SL_PeopleDept_0519FINAL_Dept 5 / 14 / 19 9 : 43 AM Page 2 OriginStory HOW JIM DRUCKER BECAME A HERO TO COMIC - BOOK COLLECTORS AROUND THE WORLD . By Bill Donahue | photography by Jody Robinson ohn Donaldson grew up in a two - Drucker turned his newspaper family . Every Sunday , childhood passion into an online Jafter his parents finished leafing marketplace that through the pages of the Philadelphia moves as many as 250,000 comic Inquirer and Bucks County Courier books per year . Times , he would follow suit . His first destination : the comics . He loved the smell of the ink and the feeling of the grain against his fingers as he smirked along with Blondie , The Family Circus , and Hagar the Horrible . He also consumed comic books by the dozens . His favorites include war - themed books along the lines of Sgt . Rock , but he also adored those that had to do with horror and science fiction — mummies and monsters and invaders from different worlds , to be precise . “ To me , there’s always been something special about comic books , ” says Donald - son , a creative professional on the cusp of 50 who lives near Quakertown . “ They make you think anything can happen , and a red dot next to a blue dot . When I left City , N.J . , and saw stacks of old comic that’s pretty addictive when you’re a kid . ” for college in ’ 69 , I told my mom , ‘ Don’t books . As he leafed through scores of As often happens when people transi - throw out my comics , ’ because I had classic plastic - sleeved books , he saw a fa - tion from adolescence to his teen years , such fond memories of them . Every year miliar cover staring back : Marvel’s Conan Donaldson slowly parted ways with childish for the next 20 years , she could tell me , the Barbarian , volume 1 , issue 123 , from things : first , his collection of action figures ‘ Hey , come get your comic books . ’ Even - June 1981 , titled “ The Horror Beneath the and cap guns , followed by the rest . He tually I relented and my wife became the Hills ” — his favorite from childhood . doesn’t remember exactly what happened reluctant caretaker . ” “ I couldn’t believe it , ” Donaldson says . to his collection of comic books , whether “ Of course I snatched it right up . This was he gave them away or they simply got ‘ There Is Something to This ’ the mid - to late 1990s , before the internet , thrown in the trash . For Drucker , peddling comic books online or before the internet became the internet Although he was busy doing adult is something of a third or fourth career . An we know today . Now you can get anything things — finding his way in the working attorney by trade , Drucker once served as anywhere , anytime you want , but back world , getting married , starting a family — commissioner of the Continental Basketball then you really had to hunt things down . ” every so often he would think about some Association and , later , the Arena Football Enter Jim Drucker . Donaldson is among of the things he let go . League . In between he served as a legal the growing universe of people Drucker “ There was one [ comic book ] in par - commentator for ESPN . might consider potential customers . Druck - ticular I couldn’t stop thinking about — it When he retired from his AFL job in er founded NewKadia.com , an online com - was a Conan the Barbarian , ” he recalls . the late 1990s , he took some time off to ic - book marketplace , nearly 20 years ago . “ This one issue had him fighting a horde consider his next step . Since then it has grown to move as many of small , orange devils , and I swear there “ I sat by the pool and went to the as a quarter of a million comic books per was blood on every page . For as 12 - year - movies three times a week , ” he says . “ We year . old kid , it doesn’t get much better than closed the pool in mid - September , and my “ I read comics from age 6 to 12 , and I that . ” wife said , ‘ Now what are you going to used them as my primary source of learn - Then , one summer while on vacation , do ? ’ I thought : I’ll look into this World ing and vocabulary , ” says Drucker , a Ply - serendipity struck . He walked into a sec - Wide Web thing . TIME magazine had just mouth Meeting native . “ I loved the dots , ond - hand shop on the boardwalk in Ocean done a story on Jeff Bezos [ of Amazon ] , how you would get a purple dot by printing SUBURBANLIFEMAGAZINE.COM MAY 2019 | 71