I say that I'm the founder of Free Comic Book Day, but fortunately I don't have to do all
the heavy lifting.
One day I was scratching to beat a deadline, actually, and it was April 2001.
Bastian Robbins would do a thing called Free Scoop Night, and I looked for my office out
the front door and I saw this long line of people out there.
Wow, this is something we could do for comics because, you know, the only thing cooler than
ice cream is comics, right?
And that's the end of the line.
I wrote this article, my column for the magazine, and in it I pretty much laid out the whole
parameters for what Free Comic Book Day would be that publishers would publish special edition
comics that we would give away on the day, and it would be a great way to call back people
who used to be comic book readers, or a great way to introduce new people to comics.
Probably the smartest thing I did with that column is I made sure that there was a response
from the rest of the industry to tag on to my column.
The response was very positive.
We had a meeting that happened then in October 2001.
It was the first time the industry had gotten together after 9-11.
And in the meeting were the heads of Marvel and DC and Dark Horse and Image Comics and
Diamond Comic Distributors and me.
I sort of sat back and just wanted to see what would develop.
It was a really fragile time in the country because it was post 9-11.
Companies that had normally really bickered with one another and not gotten along knew
that this was something to kind of bring the whole industry together, so everyone just
dropped all of their normal ways of not doing business with each other and said, yes, we
have to do this.
It's just such a great way to introduce, it's sort of like we say the gateway drug, to this
world, this universe of comic books.
And I think it's a great institution now, what, 11 years that it's been going on, that
it always gets good press, there's always now they coincide, big movie releases with
my free comic book day and things like that, so yeah, I just think it's great.
There you go.
Hello.
You want some of these?
It's a Serenity Star Wars flipbook, so it's two stories and one book.
You know, I think it gives a lot of people a voice who are searching for one, you know,
and I think a lot of people find in comics, sort of like-minded souls, and you know, it's
a wonderful place to escape to.
Where are we looking?
Here.
Just enjoy, enjoy, you know, pick up something you've never seen before and, you know, explore,
yeah.
I just want to let you guys know that Joe Field, Concord resident here, and owner of
Flying Colors Comics and other cool stuff, is the founder of International Free Comic
Book Day event, whereas Free Comic Book Day promotes literacy and distributes free reading
material and reading in readers of all ages and interests on the first Saturday of May.
These are proven educational tools helping reluctant readers take an interest in and
develop a lifelong love of reading.
It was an industry effort, and we've gone from that first event where there were four
Free Comic Book Editions and, I think, five publishers participating to this year where
there are more than 40 different special editions Free Comic Book Day comics and about 35 publishers
participating.
Free, Free Comic Book Day!
Woo!
Click to learn, for free, for free, for free, for free.
