(Posted March 27, 2013)

Life-Size cutout of Sheldon Cooper, popular character on The Big Bang Theory
Life-Size cutout of Sheldon Cooper, popular character on The Big Bang Theory

Juniata's Comic Book Club held JuniataCon, a convention celebrating comics and nerdiness, March 24 in the Von Liebig Center for Science. Kelsey Cleland, president of the Comic Book Club, described the plans for the con.

Q: What was available at JuniataCon?

A: First, we had an artists' corner. Unfortunately we did not have outside artists because we got this started a bit later than we had planned, but we did have student artists come and try to sell some of their stuff. We had a gaming room with a Magic game going on at random times throughout the day, and we'll have XBox games. We also scheduled a Halo tournament, and Just Dance set up with the Kinect.
Jay Hosler, professor of biology, did a panel on comic books, and there was a panel on prejudice as shown in comics. We did medieval football, which involves 16 players with foam swords. The goal is to get the ball to the enemy's goal, but if you're touched by a foam sword you're dead. We had an artists' corner showing people how to draw mangas and comic books.

Q: Why did you decide to hold a convention?

A: Initially we weren't going to do it until next year, but Bader, the club secretary, is only here for a year so we're doing it for him before he leaves.

Q: What were some of the challenges you faced in planning this?

A: We wanted outside artists, but we got started too late so we didn't have time to send out insurance forms and all that. And it was difficult to schedule a time and a building we could use, way more difficult than I thought it would be. We couldn't find foam swords until yesterday, so that was sad. Pretty much the normal challenges you would have in planning a large thing. You have people who don't want to do it, people who are too lazy to do things, people who are very enthusiastic and enjoy doing things, and someone who is shoved into the position of doing everything.

Q: What are the plans for future JuniataCons?

A: The plan is to hold it again as long as it does not turn into some horrible disaster, which could always happen. Like no one shows up or something goes horribly wrong. We'll have outside artists, we'll have a better gaming room planned, and we'll have more things for the reading corner. We'll pretty much plan the same stuff, but more developed and generally better.

Q: What were you looking forward to the most?

A: I'm doing a comic, so I'm looking forward to printing out my comic and seeing if people actually like it.

Q: What do you hope for from JuniataCon?

A: I hope that this gets our clubs more interested in what each other are doing. We have a lot of clubs that are really closely related but refuse to have anything to do with each other. I hope that our clubs will interact better, and generally have fun.

~Laura Bitely '14, Juniata Online Journalist

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Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.