lou_fine

fight 3 is also raw...Steve said he just neglected to send it in to cgc If you are referring to the Mystery Men 11, it's interesting to note that it is by far the lowest graded Church copy of the entire MM run in Chuck's original MH catalogue. As such, it was also priced the lowest when the run was sold by Diamond to Jon Berk during the Diamond Int'l Galleries grand opening back in '95. Since it was unslabbed, I guess this also explains why it was the only MM book left out of the auction catalogue.

Only until the original art for the cover to Suspense 3 shows up.

7 stalling at 56? Well, looks like it ended at the sign of the Anti-Christ at $66K.

If I was relying on my better half for this auction , all I can say is that she will be sure to find the Delete button for all of my bids.

Looks like the books which I am most interested in doesn't hit the hammer until the last hour of the day. Hope everybody is either totally engrossed in the game or fast asleep by then so that I can scooped up the goodies at a basement bargain price.

I have heard that he has said Science 2 is Lou Fine's best work in his opinion, even though he has the Fantastic 3. Does anyone know if he has the Mile High Science 2 and did not put it up? Not sure about his love for Science 2, but I have heard and read many of his articles where he has stated that Mystery Men 3 is his favorite cover due to how dynamic and free flowing the cover image is. In fact, whenever I see the cover for MM3 now, I think of Jon Berk right away. Similarly, I also feel that with his research on the Larson books and on the man himself, I always think that the Larson pedigree is almost synonymous with Berk himself. So from my point of view, keeping the Larson Mystery Men 3 is the absolute perfect book for Jon to retain in his collection.

Well, still waiting for your con report. Hope you guys managed to move out a few of your 200 long boxes before your have to start looking for some additional warehouse space.

I think he kept his favorites...I know a few he still has so the answer is actually "yes" For sure his Larson copy of Mystery Men 3 since it did not show up in the auction. Interesting to note that he decided to keep the Larson copy and to let the Church copy go instead. Since Spidey was apparently his favorite comic book character, I am also assuming that he must be holding onto his AF 15 plus his ASM 1 -10 run since his Spidey auction run seems to start from ASM 11 and up.

Congrats on a nice pickup! If I may ask, how much did this historical book set you back?

Allan; Absolutely no problem as long as they are of vintage quality books, in nice presenting condition (i.e. relatively high grade), priced at or slightly under condition guide, and doesn't go past my threshold level of $1K per book. Or are these things now mutually exclusive in today's robust marketplace, as it's definitely been a long time since I've been able to pick up a nice half decent book for my collection?

Don't waste your time with bagging and boarding. Just bring all of those books that you recently got slabbed from CGC since this will save you a lot of time and yet put much more money into your pocket.

Shhhh, as per the owner we are not to talk of this in open forum. Aahhh, I believe it's probably a bit too late to keep this quiet now. Did I read somewhere that this owner is already into his mid 90's and that you guys believe this collection would be a slam dunk to achieve pedigree status? I believe the owner must be fully aware of exactly what he has in terms of their value, and if so, I hope he's done his estate planning with respect to the dispersal of this collection already. Unless he believes in the law of immortality or thinks he has found the fountain of youth which he will make use of when the time comes.

And a boardie owns the mile high copy too Would that be this one or are we talking another ? My bad as I had intended to mention that I was referring to the Church copy, but obviously I forgot. Not sure if it's an actual NM copy, but that's what Chuck has it listed as in his MH catalogue. Makes me wonder where some of these Church Centaur books are since they all seem to be scattered to the wind, unlike the Fox runs, Tep runs, Timely runs, etc. which have pretty much stayed intact to this point in time.

MF 73 maybe? Or has it been more than a year since that one popped? Yes, that one popped back in June of 2015 when CC was able to auctioned off a VF copy for something like $99K. The book has basically dropped back or at best plateaued at that level since that time.

+1 Yes, I also came to the same realization some 20+ years ago, as you should always go for quality over quantity. Especially in a marketplace where it's almost impossible to move out off the shelf CA books guiding for $12 even at a $3 price point, and yet you have frantic buyers beating down the doors and bidding $30K+ for relatively lower graded vintage quality books that guides at only $12K.

Now, now, don't say that so loudly or you'll have boardies like Jaydog pounce on you claiming that all of the HG SA books must have already been graded by now, with only an insignificant small fractional amount left to be slabbed.

Most collections probably have at least a few secondhand books, even if the majority were bought new. Didn't Edgar Church have some secondhand books? Well aware of that. From his description, however, it sounded as though a substantial portion of the earlier or better books were actually brought second-hand, as opposed to just a small fractional portion which was indeed the case with the Church collection.

I know there was 5 copies of Iron Man #1 as per the list ( as an example ) Confirms my thinking exactly if this was the best they had, as IM 1 is a late SA book and not even a first appearance at that. Now, if you had seen a TOS 39, TTA 27, or a JIM 83 on your initial list, then that would have been different.

Fun book Although a fun book, I imagine there's no spillover effect in terms of values for these types of WW related books, even with the the success of the WW movies? My bet is that these "fun" covers have been in the doghouse for the longest while now, and will remain there indefinitely no matter how hot Wonder Woman gets since today's marketplace is generally focused only on the keys and classic covers.

I want it so bad!! Unfortunately I can't afford it...lol Prices like this definitely confirms that I am from the old school and definitely nowhere near the same league as this generation of big money collectors. Although this is definitely a great cover, but I simply don't see $38.5K or whatever it will sell for "worth of goodness" in this book here. Especially when you have a slabbed 9.0 Larson copy and another unslabbed supposedly NM copy out there somewhere. But to each, there own.

Based upon your description here, this basically confirms that this is definitely not an original owner collection. An original owner collection is one which is compiled by a collector buying his books fresh off the newsstand, as opposed to buying them second-hand from used book stores. I guess this is why I had a hard time time thinking this was an original owner collection when I first saw your scans of the books. Especially since OO collections are generally always minty fresh as they are brought right off the newsstand and generally kept in that same high grade condition by the original owner.

My thinking is that there was most probably not a single Marvel SA key book in terms of a first appearance in the entire lot.

I think you have to be partially crazy buying 100k comics....even with the CAD dollar as low as it is! Even though that works out to only $2 a pop, it sounds like an almost insurmountable amount of work would be required in order to get your money back out. Since I am the lazy type of collector, I would much rather pay this kind of money for say 100 vintage quality books that would have no problems selling themselves in this current robust marketplace.

Just curious, but what type of GA keys are crazy hot this year, but were dumb cheap only a short year ago? As far as I know, the GA books that are currently hot right now have been hot for an extended period of time. Not aware of any new hot GA books that have just popped up onto the scene.

Same, looking forward to the crash! People always say that when the markets are going gangbusters with no end in sight. When the markets are actually way down there however, history has clearly shown us (especially in terms of the stock markets) that's when most people do their selling simply because they can't take the psychological beating anymore.