I can’t remember the first time I met Doug Fratz, but I know the first time we were under the same roof—though I don’t think I knew it at the time. It was in 1971, at Phil Seuling’s annual 4th of July Comic Art Convention, and thanks to Mike Zeck, a comics fan turned comic pro just like me, a photo turned up from that day a few years back.

Here we are more than 45 years ago …

That’s me in shadows to the left, in the front row as always, wearing my denim jacket emblazoned with studs and a barely visible “War is not healthy for children and other living things” patch. (Yes, I was a hippie.) And there to the right, half a dozen rows back, is Doug, his hair at the time equally as long as mine, if not longer.

I have no idea what panel we were waiting for when Mike ran to the front of the room and snapped a photo of the crowd, or whether Doug and I actually met that weekend. No matter. We met sometime within the next few years, and I became a constant reader of his fanzine Thrust, which eventually changed its name to Quantum, earning five Hugo nominations along the way. And when it came time for me to edit Science Fiction Age, and later Science Fiction Weekly, he became a frequent book review contributor.

When we last spoke, just a few months ago at the Kansas City Worldcon, we reminisced about Discon II, the 1974 Worldcon which had been the first for both of us. I’d hoped to see him again at Capclave next weekend. Instead, I’ll be taking his place on a panel there about book reviewing, when I’d much rather have been in the audience hearing him talk on the subject. He was a nice guy, an excellent critic, and will be greatly missed.

For more details about Doug, check out his entry at the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.

Each day of this past weekend was split between the Baltimore Book Festival and Baltimore Comic-Con, and while that first event felt forward-thinking, the second was all about the past. Not only did I wander a dealers room in which I recognized every comic published or piece of original art created before 1980 or so, I also managed to catch up with seven people I’d worked beside during my time as a professional in the field.

And some I hadn’t seen in more than thirty years!

My nostalgia ride began with artist Ramona Fradon, whose work I’d loved as a child on titles such as Metamorpho and Aquaman.

Here we are posing with a copy of House of Mystery #273 opened to a story of mine which she drew in 1979! Not only was it a thrill to work with one of my idols, I couldn’t and still can’t imagine any artist more perfectly suited for that particular story. (more…)

Comic book artist Mike Zeck—who drew the Drax the Destroyer/Thanos story I’d written that was published a lifetime ago in Logan’s Run #6, recently uploaded to Facebook some photos he’d taken at the 1971 Phil Seuling 4th of July Comic Art Convention. (They’re here, but unless you’re Facebook friends with him, I don’t think you can see them.)

I enlarged his pics of the dealers room until they were nothing but pixels, because I was on the hunt for a very special photo—one of me and Irene from the years before we met on my first day at work at Marvel Comics. I’ve always hoped that serendipity would deliver to me a photo of us in the same room at some early con, perusing boxes of comics, unaware of each other’s presence, blind to the future that lay ahead.

When I mentioned this to Mike, he sent along his outtakes, and though I didn’t find that Holy Grail of me and Irene, I did come across one photo which included me in the crowd. Check it out below and see if you can spot me.

Did you find me? Probably not. I’m a little … incomplete. So let me give you a hint.

Got it figured it out now?