Malacoda

You think you're bored now? Oh Steve, I haven't even started yet, mate. There's a whole new year of weapons-grade OCD comin' atcha.

Well, either 3 years or 30 seconds. For some reason I collected a lot of DD#35 over the last 3 years so when Albert posted his DD #35 noting the exception, with a comment that Ethel usually went top right, I immediately saw that, ironically, DD #35 was the absolute poster-child for top-rightery.

While we're here.....

And actually there's no better example of that than DD 35 itself. I think the L provided a nice crook to rest it in.

Lovely gallery of FF 57's. So the 10d stickered ones appear to have landed somewhere other than Goldstar (assuming we're right about the oblongs being GSP). However, they did so in the 11 months before prices went up to 1/-. The mystery 1/- stampy seems to indicate that rogue copy popped up somewhere else, somewhen else. Every picture tells a story. (I just wish they would speak more clearly).

Nice catch. Whoever wielded that marker pen definitely possessed the power of Thor. I wouldn't mind, but it wasn't even so they could write another price in.

Lovely work. I note that you put my avatar over MJ rather than Norman Osborn. Are you trying to keep the shocking surprise going?

Happy New Year, Gents. It's been a great year on this board (if not necessarily in real life). Thanks to everyone.

This is a great post. Thank you. I think the answer to this question is probably staring straight at us. Those old numbers worked by dialling the first three digits of the phone number from the word address of the corresponding exchange (so Hyde Park was 493, so to get T&P you could either know it was 493 9521 or you could dial keys corresponding to H,Y & D =4, 9 & 3). Some exchanges hadn't even gone over to direct dialling so you would dial the first three digits which would connect you to the exchange and then the operator would ask you what number you wanted. The Hyde Park exchange only had 160 lines and it was eventually subsumed under Mayfair, so I assume the Hyde Park exchange predates the Mayfair exchange. Given that T&P's number was Hyde Park 9521, at the point where they got that first phone number, 95% of the available numbers were already gone, so if they subsequently had a second phone line installed, it would have to have been from the Mayfair exchange (hence the far lower number).

Interesting. And, once again, shows that you'd really have to know your onions before you tried to prove anything with CI. I think these had nothing to do with T&P as these were from 1949 and T&P started reprinting them in 1951. It's hard to imagine how much money these must have generated for Gilbertons.

Good shout. Tomahawk dates back to 1954 at the earliest ( T&P's Tomahawk #3 reprints DC's number 25 from July 1954, so I assume 1 and 2 are probably 23 and 24). I already have the UBS address confirmed in 1954. Kid Colt seems to go back to 1953 or maybe as far as 1950, but the publisher of record is an absolute show....you can see for yourself of what variety. I started having a look at the pulps and digests, by which point this was just God daring me to go on living. I looked at Galaxy because T&P numbered theirs, whereas the US ones didn't. Oadby is all addresses up to number 49 and the first mention of UBS is no 56. However, I think this probably dates from some time in 1957, so it's too late. Is anyone an expert on the T&P pulps and digests with an extensive collection to hand which happen to specify the publisher's imprint address of record in the indicias? Please, please, form an orderly queue, stop shoving.....

Ain't that the truth. Here's the original US pressing, with a card cover, of Ivanhoe which was for sale in the UK, I mean now not then, along with the UK variant and an unpriced version that may have been some sort of giveaway or tie in (Classic Comics were the forerunners of CI). Here's the 15c original (with it numbered as 2), along with a stickered 25c version and a re-printed 25c version 1/3 price and we're number 20 now. Still number 20 at 2/-. OK, we're priceless now and sometimes we're bigging up Norman Nodel and sometimes not. and now we cost £3.75 and have a bar code. and now we've been taken over by Frawley and we're a Twin Circle giveaway... and now we're still Twin Circle but we cost 25c and now we're a T&P stampey... and now we're a hardback.... and don't even get me started..... If you can believe it, I found all these in ONE search, so imagine how many variants there actually are.

Cool, thank you. It occured to me that a lot of those phone numbers you found would be the reps. Now, I can't imagine T&P paying the 1950's cost of getting a phone installed in the house of a rep who might only stay 5 minutes, nor would you have phone lines being installed in the garages, lock ups etc. So I reckon some of those are the private numbers of reps who have had T&P added to their name. Does it look like that in what you're getting returned? Many thanks again.

