Show Us Your Atlas Books - Have A Cigar 26 26

[goldust40]

I've always heard print runs, and paper quality as the two main drivers of the lack of high grade Atlas PCH.

 

 

 

That plus lack of interest in them - they may well have been bargain bin fodder until the 1990s, when their worth in the marketplace started to become reassessed.

[rjpb]

I think Atlas PCH was somewhat overlooked for a long time because it was rather tame compared to EC, Gilmore, and Comic Media, and some of the more gory output from other companies.

 

Despite a roster of artists that rivaled EC, the storytelling generally wasn't on the same level, and there is so much to choose from with Atlas, that it was harder for individual books to break out. Even when they did ( as with Astonishing #30), the price floor was so low for the average issue, that selling for 2 or 3 times the price of surrounding issues was still cheap.

[rjpb]

I've always heard print runs, and paper quality as the two main drivers of the lack of high grade Atlas PCH.

 

 

 

That plus lack of interest in them - they may well have been bargain bin fodder until the 1990s, when their worth in the marketplace started to become reassessed.

 

A lot of younger collectors may not be aware that the bulk of convention and comic shop inventory didn't start getting bagged ( let alone having backing boards) until the 1980s, and the stuff that was were obviously going to be the more valuable books. Atlas PCH didn't qualify, as most of it was worth no more than a dollar or so back in the 70s. Back then the only PCH stuff anyone seemed to care about was EC, so a lot of books sat in boxes show after show getting pawed through by buyers often unconcerned with the damage they did to books they weren't interested in.

 

Unfortunately, the first couple decades of comic fandom did less to preserve the condition of comic books they passed around than the kids in the 40s or 50s who read them once or twice and then put them in an orange crate for the next 40 years.

[Johnny545]

I've always heard print runs, and paper quality as the two main drivers of the lack of high grade Atlas PCH.

 

 

 

That plus lack of interest in them - they may well have been bargain bin fodder until the 1990s, when their worth in the marketplace started to become reassessed.

 

A lot of younger collectors may not be aware that the bulk of convention and comic shop inventory didn't start getting bagged ( let alone having backing boards) until the 1980s, and the stuff that was were obviously going to be the more valuable books. Atlas PCH didn't qualify, as most of it was worth no more than a dollar or so back in the 70s. Back then the only PCH stuff anyone seemed to care about was EC, so a lot of books sat in boxes show after show getting pawed through by buyers often unconcerned with the damage they did to books they weren't interested in.

 

Unfortunately, the first couple decades of comic fandom did less to preserve the condition of comic books they passed around than the kids in the 40s or 50s who read them once or twice and then put them in an orange crate for the next 40 years.

 

This is an interesting observation i.e. the lack of bagging/boarding I hadn't heard that before, but it makes perfect sense.

[mrmyst]

I think Atlas PCH was somewhat overlooked for a long time because it was rather tame compared to EC, Gilmore, and Comic Media, and some of the more gory output from other companies.

 

Despite a roster of artists that rivaled EC, the storytelling generally wasn't on the same level, and there is so much to choose from with Atlas, that it was harder for individual books to break out. Even when they did ( as with Astonishing #30), the price floor was so low for the average issue, that selling for 2 or 3 times the price of surrounding issues was still cheap.

 

Agreed.

 

Astonishing 30 is a great example; it's a book that the horror collectors I hung out with going back a ways always looked for. Still dang hard to find a presentable copy.

[jimjum12]

I've always heard print runs, and paper quality as the two main drivers of the lack of high grade Atlas PCH.

 

 

 

That plus lack of interest in them - they may well have been bargain bin fodder until the 1990s, when their worth in the marketplace started to become reassessed.

 

A lot of younger collectors may not be aware that the bulk of convention and comic shop inventory didn't start getting bagged ( let alone having backing boards) until the 1980s, and the stuff that was were obviously going to be the more valuable books. Atlas PCH didn't qualify, as most of it was worth no more than a dollar or so back in the 70s. Back then the only PCH stuff anyone seemed to care about was EC, so a lot of books sat in boxes show after show getting pawed through by buyers often unconcerned with the damage they did to books they weren't interested in.

 

Unfortunately, the first couple decades of comic fandom did less to preserve the condition of comic books they passed around than the kids in the 40s or 50s who read them once or twice and then put them in an orange crate for the next 40 years.

 

This is an interesting observation i.e. the lack of bagging/boarding I hadn't heard that before, but it makes perfect sense.

