One Dollar Goodness!

Who says you can't find 9.8s in bargain boxes anymore?

I have been working on completing a graded set of both Marvel Fanfare and Vigilante for some time now. I've had far more success with the Marvel Fanfare set.

While at least most of them have been submitted from time to time, Vigilante issues are extremely difficult to come by in graded form. In fact, outside of the first few issues, most have not ever been submitted for grading at this point.

I understand that the character is not a hot topic with the general comic population or anything like that, but I really liked the character and stories when I was a kid. Probably because at the time, it was a series that was "suggested for mature readers" and I thought it was cool to be able to read more mature material as a kid.

Anyway, I am getting much closer to a complete set of Marvel Fanfare, but up until now, I've had to rely on Vigilante issues that show up on auction, which is almost never, with the exception of #1. In fact, the only non-auction issue I have acquired in 9.8 was a #28 that Ronnylama sent me a while back.

Until now, that is. There is a Books A Million near my house here in Tallahassee. About six months ago, they apparently bought somebody's small collection of comic books and put them for sale at one dollar each. I quickly went through them a few months ago and picked a few out, but it was when I had decided for sure about attending Megacon this year that I went back for a more thorough examination.

I went through every box, comic by comic. Most were 90s cannon fodder. But there were a few 80s goodies mixed within them. I wasn't interested in most of the 90s material, but I found a decent amount of 80s issues for consideration.

Once I had weeded out all of the ones that were definitely not worth grading, I took the remaining ones out of their bags one by one and did a more exhaustive eyeballing of them to determine grade worthy items.

Among them were three particular issues. A Marvel Fanfare #25, a Vigilante #40 and a Vigilante #41. I was sure that these three were 9.8s with a pressing.

So I took them with me for onsite grading at Megacon. These weren't to be signed by anyone, so I just turned them in to CGC as soon as Tnerb and I walked in the door at the show. I wouldn't have spent the money for onsite on them if I wasn't absolutely sure of 9.8s.

These weren't for me to resell and make money on. They were to help with set completion. The Vigilante especially were big deals to me. These just don't get submitted at all.

When it was all said and done, I was thrilled to see on Sunday that my grading skills are right on target!

Marvel Fanfare #25 - 9.8 WP

Vigilante #40 - 9.8 WP

Vigilante #41 - 9.8 WP

The Vigilante issues are both dark covers as well. #40 in particular has jet black going right down the spine! While these aren't big key issues or even sought after or popular issues for most collectors, I am ecstatic that I am creating OAKs that are helping me towards completing my sets!!!!

And for just one dollar each for the raw pickups!!!

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