Heritage February

[tth2]

HOM 204 was an incredible issue - who wouldn't get hooked on that?? Same with MS5.

 

The first English language comic I owned was Wolverine LS #2 - and who wouldn't get hooked on that??

 

I wonder if guys whose first comics were total drek got hooked at nearly as high a rate.

 

My first comic was Marvel Treasury #14...it was the first time I had ever seen a comic and took a few months till I got another one. Imagine my disappointment when I found out all comics weren't Treasury sized

 

[tth2]

What the hell, modern comic strips have suddenly popped.

 

I had my eye on the Dilberts, but they went for way more than I had expected.

 

I won the Doonesbury, a particularly classic strip, but paid through the nose (relatively speaking) for it. Man, I can remember when I could buy great Doonesburys for under $1000. I can only speculate what the classic "Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!" strip would go for now.

[MrBedrock]

Not sure if this was posted already .

 

Richard Evans won the Action #15 original art cover, owner of the 4-store Houston-area Bedrock City Comic Company retail chain. Evans states that he intends to put the cover on display in one of his stores.

 

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2014/02/21/fred-guardineer-action-comics-15-superman-cover-original-art-sells-for-286800/

That Evans guy is just a stinking publicity hound. Makes me sick

[innocuous]

$13k for a Bob Montana page from Archie #1.

 

I knew I didn't have a chance, but I thought it would could higher.

[igotnogame]

Not sure if this was posted already .

 

Richard Evans won the Action #15 original art cover, owner of the 4-store Houston-area Bedrock City Comic Company retail chain. Evans states that he intends to put the cover on display in one of his stores.

 

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2014/02/21/fred-guardineer-action-comics-15-superman-cover-original-art-sells-for-286800/

That Evans guy is just a stinking publicity hound. Makes me sick

 

Indeed, see what happens when you sell the Key to Hell? It leads to much better things. Congrats again, Richard. (thumbs u

[Brian Peck]

Ah didn't know Richard was a member here. Congrats! Glad to hear you will be sharing the cover with your customers.

[drdroom]

TOS cover @167K, hmmm. I guess restoration is not a big problem, and I guess covers continue to rule...

 

Yes, I had heard there was SIGNIFICANT restoration on this (I believe it had serious water damage), but it's still a sharp looking cover. One of my favorites of the whole auction.

 

Scott

 

The description said "some" restoration. The word was that "significant portions" were re-inked, somehow I think NOT by Frank Giacoia

 

The Cover looked great but at 167K I'd want to see the before and after photos wouldn't you.

 

I really would. Even at a lot lower prices than that, I would be upset to learn that I had paid for OA that was in actuality only part OA. It seems to me that our little hobby has reached fine art pricing without fine art levels of accountability.

[chromium]

Ah didn't know Richard was a member here. Congrats! Glad to hear you will be sharing the cover with your customers.

 

Sharing you say ? Like every customer gets to take it home for a week ?

[romitaman]

The action 15 cover is awesome...had i not been saving up for my ditko ASM book i'm oh so close to getting......i'd have paid over 400k for sure or the action 15..to me its a million dollar cover in the near future. Earliest known MAJOR super hero cover EVER...VERY HISTORIC and what a great scene to boot...congrats to the new owner!

[Unca Ben]

had i not been saving up for my ditko ASM book i'm oh so close to getting......

 

[jjeanius]

:banana:

 

I won the Romita Jr. Uncanny X-Men #176 cover.

 

Awesome Gene, congrats! Nostalgia aside, that's a great example, and I thought you got it for a very reasonable price. I wouldn't have been surprised to see it go for $30k+.

 

Nice when you can land your childhood grail without having to go X-Men Annual 5 to get it!

 

On another note - I find it interesting how many of us can remember the first comic book that grabbed our attention. It's amazing how vividly I can remember seeing certain issues at the grocery store, on the spinner racks, etc....and sometimes they are the most random books. Transformers 1, Star Brand 1, Batman and the Outsiders 16 (?!?!?).

 

Now that I am thinking about it - anyone happen to know where the cover to ASM 252 is now...? I remember when Bill Woo had it years ago, but haven't seen it surface since. That was the first book I ever paid above cover for at an actual comic book store - paid the princely sum of $8 for it as a 9-year-old in 1984. That would be one of my personal grails - but then, I'm not alone on that one, and that cover would not come cheap.

[delekkerste]

Nobody mentioned the Wally Wood DD #6 page going for almost 54k. Don't really follow the prices on these Wood DD pages, but isn't that a big number?

 

It's a huge number, and probably the shock of the entire auction. Frankly, I liked both of the Wood DD pages in the last sale better (one of which I tried to buy) given that DD has his back turned for 3 out of the 5 panels in this one. It's still a very nice page, but, given the price, I have to believe that it was just one of those random "gotta have it" bidding situations between a couple of guys, with the rest of the pack far behind.