 

.... there are shops around here that still use only bags with no boards to cut costs. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[pmpknface]

.... there are shops around here that still use only bags with no boards to cut costs. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

 

Savages!

[Flex Mentallo]

I've always heard print runs, and paper quality as the two main drivers of the lack of high grade Atlas PCH.

 

Also... Menace 2 if you still have it

 

 

I wish I still had it!

[fifties]

 

A lot of younger collectors may not be aware that the bulk of convention and comic shop inventory didn't start getting bagged ( let alone having backing boards) until the 1980s, and the stuff that was were obviously going to be the more valuable books. Atlas PCH didn't qualify, as most of it was worth no more than a dollar or so back in the 70s.

"Back then", bagging and boarding were unheard of.

 

Inflation;

 

I remember back about 1957 or so, going to a small used book stand and asking if he had any horror comics. He got out a small box, and sold me two or three PCH's, at I believe it was 50 cents each.

 

When I got back into collecting PCH in 1973, there were a few used bookstores on Hollywood Blvd in Hollywood that I would drop into, since I was working in that area at the time.

I would go to a rear counter at the largest one, and ask to see their "old comic books". The clerk would bring out a cardboard box, with maybe two-three dozen comics in it, mostly Atlas's, along with a few other publishers, at two dollars each.

 

It was here that I got a Fair copy of Mister Mystery 12 (the flame toward the eye cover), and a near-mint copy of Black Cat Mystery 33 (electrocution cover), among others. If only I had had the coin to buy all of them!

 

About 1982 or so, can't remember the exact year, I bought from a Recycler seller who was a comic book dealer, several books, and although I can't remember the others, one was Horrific 3 (bullet hole in the head cover) for the princely sum of 4 dollars.

 

No bags, no boards, no excessive cost, no speculative purchasing; just a collector buying for the reading enjoyment.

 

How times have changed, eh eh.

[CongoBill]

New here, but as a collector of Atlas PCH I am definitely loving this thread!

 

While I have collected PCH since the mid-1990s, it is only in the past 3-5 years that I have focused more on Atlas titles. Although I did put together a complete run of Menace in the late '90s that included a nice Fine+ copy of Menace #5 that I later sold around 2004 when I was in need of some cash. Ah, regrets!

 

I think part of the reason that both myself and other PCH collectors did not pay much attention to Atlas PCH earlier is, at least for me, there was just too much of it. I was interested in completing runs of PCH series I was collecting and just about every Atlas PCH series has a lot of issues to track down. That's what was so appealing to me about Menace! It only had 11 issues and that seemed more reasonable to try and complete. And then I could say I had every issue of at least one Atlas series in my collection, which at the time seemed sufficient.

 

Another reason is that back in the days when I and other PCH collectors were all looking for Weird Mysteries #5, Black Cat #50, Tomb of Terror #15, etc., it seemed dealers had boxes of Atlas stuff that nobody really wanted. And there was a certain "sameness" among all the Atlas series that made it difficult to really distinguish one from another. So a lot of it didn't really interest me even though I was aware there were some great Atlas PCH covers to collect.

 

Now I know better. Even though such books as Strange Tales #28 and Astonishing #30 can certainly stand with some of the greatest PCH covers, there are many other fantastic Atlas issues to collect, so my approach to adding Atlas PCH to my collection has changed. Now I just try and find Fine or better copies and will usually snag them up if they are priced reasonably.

 

With that said, I am interested to hear what you all think are the top 5 (or Top 10 if you wish) Atlas PCH covers. Please list them here and include pics if you have 'em. Should be fun.

 

And my apologies if something like this has already been done in this thread, but I have not had time to go through nearly 400 pages of posts to see. :-)

[mrmyst]

New here, but as a collector of Atlas PCH I am definitely loving this thread!

 

While I have collected PCH since the mid-1990s, it is only in the past 3-5 years that I have focused more on Atlas titles. Although I did put together a complete run of Menace in the late '90s that included a nice Fine+ copy of Menace #5 that I later sold around 2004 when I was in need of some cash. Ah, regrets!

 

I think part of the reason that both myself and other PCH collectors did not pay much attention to Atlas PCH earlier is, at least for me, there was just too much of it. I was interested in completing runs of PCH series I was collecting and just about every Atlas PCH series has a lot of issues to track down. That's what was so appealing to me about Menace! It only had 11 issues and that seemed more reasonable to try and complete. And then I could say I had every issue of at least one Atlas series in my collection, which at the time seemed sufficient.

