By Mike Towry Next year (2012) will see the 40th anniversary of the first El Cortez Comic-Con, which was held August 18-21, 1972. I was Chairman of the con that year, at the ripe old age of seventeen, and it’s always held a special place in my heart. I’m not alone, however, in looking back […]
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Comic-Con has just posted details for the Ken Krueger panel at http://www.comic-con.org/cci/cci10_prog_fri.php. The panel will be held on Friday, July 23, 2010. Hope to see you there (wearing your Ken Krueger Fan Club t-shirt, if you’ve got one). Here are the details:
With Comic-Con #41 coming up next month, I thought you might like to read Ken Krueger’s Chairman’s message from the program book for Comic-Con #1 (August 1970). Since Ken just gave first names, here is a list of the full names of the committee members he was thanking: Shel Dorf, Richard Alf, John Pound, Scott Shaw!, Barry Alfonso, Bob Sourk, Greg Bear, Dave Clark, Ron Cearns, Bill Lund, Gary Pagel, David McGlone, Pat McGlone, Steve McGlone, John Hull, Mike Towry, Steve Shipman, Dan Stewart, Bill Rupp, and Glen Walker.
On March 21, 1970, San Diego’s Golden State Comic-Minicon was held in the basement of the U.S. Grant Hotel in downtown San Diego. This small, one-day convention was held to raise funds and fan-recognition for the initial three-day convention, San Diego’s Golden State Comic-Con, to be held in August of that year. Richard Alf, who was Minicon Co-Chairman (Bob Sourk was Chairman) recently found a set of photographs from that small event. One of these is reproduced above.
While scanning some of Shel Dorf’s black-and-white negatives of the 1973 San Diego Comic-Con, I came across this picture of Ken on a panel with Scott Shaw!, John Pound, and two as-yet-unidentified people. (Does anyone recognize them or recall what the panel was about?)
At the ComicConMemories.com web site, you can listen to audio recordings of many committe members and guest speakers from the first San Diego’s Golden State Comic-Con, which was held August 1st thru 3rd, 1970 in the U.S. Grant Hotel. The list of those recorded includes the following: Ken Krueger, Shel Dorf, Barry Alfonso, Greg Bear, Ray Bradbury, Roger Freedman, Mark Hanerfeld, Earl Kemp, Jack Kirby, Scott Shaw!, and Morrie Turner.
The new online, Fall 2009 edition of the Comic-Con Magazine is available from http://www.comic-con.org/common/cc_magazine.shtml. It features very nice articles on San Diego Comic-Con International Founder Shel Dorf (pages 4-5) and Chairman of Comic-Con #1 Ken Krueger (page 6). There is also a great picture of Ken with some of the original Comic-Con crew at the 2009 Comic-Con on page 36.
Scott! Shaw contributed the following scan of the original 1971 edition of GORY STORIES QUARTERLY’s intro page, which has a nice sketch of Ken by John Pound. (GORY STORIES was an underground comic published by Ken through his SHROUD Publishers.)
Links to online-media coverage of Ken Krueger’s passing and his legacy in comics and science-fiction fandom. The links were good as of December 2, 2009. They may, however, not be “permanent” links and may be in effect for only a relatively-short period of time.
The original Comic-Con group watches The Phantom Empire at Ken Krueger’s bookstore back around 1970. Ken says to keep an eye out for stuntman Yakima Canutt holding his cowboy hat on his head while tumbling down a hillside so as not to reveal his bald spot.
Ken Krueger caricature by Milton Caniff