Barb: Hey, honey, interview time!!!
Park: Okay honey!!!
Barb: You learned to read and started reading at the age of two-and-a-half. What are the first books/stories you remember from that time?
Park: Not a lot, off the top of my head. I do remember seeing a for-tiny-babies library book called “The Egg And I” about a hen and her egg and thinking “I think I’ve heard about this, it’s also the title a movie or a book for grown-ups or something. Clever.” Toddler-me probably didn’t THINK the word “clever,” but it’s the non-toddler translation of my reaction.
…But… well, there were a few classics, now that I think about it a little more. Mike Mulligan had a steam shovel, I think? And I think there was also a brave little tugboat? And Curious George (went to the hospital, I think? And/or flew a giant kite?)– Oh, and Danny and the Dinosaur. Okay, so, yeah, classic literature.
Barb: I was just thinking about Mike Mulligan! Did you read Clifford? Man, I loved that dog!
Park: Yes, the first one, I believe. I worried about how they would keep Clifford fed, so he made me a little anxious. Not that I was afraid Clifford would eat people. I was just concerned about the price of all that dry dog food.
Barb: I know! I thought the same thing! And you like Lyle, the Crocodile, I believe.
Park: Oh, yes!
Barb: What was the first book without pictures you read?
Park: Ah, that’s a little hard to decide, because so many books for the young, even though advanced, had illustrations! …And charming illustrations they were…
Barb: Oh, that’s true! Man, I loved the illustrations for old kids’ books. Okay, list the kids’ books you made me read and why you liked them so much.
Park: But most of the books that the Weekly Reader program that my mother got me had illustrations… so it’s hard to remember one and say “now this, I’m sure, had no illustrations inside…”
Ah ha! Of the old Weekly Reader books, I’ve made you read:
—CONQUISTA! The conquistadores would lose horses now and then, and a Native American boy finds one and learns hey, you can ride this thing and it’s awesome!
—The Rise and Fall of Ben Gizzard: A medicine man in the Old West prophesies that Ben Gizzard won’t die until the day a raven speaks to him and he sees a mountain upside down. His charmed luck/life leads him to become sheriff, but when he meets a painter who likes painting mountains who has a pet raven, he starts getting really scared…
—Me and the Man on the Moon-Eyed Horse: a kid whose grandpa is teaching him Morse Code has to outwit bandit Step-And-A-Half Jackson and save the circus train. …Gee, I never thought about how many of these were Old-West-kinda stories before.
—Sprout. NOT an Old West story, Sprout is a not-stupid little boy in England who likes to eat a lot and who collects elephants and he has small adventures. I identified with Sprout a little, because he felt that most adults were silly and impractical (and often unfair). Sprout had not just one but four or five books in his series… I had two (again, thanks to the Weekly Reader organization). Sprout is where I first learned that trucks in England are lorries and that “ta” means thank you.
Barb: What was the first comic book you read? (SIDE NOTE: Conquista is one of the best-written books for kids I’ve ever read. It is a work of true beauty.)
Park: Uh, maybe-probably Richie Rich, Harvey? Or maybe Archie? Yes, that seems more likely– Archie digests. I’ve recently seen a poster online wonder how the heck Archie survived for so long as a comic, but that’s because they must not have been old enough to remember the secret– ARCHIE DIGESTS were waiting right there IN THE CHECK-OUT LINE. A buck, or less than two, would (and will) keep your kid (especially if your kid can read, I guess) quiet during checkout and on the way home.
Barb: (SIDE NOTE: my husband has had me read all the books he liked as a kid. I hadn’t read any of this stuff. I fell in love with The Great Brain books.)
Park: Oh, and the same goes for the Dennis the Menace digests.
Barb: Oh, yeah, I remember those. I had a lot of digests like those.
Park: And then of course I enjoyed COLLECTION books of comic strips. Especially Peanuts, but the occasional Hagar, Beetle Bailey…
Barb: Oh, yeah, I loved comic strips. Peanuts, Dennis the Menace, Hagar… What was your first superhero comic, Marvel Husband?