 

Another reason is that back in the days when I and other PCH collectors were all looking for Weird Mysteries #5, Black Cat #50, Tomb of Terror #15, etc., it seemed dealers had boxes of Atlas stuff that nobody really wanted. And there was a certain "sameness" among all the Atlas series that made it difficult to really distinguish one from another. So a lot of it didn't really interest me even though I was aware there were some great Atlas PCH covers to collect.

 

Now I know better. Even though such books as Strange Tales #28 and Astonishing #30 can certainly stand with some of the greatest PCH covers, there are many other fantastic Atlas issues to collect, so my approach to adding Atlas PCH to my collection has changed. Now I just try and find Fine or better copies and will usually snag them up if they are priced reasonably.

 

With that said, I am interested to hear what you all think are the top 5 (or Top 10 if you wish) Atlas PCH covers. Please list them here and include pics if you have 'em. Should be fun.

 

And my apologies if something like this has already been done in this thread, but I have not had time to go through nearly 400 pages of posts to see. :-)

 

Great post! Welcome to the Boards!

[jimjum12]

 

A lot of younger collectors may not be aware that the bulk of convention and comic shop inventory didn't start getting bagged ( let alone having backing boards) until the 1980s, and the stuff that was were obviously going to be the more valuable books. Atlas PCH didn't qualify, as most of it was worth no more than a dollar or so back in the 70s.

"Back then", bagging and boarding were unheard of.

 

Inflation;

 

I remember back about 1957 or so, going to a small used book stand and asking if he had any horror comics. He got out a small box, and sold me two or three PCH's, at I believe it was 50 cents each.

 

When I got back into collecting PCH in 1973, there were a few used bookstores on Hollywood Blvd in Hollywood that I would drop into, since I was working in that area at the time.

I would go to a rear counter at the largest one, and ask to see their "old comic books". The clerk would bring out a cardboard box, with maybe two-three dozen comics in it, mostly Atlas's, along with a few other publishers, at two dollars each.

 

It was here that I got a Fair copy of Mister Mystery 12 (the flame toward the eye cover), and a near-mint copy of Black Cat Mystery 33 (electrocution cover), among others. If only I had had the coin to buy all of them!

 

About 1982 or so, can't remember the exact year, I bought from a Recycler seller who was a comic book dealer, several books, and although I can't remember the others, one was Horrific 3 (bullet hole in the head cover) for the princely sum of 4 dollars.

 

No bags, no boards, no excessive cost, no speculative purchasing; just a collector buying for the reading enjoyment.

 

How times have changed, eh eh.

 

.... while you started quite a bit earlier than me, this was pretty much how it was when I started going to shows in the early to mid 70's. Books were still cheap enough to where the main focus was just on finding back issues of comics that you loved. Investment and resale wasn't really part of the equation. Resale ?...... who the heck would ever want to get rid of them after so much time was spent finding them I knew about the Pre Hero Marvels from Fantasy Masterpieces and the like.... but Atlas ? ..... I never really dreamed they even existed. It wasn't until I found this thread while researching the Atlas run of Everett Sub-mariners that I discovered the depth of the Atlas offerings. It was here that I found the mother lode of Atlas information. www.atlastales.com and the mania began. One thing I liked about Atlas was that so much of it is still fairly cheap and the emphasis here is still on content and appreciation. In a way I liked it better BEFORE the genre started heating up. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[goldust40]

 

A lot of younger collectors may not be aware that the bulk of convention and comic shop inventory didn't start getting bagged ( let alone having backing boards) until the 1980s, and the stuff that was were obviously going to be the more valuable books. Atlas PCH didn't qualify, as most of it was worth no more than a dollar or so back in the 70s.

"Back then", bagging and boarding were unheard of.

 

Inflation;

 

I remember back about 1957 or so, going to a small used book stand and asking if he had any horror comics. He got out a small box, and sold me two or three PCH's, at I believe it was 50 cents each.

 

When I got back into collecting PCH in 1973, there were a few used bookstores on Hollywood Blvd in Hollywood that I would drop into, since I was working in that area at the time.

I would go to a rear counter at the largest one, and ask to see their "old comic books". The clerk would bring out a cardboard box, with maybe two-three dozen comics in it, mostly Atlas's, along with a few other publishers, at two dollars each.

 

It was here that I got a Fair copy of Mister Mystery 12 (the flame toward the eye cover), and a near-mint copy of Black Cat Mystery 33 (electrocution cover), among others. If only I had had the coin to buy all of them!

