Duffman_Comics

Lovely books in great condition - I hope you have complimented the original owner regarding the state of preservation he maintained.

Ace Comics #47 Linky ? Or one of the books 47-53 ?

Just quietly, the workload is staggering and I am hiring. Any takers?

Well, a little wander around the web revealed that local calls from a public phone in Oz up until the late 50's were 2d (tuppence). According to this payphones were modified in the late 50's to take 4d. Yes, I am a nerd. Oh, lovely book AJD, but in this context it's spelt "nickel"

The thing is, whilst Australia didn't get decimal currency until Feb 1966, there were a lot of comics sold here that were simply "fully imported" US books, with the price adjustment done by the newsagent at the point of sale - usually a handwritten price of 9d/10d/ 1/- with the US price "struck through". I bought books like this at the time - I especially recall a Mighty Crusaders #4, April 1966 cover date that I expected to pay 10 cents for (the equivalent of 1 shilling post decimal currency) but the newsagent charged me 12c - the equivalent of 1/2d. I think he was taking advantage of the changeover/confusion to screw over his customers. I have never seen a Western (Gold Key) price variant for either the UK or Oz and I do not think Western bothered with them. Why Dell did so is a mystery. What is also interesting are the data for Australia and the UK for the same issue. In 1965 the UK's population was 54.35 million, Australia was 11.44 million. (Source Wikipedia. Don't judge me). So the UK has almost five times the population, yet gets just under a quarter of the issues sent to Australia. That's remarkable and either indicative of the strength of the local market in the UK or (my suspicion) the weakness of the locally produced Australian stuff. Further observations. Marvel's were well supported in the local market and at one point (and only for one or two issues) had white 10c stickers carefully placed over the US 12c price. Now, I have seen too many of these to believe that it wasn't the distributor's action - perhaps some feedback from angry 10 year old comic buyers who had had another extorted? Oh, and the stickers are a right mongrel to remove without damaging the comic .

Nice comics, but I think the Batman and Superman are Australian editions (the Colour Comics logo is an Australian printer), Check the GCD here and here )

Buy that for a dollar? Sure - but I think the cover art may have been a little rushed . . .

This has been bugging me for a few days, so here goes: Is there a chance this cover has been censored for production? I am looking at the native by Bullseye's head that seems to be whispering "sweet nothings". Yet the (native's) right hand, whilst a little menacing as-is, looks like it should have a knife. The other (standing) guy also has a "mystery hand", but not as pronounced. The timing for bowdlerised art is about right - very early in the Comics' Code's introduction and I'd guess publishers and the Code were feeling their way. Unless I've missed the point entirely, and the "unarmed" native is "the Prophet" and is in fact giving our hero secret instructions as to how to avoid "The Scalptaker". Oh, and a lovely book. Westerns are so under-rated.

It is a sweet cover, but the "off-character" story doesn't surprise - art by Jack Bradbury story by ""

Gorgo fan here, and although this isn't part of the eponymous run I still think it counts:

I did not have the "knickers" back in the day (and neither I nor anyone I knew referred to underdaks as such) but the Stamina group had a marketing gimmick that involved issuing sets of "collector cards" with their school pants. They were black and white pictures of heroes/heroines like Joan of Arc, Charlemagne etc and I know I still have a set around here somewhere.

Well, you have two more Romance books than me, so I think it's a spectacular collection!

"Closer observation told me that it must be a product of a model aircraft fan" Between you and Hepcat I know where to direct my enquiries. It should also be mentioned that the Crimson Comet aka Ralph Rivers was the world's only private detective suffering from scoliosis a hunchback. The wings wouldn't fit properly under his civvies, so he pretended to suffer from the condition.

