About This Site
Hi, I’m Ralph Gregory Johnson. If you are a member of a very small club, you may remember me as a family member or K through 12th grade student Greg Johnson, who spent the lion’s share of my formative years in Mankato, MN. Upon entering college, my new friends wanted to call me Ralph, and I didn’t fight it, for whatever reason. After graduating from St. John’s (MN), I fell into comics retailing, or was it a leap? I blame my dad, a liberal minded pastor from Minnesota. I was born in Iowa, 5th child 8 years younger than the 4th.
I’ve had a special relationship with serial 4-color illustrated fiction since my dad would put me in his lap and read the Sunday funnies to me before I could read. He loved Dagwood, and Peanuts and especially Pogo, which satisfied his adult intelligence while I just liked the cute animals who talked in funny accents. The culture at large was accepting and even fond of the medium when it appeared on large sheets of paper wrapping the Sunday paper. If, however, the same pictures appeared in a slightly smaller than normal magazine on a spinner rack for 10 cents, eyebrows were raised, tongues were clucked, little arms were yanked, and, in the 50’s, Senators held hearings. That was our home in a nutshell when I started to make my own choices in reading and purchasing, which is covered in my blog entry Why am I Here.... There is another chapter of the History of the College of Comic Book Knowledge store in the blog, and now that I’m not in said store, the question of why is this SITE here is answered below!
Since Chris (Nostalgia Zone) Budel and I (Ralph) came up with the idea to open up a different kind of comic book store way back in 1987, I have always imagined some kind of learning resource, a literature, maybe even some kind of institution living within this wonderful name. I imagined a Department of fake “comic book knowledge” full of the “facts” of the many universes in which the characters reside, like a wiki of the comic universes, with entries on Riverdale (Archie), Metropolis (Superman), Gotham City (Batman), Center City (the Flash), the Baxter Building (the Fantastic Four), Dr Strange’s Sanctum Sanctorum, ranking of strengths and powers – basically Comic Geek Trivia on steroids, or is it after Gamma Radiation?
On the other hand, there is REAL Knowledge about Comic Books. The fascinating history of one of America’s, and the world’s, richest stores of pop-culture history, with an infinitude (it’s real, I looked it up!) of vignettes and apocryphies (I just coined and trademarked that one!) about the artists and writers and editors and publishers that created one of America’s 2 truly original artistic contributions to the world, the other being JAZZ. The indexing of millions of publications covering the last century, back when there was PAPER and colored ink! The use of the panels-based medium as a learning tool for completely unrelated subjects, like the wonderful Cartoon History series by Larry Gonick. There exists a body of scholarly analysis and criticism of the art form itself, which has really taken off in the last 20 years. How to draw, write, letter, make your own,,,? Resources for fans, writers and artists? Is there an end to the possibilities? I think not. So, send me your ideas and let’s go!
If you are looking for updates on the latest Marvel movie makeover, or what you can get at the local comic store next week, you’ll have to look elsewhere until we get that kind of thing added in here. For now it’s a more personal blog about me and my love for rare examples of the Art Of Panelology.
And my dog, Bob. He’s so great one blog is not enough to hold him. When it fits, you’ll see a lot here about my little buddy all over this site, with links to pique your interest in a blog of his own, Dog is My Co-Worker. It’s about expanding the relationship with dogs from our laps and walking paths and into the workplace. Please check it out and I Bob hopes you will subscribe to follow us on our journeys. Actually, one of our best and most exciting journeys is chronicled here on this site .
Please visit and subscribe to my other blogs – if it’s a link, it’s live, if not, it’s still in the planning stages:
College of Comic Book Knowledge
Beatles Photo Album
We Hold These Truths.us – Politics the way it Should be
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