Rick Geary, the author of The Murder of Abraham Lincoln and The Terrible Axe-Man of New Orleans was at Bridge City Comics Wednesday signing copies of his books. Though his career spans 34 years, the cartoonist found himself a newcomer again.
"I haven't been to Portland in thirty years," he said, enjoying the rain, which is a bit more scarce at his home in Carrizozo, New Mexico.
Geary was making a trip for both business and pleasure, having been invited to visit the Rose City by friend David Scroggy.
"David and I have been friends for years," Geary said, "and this happened to coincide with APE [Alternative Press Expo, in San Francisco]."
Scroggy, VP of Product Development for Dark Horse Comics, took Geary and his wife on a tour of the Columbia Gorge and Multnomah Falls before setting up shop at Bridge City.
Geary's appearance brought out many fans of the artist's work, including David Chelsea (David Chelsea In Love) and Indigo Kelleigh (The Adventures of Ellie Connelly).
Although Geary got his start doing short pieces for anthologies like Fear and Laughter and strips for the Funny Pages of National Lampoon, history has been a "continuing obsession" for the New Mexico resident. In 1987, Terry Nantier of NBM Publishing contacted him, and A Treasury of Victorian Murder was born.
Since then, his crime books have become near and dear to his heart.
"It's one of the few continuing jobs I've had," he said, smiling. Other projects, such as Gumby and Classics Illustrated, have found themselves ending all too soon.
The process of creating each true crime book is relatively similar for Geary.
"I read as much as I can," he said, "but that's bounded by the limits of my deadline structure. I give myself six months to do research."
His next grisly subject will be the Hall-Mills murder case of 1922, in which a minister and the woman he was having an affair with were murdered. The case, famous for the journalistic sensationalism it inspired, was only surpassed in popularity by the Lindbergh kidnapping.
In the twenty-four years since A Treasury of Victorian Murder, what has been the cartoonist's favorite book to research?
"They each offer different challenges," he explained. "For some, there is almost too much information, like The Lindbergh Child. For others, like The Terrible Axe-Man of New Orleans, there was very little in any coherent structure."
Geary reflected on the journeys he had taken with his books.
"Each path has had its own joys."
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