Albert Tatlock

On 4/19/2024 at 8:16 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

The first two Marvels, as we know, were the two 58s, Gunsmoke Western and JIM. Only Gunsmoke Western carried the Miller distribution indicia data - the T&P details were absent from their inaugural UKPV issue:

 

So if anyone had their eyes open, and spotted the UK printed pricing in that first period, the only books they'd have been able to identify the distributor on would be the Miller Gunsmoke.

Let me chuck my two pennorth in here.

I believe that the first batch of Marvels arriving in 1960 numbered three, and not two.

Below are pics of probably the first 4 pre-hero Marvels I purchased, all at the same time from the paper shop at the bottom of the street where we lived at the time, which until then had been the source of my and my brother's weekly Topper and Beezer, Certainly the first purchased 'set' of the four titles of which I was them aware, Amazing Adventures escaped my notice until # 3 suddenly popped up in a nearby newsagent, which doubled as a sweetshop, situated as it was immediately opposite a primary school.

Three of them are cover dated June 1961, but the JIM is May. At the time, JIM always lagged a month behind the other three titles, a situation, I noticed, which continued until at least the end of 1961.

The reason why can be found in Mike's Amazing World of Comics, where the release date for the JIM is given as 28 February, and the other three as 7 March, just a week apart.

The June JIM, #69, was not released until 6 April, so would have travelled with the July TOS, TTA and ST. I picked up all four of those simultaneously the following month.

Now turning to the May 1960 issues, before the bug had bitten me, but Mike gives the on sale date of JIM # 58 and Gunsmoke Western # 58 as 29 January.

The on sale date of Strange Tales # 75 is also 29 January, which tells me that it would have been sent with the two May issues.

Enough to convince me, at least.

QED?

On 5/9/2024 at 1:11 PM, Malacoda said:

However, it turns out the score is Alan 0, Duncan 1, because this dropped onto my doormat this morning....

 

I think the extraordinary difficulty of finding even a single copy of this points more to it being ND with a tiny number of randos turning up either at the time or subsequently than it being distributed in anything like the same volume as a normal T&P Marvel order at the time. 

Haystack 0, needle 1.

Everything comes to him who waits.

On 5/7/2024 at 8:57 PM, Kevin.J said:

There's an old story that I found a old pound note in a puddle and showed my Dad, he said do you want that dirty old bit of paper or this lovely shiny sixpence, guess what I wanted

You should have held out for 9d then hit the spinner rack.

On 5/7/2024 at 2:53 PM, Kevin.J said:

Couple of months later

"Lets try 8p again, I hate losing all those 2ps to greedy kids"  

 

 

Not even 2p, just its forerunner, 2d.

Suppose every bit helps, though.

2d or not 2d, that is the question.

On 5/7/2024 at 12:00 AM, Kevin.J said:

Thats a bargain, someone increased the price to 8p for mine  

 

Without even looking, that has to be a Miller, with its pre-decimal PBS stamp.

Any estimates on what proportion of the surviving copies are Millers?

And does anyone know when the PBS upped the price from 6d to 8d?

When the cover price was increased to 10d, possibly?

And there are presumably some still in circulation with more than one price stamp.

On 5/5/2024 at 11:28 AM, Malacoda said:

Hey @OtherEric are there brands of backing boards in the US that have adverts on them?  Those comics Leonard is holding are clearly not JIM 83 and FF5 (though Howard is holding Hulk 160).   The pictures are wrong for the backs of those comics, but from the way he's holding them, they look like they're boarded (as you'd hope).  Are there backing boards with adverts? If so, those ads look weirdly (deliberately?) old.  Maybe for copyright reasons they couldn't display the original adverts so they had to create some. 

Or is this just bad continuity? 

Bad research.

There was an episode where Sheldon was pondering on the desirability of Flash # 123 versus FF # 48, and both of them were shown, but they were clearly mockups, the proportions were not right for a genuine comic book.

Maybe the props department budget would not stretch to the real thing.

On 4/30/2024 at 12:34 PM, Malacoda said:

How far back are you going?  He seems to have auctioned some personal collection items in Dec 22. 

Coulda been, maybe a garbled version of this that I picked up.

On 4/29/2024 at 6:50 PM, Get Marwood & I said:

Apart from people like Albert's of course, who wrote stuff down. 

Think I read not long ago that Alan Class turned up at one of Excalibur's sales, possibly as a potential buyer, maybe keeping an eye on items he had consigned.

Did anyone else hear this?

