Charlton was almost definitely the first publisher to use barcodes on comics, in 1975. As I remember it, though, the early ones were dummies--that is, no matter the title, the barcodes were the same. Think I read that in The Comic Reader, during the time when I was working in book and magazine distribution. I remember pointing that out to the Charlton rep on one of his visits to the warehouse where I worked, but he argued with me that, no, the scanner could tell the difference even though the barcodes all looked exactly the same. It would be interesting to examine Charltons from that period to see if my memories are correct.
