Garystar

$22.38 BARGAIN! I suppose it's the insurance but still......

jayhawker is showing the correct page layout. From what is shown I believe the page ripped from your copy is this one; However it is the third wrap (4th if you include cover) and comes between story pages 4 and 5 not after story page 20 as shown on your copy. All four pages of this wrap are non-story - the reverse is an ad for grit, and the other side of the wrap is the karate ad seen in your copy backed by Stan's soap box editorial page. Looks like your copy has this wrap tucked back in on itself I see tape there which would support this.

Marvelmania - now you are talking really cool. I’m constantly looking for more Marvelmania stuff, it costs a fortune to get it in UK with shipping and taxes but it really is great stuff

I still remember my dad buying me Pow #1, although I could hardly be old enough to read, and the impact the Spider-man and SHIELD stories had on me - I’d never read anything like them before.

Stars Wars Weekly had a free cut out x wing fighter. 2000AD also had free gifts, Judge Dredd started in issue 2, I don’t think the early issues had any Dredd gifts but not sure if there were any later in series.

This is the extent of my UK gifts, although I am on the look out for Avengers Weekly #1 which had a set of transfers (the type you could put on your skin) and #2 which had a gun similar to the Spider-man one in POW#1. There are plenty of gifts in later UK Marvels but after Avengers Weekly they tended to be a centrefold glossy poster or some stickers, if there's any interest perhaps others could post their comic free gifts, I recall Secret Wars had a cool rub-down transfer set.

Mighty World Of Marvel was a big hit in the UK and after 19 issues Spider-man was replaced by Daredevil and Spider-man got his own comic. Initially Spider-man Comics Weekly comprised Spider-man and Thor reprints but later also included Iron-man. Included free in #1 was a real life Spider-man mask. In reality this was a paper bag with a spider web pattern and two eye holes cut out. I can remember having this as a kid and I believe in was in tatters within a day; Spiderman Comics Weekly #2 came with a Spider-man tracer plane which was a cardboard plane which could be projected by means of an elastic band.

In 1972 Marvel decided to publish comics specifically for the UK in-house (by what became to be known as Marvel UK). First up was The Mighty World of Marvelwhich reprinted The Hulk, Spider-man and Fantastic Four with some new editorial along the lines of Stan's Soapbox and letters pages; Previous transfers must have been popular (or cheap) as MWOM #1 came with a free Green-skinned monster iron-on transfer. Presumably Marvel thought the Hulk would not be a house-hold name in the UK hence the transfer being touted as "Green-skinned monster" but it was in fact the Hulk; MWOM sold well (print run 325,000) so these transfers are not uncommon still in the UK and pop up for sale fairly regularly despite a lot ending up on t-shirts and being very fragile. #2 came with a Spider-man iron on transfer; After great transfers of two of it's features MWOM #3 free gift wasn't a fantastic Four transfer but a set of stickers, the art isn't great and we can only wonder what a Fantastic Four transfer would have been like;

Terrific, similar to Fantastic, was also virtually all Marvel reprints - Sub-mariner, The Avengers and Doctor Strange; #1 included a free gift of an Iron-man transfer again to be ironed onto fabric (I need to get a better example but I did pay less than £1 for it);

Oldhams, or Power comics as they published their Marvel comics under, next gave us UK readers Fantastic. This was different to POW in that it contained little to no UK material but was nearly all Marvel reprints - Thor, X-Men and Iron-man. The free gift here was a plastic pennant/wallet. The comic provided several uses for the pennant/wallet and suggestions where you could put it. The power comics for that week all had a back-page of Marvel pennants you could cut out and store in your wallets;

Bit bored during lockdown so thought I'd post some images some of you might not have seen (and probably not too interested in). In the UK there is a long tradition of first issues of comics giving away free gifts to entice buyers and this was the case with comics which contained Marvel reprints. When Oldhams obtained the rights to reprint Marvel stories they began with POW #1 which reprinted Spider-man and Nick Fury SHIELD from Strange Tales along with original UK stories; but of course the bigger attraction for kids was the free Spider-matic pistol which was a cardboard gun which with the aid of an elastic band fired cardboard disks; This was followed the following week by POW #2 which had a rather splendid Spider-man transfer which could be iron-on to a TeeShirt or other fabric by your mum;

I believe Rob Kirby has been working on “from cents to pence” the history of Marvel USA to UK for something like 20 years. There are several extracts on the net and if it ever comes out should be a cracking read/resource.

