I had been kicking around the idea of starting a thread on reference books, but I think this is a good spot to post some related thoughts.

I'll start off with a somewhat contentious statement, but then elaborate further: I don't overall enjoy the internet era more.

Now of course I say that as I sit here typing online my thoughts and sharing with an online community (and an excellent one at that). But when I want to do research, my first love is my library of print reference materials. And I have a simple reason for it...yes, it's a fraction of what's accessible online, it's much slower to digest/consume, etc. But I savor it more...I have a lifetime of material to enjoy and continue to learn from in printed form. It's just more enjoyable to me. I'm increasingly tiring of too much online time, I feel like every click just adds to the burden of information overload that will never let me get back to old favorites or subjects I've started to research but quickly got distracted with something else.

With pre-internet research, going to a physical library, bookstore, comic book shop, etc., it's back to the old saying "it's the journey not the destination". I miss walking into a gorgeous old library building and not knowing exactly what I'll be able to find. Playing detective with what information I might find. Sitting in an oversized chair in a reading room and just losing myself in a volume.

Now of course the ultimate breadth and depth of research on the Internet is on a completely different level. Like a number of us, it has taken my knowledge to levels I never thought earlier in my life would be possible in my lifetime. So I'm not casually dismissing by any means the benefits we've received from the "information revolution".

But again, perhaps more philosophically, I can't say it's ultimately made me happier. After say a long week at work where I'm online the whole time, nothing is better than finding some time during a lazy weekend and grabbing say a reference book on Golden Age comics and losing myself in that for a few hours. If I replaced that time with a few hours browsing Golden Age comic book info online, it just wouldn't be as relaxing for me ultimately. Maybe I'll sign off for today and do just that actually.

I didn't research, per se; but, when you got an info dump, I tended to memorize the material. For instance, i got dumped into the middle of a Legion of Super Heroes storyline (death of Chemical King) and had to figure out who some of them were, through dialogue and I got a couple of them mixed up, for a couple of issues. Then, a little further on, they had the special All-New Collector's edition, with the wedding f Lightning Lad and Saturn Girl. It had a feature, inside, with each of the Legionnaires, their powers, and their real name and origin. I read and re-read that section to understand who everyone was.

There were many books about comics available, when I was young. It wasn't until about 1978 that I stumbled across the first volume of Nostalgia Press' Flash Gordon reprints, in the area Bookmobile. i tried to find it again and put in a request and was told it was not listed in circulation (I'm betting it got swiped). They did have, however, a couple of books about comics and sci-fi, including Maurice Horn's The World Encyclopedia of Comics. I devoured that thing as it covered specific features and characters, as well as creators, of newspaper strips and comic books, from around the world. It introduced me to the MLJ and Quality Comics character, Golden Age figures like Airboy and Blackhawk, foreign stars, like Diabolik and Modesty Blaise, and the THUNDER Agents. Around the same time, Fireside Books put out some trade collections from DC and Marvel, including the Michael Uslan DC books (Mystery in Space, America at War and the romance collection, which was edited by someone else) and Stan Lee's Origins of Marvel Comics, Son of Origins, Bring on the Bad Guys and The Superhero Women. Pocket books were reprinting early adventures of Spider-Man, the FF, Captain America, the Hulk, Spider-Woman and Dr Strange (all of whom were appearing in live action or cartoons, on tv) and Warner books reprinted some DC stuff, in similar fashion.

The library also pointed me to the Wonder Woman volume of Michael Fleischer's intended encyclopedia series, cataloguing every appearance by every major supporting character and foe. My first impression was, "Man, she gets tied up a lot!" (that book was filled with bondage images from the comics, especially the "Villainy, Inc" story, that was filled with it) The front of the book mentioed the Batman volume, an upcoming Superman and ones covering other Golden Age heroes. Only the Superman book was completed, as The Great Superman Book. There was also Batman from the 30s to the 70 and Superman from the 30s to the 70s (later followed by the Wonder Woman book, with Gloria Steinem intro and the Shazam from the 40s to the 70s).

