The Comix Files: Lynda Barry

Lynda and I actually corresponded quite a bit in the 1970s, but a lot of it vanished throughout my many moves in that era. However, a few bits have survived. These are from 1975-1979. Lynda had sent me a photo of herself, taken in 1975, and cut out her face for reasons mysterious.

As I recall the postcard was hand-delivered.

Morty Comix # 2690

Morty Comix # 2690 was left in a spot that is somewhat significant in the history of comic art. The College Activities Building (CAB) on the campus of The Evergreen State College was home to the campus newspaper, The Cooper Point Journal, during the era when staff included cartoonists Matt Groening, Lynda Barry, Charles Burns, Jim Chupa, Flicky Ford, T.J. Simpson, and yours truly, among others.

The exact location of the 1970s CPJ office has since been part of a giant remake. The present area is filled with offices for student organizations. Even the outside looks different, including some kind of extension with wood panel siding.

I left Morty Comix # 2690 behind a decorative wall panel, which back in the 1970s would've been on the left hand of the entrance to the CPJ offices.

Postcard - Seattle, Washington

"The aerial view of the University of Washington Campus shows the School of Medicine and the University Hospital on Portage Bay, and the main campus complex behind."

1970s.

The campus and neighborhood just above that patch of green top center was my world 1980-1982. Just to the left is University Avenue, "The Ave." One day I ran into Lynda Barry on The Ave. and she pointed me to a print shop where you could reduce and enlarge images by yourself on a photocopier. At the time that was a major technological change for us independent pressers.

Postcard - Olympia, Washington

 

"Daniel J. Evans Library Building. This modern facility, housing seminar rooms and offices as well as up-to-the-minute library operations, is part of a 1000 acre campus on the Cooper Point Peninsula, five miles northwest of downtown Olympia."

Ah, back in the days when tuition for in-state students was less than $200 a quarter. It all became out of reach after Reagan, kids.

This card was handed to me in the spring of 1975, judging by the address. "Rena" was one of the many names used by Lynda Barry, the author of this missive. "Stella" and "Plex" were a couple other monikers for her. My trivia claim to fame in Cartoonland is that I knew Lynda Barry and Matt Groening before they knew each other.

Morty Comix # 2503

 

Morty Comix # 2503 is a little guy, a microcomic. It was drawn on the birthday of our 13th president, Millard Fillmore, born Jan. 7, 1800. I tucked it into a loose bit of rubber moulding along the floor in a corner of the Post Office in McCleary, Washington. 

There are no less than five Morty Comix in secret places in the McCleary Post Office as of tonight when I checked my PO Box. A couple of them have been there since Spring.

Although there are parts of the world out there where I still see Morty Comix remaining where I deposited the art months ago, this place has the highest concentration of the little devils. So interesting how many public places have anonymous pockets where no one ever looks.

I used to just post them on the bulletin board there, but then I became aware someone was systematically taking my stuff down, ripping it up, and throwing it in the trash. It's the ripping it up part that intrigues me. Sometimes I think McCleary would've made a great locale for a Roger Corman-Vincent Price film. We have no shortage of weird people. Fortunately, I can prove I am not one of them.

When I was 9 years old our farm house outside of McCleary burned. It didn't burn completely, it was just gutted to an uninhabitable degree. So we lived in a mobile home for 8 glorious years. When I was in college I came back to the farm one summer, in 1975, and took down the burned house to salvage and sell the old growth lumber that built the dwelling in order to earn more $$ for school. I recall finding a dead mouse in a bottle and writing my college mate Lynda Barry about it. The rodent could see freedom but could not attain it. Something like that.

Anyway, in between the 1st and 2nd floors, where the pipes for the gas lights originally ran, I found this wood planer lying on its side. Someone had built over this thing. The blade is still sharp. I have this tool to this day. The last time it was used Woodrow Wilson was still President, I am guessing.

So, maybe someday someone will find a Morty Comix in the same way. A little time capsule art bomb. My challenge will be to find more difficult hiding places in 2013 and to make the distribution method more unusual.

CPJ Photos of the TESC Cartoonists Seminar

 Seated left to right: Matt Groening, Craig Bartlett, Drew Christie, Tommy Thompson, Megan Kelso, Steve Willis, Ruth Hayes

See this and other photos by Kelli Tokos at:
http://cooperpointjournal.tumblr.com/post/23322690497/animation-seminar

40th Anniversary Reunion at Evergreen

I took part in the program Animation, Comics and Graphic Novels: A Great Evergreen Tradition as part of the 40th anniversary of The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. On my way there I was saddened to see the Handy Pantry, or the "H.P.," a place we used to go to on frequent beer runs back in the 1970s, apparently in a state of stasis.

 The TESC Steam Plant. Sometimes we would sneak past the guy in the glass office and gain entry into the maze of steam tunnels that honeycomb the campus.

 Dorm A. In 1974 Matt Groening lived in the room with the window on the 2nd floor far left. The next window was my room. He was the first person I met on my first day at Evergreen.

 This is the spot where an incident I relate in Evergroove Trivia Pt. 15 took place.

 One time Lynda Barry and I were walking together and at this point she grabbed me and made me hide with her around a corner while a conceptual artist walked by. "That man hates art!" she trembled. The actual corner has since been obliterated by building expansion.

 A lecture hall where one of our classmates in Shakespeare and the Age of Elizabeth vaulted over several rows of seats to beat up someone he didn't like in 1979.

 Ron Austin of Cartoonists Northwest and son Liam.

 Setting up

 

 With Tommy Thompson

 Tommy Thompson, Craig Bartlett, Matt Groening, Megan Kelso, Drew Christie

 Evergreen faculty Ruth Hayes, who will moderate, joins the group

 Showtime begins

The geoduck, Evergreen's mascot

A Short Walk Through Evergroove-- a Comix-eye View

The main "Red Square" and Library Building for The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. It was somewhere on these bricks Lynda Barry dropped a human skeleton and looked in horror as it shattered into tiny pieces.

Behind these doors in the CAB Building (Campus Activities Building), before the place went through a major facelift, sat the office of the student newspaper, The Cooper Point Journal when Matt Groening was editor. Today the area houses student activities offices.


I was amazed and pleased to see the Stairwell Dragons are still with us! Our fellow cartoonist David George was fascinated by this spiral mural. Cruz Esquivel and I shared an adventure with local law enforcement.











The area where the Library Ghost was originally spotted in 1988. According to the eyewitness who returned to area and demonstrated where the ghost had been seen, the being would've been walking away from the camera in the center of the photo.

The huge stairs are now absent, but this is the spot where Evergroove's amazing dedication ceremony took place in 1972.

This squat little cube is actually an air vent and one of many entrances to the fabled steam tunnels. If you are inside this thing you can see people through the grate.