San Francisco Pedigree?

[sfilosa]

Here's an interesting book in Heritage's Auction.

 

San Fran Pedigree?

 

The reason I say interesting is that the cover date of the book is June 1946. Per Matt Nelson's article (and logic itself), there shouldn't be anymore San Franscisco books after the war ended in 1945. It really doesn't make sense that Tom Reilly's parents would have bought any book after they realized their son was dead (unless of course it took months after the war to confirm his death).

 

Any ideas? Anyone else see San Fran pedigree issues after 1945?

[1962]

I agree with your assessment and have wondered about this for years on these so called San Francisco copies that are dated in 1946. I have seen many other Sensation's that have the SF pedigree designation that are from 1946 besides the #54 listed in Heritage's auction. A couple of years back I also noticed a Star Spangled from 1946 that had the SF designation. Unless it took a long, long time to confirm Mr. Reilly's death, I doubt that these 1946 copies are legitimate SF copies.

[Harvey Dude]

The cover marking in the "S" does not look like any marking that I have seen. Also, "200" is written on the back cover. I never saw that on a San Francisco copy. Interesting that Matt's article states "all titles in the collection ceased once his parents found out about his death, sometime in 1945." I have only seen twenty or so copies of this pedigree so I am not an expert. The copies I own all have a date stamp. My copies also have "Reilly" stamped on the back. Page quality would fit the description of a San Francisco copy.

[sfilosa]

From a quality standpoint, the book makes sense. But it doesn't have the tell tale markings and the issue date, seems way too late. I would like to know what makes CGC think it is a San Francisco copy.

[PedigreeMan]

Also appearing in this Heritage Auction:

 

"Windy City" Green Lantern #3

 

Thing is, Moondog himself has categorically stated that there was no Green Lantern #3 in the Windy City find.

 

Sometimes I hate this hobby.

 

Complainin' Al

[Harvey Dude]

The aforementioned postings do beg the question regarding how these books were given pedigree status. As for the Sensation comics, the Overstreet Price guide glossary notes the Reilly collection covered books from 1939 to 1945. There is no mention of books going into mid 1946. I don’t know about the Windy City copy but I would suspect that some provenance would have been provided.

 

Remember the infamous 4 Most #2 CGC 7.5 Mile High? It did not have the fresh colors or markings that you would expect from an Edgar Church copy. The 4 Most #2 CGC 9.2 Mile High did have all of the indications. I understand the pedigree status was erroneously attributed to the 7.5; however, I believe the book still resides in a CGC holder with the Mile High designation. It would be interesting to know what documentation was originally provided to support the pedigree claim.

 

4 Most #2 Duplicate Mile High submissions

[sfilosa]

Didn't remember seeing that thread.

 

So what I can assume is that San Franscisco's that are after mid 1945, are probably not Reilly books, as no one has said for sure that they exist after that period.

[1962]

I think your assumption is correct. Another telling clue that the very late 1945 books and 1946's are not SF books is that I have noticed that all of these latter books do not have the "Tom Reilly" stamp on the back cover. The stamp is very prevelant on all the SF books during the 1942 to mid 1945 period when Reilly was off in WW II, but I have yet to see the stamp on any so called SF book after mid 1945. The ending of this stamp in mid 1945 would coincide when Reilly's family supposedly found out about his death near the end of the war and the collection actually stopped.

[Harvey Dude]

Until someone can provide proof to the contrary, I have to say the 1946 Sensation comics are not San Francisco pedigrees. I would love to hear a counterpoint view regarding this issue.

 

 

.

[PedigreeMan]

Wow, I hope I haven't made any enemies with my actions this afternoon.

 

Anyway, I just got off the phone with Bob Beerbohm who said he had a nice, long conversation with Steve about this book. Long story short, the comic is going to be pulled from the auction and re-labelled WITHOUT the San Francisco pedigree. Despite it having the look and feel of a Reilly, the 1946 date was just too much of a deal breaker.

