People love to hold things. People also love good stories and to be entertained. For these reasons, Rethel Miller has been in steady business for 34 years. Catering to people’s need for something tangible in today’s virtual breed of microwave entertainment, Miller sells comic books. Her store, Comics Universe, was the first and is the only remaining comic book store in Jackson, located at 1869 Hwy. 45 Bypass North.
Miller originally ran a martial arts supply store with her husband, but after seeing the lack of a comics store in Jackson, they decided to open one themselves. After nine years, Miller’s husband passed away, leaving her the store. Miller says that it was scary when he first died because the store was her only source of income. Many of her customers left.
“They didn’t think I’d last because I was a woman,” Miller said. “But I was the first comics store here, and now I’m the last.”
She’s done so well, she says, because despite our growing technology, people still just want to hold paper in their hands.
Many of her customers are regulars who have been coming for years. Miller pulls the new editions of comics off the shelves for them and holds them in a wall of square cubbies. There are over a hundred of them, each one labeled with a customer’s name, and Miller remembers which series each person is interested in. It’s like how Starbucks remembers your order if you go enough, only Miller remembers a lot more than her customer’s comic book preferences.
She tells the story of one police officer from Chicago, Ill. who comes to the store whenever he’s in town visiting family. Every time he comes, Miller greets him by name, and every time the officer exclaims: “My wife is always surprised that you remember me, Mrs. Miller!” She remembers him because he once came and said he was having surgery and asked Miller to keep him in her prayers. So ever since then, Miller has prayed for him every night.
Another customer is Hunter Jones, who pastors Eastview Baptist Church in Huntingdon, Tenn. Jones has been coming to Comics Universe since he was nine years old. Now grown, he has four children with whom he hopes to share his love for comics. He recalls Miller questioning him as a child, wanting to know what his parents did for a living since he was spending so much money buying comics. He says Miller has been exceedingly kind to him and his family over the years.
“You don’t find a lot of shops where it’s woman-owned and the same woman has been there for a long time. [Miller] is very sweet to me and takes care of me, and so I love supporting her,” Jones said.
When he’s in town, he enjoys talking to Miller about the church and the Lord.
“Batman, Jesus and the whole gang,” Jones said.
“Good triumphs over evil,” Miller adds. She thinks this principle is one of the first things that draws people to comics, and stories in general. To stand in her store is to be surrounded by multitudes of stories where the good guys always win. There’s comfort in holding the old, soft, glossy pages of a comic book and thumbing through to the end, where the superheroes beat the villains. It’s an ancient narrative that humans have been writing about since the very beginning.
Miller has never had any employees at her store. When asked if she would ever hire anyone, her response was definite:
“Don’t want no help.”
She’s run the store for 25 years by herself, and she doesn’t see that changing anytime soon.
“Now, if somebody dies and I have to go to a funeral, I just take the phone off the hook, put a sign in the window and lock the doors.”
