Lubbock’s Comics Connections: Rob Weiner

We got a lot of local comics creators who are gonna be at the Lubbock Comic Book Expo on May 2, so I’m gonna start running these Comics Connections bits a bit more often. One of the more important comics folks we’ve got around here doesn’t draw or write comics, but he’s still had a huge impact on the comics world here in Lubbock: Rob Weiner.

Rob was a reference librarian at the Mahon Library here in Lubbock for 12 years. He took a position at the Texas Tech Library as Humanities Librarian a year or two back. He also serves as the Liaison for the College of Visual and Performing Arts and Librarian for Film, Art, Sequential Art, Music, Dance, and Theatre.

In case you haven’t noticed, the Mahon Library and the Lubbock Public Library System has one of the best graphic novel collections in the country, and Rob is the guy who made it all possible. He started building the collection 10 years ago and grew it from a few books to over 4,000. He has published numerous articles and given talks and seminars about building graphic novels collections for libraries.

Rob wrote an article in the 2008 issue of Texas Library Journal about the history of and how to catalog Graphic Novels. He is the author of “Marvel Graphic Novels: An Annotated Guide 1965-2005” and “Captain America and the Struggle of the Superhero,” both published by McFarland Press. He also wrote a chapter in “The Gospel According to Superheroes” that focuses on Captain America. Weiner has also written and spoken on the Grateful Dead, Music and Film topics.

Heck, Rob is really blowing up pretty big right now. Texas Tech is spotlighting his new Captain America book, and SciFiPulse has an excellent interview with him (as well as a cartoon of Rob as Cap that is far too funny).

And don’t forget, Rob will be at the Lubbock Comic Book Expo on Saturday, May 2! He’ll be giving a presentation on “The Reality of Spider-Man” at 11 a.m.! Don’t miss out!