Opinion on the Iron Man/Subby #1 book?

[read_em-migration]

Calamerica - aren't you the guy who owns over 500 copies of this book??

[Calamerica]

Yes I am.

 

CAL

[Calamerica]

Bump

[Calamerica]

Bump 2

[Aman619]

you bought them all together right?

do you also have each of the othe r 1968 #1s in similar quantities??

[namisgr]

I am aware of at least one warehouse find of multiple high grade copies of this book. Mark Wilson's World's Finest Comics uncovered a trove from Washington state of the '68 first issues, including this book and the two Spectacular Spidey magazines. He sold them in every high grade imaginable (VF/NM, NM-, NM, NM+, and NM/M) for several months, and they are, indeed, sweet copies. Lots of sweet copies.

[Aman619]

Ive heard of long boxes full of each of the 4 books....so Ijust cannot consider buying one no matter how nice it is. Just too many out there in unread 'mint'.

[acesilver]

Common is NOT the right word. Perhaps "the most available Silver Age Marvel there is" might work. They are everywhere! All Silver Age collections have about 3 of them.

 

Not true. I sent my three copies out in the hopes they'd be found by someone and taken to heart. Little did I know that Calamerica would find them all and that they would fuel a comic collecting issue bonanza that is Ian-esque in stature!

 

J/K Cal. We all have different sides to this hobby that we love.

[PUNYHUMAN]

Calamerica,a question for you??? Iron Man/ Subby ,I think is a pretty cool book,I even remember buing one off the newstands in 1968,long gone that copy. Of course, today I own one in at least F+ or VF I haven't looked at my copy in awhile may have to pull it out sometime. But my question to you is why do you collect so many copies of this one book ?? Does it hold something special to you?? Inquiring minds would like to know. Me, I just love all kinds of Silver Age books,Marvel ,DC, Charlton, ETC.

[Red Hook]

I've heard it theorized that the collecting of comics, like other forms of collecting, is a form of OCD, obsessive compulsive disorder. Not that that's a bad thing. The desire to put together complete runs, in the finest condition, and getting all the numbered issues in a complete row, regardless of whether we actually read the dang things or not (especially if we acquire them slabbed) is an impulse that many of us share. This goes for the collecting of anything, coins, cards, bottle caps, etc.

 

In Cal's case, if I may be so presumptuous as to offer a theory, it's just a more extreme case of OCD. His is just focused on that particular book. It may be rationalized as trying to "capture the market" on this book, much like the Hunt brothers attempted with the silver market in the 80's....or was it the 70's, but ultimately, that compulsion to buy every possible decent grade copy of the book lies elsewhere.

 

Also, the term OCD IMO is just a description of the symptoms, just as the term ADD doesn't really shed any light on the condition. But as far as comic collecting goes, if OCD is the disease, let's have some more of it!

 

[PUNYHUMAN]

Yeah!!! I think I have OCD also when it comes to collecting comics.What are we going to do??? I say Enjoy it,that's what I do!!! How about the rest of you guys?

[Calamerica]

From Redhook:

 

In Cal's case, if I may be so presumptuous as to offer a theory, it's just a more extreme case of OCD. His is just focused on that particular book. It may be rationalized as trying to "capture the market" on this book, much like the Hunt brothers attempted with the silver market in the 80's....or was it the 70's, but ultimately, that compulsion to buy every possible decent grade copy of the book lies elsewhere.

 

 

How close to the mark redhook really is.

 

Oh, I think the Hunt Bros. Silver Debacle of the Ages( no pun intended for our beloved Silver Age gems) was I THINK 1979 - may have been 1978 I will look it up later.

 

I started out hoarding this Issue because I thought I could corner a "market" a la Hunt Bros. During my hoarding activities I found out that:

 

1) There are more copies than I first thought available;

 

2) I collected ALL grades of the Issue from Poor to NM+ 9.6;

 

3) I started to become well-known for this one Issue - I even sold one privately to a Forum Member within the last month or so and he was very happy with grade and price( Forum Members in good standing get a huge discount);

 

4) having 818 copies was a bit much. Almost 60 were CGC'd copies. I have sold about 300 in the 4+ years I started to hoarde that Issue.

 

5) I found THREE copies that have the Logo with a BLUE background color other than the normal shade of magenta( or whatever the regular color was) and that has me spellbound to those particular ones. A Variant of sorts. Out of 818 copies, this makes the blue logo backgrounds RARE. The downside is that they are not on of my High-grade pets. Back to the upside I have no regrets starting this collection.

 

I got a friendly eMail from someone last week - they saw me bid some more of this Issue -

 

So I am slowly converting that collection of I/S # 1 to high-grades only.

 

That is a better way to collect that Issue if I am asked.

 

I have some other Issues that qualify me for OCD( no one has yet to disprove this theory so i will go with it for now):

 

About 30 Beatles Dell 1964

 

About 25 Amazing Spider-Man # 62( Medusa Cover)

 

About 30 Iron Man # 1

 

5 boxes of mid-to-high grades Silver Surfer all Issues. Only about 40 CGC'd - hard to get those.

 

Have 10 Fantastic Four # 1 REPRINT One is getting sent to CGC I am hoping it is a NM+ 9.9 or POSSIBLY MINT 10.0. This copy is perfect and I cannot find anything wrong with it.

