AAMC Reporter: August 2006

Look! Up in the Sky...

Jerry J. Buccafusco, Ph.D., director of the Alzheimer's Research Center at the Medical College of Georgia Photo credit: Phil Jones

It's a bird! It's a plane! No! It's the director of the Alzheimer's Research Center at the Medical College of Georgia!

By day, he is mild-mannered professor of pharmacology and toxicology and psychiatry and health behavior Jerry J. Buccafusco, Ph.D. But in his spare time, he fosters a downright heroic interest in vintage comic books.

From Superman to Spider-Man to Metal Men, Buccafusco says his collection numbers more than 1,000, with standout individual specimens dating back to 1939 and valued at up to $25,000.

"My interest goes back to high school," says Buccafusco, 57.

"I used to go to my uncle's barber shop, and there were piles of comic books on the tables. If my appointment was on a Saturday, I'd have to wait for hours, and I'd read through all of those comic books. And there were themes that developed that you wanted to find out more about."

Buccafusco is primarily interested in comic books' "Golden Age," which stretched from the late 1930s through World War II to the early 1950s. No longer an avid collector, Buccafusco calls modern-day comic books "serial soap operas,"with cliffhanger endings that force readers to buy several issues to see a storyline resolved.

"It's just not as much fun anymore," he says. In his heyday, however, Buccafusco was so serious that he attended comic conventions and even established "Adventure Heroes Hideaway," one of the nation's first comic book fan magazines. Buccafusco recalls a convention at which he met legendary comic book artist Jack Kirby and persuaded him to sign a 1945 issue of Captain America, an issue he still thinks of as "the jewel of my collection."

After his children moved out, Buccafusco converted a room in his home into a showplace for his collection. He says he has never had the comics' total worth evaluated, but tries to keep it in good condition, and will always treasure the collection.

"My wife always jokes that whenever we moved, the comics have to come along wherever I go."

— S.H.

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