One of the great memories of this Con was sitting at the Bar after the convention had closed on the Saturday and chatting with John Dixon, Allan Salisbury (Snake), Paul Wheelahan, Monty Wedd (Captain Justice, Ned Kelly), Karl Fourdrinier (artist/writer for a pornographic strip “ Willow” that ran, unsurprisingly, in a low grade porn paper), Paul Power (East meets West), Roger Fletcher (Torkan and Staria). Interestingly, Monty Wedd was not a guest, not because he wasn’t up to scratch, but rather because no one knew how to get in touch with him . Monty rang the Hotel during the Convention and asked if he could attend. Of course, so there we are in the bar. What was interesting about the bar chat was it made me realise how close the older guys were – they did not work in isolation, they all knew each other. I do not think I have laughed as much as I did over the three days at the "New Crest Hotel" in Kings Cross. Lastly, for now, this is one of the articles in the handbook. Roger Morrison is well known in collecting circles here and has written (and had published) a number of books about comics and especially Australian comics. This article is self explanatory:

Internally, a lot of potted biographies and articles. Here’s one with a self-portrait of the late John Dixon (Air Hawke) who was in attendance. Paul Wheelahan wrote and illustrated a lot of GA/Atomic Age Australian comics – Panther, Raven etc. When the industry here collapsed, he turned his hand to (successfully) writing pulp westerns under a number of noms de plume including “Emerson Dodge” . Paul also attended and is still with us, but I understand his health is not the best.

Well, Australia day is with us, so an Oz offering in this thread seems appropriate. This isn’t about Australian funnybooks per se – plenty of space for that later – this is a reminiscence about a Comic Convention in Sydney held on the October long weekend in 1982. There had been a couple of other attempts at a convention, both in Melbourne (at the Institute of Technology). The second one was in late 1979, over a single weekend and it was thought that Sydney deserved and would support a Convention of its own. It did. Sort of. Those involved in organising it had no idea what they were doing, and this was reflected in a number of very strange decisions (let’s close the dealer’s room when the “pro-Panels” are convened ) and the running at a loss – not much of a loss, but still . Speaking of professionals, there were a number of (obviously) Australian guests, all of whom gave their time freely and for no reward, bar basking in the slight glow of fannish appreciation. Onward. Here’s the cover of the convention handbook. Note the “prominence” of the “III” and the complete lack of any date. This omission, you will be pleased to note, continues throughout the pamphlet. The cover was intended to portray every Australian “heroic character” known to date. Artist Glenn Ford (and his helpers) had a lot of fun researching the details, including a visit to the State Library of NSW to examine their newspaper archives.

Hasn't "Undercopy Manor" picked clean the (extensive) holdings of AJD manor? Anyway, FC386 (of course though I have a fifties Oz colour reprint), 24, 40, 42 and 64. I have "marked off" 19 & 61 - but of course have misplaced them. Off to the GA in Australia thread with a post.

One of the disadvantages of collecting duck books here is the fact the US prints were never imported/distributed until the sixties (local reprints ruled) so the OCD completist (me) has to import them. That's expensive, not so much for the comics, but the extortionate shipping - $US25 for a single book? No thanks. Anyway, it's a waiting game and yesterday 11 Uncle Scrooges arrived with combined postage resulting in my now requiring 5 to complete the (Barks) run Four Color 386 to Uncle Scrooge 71.

Looks like the UK designers were confused as to whether Superman and Captain Marvel were one and the same. Great stuff.

The Daredevil reprint was a 32 page offering for 1/-. Pretty sure the Giant Size Westerns had (at least) twice the page counts.

Now, this is the UK/Richard Greene "Adventures of Robin Hood" TV series - is there any way to tell if the "club" is Brit/US/Elsewhere in origin? I have never seen one of these.

True, but there's also a lot of other non-comic advantages available in Italy. And they're not confined to pizza and gelato.

Of course not. It's odd how many copies have problems Lower Right Front Cover Corner. And shouldn't you be busy chatting with the fourth estate, advocating a nuclear arsenal in the South Pacific?

About time AJD The panel above is one I have often shown to non-comic folk, explaining that this is the first appearance of Scrooge in any medium, anywhere. I point out that Barks has managed to establish his persona (albeit a little closer to Dickens' offering initially) in a single establishing shot with a sole thought balloon. I mention the "bits of business" that Barks has inserted and that were consistently present in most Duck stories. I then stand back and have been universally underwhelmed by the indifferent reaction. Comic folk get it. Non-comic people just don't get it. I gave up trying to explain stuff to "lay" people many years ago. Anyway, congratulations and I agree the absence of staples should have been mentioned.