35 cent Variant List-Help wanted

[blowout]

The only way I see to find a answer is to find someone who worked on marvels marketing and distribution at that time or maybe even someone who worked at the factory that produced the comics problem is it has been nearly 30 years. But with all the comic collectors on this board their should be someone on hear that knows someone that worked at marvel back in 1976-1977 with some knowledge of this, their has got to be someone who knows how many were produced still around !!!

 

Someone must have a fair idea, especially, as you say, an employee from marketing and distribution. Will anyone ever be forthcoming with the information though?

I would really like to know at least, how evenly distributed / printed these books were.

[cosmic-spider-man]

I would like to get some ideals on which are the hardest 35 cent variants to find and lets leave out the Westerns and the Hanna Barbara ones because we all know they are the hardest .

In my experience their are some that you would think would not be that hard to find but are very tough like the Daredevil #148 that Rob looked for so long and another one you never see is Hulk #212 and one you would think would be comon for 35 cent variants but you never see is Fantastic Fout #187 I have only ever seen two of this one and I have seen three Iron Man #99 which is also very tough Also Defenders #52 seems very hard to find Also you never see those Marvel Presents #11 or #12 especialy #11. I am sure their are a lot more tough 35 centers and I would love to hear everyones thoughts on this . The reprint books are tough but I have been seeing more and more of them lately except for the Marvel Super Action's Has anyone on hear been keeping track of the ones that have sold on ebay I was trying to but I gave up a while back?

[ShieldAgent]

Hello Terry,

 

Great question. This brings up what I have been trying to get at myself. Even though scarce and rare apply to all variants, I have to believe that some are more common than others. As a matter of fact, I think that a little further down the line, some books will become to be considered common, even though still scarce & rare. We have the same type of deal with the 30 cent variants. All are rare, some are just more commonly available, some seem impossible.

 

I wonder if location will play a role in determining the rareness of these books. For instance, perhaps all the known copies of an issue come from the Carolina area???

 

An interesting sidenote is that two books that you mention--Defenders 52, and Marvel Presents 12--are the only two that I have ever owned. Both came from a Kansas collection, and the collection contained at least one other 35 cent variant-a SW4. So--Hard for some collectors, but the two easiest for me.

 

Lastly, as published before on this board, one known collector only needed 15 more 35 cent variants. Out of the 15, 9 were not HB or western. I am not sure on the current count as of today's date.

 

Harry

[cosmic-spider-man]

Hi; Harry

The ones you got from Kansas were they originaly bought their as I had never heard of any comming from their? I bought a few from a woman in Idaho but she couldn't comfirm that they originaly came from their I guess they could have came from anywhere but it sure would great to pin down all the places they were sold their are three that I am sure of.

Back to which ones are tough to find as for the Marvel Presents #12 I have only seen 3 of that comic mine, yours and Glenn's and the Defenders #52 I think I may have seen 4 of that one since I started collecting these, Another tough one to find is Captain America #210 haven't seen just a few of those. On the other hand thier are some that you see a lot of like all the ASM's I bet their have been more than a dozen of each of them sold on ebay in the last year and they still bring a much better price than most variants and the Star Wars ones come up alot more than most variants but that could just be that more people know about them than the others. And in the last few mounth's a lot of Ms. Marvel's have been poping up and some of the Master of Kung Fu's are also comming out that I thought were tough especialy #54, I think their are 2 of them up on ebay right now.

I bet s&b probably has a better ideal of which ones are realy tough maybe he will come on hear with his thoughts on this. Also s&b I was wandering about that 35 cent variant that you said a friend of yours found in NY. which one was it and have you ever heard of any more comming from their?

[underthebigw]

Hi; Harry

The ones you got from Kansas were they originaly bought their as I had never heard of any comming from their? I bought a few from a woman in Idaho but she couldn't comfirm that they originaly came from their I guess they could have came from anywhere but it sure would great to pin down all the places they were sold their are three that I am sure of.

