What Comic-Con

Looked Like in its

Early Years

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What Comic-Con Looked Like in its Early Years

It was 1969 when humans first walked on the moon. A year later, a group of self-professed

comic book junkies met in a California Hotel in what they called the West Coast Comic Book

Convention. Many years later and nine Apollo missions after, it has now re-franchised as Comic-Con

International: a single-day event that gathers a crowd of over a hundred thousand, attracts famous

celebrities, and launches careers.

Los Angeles Beginnings

David Glanzer, the face and spokesperson of Con said the event entered mainstream culture

because it was not just about comic books in the first place. Comic-Con, as one sees it today, is about

all kinds of pop culture. Although the earliest guests were mostly legends in the comics industry,

slowly, Con welcomed speculative literature, films, video games and even fine arts.

Writer Brian Lowry hints at the role of the movie industry in the ways with which the

convention turned from a small hotel-room gathering into a massive media juggernaut. Partly because

the Con was rooted near Los Angeles, and partly because Hollywood cannot help but dip a finger into

the Con’s colorful, easily riled and at that time, only a handful, audience.

From DIY to 130,000

During the 1977 gathering, George Lucas brought Star Wars. Con began attracting a larger

crowd in the 1980s, sometimes reaching thousands of attendees. About this time, everything about

the convention possessed a distinct DIY character. From the newsletters to the organizing, to the

booklets and the announcements, everything then was made by hand.

As Con was pushed further and further into the mainstream, DIY was not to meet the

standard of thousands of participants. People flocked to LA once a year to be a part of the Con. Some

would be there for TV, some for card/role-playing games. Soon, major comics companies and major

indies began playing part in the gathering.

The convention’s monster success can be associated with two things: location and

diversity. Positioned in the heart of the US popular culture industry and with its doors being wide

open to all forms of art and interest, it was bound to skyrocket into mega-stardom. Last year,

Con gathered 130,000 attendees. From DIY, Con now grew to include satellite locations and

event management software solutions, too.

References:

http://www.growtix.com

http://www.comic-con.org/about

http://io9.com/5320525/in-the-early-days-of-comic-con/