What three books in your collection have stood the test of time?

[tb]

Arguably the books we start out collecting are not the ones we end up with.

 

[...]

 

So there might be several ways to play with this thread - one is to show the three earliest collected books that are still cherished in your collection. Another might be to show by comparison what you started out collecting compared to what you collect now.

 

Or you might see a different way to tell the tale.

 

The one book from my collection that best matches this description is a nice copy of "Donald Duck Tells About Kites" which I bought from Harley Yee in 1991 or 1992 after seeing an ad in TBG. This was a couple of years after I started getting into US comics. From 1991-1995, I built a pretty nice collection of mid-grade Disney comics, primarily Mickey Mouse Magazines and Walt Disney's Comics and Stories. In 1995, as I was wrapping up my education, I got a chance to spend a year at Stanford University. I financed those studies by selling my collection but kept a few books, including the Donald Duck giveaway. As difficult as it was, selling my collection back then was the wisest decision I ever made. I made the most of the opportunity professionally and it became a stepping stone towards a career and life in the US that eventually allowed me to build a much better collection. As I've clarified my own taste over the years, it has become clear to me that I would have sold my original collection anyway since my true passion is to assemble a much smaller group of individual high grade books that I consider exceptional. I wish I could have kept a few of the very first US comics that I bought, including a Four Color 408 around FN- which was the very first "serious" American comic that I got shipped to me in Europe. But I still treasure the Donald Duck book as a memory of where I started out. Today, it is the only remnant of my first collection that I have left.

[PreHero]

 

 

 

Cool back story and great choice! This is one of my all time favorite cvrs/books. Took me a few yrs to find a decent copy (VG/F) - your Church copy is amazing!

 

Always enjoy Jack Cole's work, and Plas is on the top of the list! Might have to add some of the early Police to my want list. No one can match Cole's ability to imbue his work with a sense of whimsy!

[october]

 

What a beauty. I remember the Heritage Weekly, I remember considering bidding and I remember being quickly disabused of that notion during a corresponding PM conversation. You did win it for peanuts and it is a supremely cool book.

[october]

I have only been collecting for 6 or 7 years, so kind of hard for me to say that any book in my collection has stood the test of time, but if one book has a shot it's the one pictured below.

 

I doubt a month went by on the boards where I didn't lament my lack of a Mask 2. Cole was (and is) my favorite cover artist and I felt that it was his best work. I looked everywhere, asked everyone, and just couldn't find one that really did it for me. Finally, after 3 or 4 years of looking, a copy popped up in the Heritage Weekly previews. It was a VG or so due to a corner bug chew, but had wonderful eye appeal and white pages. I knew this was the copy I had been searching for. I was in grad school at the time, but I had built up a decent comic fund through judicious flipping, so I was ready to make my run.

 

Then, with a few days left before the auction was to begin, the book disappeared. It wasn't in the auction, wasn't in the archives, wasn't anywhere. I flipped my wig. In desperation I called Gary (Moondog) who graciously contacted Ed Jaster. He said that it had been pulled because it was actually a second print (gloss on the cover, indicia blacked out). That was good news, as the second prints are generally prettier. That was also bad news, as nobody had any idea when it would make it back to auction. I checked the previews each week, hoping for the best but fearing the worst. Then, finally, I saw it up again. This time I was ready. I bid, I won the book and I paid more than I had ever spent prior to that, but still well under my top bid.

 

So, here it is. My #1 all-time grail book, in my collection for three years with no end in sight.

 

[adamstrange]

 

What a beauty. I remember the Heritage Weekly, I remember considering bidding and I remember being quickly disabused of that notion during a corresponding PM conversation. You did win it for peanuts and it is a supremely cool book.

 

I don't believe anyone discouraged you from bidding -- just indicated that any likely bids you would make would be in vain.

[Annihilus]

I have only been collecting for 6 or 7 years, so kind of hard for me to say that any book in my collection has stood the test of time, but if one book has a shot it's the one pictured below.

 

I doubt a month went by on the boards where I didn't lament my lack of a Mask 2. Cole was (and is) my favorite cover artist and I felt that it was his best work. I looked everywhere, asked everyone, and just couldn't find one that really did it for me. Finally, after 3 or 4 years of looking, a copy popped up in the Heritage Weekly previews. It was a VG or so due to a corner bug chew, but had wonderful eye appeal and white pages. I knew this was the copy I had been searching for. I was in grad school at the time, but I had built up a decent comic fund through judicious flipping, so I was ready to make my run.

 

Then, with a few days left before the auction was to begin, the book disappeared. It wasn't in the auction, wasn't in the archives, wasn't anywhere. I flipped my wig. In desperation I called Gary (Moondog) who graciously contacted Ed Jaster. He said that it had been pulled because it was actually a second print (gloss on the cover, indicia blacked out). That was good news, as the second prints are generally prettier. That was also bad news, as nobody had any idea when it would make it back to auction. I checked the previews each week, hoping for the best but fearing the worst. Then, finally, I saw it up again. This time I was ready. I bid, I won the book and I paid more than I had ever spent prior to that, but still well under my top bid.

 

So, here it is. My #1 all-time grail book, in my collection for three years with no end in sight.

 

 

Man, that's a beauty!