Back to which ones are tough to find as for the Marvel Presents #12 I have only seen 3 of that comic mine, yours and Glenn's and the Defenders #52 I think I may have seen 4 of that one since I started collecting these, Another tough one to find is Captain America #210 haven't seen just a few of those. On the other hand thier are some that you see a lot of like all the ASM's I bet their have been more than a dozen of each of them sold on ebay in the last year and they still bring a much better price than most variants and the Star Wars ones come up alot more than most variants but that could just be that more people know about them than the others. And in the last few mounth's a lot of Ms. Marvel's have been poping up and some of the Master of Kung Fu's are also comming out that I thought were tough especialy #54, I think their are 2 of them up on ebay right now.

I bet s&b probably has a better ideal of which ones are realy tough maybe he will come on hear with his thoughts on this. Also s&b I was wandering about that 35 cent variant that you said a friend of yours found in NY. which one was it and have you ever heard of any more comming from their?

 

There are definitely differences in frequency among these, but I really believe that this is largely, but not always, due to print run. In my mind, books that show up more frequently are FF 184, 186; Conan 77; Spidey 172; Nova 12, Ironman 102, John Carter, 1-4, Tarzan 1-4. I'm sure there are others that are more common, but I think it's probably still to early to tell. If the 35'ers follow the 30 cent pattern, it will be years before we have a real sense. For example, when I found the first known Ironman 89, I was thrilled. It was the last un-identified mainstream, non-reprint superhero issue to be found, despite quite a few collectors looking for it. Then I found about 3 more in the next year. I still marked it as a "5" initially on my scarcity index, because only a few other copies were known. After another 3 years, though, I had to adjust it since other copies began to surface.

 

As for the Marvel Presents 12, add another one to your list. After Glenn picked his up, I started making a concerted effort to find one and got lucky right away. It was a horrible photo on an ebay auction for a lot of the title. I thought it didn't look right (FD thought I was dreaming), and at $9 bucks it was worth a gamble. Sure enough it was a variant.

 

Cosmic, I can't recall what title or issue my friend picked up in NY. I'm sure it was a mainstream one, since this is what we bought back then. This was back in '77, and I can guarantee you it was a fluke. I never saw another one in the next 20 years.

[FlyingDonut]

Hi; Harry

The ones you got from Kansas were they originaly bought their as I had never heard of any comming from their? I bought a few from a woman in Idaho but she couldn't comfirm that they originaly came from their I guess they could have came from anywhere but it sure would great to pin down all the places they were sold their are three that I am sure of.

Back to which ones are tough to find as for the Marvel Presents #12 I have only seen 3 of that comic mine, yours and Glenn's and the Defenders #52 I think I may have seen 4 of that one since I started collecting these, Another tough one to find is Captain America #210 haven't seen just a few of those. On the other hand thier are some that you see a lot of like all the ASM's I bet their have been more than a dozen of each of them sold on ebay in the last year and they still bring a much better price than most variants and the Star Wars ones come up alot more than most variants but that could just be that more people know about them than the others. And in the last few mounth's a lot of Ms. Marvel's have been poping up and some of the Master of Kung Fu's are also comming out that I thought were tough especialy #54, I think their are 2 of them up on ebay right now.

I bet s&b probably has a better ideal of which ones are realy tough maybe he will come on hear with his thoughts on this. Also s&b I was wandering about that 35 cent variant that you said a friend of yours found in NY. which one was it and have you ever heard of any more comming from their?

 

There are definitely differences in frequency among these, but I really believe that this is largely, but not always, due to print run. In my mind, books that show up more frequently are FF 184, 186; Conan 77; Spidey 172; Nova 12, Ironman 102, John Carter, 1-4, Tarzan 1-4. I'm sure there are others that are more common, but I think it's probably still to early to tell. If the 35'ers follow the 30 cent pattern, it will be years before we have a real sense. For example, when I found the first known Ironman 89, I was thrilled. It was the last un-identified mainstream, non-reprint superhero issue to be found, despite quite a few collectors looking for it. Then I found about 3 more in the next year. I still marked it as a "5" initially on my scarcity index, because only a few other copies were known. After another 3 years, though, I had to adjust it since other copies began to surface.

