Holy Donors, Batman! CHOC Gets a Super Gift

It’s not the first time someone cleaned out the garage and wound up handing over collectibles to Children’s Hospital of Orange County.

But this is the first time such a donation involved 50,000 comic books, enough to create a hulking tower more than eight feet high and four feet wide.

After sitting for about 18 years in a storage unit owned by a Lake Forest comic book store, the collection will be hauled away by a CHOC truck Saturday for sale at the hospital’s thrift stores.

“It’s certainly an unusual donation,” hospital spokeswoman Andrea Pronk said. “We’ll probably keep about 100 for the kids and use the proceeds from the rest to help support the hospital.”

Comic Quest owner Don Allen said the comics are mostly overstocked titles that have been gathering dust since his store opened in 1979.

“We’ve had this stuff laying around forever,” Allen said. “I’m sure we could have sold them off at salvage or even recycled them, but I figured this might be a fun way to get rid of them.”

Titles include the ever-popular Spider-man, Batman and the Incredible Hulk. Although most of the comic books are not worth their cover price, “I’m sure there are some worthwhile titles in that stack somewhere,” Allen said.