SOTIcollector

Here are the four different printings that are known. There are two different sizes of the cover with two panels on it; there are two different sizes of the one with no panels on the cover. Up next: a discussion of which came first.

Yes, I very much appreciate the efforts of a kind Mod who was nice enough to move my misplaced thread when they would have been well within their rights to just get rid of it. I poked around the Moderation area, and I searched for the terms "mod" and "@mod", but I didn't see an obvious way to thank the Mod. So for now I'll just state publicly "Thank you very much, Mod!". If anybody has any recommendations for how I thank the Mod and ensure that they actually SEE my thanks, I'd appreciate it.

And while we're at it, there's even more Peter Penny news! It appears that there were at least FOUR printings of Peter Penny and His Magic Dollar! Previously, three printings were known. More about that in a bit. Leading up to it, we have, here is some background about the book's distribution and print runs for anybody who cares. The book was published by the American Banker's Association and sold to banks, who could order the back cover personalized with their own special message. How much did banks pay for these books? It depends on how many copies they ordered and what they wanted the back cover to say. Here's the back cover of a copy they used to sell the idea to member banks. And here's a picture of what one of those personalized back covers looked like, after the bank paid for customization. The Sylvia Porter article got me searching for other articles about Peter Penny. That led me to a couple different articles that mention the print runs and the number of printings. On June 13, 1947, the Post Standard from Syracuse, NY reported that Magic Dollar had reached a circulation of a quarter million copies in its first two months. Almost a year later, April 10, 1948, the Deseret News from Salt Lake City, Utah published this, indicating that there had been three printings totaling half a million books. Prior to this article, I had identified three separate printings, and I thought maybe that was all there were. But no, there are four known printings of Peter Penny and His Magic Dollar. Details to come...

I'm looking for a devil's advocate, so I appreciate the perspective. Sure, I want this to be a new discovery. But accuracy is what's most important. It seems to me that the verb tenses could be used to support the case for "Peter Penny Saves The Day" as being a SOTI book and "Peter Penny and his Magic Dollar" NOT being a SOTI book. In the article, Porter talks about Magic Dollar, in the past tense, and discusses the upcoming Saves The Day. Let's call the former MD, because that's easy, and let's just call the latter STD, because I find that acronym funny. At the end of the article, Porter is describing books to be published in the future, rather than the ones already published, when she writes, "So as you read the comic pamphlets that undoubtedly will be coming your way in future months, realize fully that the aim is not just to amuse you. Not by a long shot. It is to instruct you in specific things, mold your thinking in a specific way." So Porter was clearly referring to STD and its ilk. Wertham didn't refer to any books matching Peter Penny's description in his 1948 Saturday Review of Literature article, nor in his 1953 Ladies' Home Journal preview of SOTI. The first instance I could find of Wertham writing about one of these American Banker's Association books was in SOTI, which came out in April, 1954, a full five years after the Porter article. Wertham: "Sylvia F. Porter, the financial columnist, writes about a comic book got out by the American Bankers Association:" There's no way to know exactly when Wertham penned his words about Peter Penny, but it's virtually certain that by the time he wrote them both MD and STD had been "got out." The fact that Wertham quoted a Porter passage, and that passage referred to STD, could be used to support the assertion that Wertham was referring to STD. That's my perspective, but I'm writing here for additional perspectives. Everybody's welcome to chime in. I'm eager to hear other opinions.

D'oh! That's the second time I've posted something in the wrong forum when I was CERTAIN I had posted it in the right place. I know where it belongs, and somehow I posted it in the wrong place anyway. Thanks for clarifying. I get it now.

I don't understand the question. This is a golden age forum, and this is about a golden age book. What am I missing?