 

As for the Marvel Presents 12, add another one to your list. After Glenn picked his up, I started making a concerted effort to find one and got lucky right away. It was a horrible photo on an ebay auction for a lot of the title. I thought it didn't look right (FD thought I was dreaming), and at $9 bucks it was worth a gamble. Sure enough it was a variant.

 

Cosmic, I can't recall what title or issue my friend picked up in NY. I'm sure it was a mainstream one, since this is what we bought back then. This was back in '77, and I can guarantee you it was a fluke. I never saw another one in the next 20 years.

 

FF 186 I believe is the easiest of all - I've personally had five in calendar 2004, and know of a couple more I could pick up. And yes, I thought he was dreaming.

[cosmic-spider-man]

FF 186 I believe is the easiest of all - I've personally had five in calendar 2004, and know of a couple more I could pick up.

 

FF 186 was my last FF 35 cent variant that I found so I originaly thought it must be a tough one to find but after I got one I have seen four more on ebay. FD have you seen any FF 187's I have only seen two of this one so I am thinking maybe it is a Tough one to find. Their is another one that I have only seen two of and that is Thor #263 it also seems to be hard to find.

I am sure s&b is right it will take some time before we know which ones are realy the rarest and the ones I mentioned may turn out to be some of the more common 35 cent variants but for now they seem to be scarce.

S&B does your Marvel Presents #12 have a couple of lines through the price like mine and Harry's not sure if Gleen's does or not but I was just wandering if maybe they were all like this. I will have to ask Dice-X if he knows how this happened.

 

Harry I hope you did not mind me posting the scan of your MP12 I didn't have one of mine handy .

[ShieldAgent]

Terry--

 

No problem posting the picture. Glenn posted his Marvel Presents 12 in this same thread. I will see if I can find it for you.

 

Harry

[ShieldAgent]

Terry--

 

The scan is on page 33 of this thread--Posted by Daethwalker--not Glenn.

 

Harry

[cosmic-spider-man]

As for the Marvel Presents 12, add another one to your list. After Glenn picked his up, I started making a concerted effort to find one and got lucky right away. It was a horrible photo on an ebay auction for a lot of the title. I thought it didn't look right (FD thought I was dreaming), and at $9 bucks it was worth a gamble. Sure enough it was a variant.

 

Hear is a better scan of the 35 cent anomily on the Marvel Presents #12 they appear to have had something stuck on the plate when the covers were printed or maybe the plate had a error on it. The example C is hard to tell for sure but it looks like it is their hard to tell with the small scan. S&B I was wandering if yours is also like this since yours is the only other one I know of and I was wandering if all of them may have been printed like this . I will have to see if Glenn will send me a better scan of his to be sure if his is also like this.

I just find stuff like this interesting and I like to compare to see if their are any variations of this mistake.

I just noticed something else look at the difference in the blue on the first two could that just be fadeing it is a big difference.

 

 

Thanks Harry for tracking down that scan of Glenn's for me

[underthebigw]

I'll have to double-check, but I'm pretty sure mine does as well. I always assumed it was a shadow of a "5", that somehow the plate "slipped" or something.

[finecomics]

Been following what's going on here and wanted to share my thoughts. I agree that the westerns are going to be harder to find than the HB books, but to what degree I'm not sure. I was thinking it could be as easy as saving a nickel. Were regular 30 cent copies shipped to Toledo as well as 35 cent copies? I would have to say YES just because of the sheer volume of 30 centers from that Toledo collection we found.

So why would someone when given the opportunity to pay 30 or 35 cents for the same book choose the latter? Esp for reprint titles?