Park: Hm… Spider-Man, I think. Um… I do remember a giant-size digest (again, probably sold in a grocery store)… It had Spider-Man team-ups. The X-Men helping Spidey stop Morbius, The Living Vampire. Spidey and Ghost-Rider. Mayyyybe Spidey and the Werewolf by Night? It was kind of a collection of spooky team-ups… And by Giant-Size, I mean it was tall and wide, not so much thick. It was awesome– you could really appreciate the art.

Barb: Now, I always joke that we’re a mixed marriage, as I’m DC and you’re Marvel. What DC comics did you read?
Park: Ah, the funny thing about DC is I didn’t get my hands on them until later– WITH one important exception– a box set of collections that I think I got for Christmas. SUPERMAN, BATMAN, WONDER WOMAN, JUSTICE LEAGUE, and the LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES. SO educational. To this day whenever I say the phrase “I have a theory…” I’m actually quoting Ray Palmer, The Atom…
Barb: Hahaha! You DO say that!
Park: That box set taught me about Lori Lemaris, red kryptonite, Two-Face, Insect Lass, and so much more…
Barb: I LOVED Lori Lemaris!
Park: And of course the origin of Diana’s Invisible Jet…
Barb: Never seen it! That’s a joke, of course. I loved the Invisible Jet. What was your favorite Marvel comic(s)?
Park: Spidey. He was smart but funny and powerful but didn’t abuse that power. Oh, and kind of a science nerd. So I really liked him. And of course he was on cartoons and had a great theme song. AND he was on The Electric Company. …Sort of. He didn’t talk. It was like they said “well, you don’t LITERALLY hear comics. You have to read the captions and thought bubbles. So this’ll help us make kids read.” So Spidey didn’t talk.
Barb: You introduced me to all of the Marvel cartoons. The first one was Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends with Miss Lion. I didn’t even know that such a cartoon existed. Then you made me watch all of the Marvel cartoons from the ’60s. Which of those is your favorite?
Park: I’m sorry, but the voice acting, Easter Eggs/callbacks, and sometimes-witty writing on Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends will always be the tops with me. They made the Green Goblin more of a cut-and-dried Jekyll and Hyde, which made much more sense. Much like, a decade later, B:TAS did fantastic re-workings of Mr. Freeze and Two-Face.
Barb: Oh, yeah, I loved what B:TAS did with those characters.
Barb: It’s hard to pick which is my favorite, as they’re all good. I learned so much about all of those characters because of those cartoons. They were stop-motion comics, kind of. I don’t think I would have gotten into Thor, for instance, without the cartoon.
Park: Well, yes. Thor was the GOAT of the first wave of Marvel Cartoons. Followed by Iron Man.
Barb: Iron Man was great! I remember thinking, “Happy Hogan? You’re kidding me. Who has a name like that?” Then I found out that he was a boxer, so it was a nickname. But by the end, I was thinking, “I love Happy Hogan, but I still can’t stand the name Pepper Potts. It’s like Etta Candy or Doiby Dickles– stop with the punning names, for God’s sake.”
Park: I felt slightly better when I understood that in Victorian literature, everyone had kind of these obvious absurdist names. Becky Sharp, to name one you know. And I’ve said before that in Victorian lit you and I would be Miss Quill and Mr. Chalk. Dickens’ readers would have a sensible chuckle over Pepper Potts and Etta Candy.
Barb: LOL, I’d forgotten about Miss Quill and Mr. Chalk! Off the wall question: Remember when I made you read one of the few children’s books I liked as a child, Dorp Dead? What did you think of that book?
Park: Dorp Dead is dark symbolist gothic literature at its finest. Roald Dahl would sigh sadly and give it the chef’s kiss emoji with a tear in his eye.
Barb: I only liked a few books as a kid, and the one that really spoke to me, Dorp Dead, a horror novel for children, was BANNED for being too intense for our delicate psyches! SMDH.
Park: I wish I could find a year-by-year list of everything banned for kids. (April Ludgate deadpan) So I could read them all. [“April Ludgate” is a reference to the only interest Barb and I have in the TV show Parks and Rec, which is the Aubrey Plaza character.]
Barb: Breakfast time! Enough interviewing for now!