Get Marwood & I

In the absence of being able to find any information myself - and I have tried - my strategy is to post a lot about things in the hope that someone who knows finally gets wind and joins in (no fart jokes please). It's quite remarkable that there is nothing to be found online about this, what the actual operating model was. No blog or forum comments that Google can detect, or articles to be found anywhere from someone whose Mum / Dad / Robot Arm used to work at T&P in the stamping department. What a job that must have been. Left a bit....right a bit....up a bit...

Just remembered, @Albert Tatlock, didn't you say TTA#62 didn't come over?

Still a 9d stamp Gary, thanks, and in keeping with the 'firsts': One observation though - if the first non-UKPV ASM (#18) arrived in the '4' slot, I can see how that would be stamped with a 9d stamp as per all the DCs that it presumably arrived with. In the '5' slot though, and again assuming that they all arrived together as a shipment, why would all the DCs be stamped 10d, four of the Marvels the same, but two Marvels as a 9d? That would suggest that - and we're in full speculation mode here taking a lot of things for granted - that the '5' shipment would have arrived and then, as T&P began the stamping process, they would have switched from 9d to 10d stamps mid-way. I probably need to add a lot more titles to see how that 9d to 10d pattern goes I suppose, but it seems that that '5' stamp delivery was the stamp switch period and that the switch happened mid-shipment. One question, as I pause before doing any more - why are we doing this?

The balance I found, to keep comics in my life, was to replace the expensive - AF#15, ASM#1-20 etc - with the inexpensive and yet, as it turns out, equally satisfying Charlton 1960's pence copies. So I still get parcels, I'm still in the hunt, I still get the thrill, go to fairs and shops, trawl online and I still get to record, document, share and explore. And all I have is a thousand or so comics that won't mind too much if circumstances mean that they end their life in a skip. Sell that AF#15, buy a car, go on holiday or secure your families income. Then set a few pennies aside for Gorgo, Doctor Tom Brent, Cynthia Doyle, Black Fury.....

It's always difficult to make a judgement regarding trimming from pictures alone, but the most suspect photo for me is the one showing the bottom of the book. That looks too clean to me along the edge when you see the handling damage to the bottom left corner. Is it likely that a book that has been handled enough to have the corner fraying that you see here... ...would have such a comparatively razor sharp bottom line as we appear to see here: On the flip side, the cover dimensions appear to be 'full' when compared to other examples, so it's inconclusive. If you are doubtful, you will always be doubtful, and therefore never completely happy, so I would send it back if that is an option.

It's a 9d stamp though, which fits the 'first issue to be stamped' pattern

One more Marvel title for today - this time the nine first hiatus UKPV gap issues (#62-70) for Tales to Astonish: First up, once again, no T&P stamped issues are to be found where a UKPV exists. And, as with the other three Marvel titles, very few or no examples of the first issue can be found, in this case for TTA, issue #62. Again, we have Noah's two consecutive issues for the 8 stamp. I plan to add a few more DC titles now, to see if I can find an 8 stamped example to sit alongside the Marvels: In the ninth cycle, one TTA joins the one ASM in the stamp '1' slot, one issue in the '3' slot and then all the final non-UKPV issues - 68, 69 and 70 - turn up as now expected in the 4 slot: That's four Marvel titles now that refuse to extend beyond the 4 slot - a pattern begins to cement..... This solitary find of a TTA #69 with an unnumbered new format 10d stamp bucks the trend, almost certainly a book that found its way into the mix in a later cycle: I mentioned earlier seeing stamps that looked like they were unnumbered by design - here's an example: I've seen quite a few like it and on closer inspection it looks like there is a rectangle embedded in the top half that normally would bear the number: I'll try to find some more / better examples - like a plonker, I didn't save them when I spotted them before. Maybe that was a deliberate addition to the stamp to remove any number. If any of you guys reading has a stamped TOS #59 or a TTA #62, dive in eh (with a picture if possible)?

