you be published soon.' There are memories contained therein, memories that fill me with a glow of contentment more than four decades later. Faster than a speeding bullet. More powerful than a locomotive. This feeling can still leap tall buildings in a single bound. You had to be there. I had to be there. I'm so grateful that I was."
A few other memories peek through the decades of accumulated fog. One such memory involved writer Martin Pasko and his creation the Albatross:
"...The Albatross was a phantom project. Not only did it fail to see print, it was never even announced as forthcoming (unlike, say, Gerry Conway's also-unpublished Ninja the Invisible), probably never assigned to an artist, possibly never even completed by Pasko. The only reference I've ever seen made to the Albatross was in my own work, specifically in an Amazing Heroes article on humorous superheroes I wrote in the '80s. You say you've never heard of the Albatross? It's okay. Neither has anyone else.
"The only reason I know anything at all about the Albatross is because I attended the Super DC Con...It was at one of the panels that the subject of The Albatross was introduced. I wish I could remember which panel it was, and who the participants were. I'm pretty sure writer Bob Rozakis was there--I have a vague memory of him responding to a friendly barb from his wife, with a 'Thanks, Laurie!'--and maybe Maggin, Denny O'Neil, and Cary Bates? That would indicate it was the writers' panel, which would have been a logical setting for Martin Pasko to talk about the Albatross.
"I do remember Pasko looking around the audience to be sure a specific, unnamed DC editor wasn't in the ballroom at the moment. Satisfied that the coast was clear, Pasko smiled and proceeded to tell us the brief saga of this DC Comics character no one would ever know.
"The concept of the Albatross had been the brainchild of a DC editor. Pasko would not say which editor it was. Pasko was given the assignment to develop the Albatross, possibly as a back-up feature. In the editor's premise, the Albatross was secretly a prison inmate, either a man convicted of a crime he hadn't committed, or a former felon who'd seen the error of his ways (I forget which). Every night, as his fellow convicts were snug in their beds, with visions of reasonable doubt dancing in their heads, the prisoner we call the Albatross would break out of prison--every night--don his mysterious costume to battle the forces of evil, presumably succeed in boppin' the bad guys, and then return to his cell, his nocturnal missions undetected by unsuspecting prison guards. Enter: The Albatross! BEWARE THE ALBATROSS!
"Spine-tingling, right? No?
"Yeah, Pasko also thought it was ridiculous.
"But an assignment was an assignment. Pasko almost certainly was the one who named our jailbird protagonist the Albatross, and as he wrote the strip, he found he could not take it seriously. He decided to play up the absurdity, go for subtle laughs, a nudge in the ribs rather than a leap over a tall building in a single bound. The editor still saw this Albatross as a straightforward costumed crimefighter, and he kept rejecting Pasko's attempts as inadequate. You don't seem to be getting the right feel for this, the editor told Pasko. One presumes that all involved finally acknowledged a dead end and moved on. The Albatross could escape from prison with ludicrous ease, but his comic-book exploits never saw the light of day.
"Pasko smiled again as he concluded his story. Those of us in the small crowd giggled in appreciation. And that was the end of what I'm sure was history's only public discussion of this DC hero called the Albatross...."
What else? I attended every panel I could. At one panel, I recall a fan expressing appreciation for artist Mike Grell's choice of Hammer Films horror actor Christopher Lee as the model for a vampire in an issue of Detective Comics, and editor Julie Schwartz dismissing the praise and complaining instead that Grell's use of Lee's image was just a lazy way out. I burrowed my way through the dealers' room, admiring original artwork from the 1940s, snagging whatever treasures I could afford (including 1960s paperback novels Batman Vs. 3 Villains Of Doom and The Avengers Battle The Earth-Wrecker). I remember meeting fans--OTHER COMIC BOOK FANS!!--and reveling in the company of kindred spirits. And I remember ending each evening with screenings of DC movies, TV shows, and serial chapters. It was magic. Magic.
I would just adore an opportunity to read more about this Super DC Con weekend; if anyone knows of any Super DC Con retrospective ever published or posted on line somewhere, please point me at it. Meanwhile, I'll close my own fragmented reminiscence with one additional memory:
"...I was 16 years old, and I was in my Heaven...It was an amazing experience, and I wish someone would publish an in-depth retrospective of that convention. Decades later, when my Dad was in hospice care and trying to express his gratitude for a strawberry milkshake I'd brought for him to enjoy, I joked to him, 'C'mon, Dad--remember that time you took me to New York for the DC Comics convention? I'd say I still you a little more than a strawberry milkshake.' Dad smiled, and enjoyed his milkshake...."
Thanks, Dad. It was one of a million big and little things you did for me over the course of our too-short span of fifty-two years together. I'm grateful for all of them. And I remain grateful for the Super DC Con.
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