 

Bob also said he convinced Steve to start doing split labelling of San Franciscos with the Tom Reilly name, a la how CGC does it for Mile High/Edgar Church copies. So start looking for "San Franciso (Tom Reilly)" notations in the future.

 

Sometimes the system does work. My faith in this hobby has been renewed.

 

Now everyone go and buy something from Beerbohm for being such a good guy.

 

Alan

[Harvey Dude]

That is excellent news. I love it when errors are acknowledged and corrections made in lieu of perpetuating a falsehood.

 

Kudos to Bob and CGC.

[1962]

Great Job Alan!

[Larryw7]

Bob also said he convinced Steve to start doing split labelling of San Franciscos with the Tom Reilly name, a la how CGC does it for Mile High/Edgar Church copies. So start looking for "San Franciso (Tom Reilly)" notations in the future

 

That's really great news, I've always found the story for the Reilly collection to be the most moving of all of the pedigrees. Glad to see the Reilly name get some recognition.

[Moondog]

Nice work, Alan. Now, how do we get the GL 3 pulled?

 

There was no Green Lantern # 3 in the Windy City collection. In fact, there was no Green Lantern # 1 in the collection.

 

I did inform Heritage back when this book was offered in an earlier sale and heard nothing back from them.

 

It's important to know that there were certain titles in the WC collection that had runs of numbers - not just the first issue. These titles were New Comics, Detective Comics, Famous Funnies, Classic Comics, and a few others. Green Lantern was not one of them.

 

--Gary

[nearmint]

Is there a master list of the SF books posted somewhere? I've always wanted to own one.

[PedigreeMan]

Nice work, Alan. Now, how do we get the GL 3 pulled?

 

Gary: I'd say to give Steve a call. When guys like yourself and Beerbohm -- the discoverers of the damn pedigrees -- say an issue wasn't/couldn't be in a collection, CGC would be foolish not to listen.

 

Is there a master list of the SF books posted somewhere?

 

Jeff: Bob said he wrote up something resembling a master list in the late '70s from memory. He sent it in to Gary Carter when Gary was editor of CBM and shortly after Matt Nelson's original pedigree article came out, but it never saw print. Every time I talk to Bob he mentions this list as being "in a file somewhere," but he never seems to really look for it.

 

All that being said, though, while talking with him yesterday it sounded like this whole Sensation #56 issue had renewed his interest in the Reilly pedigree. I get the impression that Bob's passion about various topics does radical shifts from time to time, and that he had put the whole Reilly thing far behind him as he worked on his book (memoirs?) about the rise of the direct comic market and performed his in-depth research into the Platinum Age. Whether or not we'll see another such shift back toward an interest in the Reilly find is yet to be seen.

 

Alan

[PedigreeMan]

Scratch what I said earlier about this. Sometimes the system doesn't work.

 

Looks like CGC is waffling heavily on what to do with this book. After giving me some mealy-mouthed non-response about exactly what he was going to talk to Heritage about, it appears as if Borock is ready to sweep this one under the rug. Don't hold your breath on this book getting pulled and relabelled.

 

I hope Bob Beerbohm comes on here and sets the record straight himself. I'm just some yahoo who likes pedigrees; he's the one who actually handled and sold most of the Reilly books, so maybe his word will be trusted more. I still have no belief that anything will be done about this, but I am not going to let it slip silently into the night.

 

Maddeningly, Bob told me today that just a few days after our initial conversation he received an email from a totally separate party inquiring about another CGC "San Francisco" copy ... this time from FALL 1946. Same characteristics as this Sensation -- including the "Gilboy 'G'" pencil marking on the cover. He told this person the same thing he told me: No chance that's a Reilly -- that bedroom in Piedmont was locked up tight long before the Fall of 1946.

 

There were tons of books that came out on the West Coast during this time period with that same "G" marking. That a few high grade examples survived is no huge surprise. In fact, Bob even mentioned that being out in Nebraska, he occasionally sees Golden Age books with classic Larson "ON" markings on them to this day. (CentaurMan, you might want to double-check the provenance on that "Larsen" Detective Picture Stories #5.) In other words, distributor markings do not necessarily a pedigree make.

