The Distribution of US Published Comics in the UK (1959~1982) 15 15

[rakehell]

On 4/26/2023 at 11:34 AM, Malacoda said:

Wow. You're trying to link via another German actor but you've gone for one who is not actually in any German films.  That's a lot of bonus points right there.  You have to love the fact that Anton Diffring was both gay & Jewish and pretty much played nothing but Nazis.  Now there's some payback.

He's one of my favourites. We have a rule at our house: If "Where Eagles Dare" is on, we have to watch it. Must have seen it fifty times.

On 4/26/2023 at 11:34 AM, Malacoda said:

You can actually do it (full disclosure, I had to google this one), like this:  Max Schreck in War In Peace with Trude Berliner who has an uncredited role as a baccarat player in Rick's in Casablanca, then Bogey to Audrey Hepburn (Sabrina) to George Peppard (Breakfast at Tiffany's) to Anton Diffring (Operation Crossbow) which gives you John Mills to Hayley (Tiger Bay) to Dean Jones (That Darn Cat) and he's in 2 Herbie films.  Technically that's 8 jumps. 

I think I got you beat there. Start as you did & carry on until you get to Breakfast at Tiffany's, instead of George Peppard, go to Mickey Rooney who was also in It's a Mad Mad Mad (etc) World, where you find the reliable Mr. Don Knotts, who was in Herbie goes to Monte Carlo. I think that's five.

To be fair, I was looking to end up with Dean Jones myself, but you mentioned Breakfast at Tiffany's, which I caught a bit of last week, and that got me thinking of Mickey Rooney. 

[rakehell]

Actually, I just realised I've trimmed Anton Diffring out of my Kevin Bacon. And that's not something I say every day. 

[Get Marwood & I]

Join us again next week on "The Distribution of US Published Comics in the UK (1959~1982)" for more six degrees of separation between famous people examples 

[Malacoda]

On 4/24/2023 at 10:01 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

It's not actually possible to go off topic in this thread Daphers

But you're right.   Back to comics....

[Malacoda]

This is nowhere near finished as I think I will have to plot the entire Marvel Silver Age to see the picture on this, but....

I was interested to see what happened to the indicias with regard to subscriptions during the period when ECP was handing over printing to WCP Sparta, which would obviously be a complex time for subscriptions if they were being dispatched from the printers. 

Something that is weird is that the original titles (everything up to 1964) acquire a note that says:

" Printed at World Color Press in Sparta, Illinois.  Second class postage paid at New York, NY and at additional mailing offices." 

and the ones that were started after that don't feel obliged to tell you where there postage is paid, just where they were printed and how much the subscriptions cost.  It's odd, because you'd think if there was some change to legislation or post office practice, all titles would be equally affected.  It seems like anything started (title registered?)  before a certain date is obliged to give this info and anything afterwards is subject to different rules. 

Weirder still, the 1879 act specifies that the publication must be 'issued from a known office of publication' which means the publisher's address must be published (which it always is). It never says that you have to specify in writing in every publication where it was mailed from (though I haven't read the whole thing, so may be in the small print).  So what does 'issued' mean?  The publisher's registered office, the place it was physically created (i.e. printed) or the location it was placed into the US mail.  As the old ECP issues specify Meriden, which I suspect was the nearest main post office to ECP and the later Sparta ones were mailed directly from Sparta, it feels like it's the place it was mailed from.  However, I would think a known office of publication would have to mean the publisher's address and either way it still doesn't explain why the rules for the early titles are different from the later ones. 

There are big changes to the US mail in 1970, but what on Earth is the line that divides pre and post 1964? 

I think this simple table will make everything super-clear. 

Note how it's rife with anomalies. Millie, Thor, Cap & Sgt Fury have a final month at ECP where the indicia changes before they transfer to Sparta. Rawhide Kid (bi-monthly) does not. 

Marvel Super Heroes has a first month printing in Sparta where it says 'Second Class Postage paid at Sparta Illinois', then it changes to not specifying the address.  Likewise Captain Marvel, which starts from issue 1 at Sparta and the indicia changes with issue 2. 

Iron Man & Subby start with the old ECP indicia that specifies postage privileges authorised at NY with additional offices at Meriden and then they both change to not specifying the address (but continue to be printed at ECP and, despite being new titles, are amongst the last to be transferred to Sparta).  

 

 

More as it happens on this exciting topic. 

Edited April 26, 2023 by Malacoda

[themagicrobot]

But you're right.   Back to comics....

It says Trial of the Watcher on the cover so why does the last page say it will actually be in the next issue?

[themagicrobot]

Talking of subscriptions Marvel in 1975 has a shedload of them?

[Malacoda]

On 4/26/2023 at 3:56 PM, themagicrobot said:

It says Trial of the Watcher on the cover so why does the last page say it will actually be in the next issue?

Obviously they were ratcheting up the tension to unbearable levels of suspense. 

I have to say, given what a hot mess Captain Marvel was for being stopped & started and rebooted, they were surprisingly clear with the last issue, which says there will be a next issue (as so many cancelled comic last issues do) but then goes on to say it will be in Marvel Spotlight when it gets rebooted. 