If you know me, you know I get totally jazzed when I discover new information related to Seduction of the Innocent. And I'm totally jazzed. On pages 310-311 of Seduction of the Innocent, Dr. Wertham wrote, There are publicity comic books to influence adults. Sylvia F. Porter, the financial columnist, writes about a comic book got out by the American Bankers Association: "The aim is not just to amuse you. Not by a long shot. It is to mold your thinking in a specific way." If that is true of good comic books for bankers, isn't it true, too, of bad comic books for children? They mold a child's thinking in a specific way. For many years, the Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide has contended that this was a reference to Peter Penny and His Magic Dollar, the 1947 comic put out by the American Bankers Association. I had this quote on my list of things to research one of these days. Was Sylvia Porter's article really referring to Peter Penny and His Magic Dollar? Or the other known Peter Penny book, Peter Penny Saves the Day? I was pleasantly surprised to find the answer in a Facebook group for freebie comics. A gentleman named Michael Styborski had posted the original Sylvia Porter article that I had intended to hunt down. Thank you, Michael! That led me to some fun tidbits... First off, here's the article, which appeared in The Amarillo (TX) Daily News, January 20, 1949 as well as the Philadelphia Inquirer, December 27, 1948. Scroll past the photo if you like, because I've transcribed the text below. Here's the text of the article, with the relevant parts highlighted in red. Industry is finally discovering the comic book – greeting it with huzzahs and hoopla, taking it over with energy and enthusiasm. After all these years, the men who make American industry are recognizing that what Popeye has done for spinach and Jiggs has done for corned beef and cabbage, the descendants of Popeye and Jiggs can do for private enterprise, the profit system, labor management relations, independent banking, and the like. It’s a top-notch development right now. And, according to my friends in the public relations field, we’re seeing just the beginnings of your education to business via the comic strip. Which makes it important for you – the target – to know what’s up and what’s ahead for you and your children. Are you curious about jet propulsion or atom-smashing, interested in X-rays or diesel engines? General Electric is publishing a comib book series on “Adventures in Electricity.” A half-dozen of the booklets are on my desk now; I’ve studied them; they’re superb. And implicit in each cartoon, behind each word spoken by the comic characters, is a song of praise for the American industry which has made such wonders possible and for the company within that industry which has helped so greatly in the job. Do you ever wonder how our banking system functions and what it really contributes to your way of life? The American Bankers Association, that eminently conservative organization of financiers, has a “Peter Penny and His Magic Dollar” comic pamphlet to tell you the teal on an A-B-C level. And it’s putting out a new one, “Peter Penny Saves the Day,” to extol thrift. And here, too, implicit in each cartoon, behind each word spoken by the comic characters is a song of praise for the American system of private, independent banks. Only a few corporations and trade associations have so far explored the medium on a major scale – but these have had astounding success. The Institute for Life Insurance, for instance, decided to experiment with the comic booklet, “The Man Who Runs Interference,” to help sell insurance to you and me. They’re now counting distribution in the millions. Borden’s, W.T. Grant Co., the Milwaukee Railroad have pioneered in the field. You need no explanation from me as to the impact of such characters as Elise the Cow. Surveys indicate that 70,000,000 Americans are regular followers of newspaper strips or comic books; “100 million people have a fixed habit of reading comics in some form,” reports “Public Relations News,” a letter privately circularized among public relations executives. It’s estimated that just the handful of corporations and associations that have tried the comics have distributed 45 million booklets – half of them through the school systems. That last is a statistic in a class by itself. And the publicity experts state: “More and more companies are learning what the government learned during the war: comics have a higher readership and greater influence on the average mind than any other form of communication.” This alone should start the avalanche. As a comic strip devotee myself, I can appreciate the meaning of this development in its entirety. And at this point, there’s nothing wrong with it. If a cartoon will intrigue a stockholder into reading his annual company report, fine; let management put it in the cartoons. If a comic booklet will show the high school student – or graduate – how the private enterprise system operates and why businessmen must make profits under this system, fine; let’s have the comic books. But there’s dynamite in this development- dynamite hidden under its purposes, dynamite obscured by the very ease and simplicity of the communication medium. Selling a product such as spinach via Popeye goes in one class. Selling an idea on profits or strikes or the like via Popeye goes in an entirely different category. So as you read the comic pamphlets that undoubtedly will be coming your way in future months, realize fully that the aim is not just to amuse you. Not by a long shot. It is to instruct you in specific things, mold your thinking in a specific way. Read between, as well as on, the lines. So as it turns out, Sylvia Porter, when quoted by Wertham, was referring to BOTH Peter Penny books: Peter Penny and His Magic Dollar and Peter Penny Saves the Day. She mentions both in her article, and at the end she is referring to the general category of promotional comics when she says that they are intended to mold your thinking. At least, that's what I make of it, but I'm a little biased because I'm always looking to discover new SOTI books. What are your thoughts? Do you agree that both Peter Penny books should now be considered SOTI books? That's tonight's discovery... more about the various version of Peter Penny and His Magic Dollar coming up soon!

It was the covers of the Golden Age set that convinced me many years ago that I just had to own Mister Mystery #12 and Horrific #3. Such great books! GLWTS!

Ok, I'll hang out till then...

This absolutely one of the most awesome group shots I've ever seen on these boards!

I have a copy of Tween Age Digest #1 that I would like to get graded. This is digest-sized publication that contains stories, puzzles, games, and a few pages of comics. I have two questions about it. 1) Will CGC grade it, even though it is, strictly speaking, not a comic book? 2) This digest was referenced by Dr. Wertham in Seduction of the Innocent. If possible, I'd like that noted on the label. I can provide a photocopy of the page of SOTI that references this book. Would that be sufficient to obtain the "Used in SOTI" notation on the label? Or would I have to do something more? Thanks!

