50 Rarest GA Books - CBM Survey (1993)

[stagedoorjohnny]

So looking at this list from 1993, this is obviously pre DC ashcan/Sol Harrison find since the Action and Superman ashcans are not listed.

 

Gary, can you elaborate on what titles and how many copies were part of the Sol Harrison hoard? Or do we have to wait for the article?

[agro23]

Hooray for posting the list...kudos to cloudofwit!

 

 

4) Is This Tomorrow? (1947)--2 [CGC Census: 16 copies]

 

...wild guess , this book not as rare as once believed

 

 

GE

I've owned four and have only been collecting Golden Age since 2003. (Of both color variants.)

[capt_comics]

Hey Scott

Glad you got this out there - know we've talked before about how great the early issues were with Gary Carter as editor

 

Was tempted to go try and find my issue - just too lazy I suppose

 

Lots of great info in these early CBMs

 

 

 

 

[cloudofwit]

Hey Scott

Glad you got this out there - know we've talked before about how great the early issues were with Gary Carter as editor

 

Was tempted to go try and find my issue - just too lazy I suppose

 

Lots of great info in these early CBMs

 

 

 

 

I thoroughly enjoyed the issues back in the early '90s, and re-enjoyed them more recently when I returned to the hobby. My subscription ran from #6-18; I'd love to eventually get #1-5--and the rest of the Carter run.

 

Can anyone provide the exact # when Carter left CBM? :shrug:

[JazzMan]

So, how does this list compare with Gerber's list of scarcity? Are they far apart or have some commonality?

[Socratic Wonder]

Hooray for posting the list...kudos to cloudofwit!

 

 

4) Is This Tomorrow? (1947)--2 [CGC Census: 16 copies]

 

...wild guess , this book not as rare as once believed

 

 

GE

I've owned four and have only been collecting Golden Age since 2003. (Of both color variants.)

 

I do believe there are only two B&W copies and one just sold in the last Heritage auction.

[agro23]

Hooray for posting the list...kudos to cloudofwit!

 

 

4) Is This Tomorrow? (1947)--2 [CGC Census: 16 copies]

 

...wild guess , this book not as rare as once believed

 

 

GE

I've owned four and have only been collecting Golden Age since 2003. (Of both color variants.)

 

I do believe there are only two B&W copies and one just sold in the last Heritage auction.

I haven't seen a black and white copy of it up close. I have seen an un-catalogged copy of Blood is the Harvest though...sadly it's in PR/FR.

[ArAich]

 

[cloudofwit]

 

 

Turn the tables on those Communists!

[esquirecomics]

I'll see your 1.8 and raise you a 9.2!!!

 

 

And a 9.2 B/W copy!

 

However, ANY copy of Blood is the Harvest is simply AWESOME!

 

 

[GreatEscape]

 

 

Great seeing one of these ...so serious and cold-blooded. Marvel Mystery #37 firing line looks like recess in comparison!

 

GE

[cloudofwit]

I'll see your 1.8 and raise you a 9.2!!!

 

 

And a 9.2 B/W copy!

 

However, ANY copy of Blood is the Harvest is simply AWESOME!

 

 

:hail: :hail:

[esquirecomics]

An updated list would be nice, though I'd definitely prefer to see the ashcans separated out.

 

Some may argue it's apples and oranges, but I just don't see most collectors classifying them together with 'regular' books.

 

Agreed. I find this list to be fairly useless because it`s filled with ashcans and other books that were never mass produced. It`s not such a big deal for a book to be scarce when it was scarce from the day it was published.

 

 

Though anyone who might insinuate negative emotion or context towards ashcans should be struck down like the dogs that they are, -- I agree.

 

It makes little sense to include ashcans or some of these promotional books (such as "If the Devil Would Talk") as the circulation was already scarce/rare at the time of creation. How can one analogize that 6 copies of an ashcan that was created in 1938 yet has all six survive today should be on a list that notes only 75-100 copies of Action #1, which had millions printed in its day, still survive.

 

Of course, both the ashcans and these promotional books are key facets of comic book history, but they should be discussed separate and distinct from books that had general distribution in the marketplace.

 

BTW, for anyone interested in seeing copies of many of these rare books, some of are on my website:

 

Anti-Communism/Cold War Comics

 

Notable Key Issues - features many ashcans

 

Promotional Comics

[esquirecomics]

It was actually from March 1992, and here goes ("The 50 Rarest Golden Age Comic Books: An Opinion Survey" by Duncan McAlpine)--with the known/estimated # of copies in existence at the end of each entry...