That was about it, until I got to college. Poking around in the Univ of Illinois Library (one of the biggest university libraries in the country and home to THE top library sciences curriculum) I found the first two volumes of Nostalgia Press' Flash Gordon reprints, the two volumes of Prince Valiant, and collections of Floyd Gottfriedson Mickey Mouse and Carl Barks Donald Duck stories (a cousin had had the Donald Duck one). Looking further, I found that they had both All In Color For a Dime, by Richard Lupoff and Don Thompson, and the sequel, The Comic Book-Book. They allso had Fred Schott's Manga! Manga! Manga!, the first English language look at Japanese comics. As luck would have it, I discovered Jules Feiffer's The Great Comic Book Heroes, around the same time, at a used book store, just off campus. I would soon find Jeff Rovin's The Encyclopedia of Super Heroes, at a B Dalton bookstore, at the mall (and, a little later, the Super Villain volume) and a copy of Will Jacobs and Gerard Jones' new fan history of the Silver Age, The Comic Book Heroes. I then found Ron Goulart's Great History of Comic Books. I devoured those things, absorbing everything. Then, I took a class in 20th Century American History, as an elective and had to write a 10-page paper on any subject, so long as it dealt with the history of the 20th Century or the history of a subject within the 20th Century. I chose comic books, since I had the reference material and it covered all but two decades of the century (and the newspaper strip origins could cover that). So, my theme was how comic books reflected the society of each decade of their existence and brought up paralllels in characters and the time frame (like Superman, Batman, Captain marvel and Captain America all being orphans, as the Depression had ben raging, as well as the patriotic heroes of the war years, etc). All that reference material got me an A, though I really had to edit things down to stay in 10 pages.

From that point on, I grabbed reference books when I could find them. At one point, I had all of the Mike Benton History of Comics volumes (except the Crime Comic one), Ron Goulart's Comics Encyclopedia and the other history volume he did, Jeff Rovin's other "encyclopedias" (Monsters, Spaceships & robots, cartoon characters, adventure heroes), The Penguin History of Comics, the Smithsonian History of Comics, Jerry Robinson's comic book history, RC Harvey's book, a couple on newspaper strips, the revised editions of the Jacobs & Jones book and the updated World Encyclopedia (now with Calvin & Hobbes!), Les Daniel's books about DC and Marvel a couple more about international comics, Harvey Kurtzman's From Aargh to Zap, another about anime and manga, some more superhero references and a few more. I had quite a reference library, before moving and donating them to a local library, because I just didn't have the room for all of that (plus I had practically memorized the chapters and have since gotten digital copies of many of them).

For me, too, hunting through the library and bookstores was as much about the thrill of the hunt as reading the books. I still recall walking into a little bookstore, across town, in Charleston, SC and after skipping over the romance shelves, finding a copy of Philip Jose Farmer's Doc Savage, His Apocalyptic Life staring at me; and, an aisle over, Mike Hoare's memoir about his time in the Congo, with the Wild Geese (5 Commando, the mercenaries serving under Moishe Tshombe's government, against the Simba Revolt). Not long after, I took a trip to Columbia, SC (state capital and home to the Univ of South Carolina) and found a used book store with a huge stack of Avenger pulp reprints (and later ones, by Ron Goulart), then another bookstore a block away, with a bunch of Doc Savage reprints, all of the Lensman Saga books and a Shadow reprint and a Spider reprint. Then, back in Charleston, another newly discovered used bookstore yielded about a third of the Modesty Blaise novels.

Those trips were the most fun I had, during those 4 years there. I lament now about not having my own house in which to have stored all of those treasures and revisit; but, I found alternatives to most, that gave me access, if not physical copies. Still, my lottery fantasy is my own custom built house, with a big library room as the central feature, filled with all of the books I had found and accumulated, plus other favorites from childhood and beyond and the time to spend hours pouring through them. No Rolexes, no yachts; just a library, filled with cool stuff. Libraries and bookstores have always been magical places, ever since my dad took us to the Bookmobile, to pick out a book or two and stepping aboard a wonderland on wheels. Actually, add that to the lottery list: a bookmobile, to go with the library! Card Catalogs and other reference books made you feel like you earned the knowledge you gained, since you worked for it, rather than hit wikipedia or googled a subject. You could also sidestep more crap than internet search engines.

 
So true!

All-you-can-eat-buffet is an apt term. I think of that when I look at Netflix. Blockbuster had so much choice, but I didn’t spend hours looking for something!

You’re right about next click, next click, etc, etc. The comic guides I received were magical. I remember browsing them intently, desperately hoping to find out if they would list the first appearance of Kite-Man and Catman. It was also fun to learn when some comics debuted. Even in the pre-internet age, I knew the likes of The Incredible Hulk had first been published in 1962, or that Action Comics began in 1938, but I wasn’t necessarily sure when Daredevil had debuted, or in which issue Doctor Doom had first appeared. So comic guides were useful.

I haven’t bought one in a while, but Whitaker's Almanack is a UK publication I have owned. Among other things, it lists every MP, every Lord, every government department, country profiles, etc, etc. Not something you’d read in one sitting, or in order, but sometimes it’s nice to look up details about UK demographics, or to see what astronomical data has been added. Give me that over pop-up infested websites, and “Click on this to do a survey” nonsense, any day of the week.

Also had a subscription to CBNG; but, in the 90s. I was happy when they switched to the tabloid layout, as it made it a little easier to handle, while reading.