Last call bump. If you see something you like, let's discuss. Thread closes shortly.

That's a real bummer. I've never owned one of these, so I'm not all that familiar with the glasses. But the cover of the book says it comes with "2 3-D viewers". Does that mean it should have had 2 pairs of glasses? Would it have gotten a "qualified" anyway because it has only 1 pair of glasses? The note does specifically say that 1 pair of glasses is missing.

Did somebody say "Anti-Wertham editorial"?

Thank you!

I thought I was done with the thread, but then I dug this one up. From 1952, it's a great booklet called "Your Child and Radio, TV, Comics and Movies." Parents were concerned about more than just comics: they worried about all the media their kiddies were consuming. This little guide told them everything they needed to know about how to keep kids "safe". There's one glaring condition issue: the cover is completely split at the spine, but still attached. Basically, everything is split except the part that's held on by the staples. $30+$3 shipping and it's yours. SOLD

Thanks for your interest. That's all the copies of SOTI for this thread, so nothing more very soon. As you can tell, SOTI is my primary collecting focus, and I do turn up copies from time to time, so it's a good bet I'll be back with more at some point in the future.

Thanks again!

I'll start this thing off at $60.

Here's another cool SOTI-related oddity. You're familiar with Seduction of the Innocent, which came out in April, 1954, the same month the US Senate held hearings on the dangers of comic books. You might not know that Wertham's public crusade began in earnest years earlier, when his first big anti-comics article was published in the Saturday Review of Literature, May 29, 1948. He discussed how dangerous comics were for kids, prompting echoes from other critics of the comics, and putting the comic book industry on the defensive. That article is the reason you see anti-Wertham editorials in most of the Marvel/Timely/Not-yet-Atlas books from November, 1948 to July, 1949. Looking for an original copy of the Saturday Review of Literature from May 29, 1948? Good luck. Those are really tough to come by. Here's the next best thing. Wertham's 1948 article, "The Comics, Very Funny" was reprinted, without illustrations, in The Saturday Review Cavalcade. Wertham even got prominent billing on the cover. Here's a low grade copy of Cavalcade, yours for just $15. SOLD dinesh_s

Thank you!

Thanks!

And now we have Seduction of the Innocent by Dr. Fredric Wertham, first edition (from 1954), first print, first state (with bibliography). The good news is that it has the bibliography. More good news is that it's cheaper than the last one I offered. The bad news is that the condition is extremely rough. It's heavily worn, and the black cloth of the spine is absent. Glue stains remain on the cloth binding where tape was removed. Tape repairs inside FC and BC. Ex-library copy with library cards, stamps, and other markings typical of a former library book. The stain in the bottom margin of p. 355 that you see affects a number of pages, but I have no idea what it came from. Somebody closed a raisin in the book? Rear hinge loosening. Rip at the bottom of the page with the illustration of Thing #9 (face stomping). Name inside FC. Otherwise unmarked text. All 16 illustration pages are present, as is that elusive bibliography (pp. 399-400). The dust jacket is NOT ORIGINAL TO THE BOOK. The book is a first printing, and the dust jacket belongs to a second printing book. The jacket improves the look of the book by hiding the fact that the spine is missing, but it only improves it a tiny bit because the jacket is also in REALLY rough condition with amateur "restoration." (So amateur that I can't even type that resto word without putting it in quotes). The jacket has been taped along each edge, and somebody tried to "restore" a missing section (about 20%) of the front of the jacket, by taping a white piece of paper to it and writing out the logo in marker. I didn't get a photo of the interior of the dust jacket, but I think it's obvious in the photos where the taped-on piece is. Expect to see a lot of tape inside the DJ. A previous owner also used marker to "restore" the faded red text on the spine. This one's definitely for the budget collector, or it will serve as a placeholder for that day years from now when you find a better copy with the bibliography. $200 SOLD dinesh_s

Crimes by Women #9. This is one of Fox's sleaziest titles. Sure, around this time period Victor Fox got some amazing talent, like Feldstein, Kamen and of course Baker. This book, like many of Fox's other books, did not have top talent working on it. That's part of the charm of this series. Feast your peepers on the horrid artwork and sleaze that is Crimes by Women #9. Low grade book, as you can see. Snug centerfold and cover seems to be attached solidly at the staples. Ragged edges, a bunch of tape on the spine, FC hole near the spine, a BC hole, and the list of defects goes on. But, hey, it's a Crimes by Women, a series that has picked up a lot of steam in the last few years. $40. SOLD Black Bat