You guys mentioned that Earl and I flooded the market and I could not agree more. It would have been a lot smarter to do 5 a week and no offline sales (I suggested that) But 200 copies flooding a market, just goes to show that it is a small market. If they were my books I would have also sent the best ones off to get slabbed as I think that may have attracted some new players. (Esp that double cover Terry!!!) I still think you got that for a fair price.

 

I haven't been following the auctions of late, but if these things are really selling for $18 then it sounds like some of the hardcore collectors are loosing faith, or maybe I need to start bidding myself. I'm still confused by the complete lack of 30 centers in that collection (there were like 5-10) as I thought Toledo was a test city for both? Maybe someone culled the boxes for those just because they are easier to spot? But out of 350+ boxes 5-10 30 centers to 200+ 35 centers, the numbers are way off to support 30 centers are more common theory. I think it boils down to 30 centers are easier to spot.

 

You have to remember also that this find was a complete unknown at the time of purchase, and will end up almost paying for the whole thing. Can't really complain about that.

 

Just my 2 cents

[cosmic-spider-man]

Hi; finecomics that collection you and Earlshaw found the 35 cent variants in were all the comics in that collection from Toledo and were their a lot of 30 cent ones from June to Oct 1977 in their also and were they different ones than the variants you found or the same or a lot of both?

 

As far as flooding the market maybe a little but it will end when they are all gone, I wish I had more money to spend right now their will be some great deals to be had. I am sure when the supply dries up agian the prices will go back up. Their was just one 35 center that sold for $18 I think a Marvel team-up but the rest have been selling in the $35 range with a few exceptions like Star Wars and ASM's did anyone noticed that CGC 9.0 ASM 169 sold for $500 I think mine is close to 9.0 . I still think 35 cent variants will hold their value over the long haul at least I hope.

 

As far as I know Toledo was a 30 cent test market to I might be wrong on that but I am sure their are others on hear that know. And wheather 35 cent variants are rarer than 30 cent variants I don't know for sure but in the last two years I have seen a lot more 30 cent variants than 35 cent ones, but you are right the 30 cent variant are very noticible and the 35 cent ones are not so I guess it could just be they haven't been found in as great a number as the 30 cent ones yet

[finecomics]

Hi; finecomics that collection you and Earlshaw found the 35 cent variants in were all the comics in that collection from Toledo and were their a lot of 30 cent ones from June to Oct 1977 in their also and were they different ones than the variants you found or the same or a lot of both?

 

 

Don't get me wrong there were definite cases of finding a run of 35 centers in a row. The conan's come to mind. But there were several cases were only 1 or 2 would be 35 centers and the rest would be normal copies. If you really think about it, that has to be the case. Most places would have had to have both copies available at the same time. That adds a little weight to the "Save a Nickel Theory".

 

But who knows what happened to these books over the years. This collection was advertised in the CBG for all to see, and the only thing I can say for sure is that it was sitting in Toledo Ohio. There was also a lot of duplicates of 70s books which to me indicates unsold copies. (esp on double sized books)

 

On another note.... Went to Dragon Con for the first time in 4 years to look for variants. Does anyone else notice that the November 1977 issues of Tomb of Dracula, Nova, and Marvel Triple Action have the same 35 cent font as the variants? It kept messing with my head. This is the first show were I forced myself to flip through boxes to find a variant. I did find a Defenders #51 in g/vg condition. Anyone need that one?

[Darthdiesel]

Does anyone else notice that the November 1977 issues of Tomb of Dracula, Nova, and Marvel Triple Action have the same 35 cent font as the variants?

 

Yeah me ...all the time on eBay in 2002...you don't know how many TOD 61's I passed up but I have a few now because I saw the font, put in the snipe, and didn't realize it was a Nov issue until it was too late and I had won it

[joe_collector]

Yeah me ...all the time on eBay in 2002...you don't know how many TOD 61's I passed up but I have a few now because I saw the font, put in the snipe, and didn't realize it was a Nov issue until it was too late and I had won it

 

Not to mention Paul had that ToD 61 listed on his site for the longest time.....

