Comic Book Memories: Iron Man issue 38 - Food poisoning, angry ladies and Askit powders!

Time has an unsettling habit of creeping up on you in ways that we never thought it would, it teases you with what seems like long days of eternal youth before suddenly hitting you square in the face with a heavy dose of reality and all of a sudden those youthful days of our past are literally a lifetime ago. One such “slap in the face” happened to me recently when I was tidying up some old boxes of comics when I came across Iron Man issue 38. It was one of those Madeleine moments when upon seeing that Sal Buscema cover, I was instantly transported back to when I first purchased the comic which to my mind was only (only!) around 30 year ago. However upon checking the comic in more detail it turned out that the cover was dated June 1971 which meant that it would have gone on sale in the US around March and would have hit our shores in October /November 1971, some 50 years ago!

The memory of picking up this comic is particularly strong to me as in May of that year my family moved into our first bought new house, I had not long started secondary school, and on the day I bought this comic my dad had taken ill with suspected food poisoning from a works lunch. I can’t recall the actual day or the exact month (it was cold so it was probably November) that this happened but I do remember that my dad looked really ill and went to his bed around 7pm. By 8pm he really wasn’t well at all and my mum thought we should phone a doctor. However as we had not long moved into our new house our land line had not yet been installed (this would happen in the next few days) so as many people did back then, my mum and myself made our way to find a telephone box and call the doctor while my brother stayed at home to look after my dad. On the surface this was not as easy a task as it should have been as we were new to the town and the first phone box we came upon had been vandalised. My mum then asked the owner of a local laundrette if we could use his phone to call a doctor and to our surprise he refused. This resulted in two women who were using the laundrette at the time giving him what we would call a severe “Glaswegian dressing down” . One of the ladies then said that we should go to a grocery store a few yards further up the road and use the phone there as “…the owner there was a decent human being, unlike the uncaring *&@~# in this place” - shouted at the top off her voice in an unmistakable Glaswegian brogue aimed at the laundrette owner.

On reaching the grocery store my mum was able to use the phone and call the doctor. While in the store I also remember my mum buying some Askit powders (used for upset stomachs) for my dad in case he needed them. As she purchased the Askit powders I took the time to peruse the well-stocked shop and spied a spinner rack mostly filed with gag and auto magazines, but it also had a US comic - Iron Man issue 38 which I immediately purchased (my first ever Iron Man comic) . We then made our way back home passing the laundrette where the two ladies asked how we got on and wished my dad a speedy recovery. As we made our way home I heard one of the ladies again give the laundrette owner “pelters” (abuse) and remember smiling and thinking only in Glasgow (well Greater Glasgow in this case) would that happen. The doctor arrived at our house a few hours later and my dad made a full recovery in a couple of days.

The Iron Man story itself isn’t that good. It basically revolves around Tony Stark being asked to hire an teenage con called Frankie Majors who was framed by the mysterious gang lord known as Jonah for murder. Tony Stark believes in second chances and gives Frankie Majors a one-month trial period while as Iron Man, he checks into Frankie’s past to verify whether he was really framed or not. Despite the blandness of the story this comic will always hold a special place in my memory, sadly my mum , dad, brother and even that grocers shop are no longer with us but having Iron Man issue 38 to hand briefly reminds me of that particular day even if it is only for a short period of time.