 

Back to caveat emptor with regard to pedigrees, I guess. Funny, and here I thought third party grading was supposed to make life easier.

 

[Harvey Dude]

That is a real shame. I know to look at the book and not the label but that does not apply to the identification of a book as a pedigree. I put high trust in CGC's ability to identify a pedigree based on some provenance being provided. I have some super high grade books that have the look and feel of a pedigree but they are not pedigrees and do not obtain the same price on sales. If the Sensation was listed in error, the error should be corrected.

[1962]

Alan, a worthy rant if I ever saw one. I have noticed these late 1945 and 1946 so called SF Pedigree books for a long time. In fact the first time I noticed it is when Metro put out their Giant catalogue back in 1997. I remember several Sensation's being listed for sale in that catalogue that were designated SF Pedigree, but obviously were not simply because of the time period in which they were published. I am amazed how 8 years later that CGC is putting the SF Pedigree on a book that is obviously not part of the SF Pedigree.

 

CGC should be more careful in this area. It doesn't matter how much a book looks like or feels like an SF book. If it doesn't fall during the time period in which the collection was assembled, it can't be part of that pedigree. A duck is not always a duck.

[BLBcomics-migration]

Hello

 

This is my first post to the CGC boards. Al Flenard called me last week (so have a couple others) regarding Tom Reilly parameters. Hopefully i can set the record straight here once and for all.

 

I did a follow article to Matt Nelson's interview with me following his predigree CBM (Hawkman cover) back in 1995 which Gary Carter ran as a letter. It appeared some six issues following Matt's original missive to correct errors in his interpretation of his notes he had taken.

 

The collection began in the summer of 1939. There was a Tec 27 29 31 up, Actions began with 17, no Superman 1 2 but #3 up were there. The All American 16 had a coupon clipped. Marvel Mystery began with #4, etc.

 

By 1940 most comic books issued were present. By 1941 all comic books distributed to Oakland Calif were present. I would say 99% of all comic books 1942-summer 1945 were in the collection. Most have the Reilly stamp on the back cover, but not all. The collection abruptly stopped in late summer of 1945. My count told me there were around 4800 books in the collection total.

 

Dunno what rationale CGC used on this Sensation 54 1946 in the ongoing Heritage auction nor a Spirit #6 some one else emailed me about this past week end dated Fall 1946 but CGC'd as a "San Francisco" copy. Both are bogus claims.

 

Neither have the stamp on the back cover, and any distributor notation on the front cover doesn't make it so such as the G for Gilboy - the distributor for Oakland/Piedmont of Calif, a distributor we also used when i was involved in Comics & Comix 1972-1975 plus later when i went solo in comic book stores, using them into the early 1980s.

 

Tom Reilly was kamikazee killed in the Pacific in the waning days of World War Two, this is what the heirs told me at the time. My memory has said for 30 years nothing should be eligible after the summer of 1945.

 

And it still pains me to see them referred to as "San Francisco" copies when the damn books were never IN San Fran - except when we took some of the collection over to our San Fran store on Columbus Ave, down the street from North Beach on the way to Fisherman's Wharf.

 

They should be called "Tom Reilly" copies - the Reilly family lived in Piedmont, the first books we got came out of Moraga Calif - a battle i seem to have lost long ago since San Francisco must sound much more romantic to the powers that be.

 

I do not claim to be a pedigree expert, but i know the collection i co-found in 1973 and personally sold about 2/3-rds of back then. It was the best collection i ever had the good fortune to uncover and acquire.

 

I have a list i had made up in late 1970s about half a decade after we found them. This was soon after Chuck was blessed with Edgar Church's collection. I believe that list to be 99% pure. i had sent it to Gary Carter when that letter ran back in 1995, but he never ran it. Why? I do not know.

 

Hope this helps out a bit.

 

Robert Beerbohm Comic Art

PO Box 507 Fremont, Nebraska 68026

beerbohm@teknetwork.com (402)-727-4071

 

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