I spent Sunday at SPX—the Small Press Expo—in Bethesda, Maryland. (Actually, its location seemed more like Rockville to me, but I guess at some point parts of Rockville started to be called North Bethesda because the Bethesda name helped the area sound posher.) I had fun wandering the packed dealers room and picking up comics by cartoonists who are doing the more personal kinds of work mainstream publishers have for the most part abandoned with their constant focus on superheroes, superheroes, superheroes.

But as much as I enjoyed all that, the highlight of the day was attending a panel on March: Book One, which focuses on the life of civil rights pioneer John Lewis, and then getting a chance to meet the congressman and pick up an autographed copy of his book (which he created with co-writer Andrew Aydin and artist Nate Powell). In case you don’t know, Lewis was one of the 13 original Freedom Riders, helped plan the March on Washington, and is the last surviving speaker from that day.

Here we are together right after I shook his hand and thanked him for his courage and sacrifice.

March: Book One is in the vein of the famous 1956 comic Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story, and is dedicated “to the past and future children of the movement.”

His signature, seen here beneath that dedication, is a bold one.

But then, to have lived the life he’s lived, I guess it would have to be.

I recorded the moving panel during which Lewis, Aydin and Powell discussed the book, and will get it up on YouTube as soon as I can spare the bandwidth. I’ll let you know when it’s live.

Meanwhile, why not grab a copy of March: Book One for yourself?