[joe_collector]

Does anyone else notice that the November 1977 issues of Tomb of Dracula, Nova, and Marvel Triple Action have the same 35 cent font as the variants?

 

Here's two more:

 

 

[Darthdiesel]

I forgot about those. I think I have copies of those too laying around. Before I really got into it, I had pulled a few at the Tysons shows and at my local comic shop thinking they were becuase of the fonts. I finally listed to Donut at one show and just hunted based on the cover dates. Weird how 35 centers don't have analogous exceptions like Kazar 16 and Inhumans 5 30 cent books where all the copies of that particular issue were 35 cents across the board.

[cosmic-spider-man]

Don't get me wrong there were definite cases of finding a run of 35 centers in a row. The conan's come to mind. But there were several cases were only 1 or 2 would be 35 centers and the rest would be normal copies. If you really think about it, that has to be the case. Most places would have had to have both copies available at the same time. That adds a little weight to the "Save a Nickel Theory".

 

I have been thinking alot about wheather of not the variants were sold alongside the normal priced comics and I don't think this is very likely, but I guess it is posible, if Marvel was testing the waters to see if people would accept the price increse would they want the people who they were doing the test on to know that nearly everyone else was getting the same comics for 30 cent instead of 35 cent seems like that would make a lot of comic buyers very mad, although I am sure a lot of people knew what was going on most probably didn't .

Of course this is just speculation I have no way of knowing if this is true. It would sure be good to hear from someone who bought these when they came out like Daethwalker who posted his original collection on hear a while back, It would be great if anyone who has a memory of buying these back in 1977 would come on hear and share what they remember

Finecomics was that collection you found the variants in from a old store's stock or someones personal collection?

[cosmic-spider-man]

These were all purchased new, in and around the Wilmington, N.C. area.

 

Two shops exist today. Fan Boys and Memory Lane. Neither have variants for sale. But, I do know that the owner or manager of Memory Lane collects both 30 and 35 cent variants and also holds doubles for favorite customers. He's offered to do the same for me. From conversations I had with him, there are at least 2 other existing collections in Wilmington, including his.

 

I do think mine was probably the largest and of better quality. Simply because it's a one-owner collection bought new. Both of the other collections were basically "collected" years later.

 

As far as how plentiful these variants are, I can only speak from my own experience with them here in Wilmington. I'd have to agree with other statements that there were various print runs. Probably determined by the issue sales of various titles.

 

From what I can remember, the ratio of 35 cent variants to normal priced issues, varied from store to store and title to title. And even seemed to change from month to month. But, if I recall correctly, it was usually the "best sellers" that came in priced at 35 cents and the less popular titles priced at 30 cents.

 

I also seem to recall a big "uproar" about this among the fans. So, for those looking for further info about these, I would check out the "fan mail" that gets posted and answered on the various "Mail Pages" of both the later issues of the variants and maybe some of the other issues posted a few months later. I'd do the same with any "Fan Based" Mags or comics that came out in that same time period.

 

I also know that me and my brother both actively tried to find the 30 cent versions. I was pretty sure this was because we couldn't afford the extra 5 cents per comic ( which could add up when buying 15 - 75 titles a month). But, after noticing that I also seem to have both versions of some of the titles, I'm starting to think we may have been trying to get both versions for our collection. But, we usually ended up with only the 35 cent variant. So, at least for Wilmington, the majority of available comics at the time were the 35 cent version.

 

So, it's possible all of the variants were bought up at the time of printing. At least when they could be found. And few, if any were part of your average returns.

 

But, if they were bought up by collectors and speculators at the time, then to me, that verifies other's beliefs that these were extremely small print runs. Because, if they were not, then where are all of the speculators? As high as prices are right now, I'd think more would be showing up on ebay and other places.

 

 

I was looking back through this thread and found this post by DaethWalker this is a Great post I would sure like to see more like this it seems that maybe they were sold together