Just looked through about 100 of my stamped Marvels. Just as you said they are mostly T number P, I couldn't see any pattern although I had no #1's and only one #5. I started collecting in 1973 so all my stamped comics were bought second hand and could have come from anywhere in the UK. I did notice that all the ones with a number were pre-decimal and all the decimal ones were T&P, appears the change over is cover dated September 1970. There also appears to be a one month, cover dated August 1970, when the stamp showed 5p at the top and 1/- at the bottom.

Had never noticed T&P stamp was actually T number P. I’ll have a closer look at some of mine. Perhaps a distribution centre as you suggest.

Should read T & P Thorpe and Porter not T2 P - either poor inking or misprint. 1/- is one shilling. Pre decimalisation (1971) there were 12 pennies in a shilling and 20 shillings in a pound. Today’s exchange rate with current strong dollar 1/- equates to about 6 cents.

Great seeing all these actual comics at both ends of the grading spectrum; the well loved ones (which most of mine are) which were once some ones prized possession and the high grades, its jaw dropping to think comics 40 - 50 - 60 years old even exist in these grades. Anyway to lower the tone a little I'll post some UK reprints some people might not have seen. To kick-off, FF Full Colour Comic Album from 1969; Reprints FF 51, 53 and 60 UK comics were generally in B&W so given this chance the colourist seems to have gone overboard; FF Comic Annual from 1969; Reprints FF 23, 22, 81, 24 (who cares what order they're in, at least the colours were correct) Next up FF Television Annual also 1969: reprints FF 54, 56 and 59 and our friend the mad colourist makes a return with FF in pink pants (apart from Ben's which are green) ,a blond Reed Richards and first appearance of the Blue Surfer; FF Comic Annual from 1970: reprints FF 84, 85, 86 and 87 I think Jack Kirby could have sneezed a better cover than that but at least the colourist gave us a nice understated Doc Doom; and finally from 1975 (My comic shop states this as 1969 but its decimal 15p which clearly puts it post Feb 1971 and copyright shows 1975). Quite sensibly we'd given up on colour by then and left it to the reader to colour: reprints FF 91 and 94; Wishing you all the best in these troubling times.

I'm a fan of Elvis and Morrisey however I prefer my music a bit rougher round the edges. Caught the fantastic Irish punk rockers Stiff Little Fingers for the 53rd time shortly before the great lockdown, they only played three gigs before having to abandon tour. I first saw them in 1978 at Rock against Racism gig in Brixton which Elvis Costello headlined. There's a comic book theme going on with the backdrop

Not the best of condition but here's my Hulk one..... My favourite ads were always the Helen Of Toy soldiers/war games, they always looked fantastic but completely out of reach for a UK school kid with no money. I still look on ebay for them but complete sets seem extremely rare. and here's a link to a web site which shows they weren't as fantastic as I'd always imagined them... http://www.thortrains.net/milihistriot/comictoys/comicbooktoysoldierswargames.html

The comics in the Golden Record sets are reprints (with some changes), I'm unaware and have never seen any official re-issues of the records or reprints of the reprint comics. There were only the four Marvel sets. According to the ad on the back of the comics there was also a Batman set and a Superman set and there have been numerous record/comic sets issued by other distributors (some are showing in my 14th picture).

Yes, all four. I don't make records of when or where i bought anything but from memory I pieced two possibly three of them together buying record and comic separate. I did play the records when I first got them and I recall them being a good transition of the comics to audio.

...and a reworking of this cover was produced for the Marvelmania fanclub;

Really enjoy looking at your comic rooms so thought I’d share mine. I especially like seeing glass display cabinets and rows of comics, I would love to get a comic spinner rack like some of you guys have but being in UK I don’t think that’s going to happen. I think I’ve lots of good stuff but only a small room to keep it. Not sure if I should thin out what’s on display so only the best stuff showing. Apologies for picture overload.

ALL EDITIONS!Keep 'em coming please! This is the only Alan Class UK edition I have reprinting Thor - JIM #94 (it also has Wally Wood's Daredevil #6 tucked away in back). There are a handful of others I haven't got, including Secrets Of The Unknown #38 which reprints JIM#84. This is not common even in UK. Reprint from JIM#118

Perhaps I could have used this one.. it is Silver Surfer #10 and has pence and pennies? Steve you might notice some extra page art on the left (and a guard MIA) which ties in with another of your threads.

Yes the whole run 1 -18 is my favourite title. You've shown all the pence copies so I can only add my copy of this which has been read numerous times since I got it about 40 years ago.