Thank you. Yes, I agree, there's a lot of complications. I think that the UBS address was used primarily as a flagship office. I think that when the likes of Bill Kanter (Gilbertons), Nat Fleischer (the Ring) or Arnold Gingrich (Esquire) were in town, Fred entertained them from there. It's hard to imagine them using that property for any kind of storage or distribution, particularly given that they had a variety of depots, lock ups, garages and other storage facilities throughout London. I think it probably was used for some actual publication work, mostly editorial (the UK version of Esquire opens each issue with a Harrod's London Journal column which would have required some imagination to write from Oadby). Also where you see it printed in London or nearby, it wouldn't make much sense to do all the pasting up and creation in Oadby, then drive it down to London to print, then drive tens of thousands of copies back to Oadby for distribution. I think some of the assembly work was managed from London, though this could also be about resources (paper was still on the ration well into the 50's). So I think the reason Strato has 2 addresses is that UBS was the official head office (for business correspondence) but all the distribution was done from Oadby, which is why they give that address on the back (for subscriptions). When visiting dignitaries rocked up, they must have landed in London (Birmingham didn't start flights to NY until 1967, East Mids wasn't a passenger airport until 1965), so I suspect meeting them at his Mayfair offices made exactly the right impression (although Nat Fleischer for one definitely toured the site at Oadby). Having said all of that, I have an entirely separate theory about UBS, for which I have absolutely zero evidence, so I'll keep quiet about it for the moment (and then pretend it was something far cleverer when I know more).

Just because I know it's on everybody's mind, X men has become the latest title where I've found a stamp for every issue in the 7th era of T&P Marvel distribution (i.e. there are both stamps and PV's for every issue). I think it will ultimately be the case that there are stamps for every issue of the key titles... not so sure about Chamber of Darkness! That said, and I know you can't prove anything from the leftovers 50 years later, but the fact that you can find 6 or 7 copies of some issues at any time on ebay, and yet it will take you literally years to find one instance of some others, I think indicates that the numbers were very variable at the time. For example, while you can find 6 or 7 copies of Sub Mariner 24 and 25 any time you like, it will take you a couple of years to find a copy of Xmen 58. I think we can all agree that X men has been VASTLY more collectible than Sub Mariner since the mid 70's, and #58 in particular (first Havok in costume) so I can't imagine that the survival rate for X men 58 has been less than Sub Mariner 25. If it indicates anything (and maybe it doesn't), it's that there were a lot more stamped copies of Subby 25 than X men 58.

Working on Christmas Eve and on a Sunday? Harsh. Drive safely. At least the roads will be empty. Merry Christmas, matey.

Unless you want to get really specific about the artwork or the Jollies, I think The Architect is already on it.

Just randomly, as I will surely forget, on the subject of not trusting wikipedia on T&P, it asserts (in 2 different places) that although Pembertons published and printed the UK reprint of Forbidden Worlds 1, it was distributed by T&P. This is weird as Pembertons owned World Distributors and were far more a distributor than a publisher. According to the indicia of this pulp, it was indeed distributed by World, not T&P. Apparently, Thomas D. Clareson, "Fantastic Novels", in Tymn & Ashley, Science Fiction, Fantasy and Weird Fiction Magazines, pp. 241–244 is the source of this info. Does anyone have a copy of this book? I'd be interested to know what this actually says on these pages but also if this book has other useful info. Many thanks.

No surprise there. With the official receiver ensconced in Thurmaston, I would imagine they were diverting anything they could to other premises to avoid it falling into the hands of official receiver. Wouldn't it be hilarious if after all these years of speculation, it turned out that oblong stamp was just the London branch of T&P? (The correct answer is no, it wouldn't be hilarious, by the way).

Yes please. I have no idea if it will help with anything, but my experience is you have no idea what you're looking for until you find it. The Rutherglen address is interesting. My suspicion was always that T&P just delivered to a national distributor, e.g. whoever distributed the Scotsman, but the Rutherglen address is small town south of (later a suburb of) Glasgow, which sounds exactly like the sort of place a T&P rep would be located.

No freaking way. I've walked past that a zillion times. It's a wine bar and deli now. So if I could turn back time, instead of looking at salami slices, I'd be looking at a box of AF 15's? Damn. Jenkins......ready my tardis!

Well, indeed, so it seems Young Romance was not reprinting Crestwood's Young Romance, but Timely/Atlas's Stories of romance. Also, I'm not sure what that kiss led to, but that young lady appears to now be wearing a different colour dress.