They're Still Out There! 22 22

[Terry JSA]

2 hours ago, szav said:

I think I like and feel safer with the lower grade books in this pedigree for now.  Not much into DC hero books in general but I've always loved Tec 73...dunno what other people see when they look at it, but I see Batman in an almost timeless depiction valiantly fighting an insane monster/ villain ..and Robin, well he's just off in the corner smiling an doing his best Uncle Scrooge.

Another great cover from the Golden Age of Comics, 1st and only Scarecrow cover from that era. The gold label goes so well with the book! 

[buttock]

6 hours ago, october said:

Pretty sure Heritage doesn't scan. Those are photos.

Not only that, but you can adjust the intensity of the picture at the top of it.  Everyone complaining about how intense the pictures are simply hasn't bothered to look at them.  

[Pickie]

7 hours ago, Mmehdy said:

First of all lets look at the context of the situation down. If we related back to the direct sales at the time of SF and Church...with from Chuck or the Berkley boys of Bob, Bud, and John. The prices realized in this last Promise  auction were in line those sales 40 plus years ago. So,  I do not from a historical perspective see anything different this time compared to the last two times OO Pedigree collections were introduced. The advantage that the "Promise" collection has over all of those, is at the time we bought them we did not know they would obtain a Pedigree status. We bought them blind, and know they were unlike anything we had ever seen before in that quantity and so out of the gate, like Billy Wright, Promise does have a advantage historically.

 When I see the SF label or Church label that takes a leap of faith. There are a lot of dealers out there that say SF, Church etc without absolute proof. The Promise collection will have NO DOUBTS. That is a factor in this new value. In addition, the special certificates issued by HA on resale (90% including BP) is unprecedented.

  Unlike 40 years ago, we now have the opportunity to take a mega OO Pedigree 5000+ book collection and entirely document every comic  book image front and back , every grade, every flaw and  all of that information will  be available on the internet instantaneously world wide for the ENTIRE collection going forward. This is unprecedented in our GA comic book world and the resulting prices will reflect that now and in the future. Yes RHG, there is a difference here. I do not believe any one collector can take over this collection, this is going to be very spread out initially among different collecting groups rather than a "dentist" cherry picking the collection. Sure some smart investor/dealers are going to go after the "impossible" 9.8 books as well as real TCBC's. So be it. But the fact that his collection and bidders are equal in terms of being able to get ALL the books, rather than it is who you know in the old day GA dealer mode, that accessibility coupled with a simply amazing website to navigate thru, rather within waiting one hour to see the final result for one book like other auction houses, is going to result in a different outcome compared to SF and Chuck both at the time of sale and in the future. That is why, RareHighGrade  the values appeared to be viewed differently than a few months ago and will be going forward. This is new territory for GA comic book collectors and your recognition  of that change is very perceptive.

Good points. Interesting enough, no one can do a truely accurate analysis on these sales. Personally I just doubt that the buyers of these books bother so much for all of the details that YOU - and MANY other of the experts from these boards - will put into your "due diligence". In order to buy one of the true gems from this collection you just have to throw in 4 to 10 times FMV. For the "regular" collector, this would be impossible or a once(!)-in-a-lifetime purchase at most. Veeeery entertaining show, nonetheless! 

[Terry JSA]

9 hours ago, Pickie said:

Good points. Interesting enough, no one can do a truely accurate analysis on these sales. Personally I just doubt that the buyers of these books bother so much for all of the details that YOU - and MANY other of the experts from these boards - will put into your "due diligence". In order to buy one of the true gems from this collection you just have to throw in 4 to 10 times FMV. For the "regular" collector, this would be impossible or a once(!)-in-a-lifetime purchase at most. Veeeery entertaining show, nonetheless! 

I agree with this! As someone who’s a “regular” collector, the books from the Promise Collection feel like once-in-a-lifetime opportunities just because of the rarity and scarcity some of the books have.

[Cat-Man_America]

12 hours ago, buttock said:

Not only that, but you can adjust the intensity of the picture at the top of it.  Everyone complaining about how intense the pictures are simply hasn't bothered to look at them.  

Would you mind expanding on this a bit.  I may be completely misreading the point you're making and if so, apologies in advance.  

Are you suggesting that complaints about the intensity of images are unwarranted because patrons can adjust the image to suit themselves?   Sorry, but this sounds a little like a Catch 22 scenario to me.  If the Heritage image is user adjustable, how does one determine from the images provided which adjustments reflect what the actual books will look like in-hand?  Note: FTR, I'm local to the Metroplex, so I can choose to go look at lots beforehand, but most bidders don't have that luxury.

Since HA is the final arbiter of lots being auctioned, I'm persuaded that bidders contemplating the payment of sizable sums should rightfully assume those images provided are exactly what they'll see in hand, no more, no less.

Perhaps in some distant dystopian future we'll be sold CGC/HA Kindle screens instead of actual books and provided a full array of tools to adjust the images to our liking while the actual books are stored on the moon at the prestigious Ray Bradbury Archives for Inflammable Collectibles.  Fortunately, that isn't today.

[SOTIcollector]

On 6/18/2021 at 6:57 PM, Mmehdy said:

5- True Crime 2 "Blast the Rats"...I remember when Bob Overstreet featured this in one of the "color" sections of the price guide, could of been on the SOTI issue..the book just exploded and everyone wanted  to own one. The Cover and contents are a total classic. What I do not understand at CGC 9.2 and  with the "promise" pedigree  and such a great GA book that it is still under guide..at like 3800 or something including "BP". This is the "sleeper" of the entire "Promise" auction. "Murder, Morphine, and Me....this is the poster child  of the SOTI and it is top copy by a mile..9.2 with one 7.5 way behind.....

