What "Comic Time" Do You Look Back To With the Most Fondness?

[joe_collector]

joe,...

 

those images are linked from another site (comics.org)...

 

ooops.

[joe_collector]

I have great fondness for childhood comic book memories, but the 'most fondness'? It would probably be what I think of now as the "2nd golden age" of comics.

 

I would shop at Fantastic Worlds owned by Bob Wayne (later he became DC Comics VP Sales). Man, that store was so clean and well organized. But the new comics coming out weekly were just jaw-dropping. I was in heaven through those years leading up to Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, and beyond. Swamp Thing, Camelot 3000, Batman/Detective, Doom Patrol, Crisis on Infinite Earths. Discovering works by Dave Stevens, Tim Truman, Brian Bolland, Alan Moore, and on and on. The quality of material was stunning.

 

That sounds exactly like my experience - being in a comic shop from 1985-88 was a fun place to be - very exciting times, though I never got into the B&W craze (thankfully).

[Artboy99]

1972-1984 era.

My Dad used to drive into town to buy his lunch meats and breads from specialty shops. Across the street there was a used book store named Paul's Book Store, and he would give me the change in his pocket so I could go across the street to buy used comics.

I used to love going through the stacks on the shelves, and the first comic I ever bought was Fantastic Four 112 when I was 7 years old. The cover just jumped out at me and looked so awesome. ( I still have that book ). It was great being able to buy so many books at 1/2 cover price with the 50 cents or a dollar i got in change from Dad.

When I turned 12 I got myself a paper route delivering to the new trailer park that sprung up near our farm. Every wednesday ( comic delivery day ) I would get on my bike after school and head to the corner store named the Glowing Ember. It was right beside the CFRN TV studio on the outskirts of the west end of the city I live in, and because I showed up every week to buy my comics the lady that ran the store began keeping me copies of the books I wanted. The first comic file ( 1977-78 ). I was a Marvel fan, and always bought Hulk, Spider-man, Thor, Avengers, Defenders, X-men , Captain America, Fantastic Four. If anything else caught my eye I picked that up to.

She was such a nice lady, that she also started just giving me the books that didnt sell. She had to rip the covers off to send those back so she was giving me coverless books but I appreciated reading them. This lasted until 1980, when she died suddenly, and the new owner of the store was not very friendly and didnt want to hold comics under the counter for this kid. I had to find a new place and since I was older I was allowed to bike further and went to a store called Reid Books stores on Stony Plain road about 30 blocks from where I lived. I got an actual comic file from him, and through him i placed my first order for back issues. by my 18th birthday I completed full runs including first issues of Spiderman, Hulk, and Fantastic Four. I seemed to have good taste, and I was buying extra copies of books so I had 1 to read and at least one to keep and therefore always had an extra copy of the "hot books". Example: one of the coolest characters from those days to me was Wolverine, and I had several copies of Hulk 181, and because I liked him I also bought several copies of X-men's as they came out. Being an artist I had appreciation for art well done, and therefore when Frank miller burst on the scene I picked up Daredevil and had extra copies of his run. In those days it was actually a challenge to find back issues of books as your only source was other collector's or the used comic stores and therefore in my circle of friends i became the "go-to" guy for in demand books that you couldn't buy off the stands. Having several copies of the hot books allowed me to trade for older stuff which helped me complete the previously mentioned runs.

Then I discovered girls ( more like they discovered me ) and I sold my entire collection keeping only a handful of books so I could buy a TV and a car in 1984. I took a break from comics until the year 2000 and I have spent the last 9 years trying to re-collect all the books I used to own, and pick up the quality books i missed during my time away...my how the prices have changed.

 

Great memories

 

Artboy99

[Ken Aldred]

For me easily the mid to late 70's, about 11 years of age upwards, before comic marts and shops were well established here in the UK, and distribution of American comics was extremely patchy.

 

--Loved the DC 100 pagers, which I got off the news stands locally. Could hardly wait a month for those. Too long.

 

Going on holiday, finding books up to 10 years old, at cover price, such as...

