Carol & John’s Comic Book Shop feels less like a retail space and more like a place where stories are handed down. Some people come in looking for something specific, some people come in just to browse, but everyone leaves with something. A kid walks around looking at a Spider-Man book, a longtime customer flips through new releases on a table in the center of the store, each one of them there for the same reason. They’re a part of a community.
This is part of why comic books endure. They survive because we share stories with each other. It is a part of how we got to where we are culturally. Comic book heroes are America’s mythology. Much like England has its Arthurian myths and Greece has its Hercules, we have Superman, and places like Carol & John’s are the reason why our heroes have endured for generations.
It feels like that philosophy sits at the center of the store, whether or not anyone says it explicitly. It is also why Carol & John’s was recently named one of MSN’s 15 best comic book stores in the country. The recognition did not arrive with fanfare or ceremony. The owners found out the same way many customers did.
“They never notified us,” owner John Dudas said. “A customer posted it, and then my friends who own comic shops were like, I didn’t know about it until I saw your post.”
Dudas was proud, but not because of the headline alone.
John opened the store in 1990 with his mother, and you can tell that the business is rooted in that original sense of love and care. Today, Dudas’ daughters help out in the store as well, extending the line another generation.
For Dudas, the story stretches back even further, to a great-grandfather who used comic books as a bridge into a new country.
“My great-grandfather was a Polish immigrant,” he said. “He could speak English, but he couldn’t read or write it. So he would learn from the context by reading comic books.”
When his great-grandfather died, the comics were left to the kid who cared. Dudas was 6 or 7years old and studied them closely. By the time he was 12, he was working in a comic shop. Then, later, he and his mother opened their own.
“Between my great-grandfather and my daughters, it’s five generations of comic books in the city of Cleveland,” Dudas said. “I could talk to my great-grandfather about Superman, and I could talk to my daughter about Superman.” It’s a bridge that ties them.
That inherited understanding is what turns stories into cultural touchstones. Spider-Man and Captain America aren’t just characters. They’re mirrors. These stories persist because their morality transcends eras and they answer the same questions for every generation. Questions about responsibility, sacrifice and how tough it can be to be a righteous person when it is so easy to give in and quit.
I asked John whether comics had always shaped who he was, or if it was something that he discovered about himself later in life.
“I’m a better man for it,” he said. “My morality was developed around it.”
Carol and John’s has endured because it cares about people just as much as their inventory. It is positioned as a gathering place. A place to hang out, talk and return to. Comics are just the gravitational force that pulls people there.
“It’s a community hub,” Dudas said. “People come here to hang out and talk about what they care about.”
That philosophy shapes how the shop operates. After years in a much larger space, Carol & John’s downsized within the same plaza. The lesson stuck.
They downsized the square footage, but the shop expanded outward into the community. “Polish the diamond. Use what you have and then touch up the little things in the corner as opposed to trying to get bigger and bigger.” And expand they did.
On Free Comic Book Day, thousands of people pass through the doors, and tens of thousands of comics are given away. The store provides free vendor space for local artists, hosts cosplay groups, and runs charity events that have helped generate more than 200,000 meals for the Greater Cleveland Food Bank. Free Comic Book Day is scheduled for May 2 this year.
On a Saturday, standing in the middle of the shop, that story becomes easy to read. Comic books endure because we need heroes. Not perfect ones, but flawed ones who try the way we try. We pass these stories down because they help us explain who we are and who we want to be.
“I believe in the hobby,” Dudas said. “I believe this hobby makes you a better person.”
In a country still writing its mythology, Carol & John’s is where those stories are shared again, one comic at a time.
Keep our local journalism accessible to all
Reader support is crucial as we continue to shed light on underreported neighborhoods in Cleveland. Will you become a monthly member to help us continue to produce news by, for, and with the community?
P.S. Did you like this story? Take our reader survey!
