He was the most unlikely of supermen: a former accountant and real estate agent with a love of comic books, whose incredible powers were mostly confined to yo-yo tricks.
But William Liebowitz, founder of the Golden Apple Comics store, was a hero nonetheless in Hollywood's alternate universe of comic book artists, collectors and pop-culture junkies. His death last month at age 63 was a loss, as one patron put it, of a "true pioneer of L.A. culture."
On Sunday evening, a number of fans returned to the Melrose Avenue storefront to pay tribute to Liebowitz and to recall his contributions as comic book mogul, patron of the arts, soft-porn aficionado and super-sized personality with all of the pow! of a Lichtenstein painting.
"He had a kid's enthusiasm about this stuff," said John Rubin, a singer with the Mighty Echoes, a vocal group that crooned Liebowitz's favorite tunes through the night. "That's what made him so much fun."
"This is one of the most important comic book stores in the world," said Bob Wayne, a vice president at DC Comics, who flew in from New York. DC publishes some of the best-known superhero comics.
And longtime patron Anthony Albright, 36, met his wife at the store. "She was an employee here," he said, "and we both had superhero tattoos on our arms."
Liebowitz, a native of New York, died of congestive heart failure on Oct. 27. His comic store -- with locations in Hollywood and Northridge -- was celebrating its 25th anniversary.
Liebowitz founded the store after growing disillusioned with a successful corporate career. By the early 1980s, he was a vice president at the powerful real estate company Trizec Corp., but he found the work stifling.
He started Golden Apple in 1979, and left Trizec a few years later. He took a job as entertainment director of the 1984 Olympics, and did a stint working for concert promoter Bill Graham. But the comics business was taking off, and eventually he was able to dedicate himself to the store full time.
Golden Apple became a shrine to some of his pop-culture passions -- comics, yo-yos, pinup girls and collectibles. Patrons came looking for the latest adventures of Plasticman, and stayed to test Liebowitz's knowledge of underdog music forms such as doo-wop and zydeco.
Comic book fans appreciated his wide-ranging inventory. The superhero genre was stocked deep, as were alternative comics, from classic R. Crumb works to more recent literary graphic novels by Marjane Satrapi and Art Spiegelman. And Liebowitz's unswerving championing of the yo-yo earned him the loyalty of ardent practitioners like Tony "Lunchbox" Elkins.