 

--52 page DCs, loads of them, on the Central Pier at Blackpool. (A northern English coastal resort.)

 

--Justice League, Metal Men, 1st Poison Ivy in Batman from a spinner rack in a post office just across the road from there, and in later years Tomb of Dracula, P. Craig Russell's Amazing Adventures and a run of the Marvel Treasury Editions.

 

--On holiday in the Isle of Man in '75, finding a copy of X-Men 58, and thinking oh, this Adams guy is really good.

 

Can't recall their original condition- I don't have them any more and I wore them out through re-reading, but they were hardly in my now preferred 9.6 / 9.8 white page collector grade, of course (!), and the books had ink "T&P" distributor stamps on the cover- but that's not the point. This was the first time I really got into comics, and there was an exciting and novel unpredictability to the hunt during this time. Comics in the wild rather than the comparative sterility of dedicated shops or conventions, and so I'd have to say that no interval as a collector, following on from this youthful initial "casual reader" period, can be recalled quite as intensely.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Silver Surfer]

Late 70's to early 80's. I feel lucky to have been able to read and buy off the shelf some of the best material that has ever come down the pipe (for Marvel at least) during this time. My first LCS visit where I saw a FF#195 with the killer Sub-Mariner cover, still have that issue. The Bryne X-Men and FF era. Killer issues like X-Men #112, FF#242, Avengers #165-166 and the many great issues that followed. ASM run from about issue #200-250ish and almost krapping my pants with excitement when I first saw the cover of issue #238 which at that point in my comic collecting life had to be the best I had ever seen. Still have that copy too. Later on the Simonson Thor era began and that was just the best written 40-45 issue run I have read to this very day. Also, the X-Men run from 170-220, just couldn't wait to get the next issue each month.

[JazzMan]

I recently bought Rampaging Hulk #2 from Mary on these boards and when I received it and held it in my hands I was instantly transported back to 1977. The magazine cost a dollar so I had to save up for that. Imagine, in 1977 you could buy 4 or 5 candy bars, 10 chick-o-sticks, 100 swedish fish, 4 packages of hostess cakes or 3 comic books, so it was a big decision for me. I had just gotten into the whole X-Men thing and my friend Richard had lent me the Origins and Son of Origins of Marvel Comics so I knew a bit about the original X-Men.

 

The only place to get comics in my neighborhood was a store front news stand that was kinda dark and out of the way on Fulton Street and Cleveland Avenue, right in front of the Cleveland avenue station for the J Train in Brooklyn. It was a dimly lit place but my haven for comics. I remember eying that Rampaging Hulk mag for a few weeks before I broke down and purchased it. I loved the pencil art in that magazine, and it contained a story line with the old, original X-Men, so I thought I'd hit the jackpot. I collected for about 3 years before I moved to middle school and it wasn't the cool thing to do at the time. I miss those days. I restarted my collecting just 3 years back, but I won't soon forget the dimly lit store where my memories reside.

[slym2none]

The Chris Claremont X-Men era.

 

 

 

-slym

[Comicsarefun]

1977-1983. Savage Sword of Conan, Twisted Tales, Alien Worlds, and Spidey!

 

And the first printings of the hardback EC's. They cost $90 for the big 5 book volumes and I was so freaking pumped when I saved enough money to buy Vault of Horror from Mile High Comics in Buchingham Square Mall in Aurora CO!

 

I remember every month counting down the issues until Amazing Spider-Man #200. What a day that was when it hit the stands.

[bergdoll]

I can't remember the date, but it was around the X-Men 119 and I was in grade 7. I became "comic crazy" and used to go across the street to the convenience store every day - new comic day was the best.

 

In the summer, we figured out the very first magazine truck that the delivery van visited and used to wait out front until it arrived. Buying 10 copies of all the X-Men from 132-145ish so we had "traders".

 

There were so many great comics. Then, I helped a bookstore start selling back-issues and made a huge amount of money (for a kid) - that went into arcade games (insufficiently_thoughtful_person!), but I had fun.

 

The B&W craze had some pretty good titles too! (and some horrid ones).