 

3) Amazing Mystery Funnies (1940?)--1

6) Syndicate Comics Features (1937)--3

8) Feature Book (Popeye, 1937)--3

16) Wow #2, 1st series (1936)--4 to 7

20) Marvel Mystery Comics (1943/44)--9

21) Feature Book ( Tracy, 1937)--9

22) Famous Funnies (Series 1, 1933)--10

23) Comics Magazine #1 (1936)--10

24) Comics Magazine #2 (1936)--10

25) New Comics #2 (1936)--10

26) New Fun #2 (1935)--10

27) Stuntman #3 (1946)--10

28) Danger Trail #3 (1950)--10

29) Famous Funnies #2 (1934)--10

30) Famous Funnies #9 (1935)--10

31) More Fun #9 (1936)--12

33) Big Book of Fun Comics (1936)--14

34) All New #15 (1947)--9 or 10

35) Detective Comics #3 (1937)--13

36) New Fun #6 (1935)--15

37) Green Giant #1 (1940)--16

38) New Fun #1 (1935)--17

39) Wow Comics #1 (1936)--17

40) More Fun #8 (1936)--18

41) Wow Comics #3 (1936)--20

42) Detective Picture Stories #1 (1936)--22

43) Detective Comics #2 (1937)--23

44) New Adventure Comics #13 (1937)--25

46) More Fun #7 (1936)--26

47) Boy Explorers #2 (1946)--27

48) Detective Comics #1 (1937)--30

49) Famous Funnies #1 (1934)--30

50) Funny Picture Stories #1 (1936)--30

 

33 of the 50 are appropriate for discussion with respect to mainstream books. Of course, if one really wants to nitpick the majority of the above referenced books are not GA, but Platinum era.

[tb]

If anyone wants to know the approximate print run for any given issue of any given title, it should just be a matter of simple calculus and some moderate data mining. The CGC census, GPAnalysis, and the known circulation figures for other golden age titles ought to be all you need:

 

Census(x) = F( Circulation(X), Date(X), GPAnalysis(X) )

 

For hundreds of GA comics, everything except F is known. It should not be hard to come up with a function that would fit the data accurately. You could then use F to estimate the circulation for every GA comic.

 

I'd do it myself except unfortunately it won't pay the rent...

[Scrooge]

I smell the need of a Black Box Neural Networks function F here to make this system work ...

[esquirecomics]

If anyone wants to know the approximate print run for any given issue of any given title, it should just be a matter of simple calculus and some moderate data mining. The CGC census, GPAnalysis, and the known circulation figures for other golden age titles ought to be all you need:

 

Census(x) = F( Circulation(X), Date(X), GPAnalysis(X) )

 

For hundreds of GA comics, everything except F is known. It should not be hard to come up with a function that would fit the data accurately. You could then use F to estimate the circulation for every GA comic.

 

I'd do it myself except unfortunately it won't pay the rent...

 

It would be very interesting to chart not only which books are rare/scarce simply by the # of copies known to exist today, but also by statistical percentage of how many copies originally existed but now remain.

 

I would need a billable client to do that though.

[tb]

I bet that something really basic like:

 

Census(x) = Circulation(X)* G(GPAnalysis(X) )

 

would work - you could skip the date if you're just interested in a few years around 1940.

 

For G, I'd just plot the curve for know data and guess a function that looks like that...

 

----

 

As for estimating known existing copies, the only thing I can think of would be for a bunch of people to track every single sale, eBay or otherwise, of a fixed set of books for which the circulation is known over something like a 10-year period. Then you might get a hunch for the missing fraction...

 

Unfortunately, I can't bill anyone for any of this work either.

 

[Scrooge]

Well, the known Circulation data is available here: Circulation Data so that part of the data is already readily available. What exactly do you have in mind for GPAnalysis(X): a weighted price for the book to account for difference in grades or to keep it simple, price realized in VF (which is my guess is the most frequent grade with observed transaction. Note: I don't subscribe to GPA) or something else so as to account for demand pushing Census numbers up, right?

[tb]

Hmm, it should probably be a different function for each grade for a start:

 

Census_60(x) = Circulation(X)* G_60(GPAnalysis_60(X) )

Census_80(x) = Circulation(X)* G_80(GPAnalysis_80(X) )

Census_94(x) = Circulation(X)* G_94(GPAnalysis_94(X) )

etc.

 

I am pretty sure this should give a very useful set of G_XXs if you used enough data points for the fit (a few thousand?)