 

But saving the best part for last, yes, when I was a boy, I did not have the money to add this Issue to my monthly take of comic books. I only had $1.00 to spend in those days and I was told to put that Issue back on the rack. Marvel just started to publish many more Issues as the Tales to Astonish/Tales of Suspense were discontinued. That day I will never forget. 35 years later, my finances are changed, and I can buy as many as I want. Price is not that big of a concern - if it is NM+, I will spend a few days' pay to get it.

 

More later if anyone wants the info.

 

CAL

[FlyingDonut]

From Redhook:

 

In Cal's case, if I may be so presumptuous as to offer a theory, it's just a more extreme case of OCD. His is just focused on that particular book. It may be rationalized as trying to "capture the market" on this book, much like the Hunt brothers attempted with the silver market in the 80's....or was it the 70's, but ultimately, that compulsion to buy every possible decent grade copy of the book lies elsewhere.

 

 

How close to the mark redhook really is.

 

Oh, I think the Hunt Bros. Silver Debacle of the Ages( no pun intended for our beloved Silver Age gems) was I THINK 1979 - may have been 1978 I will look it up later.

 

I started out hoarding this Issue because I thought I could corner a "market" a la Hunt Bros. During my hoarding activities I found out that:

 

1) There are more copies than I first thought available;

 

2) I collected ALL grades of the Issue from Poor to NM+ 9.6;

 

3) I started to become well-known for this one Issue - I even sold one privately to a Forum Member within the last month or so and he was very happy with grade and price( Forum Members in good standing get a huge discount);

 

4) having 818 copies was a bit much. Almost 60 were CGC'd copies. I have sold about 300 in the 4+ years I started to hoarde that Issue.

 

5) I found THREE copies that have the Logo with a BLUE background color other than the normal shade of magenta( or whatever the regular color was) and that has me spellbound to those particular ones. A Variant of sorts. Out of 818 copies, this makes the blue logo backgrounds RARE. The downside is that they are not on of my High-grade pets. Back to the upside I have no regrets starting this collection.

 

I got a friendly eMail from someone last week - they saw me bid some more of this Issue -

 

So I am slowly converting that collection of I/S # 1 to high-grades only.

 

That is a better way to collect that Issue if I am asked.

 

I have some other Issues that qualify me for OCD( no one has yet to disprove this theory so i will go with it for now):

 

About 30 Beatles Dell 1964

 

About 25 Amazing Spider-Man # 62( Medusa Cover)

 

About 30 Iron Man # 1

 

5 boxes of mid-to-high grades Silver Surfer all Issues. Only about 40 CGC'd - hard to get those.

 

Have 10 Fantastic Four # 1 REPRINT One is getting sent to CGC I am hoping it is a NM+ 9.9 or POSSIBLY MINT 10.0. This copy is perfect and I cannot find anything wrong with it.

 

But saving the best part for last, yes, when I was a boy, I did not have the money to add this Issue to my monthly take of comic books. I only had $1.00 to spend in those days and I was told to put that Issue back on the rack. Marvel just started to publish many more Issues as the Tales to Astonish/Tales of Suspense were discontinued. That day I will never forget. 35 years later, my finances are changed, and I can buy as many as I want. Price is not that big of a concern - if it is NM+, I will spend a few days' pay to get it.

 

More later if anyone wants the info.

 

CAL

 

Can you post a scan of one of the color variants? That would be quite cool to see!

[Calamerica]

Flying Donut

 

I will find one real soon - I promise to scan one for this Board!

 

CAL

[Red Hook]

I wonder if it's a true variant, or whether it's just the kind of color change that occurs on press during a big run. Will be curious to see the scans.

[ShieldAgent]

And, thank you again for the great book Cal. It was a nice grade, and a great price.

 

Harry

[Calamerica]

Shield Agent

 

You are welcome! Glad you are happy with the transactions. Thank you for trusting me!

 

CAL

[Calamerica]

I wonder if it's a true variant, or whether it's just the kind of color change that occurs on press during a big run. Will be curious to see the scans

 

I am not good at this part of Board postings, but I will do the best to my abilities:

 

This is the Standard background colored Logo(most common by a wide margin):

 

 

This is the 2nd background colored Logo( about 5% of copies have this based on 818 copies):

 

 

This comic is graded a G 2.0 and a dissapointing copy. Nevertheless, this is the BLUE Logo - bleedthrough from top to bottom of Logo into the original shade of the most common Logo( one out of 3 copies = I inadvertenlty sold a NM- 9.2 recently and had forgotton about it):

 

 

What do you men out there think???

 

CAL

[FFB]

I see the difference, but aren't color variations like this not uncommon on silver age books, due to low ink levels that occurred occasionally during the printing process? I've seen a lot of silver stuff with variations in color.

 

How do the rest of the colors on the covers compare?

[Calamerica]

Hello FFB always good to see ya!

 

To answer your quick Q, No, there are NO OTHER COLOR DIFFERENCES in the 3 Issues I used this morning. I just got done tinkering with the Logos on the Test Thread so let me first do the next images now to help everyone out here a little better:

 

 

Maybe this format is better than the other post I did

 

CAL