Cowabunga! New Hampshire Town Celebrates Being the Birthplace of the Ninja Turtles

DOVER, N.H. (AP) — As the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have become a pop culture sensation, the place where they were created has rarely been mentioned.

This wasn’t the sewers of New York, where the Turtles transformed into a quartet of crime fighters who fought their enemies with nunchucks, sarcasm, and pizza. This was a small town near the New Hampshire coast.

A new exhibit hopes to put this community, Dover, New Hampshire, at the center of Turtle history and, in turn, attract Turtle-obsessed fans or anyone who grew up reading the comics and watching the Ninja Turtles movies and TV shows. At one point in the 1980s, the frenzy around the Turtles was called Turtlemania.

“This is the birthplace,” said Kevin Eastman, who with Peter Laird created the Ninja Turtles 41 years ago when they shared a house in Dover. The first issue went on sale a year later. “This is where the Turtles were created. … It’s a historic place and very important to us.”

The Turtle exhibit opened last month at the Woodman Museum, which houses an eclectic collection including a stuffed polar bear and a Victorian funeral exhibit with a horse-drawn hearse.

With its explosion of color and display cases filled with action figures, the exhibit is the place to go for all things Turtles.

It all begins with the franchise’s humble beginnings in Dover, where the duo founded Mirage Studios, a play on the fact that they were creating the first comic book in their living room rather than an actual studio. Inspired by Eastman’s fascination with turtles and martial arts, they came up with the Turtles, crime-fighting creatures, and self-published their first black-and-white comic book.

“We hoped that one day we would sell enough copies of our 3,000 $1.50 print comics to pay my uncle back,” Eastman said, adding that they had no plans to write a second issue until fans demanded more.

“We loved our characters. We loved what we were doing. We told the best story we could. We hoped for the best,” he continued. “But I never could have imagined that one comic book could lead to all of this.”

Ralph DiBernardo, whose Rochester store sells comic books and games, was an early advocate for the Turtles. He knew Eastman and Laird from selling them comics and was the first to sell their Turtles comic commercially after buying 500 copies. But he said at the time it seemed more like a favor to friends than a business decision, because he thought “those guys are never going to get their money back.”

“To see them go from two struggling guys barely getting by to multimillionaires, it’s this story of the American dream that never happens,” said DiBernardo, who remains friends with both artists.

The exhibit details the Turtles’ emergence as a global phenomenon, featuring pizza-obsessed characters with catchphrases such as “cowabunga” and “booyakasha.”

Highlights of the exhibit include a video game console on which visitors can play Turtles arcade games, vinyl records of Turtles movie soundtracks and first-run signed Turtles comic books, some worth tens of thousands of dollars. The marketing power of the Turtles is also on display, with everything from Turtles-inspired Christmas ornaments, rugs and backpacks to a talking toothbrush.

Amidst it all is a set of massive bronze statues depicting the four turtles—Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello and Raphael—as well as the mutant rat and resident wise man, Master Splinter. The exhibit is one of 12 that Eastman has created as part of a fundraiser for a museum in Northampton, Massachusetts.

“The Ninja Turtles are a multi-billion dollar international franchise, and they were born here in Dover,” said Jonathan Nichols, executive director of the Woodman Museum. “So it was a no-brainer for us to bring the Ninja Turtles here. This gallery is really a celebration of the history of the turtles from their inception to today.”

According to Eastman, the exhibit demonstrates the Turtles’ general appeal, which he attributes to their heroic nature and the fact that they function almost like a bickering family but also work best as a team. Fans also like the fact that they are “four mutant green turtles who are of no race, creed or color.”

“Anyone can be a Turtle,” said Eastman, who now lives in Arizona but plans to attend a comic book convention in Manchester, New Hampshire, later this month. He said he enjoys “talking to fans not only about what they like about their Turtle,” but also “what their favorite Turtle is.”

“I ask them who they identify with. It says a lot about their personality,” he added.

The exhibit’s opening is part of a larger, long-awaited effort by Dover to welcome the Ninja Turtles. A historical sign was erected next to the museum last year, recognizing Dover as the birthplace of the Ninja Turtles. A few blocks away, a decorative manhole cover has been placed in front of an empty lot where the creators’ home once stood.

“I grew up here in Dover and I had no idea I was growing up in the town where they were created,” Nichols said. “So once it started to come to the forefront, I think it took a huge effort in the town to really get it out there.”

Nichols said a few high-profile fans have visited the museum in Turtles gear before. But the other day, the exhibit was attracting visitors from other parts of the museum who found themselves reflecting on Turtles memorabilia.

“It’s just memories of the Turtles eating pizza,” said Heidi Stephenson, who was visiting with family from Canada.

David Sarge, a Pennsylvania cook who was an avid comic book collector as a teenager, said the exhibit brought back memories of a comic book convention in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where the first comic book was sold. He bought signed editions of the first two Turtles comics, but let youthful exuberance get the better of what could have been a big payday.

“I traded them in for cannabis shortly after and I still regret it to this day,” he said with a laugh.