 

At any rate, I think I'm pretty fond of the current time!!! There are some fantastic books being created today, I can get reprints of so many classics, I can get third-party grading and restoration checks easily.... computers allow us to connect to one another.

 

Mostly, I'm old enough that a few years ago I achieved my childhood dream of buying an Uncle Scrooge #1 - should be back from CGC this week! The 1980's were economically tough, and while I enjoyed the reading - I never had the cash to get the older books I would have liked. I still remember a screaming-mint ASM #1 going to $1500. If only.... .

[Shark]

1962 to 1967. I was 5 years old in 1962 when Marvel Comics started releasing a few new titles - Fantastic Four, Amazing Spider-Man, Incredible Hulk, X-Men, Avengers, etcetera. You know, a few new comics that they hoped would do well.

 

I remember walking a couple of blocks from our house with my brother to a local restaurant which had a spinner rack full of new comics. A quarter actually bought 2 new comics then.

 

I still remember holding brand new FF #1, Amazing Spider-Man #1, Incredible Hulk #1, X-Men #1 and Avengers #1 in my hands as a 5 or 6 year old kid. The last thing on my mind at that time was how careful I should handle them or that I should buy 10 copies of each so I'd be a millionaire someday.

 

Oh, if I had only known then what I know now.

[ciorac]

1973 - 1979. Without a doubt, the simplest and best time of my comic life. I'd deliver papers on my bicycle before dawn, go to school all day, and wait until the day each week the new comics would arrive at the local drugstore. My friend Gordon and I would take all the cash we had from our paper routes and head over. We'd buy a big stack of comics, a box of Reese's or similar candy, and a big ole bottle of soda pop. We had a favorite tree in the park near our neighborhood that supplied some shade from the blazing Arizona sun.

 

We'd sit for hours reading comics, eating candy and drinking that soda. Then we talk about the comics we'd just read and anticipate what would happen in the next issue. Very simple, enjoyable time.

 

The next comic renaissance for me was when I had my comic stores in New Orleans. At the time it was the culmination of a lifelong dream. Such fun times were had in those stores, especially in the early 90's when collections were coming in almost every week. I was able to own every book I ever wanted to own, and got to read all the comics I wanted for free!!

 

 

 

[blink]

I want to hear Blue's story!!

 

Your my boy "Blue" now give us your story!!

[Ken Aldred]

Some great stuff in the last few posts.

 

In my earliest collector period I too remember most fondly the Claremont / Cockrum / Byrne X-Men and my Marvel black-and-white magazine collection, particularly Savage Sword.

 

My first Russ Cochran EC Library set, Weird Science, blew me away, particularly the last volume with all of its superb Wood, Williamson and Frazetta art. I didn't buy many comics in the '81 to '82 period, which was something of a nadir for me, but to rekindle my interest I believe I chose rather well there, to say the least! Couldn't have made a more solid choice.

[Loki]

For me, the golden "comic time" had to be 1977 - 1981. I was just starting to collect comics and my $1 allowance was enough to buy two new comics each week with a bit of change left over.

 

OR... I could go to a used bookstore in town called "The Bookworm" where every back issue was only 20 cents and pick up five old books. They also gave 10 cents credit on each book you traded in. For a while there, I would take in 10 books each week along with my $1 allowance and get 10 new back issues to read.

 

It took a while before I figured out that I could just buy 5 books a week, trade them with my buddies and accumulate a collection instead of constantly rotating 10 books. They must have had 5,000 - 10,000 books in there and I got an opportunity to read just about every title from the late 60s onwards.

 

Usually, I'd buy a mix of brand new and used books. However, it all came to an end around 1981/1982 when I walked into The Bookworm one day and all the comics were gone. Apparently old comics were valuable! Some dealer or collector from the city had come through and made an offer for every comic they had, regardless of condition. From then on, it was new books only...

 

Probably a bad move on the store's part, since I think the used books didn't do nearly as much business as the comics. The place went out of business not long afterwards.

[dekeuk]

 

1977-1979