Unfortunately this was one of the things I neglected to write down, so no chapter and verse at present.

itmmeta=01HWDJ77R5YR602QNMFR0J42WX&hash=item2aca0fac07:g:MKAAAOSwbxpalfWY&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAA4B%2Fglx%2BKO5qe0VQhXGqNwSfAJGpqhV7GTKDQibMxvlH2YQq9m55aRmoyeqDrgmABbe5vg1vgTPN8fqM6Hr7dIBEzcVqHIAO0hMDLWJrXSXMz6fazDq76lOJlBH1sG7oMYKNS6kt1b8Zjm4XOxganTmWS35HPGs483DDxQ3bOCLxmXn5dOOly%2F4jpCTc%2BcB28jH3ORpZhpHH0f7yCgLsTseVqa30U1y0fjGD2yQv3kgGf0h1pSB091MiUJJ0yU%2FHh4cN5gqS7I2Zqnar2WWOuULR%2BhO01SolgcJ%2B2c2EwmQll|tkp%3ABk9SR5T8nLLjYw

The seller of this item (Action # 317) on ebay says it is a rare version, not the usual 10d one.

Probably true, all the other stamped copies on ebay right now are 10d ones, but here is one I got locally recently:

Also an 8d stamped copy of # 430.

And Ethel has positioned the stamp on both the #317s within a couple of microns of each other. That's what years of experience can do for you.

On 4/23/2024 at 7:16 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

Back in the day you could sleep eight hours and they'd still be on the first frame 

I used to like Steady Eddie. Selby is in the same mould. 

Eddie Charlton's middle initials,

On 4/22/2024 at 9:04 PM, Get Marwood & I said:

Fell asleep in front of the snooker.

Was it Eddie Charlton v Cliff Thorburn?

If so, don't bother waking up.

On 4/19/2024 at 5:37 PM, Malacoda said:

What's the guide they're talking about? 

Canadian Price Variant

On 4/19/2024 at 7:32 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

     I love that big, awkward looking 15c price font 

    One for the kerning enthusiasts to marvel at...

    DC, sorry.

There is a ton of similar stuff on the SA blog.

The guy who runs it has done some serious spade work.

Wonder why none of this stuff turns up on ebay? You would have expected some of it to have leaked out of the confines of the Dark Continent.

There are many examples of football programmes from the 1950s and 1960s from matches involving British clubs touring SA and Rhodesia (as it was then known)

I would love to get hold of some of the Mystery in Space, they are probably similar to the Strato/T & P run of that title in terms of content.

There are also a lot of DC Romance books, retitled like this:

On 4/19/2024 at 8:03 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

Evidence of mucking about, found in the files...

1 pic = 1k words

On 4/16/2024 at 6:48 PM, OtherEric said:

And if my calculations are correct, no less than 75 of those pages contain posts related to the distribution of US published comics in the UK, at least tangentially.

Yes, indeed.

The original thread has thrown out many roots, branches and even twiglets in a multitude of directions, but I am happy with that.

The material may have originally been published in the US, but much of it has reached us here in the UK by circuitous routes, and I have greatly enjoyed reading about Brazilian and Mexican reprints, and all the research about it.

Below are a few Archie Digests, how they reached our shores I have no idea, but they assuredly did, as I have just taken delivery of them this afternoon from a local auction house, buried among a hotchpotch of other juvenilia.

The stickers price them in Rands, the currency of South Africa.

I have Googled Intermag, and found there a website with a similar thrust to this thread here, and will post a link in case anyone is interested.

https://southafricancomicbooks.blogspot.com/2013/05/chronology-of-south-african-comic-books.html

On 4/10/2024 at 8:48 AM, themagicrobot said:

I wonder if this letter is genuine or really written by the Editor?

I was surprised by the results of a competition. This shows Miller's did have national coverage, reaching Scotland, Northern Ireland and remote outposts like Tottenham, Paddington and even Monument Road Birmingham. I think I can picture the two newsagents round the corner from there where young John may have purchased his Captain Marvel comic. I wonder if he noticed/approved a few weeks later when it turned into Marvelman and his Captain Marvel fan club badge was suddenly obsolete.

 

 

Very narrow age range in the readership. One at 9, one at 14, the rest all 11 to 13.

Probably a slightly older lot than Beano, etc.

I suppose that in those days, school leavers would develop different priorities on being cast out into the world of work.

My mother left school at 14 on the Friday and went to work in the cotton mill across the road on the Monday.

Stay on at school? Not when you can help with the breadwinning in those pre-safety net days.

Further education was the preserve of the toffs back then.

I would have liked to see Lord Snooty turfed out of Bunkerton and earning a living shovelling coke into the boiler of Bash Street school.

On 4/4/2024 at 5:52 PM, OtherEric said:

Any other thread on these forums, I would read "nice" as dripping with epic amounts of sarcasm in this context.  This thread, we mean it unironically.  You're a wonderful bunch of comic loving geeks to hang out with and I'm happy you've accepted me here even if I am a Yank.

No problem at all.

The only thing that bugs me is that you got the chance to leaf through all those hallowed pages weeks or even months before we did.