 

 

Is Rick Jones' girlfriend really called Gertie? She doesn't look like a Gertie.  

Whatever happened to Louanne? [sigh] 

 

[Malacoda]

On 4/26/2023 at 4:01 PM, themagicrobot said:

Talking of subscriptions Marvel in 1975 has a shedload of them?

Amazing.  There is something strange about subscriptions.  Given that the publishers were cranking out hundreds of thousands of unsold copies every month and that due to an outdated act of congress, second class mail was practically free, this was an opportunity to have an area of sales with 100% sell-through with almost no additional cost (they were mailed directly from Sparta).  

As you discovered Robot, DC, whose sell through was absolutely catastrophic, seemingly didn't offer subscriptions at all for years. 

For anyone who has ever lived in the US, the distances are difficult to appreciate with a UK brain.  Even if Marvel/DC comics were delivered to your local store, the local store could be miles away and only accessible by road. The world where you hop on your bike and cycle to the shop at the top of the road is not the world that millions of Americans live in. Where Albert & I used to cycle to a dozen shops in the neighbourhood, in rural parts of the US, the nearest dozen stores would be a 50 mile round trip.  

Why on Earth didn't they put more resource / advertising / marketing behind subscriptions? Or did they and we're not seeing it? 

[themagicrobot]

As has been mentioned before, after 1960  until Direct distribution it may have been easier to get a Marvel DC Charlton comic here in the UK (albeit a few months late) than it was to get one in some states in the States

If the newsagent at the bottom of the street hadn’t got the Jimmy Olsen you wanted there were 30 other newsagents within cycling distance

And we had the best of both worlds. Those magical coloured comics from across the Atlantic as well as dozens and dozens of our own weekly comics

 

 

[Malacoda]

On 4/26/2023 at 4:41 PM, themagicrobot said:

If the newsagent at the bottom of the street hadn’t got the Jimmy Olsen you wanted there were 30 other newsagents within cycling distance

And we had the best of both worlds. Those magical coloured comics from across the Atlantic as well as dozens and dozens of our own weekly comics

 

Indeed we did. I always thought it was odd that Marvel and the others continually struggled (and failed) to sell comics to girls.  Over here, just as many girls read comics as boys, and I don't think it was just a younger audience (although girls probably graduated to teen type comics with photo stories and the like while boys were still reading actual comics). 

I say that like we're not still reading them now. 

[Malacoda]

While we're on the subjects of subscription indicias and the end of Captain Marvel (yay, relevance....or at least, continuity) CM doesn't publish the address where the postage is paid right through the run (spot checked, not every issue), until five to midnight.  Issue 60 it suddenly returns. 

[Albert Tatlock]

Wonder whether this lot of fanzines, etc are the leftovers from the Ian Penman collection.

No really good stuff there, if they are the Penman items, the choice items have been weeded out.

https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/ancient-mariner-auctions/catalogue-id-ancien10004/lot-db39ff2f-fc49-404e-9b7e-afab00e47901

[Malacoda]

On 4/26/2023 at 8:45 PM, Albert Tatlock said:

Wonder whether this lot of fanzines, etc are the leftovers from the Ian Penman collection.

No really good stuff there, if they are the Penman items, the choice items have been weeded out.

https://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/ancient-mariner-auctions/catalogue-id-ancien10004/lot-db39ff2f-fc49-404e-9b7e-afab00e47901

The Fanzines (well, some of them) do make for fascinating reading. It's often very surprising to see what was actually known about and understood at the time. Often actually more than we know now as information has been lost or lain unnoticed for years.  Good spot, Albert. 

[Albert Tatlock]

They are indeed from Ian Penman's collection.

His name appears on this item:

Edited April 28, 2023 by Albert Tatlock
correct typo

[Albert Tatlock]

Three theories:

1) These are some of the A & G items that the buyer is putting on the market, having bought them specifically to split up the lot and make a profit.

2) These are some of the items that the buyer found surplus to requirements and is now offloading, having decided to keep the rest.

3) These are a fresh batch being sold by Ian's family, who have decided not to consign them to A & G this time around. 

Did anyone at the time notice whether these items were included in the A & G sale? There were a couple of large heavy boxes, but no list. If these are from the A & G sale, they are possibly only a fraction of the original accumulation.

Edited April 29, 2023 by Albert Tatlock
add 1 word

[Albert Tatlock]

Have we had this one? I forget which page the table of 10d and 1/- stamps is on.

[Get Marwood & I]

On 4/29/2023 at 9:38 PM, Albert Tatlock said:

Have we had this one? I forget which page the table of 10d and 1/- stamps is on.

I've been saving these 'satellite' examples to the files when I see them but I haven't gotten around to adding them to the table yet Albert - here's the latest version anyway - my focus was the UKPV second hiatus issues:

[Get Marwood & I]

Looking back through the files, it's hard to imagine ASM #42 will ever show up now as a 10d oblong given how long I've been looking. Still, Sgt. Fury #35 took his sweet time to pop up as a shilling so never say never. Anyway, some images gathered during the hunt which momentarily got the pulse racing...

  

...if only Albert still had his '10d' ledger copy....

[Get Marwood & I]

No #42, but if we could find a 46....