My Famous Life: Fargoan Sells Comics Collection

Recently, the Other Doctor K and I have been doing a purge of our closets and other storage areas, getting rid of boxes and boxes of paper that we seem to accumulate as teachers. In a box of random stuff, I found this article from The Fargo Forum, dated October 20, 1991.
(Click on image to read the article)

In 1991, I decided to sell part of my comic collection at a local Fargo sci-fi and comics convention called ValleyCon (which I'm glad to see is still going strong). I'm not sure, however, why this proved to be a newsworthy event, though it did give the writer the opportunity to trot out the ubiquitous "Wham! Bam!" that seems to have accompanied most comic-related news articles for decades. The article also features other biases common to reporting on fan cultures, as the writer takes pains to highlight my apparent "normalcy" in relation to the other convention-goers.

The article mentions that I was selling the collection to help pay for grad school and an upcoming wedding. Only one of those two events actually happened, but both worked out exactly as they should have. In the end, I also made much more than $20--the sale gave me enough money to make the deposit on an apartment and pay for moving expenses.

I did not keep track of everything I sold at that convention. I ended up getting rid of a big chunk of my Silver Age DC collection, something that I regreted years later, though now I see it as a good decision at the time.

I am, however, jealous of that skinny kid in the picture.

Also, from now on, I want to be called "The Fargoan."