While we we waiting for a tramp steamer to make its laborious way to our shores, you had already read the cargo on board, and the next couple of issues too, in all probability.

On 4/2/2024 at 3:10 PM, Get Marwood & I said:

Sorry I haven't been around much boys. Mag's Mum and Dad both died within ten days of each other so there's been lots to do. I'm helping CGC Mike with the grading contest sign up lists, and that's about all I have time for at the mo, but I'll be back at some point to resume the pence ramblings. It's actually quite nice to know that my old threads now have enough pence-participants to carry on without me! Cheers boys 

Sorry to hear this, Steve,

None of us, except the very young, have managed to escape the shadow of ashes to ashes, dust to dust and all that goes with it.

Take as much time as you need, the rest of us will do our utmost to muddle through.

On your return, you can set about putting right whatever we have inevitably managed to botch.

On 3/31/2024 at 9:54 AM, themagicrobot said:

Gotta love some of the eBay sellers across the pond. He claims that issue of Fantastic 71 is rare because the CGC haven't encapsulated any compared to the original Marvel comics.

Even if you had a 9.0 or above of mags such as these, the cost of having it processed by CGC would far exceed the likely sale price.

Maybe they are undervalued at the moment, but 200 quid plus is sheer fantasy.

On 3/30/2024 at 9:01 PM, Albert Tatlock said:

There are different versions of this being offered by US based sellers.

Some are described as officially licensed, with a line of type confirming this at bottom, some not.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/394706416220?itmmeta=01HT8JQHVJPENB0499J7SEV5KE&hash=item5be655f25c:g:YwEAAOSw1Vpkm3z-&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAA4MQuIDDBk5ve%2BEKUaAZ7PSqZZDNzK9u3Lgn8LzEPMDKRhLBh2gkTb1cw91e6LGpmAHFAqMAE8jW0B37kz4bV3lHs7EwV4kky0wMg9qVtqPS4tJWeBec00D3jiIcZlyC86K5J07ex2Sxkcd%2B7wsD7PraaS3%2Fum4zNuDO8A0dxhQE%2FIKbd%2BtQl9qgck68ofIlCcm5lurFR4459YujMOFspMF08om13z96YdIvHbYefH2HS2zaowuIX9deA9f6h9fWKp6kso1Q9JJrytMCG5p1WuEPOgbOa5hJ1Ji%2Fq1H8BNgz6|tkp%3ABFBM8p3ektJj

Someone is clearly trying it on.

On 3/30/2024 at 5:57 PM, Yorick said:

I don't like the look of it as "an original".  The dot matrix lines on her legs appear to me as an artifact of a printed scan.

There are different versions of this being offered by US based sellers.

Some are described as officially licensed, with a line of type confirming this at bottom, some not.

On 3/30/2024 at 5:45 PM, themagicrobot said:

Anyone with the right links should be able to visit my Box stuff. There is 9GB of goodness in there. Sorry I have changed the link. Forgot to tick a box in Box. 

PS: Someone in the US is selling a back cover of a Fantastic comic for $28.79 claiming it is a print produced by Marvel UK on "heavy stock". Dunno about that! He says:-

Offered here is a Vintage POWER PIN-UP Print featuring PEPPER POTTS. These awesome pin-ups were only available in Europe and distributed thru Marvel / UK originally released in 1960's on the back covers of the Marvel magazines.  These were purchased from a UK collector as original prints but we have yet to find info to back it up. These are likely later releases in the UK, they are copyrighted but there is no date on them to actually determine when they were released but they have never been released in the US. The print is in great condition, quality printing on heavy stock, and are 10" x 14"

According, some say, to PT Barnum: 'There's one born every minute'.

And according, some say to WC Fields: 'Never give a sucker an even break'.

Don't touch this with a barge pole.

On 1/28/2024 at 10:52 PM, Malacoda said:

Indeed. He was the last person ever prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act. Perhaps more impressively, he was also the first person to have been prosecuted under it for 25 years.  I imagine barristers were queuing up to get that one. 

In fact, prosecutions continued under the 1959 Obscene Publications Act The Britton case was a landmark as it was the last time that a book had been banned outright.

Below is an ad from a magazine of the time:

£1.25 seems cheap when compared to this offering from a US bookdealer (admittedly a dedicated copy):

https://www.jamescumminsbookseller.com/pages/books/315469/david-britton/lord-horror

According to the House Of Lords Library here:

https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/LLN-2019-0103/LLN-2019-0103.pdf

The Children and Young Persons (Harmful Publications) Act 1955 banned comics that children were likely to read that contained acts of violence or cruelty, the commission of crimes, or incidents of repulsive or horrible nature. However, in seven years, the Home Office only received twelve complaints against comics, five of which the Attorney General refused to act on,

Talk about a sledgehammer to crack a nut.