Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
NORTH MANCHESTER – A Manchester University senior was recognized by Guinness World Records as having the largest Joker memorabilia collection.
Joker is a character from the Batman comic books, movies and television shows.
Megan Pierce officially counted how many pieces her collection had on Aug. 13, 2023, which her certificate from the Guinness World Records (GWR) has on it. She didn’t officially receive recognition from GWR for her collection until Sept. 19, 2025.
During the process of getting her collection recognized, she took a continuos video of all her collectibles on Aug. 13, 2023. There were a lot of other steps Pierce had to go through, including putting together a document with photos, descriptions and measurements of all the collectibles. She had to make sure the information matched the order the collectibles appeared in her video. In the documents she provided to GWR, she also had to provide timestamps of when all her collectibles appeared in her video.
As of August 2023, Pierce had 2,318 pieces in her memorabilia collection. Pierce said the memorabilia that was submitted for the record had to be officially licensed memorabilia from DC Comics, so it can’t be fan-drawn, bootlegged or hand-drawn. There also can’t be duplicate items. Pierce said she does have duplicate and fan-made items, so those items didn’t count toward her record.
“The number there doesn’t recognize everything I have, but what Guinness would accept at that time,” she said.
She said she wanted to try for the record because she always had an interest in the Guinness World Records.
“Everyone knows the Guinness Book of Records, and I always thought it would be kinda cool to be a part of it. And I also know of other collectors who recently went for Guinness records, so I thought, ‘You know what, why don’t I try?’” she said.
Pierce said she’s been collecting Joker memorabilia for about 10 years. She collects anything with a Joker on it, including action figures, comics, food packaging and advertisements. She finds the pieces in a lot of different places and does online shopping for the more unique pieces in her collection like Ebay and from other collectors. She tries to be smart about the items she buys and always tries to look for the best deals.
Since 2023, Pierce has added to her collection. She thinks she even bought something the day after making the official count for the Guinness World Records, “so that record isn’t necessarily 100% accurate as of right now.” Part of her collection is kept in her parents’ home in her hometown of Bloomington, while she does keep some of her collection with her.
“(The Joker is) just an interesting character and I watched and read some things about him and he really stood out to me the most, so that’s what kind of what got my interest at first,” she said, noting the character is very animated, colorful and fun.
She said the getting the record is just for her. At some point, she does hope to open a museum with all of her Joker memorabilia. She’s just hoping her record brings some awareness to her collection so people are aware there’s a collection in Indiana.
Over the years Pierce has been collecting memorabilia, she said she has met a lot of different collectors and celebrities at different conventions, like Mark Hamill, who voices the Joker, and illustrator Jim Lee, chief creative officer of DC Comics. She said the experiences meeting them has been great and she’s never met a rude person at the conventions.
Pierce is currently studying communications and is part of the honors program. She wants to eventually get her Ph.D. and study media studies and comics. She wants to teach at the college level. Her main interest is possibly teaching the history of film and comics.
“When you’re a collector, there’s a lot of research that goes into every single piece. I’ve learned so much throughout the process,” she said, noting she there’s a lot of things she can apply from researching her collection to her studies, which is why she wants to teach that in the future.
In a public relations course, she talked about the public relations campaign behind the 1989 “Batman” and was able to use her knowledge of collecting with that.