I added the ten UKPV gap issues (#59-68) for Tales of Suspense this morning: I couldn't find a single stamped #59 but found many multiples for the others: Here's how they plot (click to enlarge / zoom in). In the eighth cycle, Noah must have piloted the boat as many of the issues arrived 'two by two'. There is a clear pattern here for the three plotted Marvel titles developing - two consecutive issues for each title in the 5, 6 and 8 stamp slots, no books in the 7 and 9: That increases to three or more consecutive issues for some titles in the 2 and 4 stamp slot of cycle nine (although the TOS #67 in the two slot might belong in the tenth cycle, a scenario potentially applicable to every plotted book when you think about it): For me, this bunching of issues indicates that the stamp numbers - if all pertaining to the same calendar month / delivery - could not realistically have been used by newsagents as a returns process guide. Bringing it to life, there were four consecutive issues of TOS stamped '4' in the 9th cycle. I don't see a newsagent putting all four issues out and then removing all four in line with some noted T&P invoice / instruction even taking into account the suggested lack of chronological observance of the time. And, again, I couldn't read a large proportion of the stamped copies that I found online. What a headache that would have been. We have another of those 'number-only ten stamps' too, in this run: They get about don't they. One other observation - for these three Marvel titles that I have plotted, there is not one stamped copy for any book preceding or following the UKPV issue gap. Not one. So this process of filling the UKPV gaps with stamped cents copies was - based on this limited sample at least - surprisingly precise.

That was a classy stamper

Night Albert

It's a good job Spidey resumed UKPVs at #28 - where would you stamp this one!

....or the Earth

Yep, that's presumably why the 9d was on there to start. Found it's way back in to the mix somehow for a second bite. Every penny clearly counted!

Stamp the moon!

Another one: That makes four...

Doctor: It's very bad news I'm afraid Mr Jones - you have cancer and Alzheimer's. Mr Jones: Thank God it's not cancer.

Vet: It's no good, I'm going to have to put him down. Dog owner: Dear Lord, why?! Vet: He's heavy.

Found this old thread while searching - I'd forgotten all about it:

We did, well said Robot, well said

I was the same as a kid - June was June, surely! I like how the tables we're populating, factually by the evidence of stamp numbers, tie in with the recollections of those on the ground

Cheers Stephen. I like to try to put thoughts, discussions and observations into summary documents and graphs to bring them to life. Also to create a visual record that can be easily revisited and which the Google bots can find and pop into everyone's searches. I like pictures too, over long bodies of text. My eyesight is rough lately though and it's getting harder to do. Some things are impossible to capture without the detail and I wish the board software didn't enforce a maximum picture size (hence I'm always reminding readers to zoom in). It's good stuff we're doing here though I think, collectively. I don't think anyone else has attempted to drive these conclusions out this way for books that are 50-60 years old and which have supposedly been reviewed and analysed to death. Oh no!

This might sound silly but I had the most superb collection of books and I sold the lot as I saw no way forward with them, having no outlet or friends to share them with and having completed the various collecting goals I'd set. Then I found this forum and realised I could have got so much pleasure sharing the stuff with the crowd here. Variants, misprints, inserts - a thread of enthusiasts to show off to for each and every damn book. I've always had lousy timing in my life.

Nice post. In my experience, the only thing that may make you feel differently is the passing of time. Even at our advanced ages, when you think you've finally cracked it and found your thinking, I find it is possible to feel differently about things after a few years or so. The thrill can return. If and when it does, regret may come with it, if you revisit the things you used to own and love. I sold one comic and bought a car the other year. The car does so much more for me than the comic ever could, sitting as it did in a box unseen. And the pressure of owning things worth a lot of money starts to tell as you get older. The worry of fires, floods, burglaries, or inadvertently dying and leaving the problem to your loved ones. There have been many threads about the type of sentiment you are displaying Shadroch and I've contributed to them fully. I won't do it all over again here - I could write a thesis - but suffice to say I have some regrets over selling some things. But, if it's any comfort to you, not nearly as many as you might imagine.

How about a Pilipino Edition though?