Albert Tatlock

The 9d looks like crayon, in which case it could easily be made to disappear as though it had never been there, even by the most ham-fisted amateur restorer, and the mag could then pose as a straightforward cents copy never previously hawked around in Blighty. But of course we would know better.

Will we ever know the circuitous route taken by this item to our shores, where some entrepreneur who probably bought it second hand tried to sell it on at the outrageous pre-decimal price of 9d. His clientele must have protested 'But I can get a new one for that price!'.

Ta very much. This is the sort of info that would take forever to glean by myself, so my heartfelt gratitude for the advance footslogging that has made the trail so much easier to traverse. Only sorry that the Wagon train I posted was not one of the remaining two that have proved themselves reluctant to emerge from the undergrowth, but one day, no doubt, they will be tracked down and given their 15 minutes of fame.

But an easily overlooked one. I missed it myself until your post. Better safe than sorry. And maybe there were others in the same delivery with only a cents price which needed pricing up. A job like that becomes just a blur, as we know from the frequent T & P stamping of already UKPV printed examples.

I would say that the 6d triangles are all smoking guns. They suggest that the comics came in, were stamped 9d and were sent out, then later were returned unsold, with some of them, at least, recirculated at a reduced price. The only other scenario would be that they were stamped 9d and not sent out, until after they had been repriced. But why pay people to stamp them and then let them languish for months or even years in storage without any attempt to distribute them? I am sure that these were recycled after they failed to sell. I wonder what is the oldest example of the triangle. Surely Pat Boone # 1. But we do not know how long it was in storage for. Could have been only a couple of months, or over 10 years, until decimalisation.

Another couple of Dells. Wagon Train as a regular UKPV, the other one has a handwritten one shilling price, not in a childish hand, so presumably by the shopkeeper preparatory to laying it and its companions out on his shelf.

Car 54 where are you was a spin-off of the Phil Silvers show, aka Bilko. Many of the Bilko cast featured in Car 54, including Fred Gwynne (Herman Munster). Bilko also reappeared in the guise of Top Cat. All well know in their comic book incarnations.

And here is one that did not sell for the full price of a shilling, as shown by the stamp. Only one thing to do, then, send it out again, with a sticker, at the reduced price of, er, a shilling.

And the prospective buyer seems to be unaware of the DCs from late 1959 (except that MIS 50 on appears, but as far as I know, # 55 was the first distributed, even though I found a copy of # 54, which probably arrived without the help of T & P).

Much appreciated.

Here is a copy of Avengers # 79 which was distributed on a sale or return basis. How do we know that? There is a little stamp on the back, a bit blurred but still perfectly legible. It says W SOR. No idea what the W stands for, though. Possibly the initial of the local wholesaler.

If only the stand and deliver merchant had been called Willie Turpin, or even Big Willie Turpin, then we would have been in the clear.

Perhaps Mike could tell us why the first name (MR. will automatically take its place if you attempt to insert it - the word, that is, lest I be accused of anything snigger-inducing) of the Highwayman Turpin cannot offend the sensitivities of the good folk here. Presumably Lord Mayor Whittington and former Met Commissioner Cressida are similarly granted unpersonhood.

A few Gold Key and Dell here. The first couple of them bear a shilling stamp, but tiny, only half an inch across. This was at a time when Marvel and DC's cover price was 10d, so maybe that would have affected the level of sales to budget-conscious youngsters. The Dell stamp is slightly larger. The Richard Turpin (CGC software will not permit me to use the name of Mr Turpin as shown on cover) has a neatly written price in the top margin and I have seen others similar enough in size and placement to convince me that they were applied by the retailer at the time.

The Doc Strange # 179 was delivered to a US retailer on January 2, as the stamp shows, and bought by a customer. What happened to it after that is unknown. If it got to the UK, it has had several years to make the journey, and could have changed hands many times. Maybe a British collector bought it by mail order from a dealer, here or in the States. Or at a convention, the possibilities are many. We can be pretty sure that T & P were not involved, but not much else. Good luck with unravelling this, but we do not have much firm material to go on.

Here is an example, on the Blackhawk # 122. Never visited these shores, as some kid fished out a dime and took it home.

There would be little if any point marking the date on only one copy, especially if it were likely to be sold quickly. I reckon some news vendors would mark all their copies (easy enough if you have a junior assistant or a rubber stamp), so that they knew when a mag had outstayed its welcome and could be bundled up and returned. The ones without arrival dates which subsequently crossed the Atlantic could have been among those distributed to retailers who did not bother to carry out that operation, or equally from stock which never left the warehouse. Probably we will never know, all the arrival dates tell us is that someone, somewhere, tried and failed to sell that particular issue in the US. That applies only, of course, to UK stamped copies. There must be many with arrival dates that remained in the US with the original purchaser, including all pre-October 1959 issues. We do know, from the published circulation figures, that a high percentage of the mags printed remained unsold.

At least some had been through the retail chain, as we know from arrival dates frequently found on surviving stamped T & P copies. No wholesaler would have done that, it must have been individual retailers, as the style of dates applied varies so much (pen, pencil, crayon, rubber stamp, etc) and are to be found in different positions on front or back cover.

We are the poor relations of collectables as far as the auction houses, especially the snootier ones, are concerned. Many times I have tried to get more information on jumbled up lots, only to be met with indifference. Sometimes it is an uphill struggle to find out how many comics are in a lot. 'A quantity' seems to be their elastic term of choice.

Reply from another auction condition report........... Good morning, Thank you for your enquiry. Avengers No. 3 has light creasing across the covers, a few marks, a neat contemporary owner inscription on rear cover, contents seem good throughout with a small nick to one page edge, a few marks to final page. Unfortunately, I'm unable to grade the comics, and so, as stated in the catalogue entry, this lot is sold with all faults. Hope this helps. Kind regards, Jim Spencer BA (Hons) Associate Director, Head of Books & Works on Paper Good job it came to the attention of the Head of Books & Works on Paper, and not to a mere underling.

Do you really think so? Wouldn't £120 have made your vendor delighted?

Now, unless someone here has knowledge of how to resurrect old digital postings, (currently outwith my capabilities), we will never be able to see again just how out of touch (in this case at least) auction houses are to our requirements. Of course, their bottom line and ours seldom, if ever, coincide.

They will have to hold it over until another day, because this sale is tomorrow. The original listing was for a scruffy boxful of British and US stuff, only ones visible were a few Alan Class and Strange Tales # 79 (UKPV). I asked for a list, and they have withdrawn it.

Oh, the perfidy of auctioneers... Maybe I should have kept my big mouth shut! 489 We're adding photos of all the comics now. We've just realised there is an X-Men no1 in the lot so we may have undervalued it! If you require any further information about any lots in this auction or about bidding please do not hesitate to contact us again. Kind regards, Reeman Dansie

https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/britishtoyauctions/catalogue-id-bta10141/lot-baf07e37-db61-4492-8033-afba00a6981a Sanity has prevailed.