I'm from Cleveland - and it was a bit of a chore to get my mother to ferry me, my younger brother and another friend down to Mansfield for the afternoon.  I was only a sophomore in high school at the time.

But truly, the best part was watching JB sketch and ink that Batman right in front of me!  I was in awe.

Funny side note - my brother was only 8 at the time, and he watched JB draw for the entire time we were there.  And when it came time to ask for his sketch, he asked for JB to draw the Beast.  What my brother couldn't see was a sign JB had on the table stating that he wasn't going to draw any X-Men (esp. Wolverine).  I'm sure he would have been drawing Wolverine all day (in all honesty, that's who I originally wanted, but I changed my request to Batman.)  Anyway, when my brother asked for the Beast, JB paused for a moment and took a good long look at this little wide eyed kid, grumbled something, and started drawing.

I guess Beast being in the Avengers at the time was a loophole.

The other cool thing I remember was JB had some fiished pages of Alpha Flight #1 on the table before the book had been published!!!  So we got a sneak preview!

It was an awesome trip!