A BATMANIA Tribute to TOM FAGAN and the Famed RUTLAND HALLOWEEN PARADE
With the Batman #237 Facsimile Edition out, dig this look at a famed comic-book tradition… — UPDATED 10/9/24: The Batman #237 Facsimile Edition is out! Perfect time to reprint this piece from October 2023! Oh, and this year’s Rutland parade will be Oct. 26. Click here for details. Dig it. — Dan — From the first time I read Batman #237, I was entranced by the Rutland Halloween Parade in Vermont. I didn’t even realize it was a real thing until much later (I didn’t read the letters when I was five); I just remember gawking at this magnificent tryptych by Neal Adams and Dick Giordano and trying to name all the superheroes and wishing I could go to such an amazing event. Five decades later, and I still haven’t made it, but I’ve long wanted to do a feature on it here at 13th Dimension, beyond our annual tribute to Batman #237, the greatest Halloween comic book ever. Well, just this week, I happened upon a post in the Batmania by Biljo White Facebook group, by administrator Kirk Hastings. It pretty much said everything I’d want to say, and more. With Kirk’s permission, we’re adapting it here as a special guest column. You can also check out the annual INSIDE LOOK at Batman #237, featuring insightful and revealing comments by the late Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams. Click here for that. Now, here’s Kirk. — By KIRK HASTINGS I knew Tom Fagan really well. But I never met him in person! Despite that fact, he is the reason I will be in Rutland’s annual Halloween Parade this year. Permit me to explain: I grew up in a little seashore resort town called Wildwood Crest, New Jersey, located near the southern tip of the state, in the 1960s. And from a very early age I was a great fan of Batman comics. The very first time I ever heard of Tom Fagan was from the letters page in Issue #148 of the Batman comic, which came out in April of 1962 (I was 9 years old at the time). Tom was a big Batman fan too, and in his letter he described this wonderful Halloween Parade that had been going on in Rutland, Vermont, since 1959, and how he had ended up getting involved with it beginning in 1960,...
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