 

About 1982 or so, can't remember the exact year, I bought from a Recycler seller who was a comic book dealer, several books, and although I can't remember the others, one was Horrific 3 (bullet hole in the head cover) for the princely sum of 4 dollars.

 

No bags, no boards, no excessive cost, no speculative purchasing; just a collector buying for the reading enjoyment.

 

How times have changed, eh eh.

 

I always imagined Hollywood Blvd to be a mecca for back-issue collectors, especially in the early 70s. Oh for a time machine...

[jimjum12]

New here, but as a collector of Atlas PCH I am definitely loving this thread!

 

While I have collected PCH since the mid-1990s, it is only in the past 3-5 years that I have focused more on Atlas titles. Although I did put together a complete run of Menace in the late '90s that included a nice Fine+ copy of Menace #5 that I later sold around 2004 when I was in need of some cash. Ah, regrets!

 

I think part of the reason that both myself and other PCH collectors did not pay much attention to Atlas PCH earlier is, at least for me, there was just too much of it. I was interested in completing runs of PCH series I was collecting and just about every Atlas PCH series has a lot of issues to track down. That's what was so appealing to me about Menace! It only had 11 issues and that seemed more reasonable to try and complete. And then I could say I had every issue of at least one Atlas series in my collection, which at the time seemed sufficient.

 

Another reason is that back in the days when I and other PCH collectors were all looking for Weird Mysteries #5, Black Cat #50, Tomb of Terror #15, etc., it seemed dealers had boxes of Atlas stuff that nobody really wanted. And there was a certain "sameness" among all the Atlas series that made it difficult to really distinguish one from another. So a lot of it didn't really interest me even though I was aware there were some great Atlas PCH covers to collect.

 

Now I know better. Even though such books as Strange Tales #28 and Astonishing #30 can certainly stand with some of the greatest PCH covers, there are many other fantastic Atlas issues to collect, so my approach to adding Atlas PCH to my collection has changed. Now I just try and find Fine or better copies and will usually snag them up if they are priced reasonably.

 

With that said, I am interested to hear what you all think are the top 5 (or Top 10 if you wish) Atlas PCH covers. Please list them here and include pics if you have 'em. Should be fun.

 

And my apologies if something like this has already been done in this thread, but I have not had time to go through nearly 400 pages of posts to see. :-)

 

Great post! Welcome to the Boards!

 

WTTBs X2 ...... and I don't know if I really could narrow it down to 10 favorites.... I like so many of them. One thing I've found about Atlas is that many of the covers that seem ho-hum actually look much better in person due to subtleties in color and such. I know since I started checking out this thread my likes have slowly diversified away from the Everett-centric views I once held. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[BOOT]

Not too many Everett war covers..... this one is fairly uncommon.... GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

 

Here's one of his post-Code covers...

[jimjum12]

Not too many Everett war covers..... this one is fairly uncommon.... GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

 

Here's one of his post-Code covers...

 

I like that one also....... Everett I think it's Battle 57 that has another sharp Everett cover. I really like the war books from Atlas. GOD BLESS...

 

-jimbo(a friend of jesus) (thumbs u

[Jayman]

Unlike most here I was naively unaware of the big books from the other publishers till I came to these boards and snagged a set of Gerbers. I was only aware of ECs and Atlas. As I've told others, I was always curious about the origins of the Atlas stories reprinted in the Marvel Bronze Age books and started seeking them out. EC comics seemed out of my affordability which made going after the Atlas titles a no brainer. In the early 2000's VF-VF+ Atlas PCH could be had for around $75-$125 depending on the title. Spellbound and Mystic always seemed in less demand as I recall. If only I was driven to collect more frequently back then, but it was more of an occasional interest at the time!

[adamstrange]

Atlas published 399 pre-code horror books, more than any other publisher. For example, that's more than 4x what EC put out.

[Supernerd]

Atlas published 399 pre-code horror books, more than any other publisher. For example, that's more than 4x what EC put out.

 

Wow! That's a lot of books. Is that including Men's Adventures, and Amazing Detective Cases when both titles dipped into the horror genre?

[adamstrange]

Atlas published 399 pre-code horror books, more than any other publisher. For example, that's more than 4x what EC put out.

 

Wow! That's a lot of books. Is that including Men's Adventures, and Amazing Detective Cases when both titles dipped into the horror genre?

Yes