 

The TOS cover was also a surprise; I know there was a lot of talk behind the scenes about how uncomfortable people were with the extent of the restoration, though, by all accounts, the piece looked stunning in person. I personally don't think this marks some kind of new normal view towards extensive restoration or twice-up pricing; I suspect this was another case where it didn't matter to a couple of relatively price-insensitive people who really wanted it (I'm pretty sure I can guess who at least one, if not both, of those people might be).

[DJRome]

I thought it was good auction. All of the big pieces caught strong bids, which attests to the health of the market. Though perhaps Heritage's smaller collection of lots helped to keep the bids from getting too diluted.

 

I'm very impressed with the latest prices for 2-up Marvel pages, especially the Avengers 22 and Daredevil 6 pages. Both of those lots went for triple my expectations.

 

Speaking of 2-ups, how about that ToA 83 splash? I have an old Sotheby's catalog that has both this page and the FF 4 cover recreation by Ayers. The splash sold for around $800 back then, compared to almost 24k yesterday! Meanwhile, the Ayers recreation actually lost value vs the 1994 price. There's a lesson in there, kids.

 

I hope whoever won the ToS 84 cover had a chance to inspect the item beforehand. It looks great, but has had extensive work done. Even by oa's forgiving condition standards, it's too altered to ask full price for. And I consider 167k full price, so you can tell I think it was a bad deal.

 

The Byrne FF 256 cover was a shocking price, too. Did anyone else notice that the winning bid was $51,001? The auctioneer actually stopped the auction for a minute to explain that the lot received hundreds of bids and that the final number wasn't at all suspicious. Which is actually kind of a suspicious thing to say...

 

Seriously though, I think this is the fallout from going hard with three weeks to go in the auction. Sure, you scare away most of the less serious bidders. But you also give another guy time to think and rationalize the purchase while figuring out how to raise more money than he originally expected to. IMHO, early bidding is a double edged sword and I don't think it paid off this time (except for the seller).

 

I walked away with a couple of small pieces, but I wish I had bid on the Thor 254. It's a good looking cover by a couple of good artists. It wasn't cheap at 7.7k, but I would have enjoyed winning it. Well, there's always something else to buy, isn't there?

 

Congrats to all the winners.

 

[delekkerste]

And thanks for all the kind comments about my UXM 176 cover win (both here and everyone who contacted me via e-mail, PMs, etc.) I feel like pick-ups like this one really get to the essence of why we love this hobby - it really touches all the bases. (thumbs u

[suspense39]

I thought the wolverton portraits were a steal at approx. 3 and 5 k. They seem to go generally around 7k.

[suspense39]

I was just thinking about the heck/wood avengers 22 page ($15,525) vs the heck/wood tales of suspense 71 ($6,932) page from last auction. The latter being a far better page IMO with art by the co-creator of the hero. The avengers page being a three panel page and the suspense being a four panel page.

[DocR]

I was just thinking about the heck/wood avengers 22 page ($15,525) vs the heck/wood tales of suspense 71 ($6,932) page from last auction. The latter being a far better page IMO with art by the co-creator of the hero. The avengers page being a three panel page and the suspense being a four panel page.

 

I really feel like wood blew up this auction. I agree with all of your points. Definitely Surprising.

[suspense39]

Congratulations to the buyer of the Action Comics #15 cover at $286,800.00

 

 

Exact same price as the ASM #121 cover.

 

 

I didn't know what to expect with the supes cover......I was hoping for higher than it sold for

[theflashunc]

I really feel like wood blew up this auction.

 

You have to be careful with that. Sometimes it blows up before you want it to.

 

 

[Nexus]

Seriously though, I think this is the fallout from going hard with three weeks to go in the auction. Sure, you scare away most of the less serious bidders. But you also give another guy time to think and rationalize the purchase while figuring out how to raise more money than he originally expected to. IMHO, early bidding is a double edged sword and I don't think it paid off this time (except for the seller).

 

Yup. Bidding begets more bidding. I don't believe in "price discovery", unless that means you hope the lot goes beyond a point that you want/can afford to pay-- which means you don't *really* want that piece at all. You just don't want to have to think about it any more. Early bidding causes the serious players to recalibrate values. I just got a PM from an underbidder on the MIRACLEMAN page. I asked him if he really thought the page was worth his bid. His answer: No, not before bidding started. But seeing the bidding hit $14K as soon as it the Internet session started caused him to believe that he would have to bid more than his initial estimate to have a shot. So all that the early bidding accomplished was for him to rationalize a higher value and increase his bid amount when the auction went live. Making the actual winner have to pay more.

 

The early bidding was great for the seller, not so great for the bidders.

 

Gene, as a vocal proponent of early bidding/price discovery, how early and often did you bid on the UXM #176 cover during the Internet session? Were you the high bidder when the Internet session ended? As I mentioned to you, I had my eye on that, even though I'm not a J.R. Jr. fan...the $8K high bid before live bidding just seemed impossibly cheap for a memorable cover. My hunch was that the serious bidders were simply laying in wait. In any case, the subdued bidding on that piece helped your cause. No one who truly wants to win is ever happy with excessive "price discovery" by thrill bidders.