Yes, it's the ultimate SOTI book. It was the only book that Wertham seems to have mentioned every chance he got.  It was in his 1948 Saturday Review of Literature article, the 1953 Ladies Home Journal article, and it had several mentions plus pictures in SOTI.  The "injury to the eye" panel was pictured on the front cover of the stand-alone reprint of the 1953 Ladies Home Journal article, "What Parents Don't Know About Comic Books,"  and so on.  Wertham's assertion was that comic books were dangerous for kids.  If he had to pick a "most dangerous" comic book, it seems apparent he would have picked this one.

I watched that ridiculously low price late in the auction and crossed my fingers. But I couldn't touch that final price.  I'll have to remain satisfied with my lowly 7.0.

 

 

 

[Mmehdy]

1 hour ago, SOTIcollector said:

Yes, it's the ultimate SOTI book. It was the only book that Wertham seems to have mentioned every chance he got.  It was in his 1948 Saturday Review of Literature article, the 1953 Ladies Home Journal article, and it had several mentions plus pictures in SOTI.  The "injury to the eye" panel was pictured on the front cover of the stand-alone reprint of the 1953 Ladies Home Journal article, "What Parents Don't Know About Comic Books,"  and so on.  Wertham's assertion was that comic books were dangerous for kids.  If he had to pick a "most dangerous" comic book, it seems apparent he would have picked this one.

I watched that ridiculously low price late in the auction and crossed my fingers. But I couldn't touch that final price.  I'll have to remain satisfied with my lowly 7.0.

 

 

 

When this auction is said and done, and the Monday morning  Promise  Auction quarterbacking  begins, they will look at this  first auction and point to that book and say....I should of bought it, that was a real "bargain". That book in 9.2 fully established Pedigree OO is not replaceable, for any price.

Edited June 25, 2021 by Mmehdy

[bpc3qh]

I'll be very interested in this book. I consider it a hugely underrated D.C. key, and Two-Face is, to my mind, #3 on the list of Batman's villains (behind only the Joker and Ra's al Ghul. Of course it won't come near the highest prices for the other Promise Detective books, but I'm very curious nonetheless to see how it does.

[tth2]

10 hours ago, Cat-Man_America said:

On 6/25/2021 at 11:14 AM, buttock said:

Not only that, but you can adjust the intensity of the picture at the top of it.  Everyone complaining about how intense the pictures are simply hasn't bothered to look at them.  

Would you mind expanding on this a bit.  I may be completely misreading the point you're making and if so, apologies in advance.  

Are you suggesting that complaints about the intensity of images are unwarranted because patrons can adjust the image to suit themselves?   Sorry, but this sounds a little like a Catch 22 scenario to me.  If the Heritage image is user adjustable, how does one determine from the images provided which adjustments reflect what the actual books will look like in-hand?  Note: FTR, I'm local to the Metroplex, so I can choose to go look at lots beforehand, but most bidders don't have that luxury.

Since HA is the final arbiter of lots being auctioned, I'm persuaded that bidders contemplating the payment of sizable sums should rightfully assume those images provided are exactly what they'll see in hand, no more, no less.

Unless Heritage know exactly which model of computer or screen you're using, and the settings you've got, how could they possibly ensure that?

[Cat-Man_America]

37 minutes ago, tth2 said:

Unless Heritage know exactly which model of computer or screen you're using, and the settings you've got, how could they possibly ensure that?

You'd have an excellent point except for two things: 1) Heritage uses exactly the same images in their auction catalogs, ...so when color is blown out on my monitor it's usually blown out in exactly the same fashion in the catalog, which means it's not difficult doing A/B comparisons with books in-hand, and 2) this theory assumes that an artist and movie fan wouldn't have his computer screen ...regardless of manufacture... set up for high quality definition, color, contrast, gray-scale, etc., IOW, it's a matter of calibration, not model.

My point being that when color saturation is an issue ...and I'm not suggesting it is in every case... this is a problem for Heritage to resolve on their end, not their bidders.

[Professor K]

Just throwing this out there, not implying anything. 5000 books takes up a lot of space. I wonder how the surviving brother stored them up in that attic. I don't think they ever got into that detail. And almost 70 years in the same attic. I guess the family never moved and it's also incredible how no one in the family handled them for all those years. I've seen a hoard of thousands of mostly Silver Age books stored untouched for about 30 to 40 years, time alone really took its toll on them. 

Edited June 26, 2021 by Professor Chaos

[LearnedHand]

On 6/24/2021 at 6:43 PM, Mmehdy said:

First of all lets look at the context of the situation down. If we related back to the direct sales at the time of SF and Church...with from Chuck or the Berkley boys of Bob, Bud, and John. The prices realized in this last Promise  auction were in line those sales 40 plus years ago. So,  I do not from a historical perspective see anything different this time compared to the last two times OO Pedigree collections were introduced. The advantage that the "Promise" collection has over all of those, is at the time we bought them we did not know they would obtain a Pedigree status. We bought them blind, and know they were unlike anything we had ever seen before in that quantity and so out of the gate, like Billy Wright, Promise does have a advantage historically.

 When I see the SF label or Church label that takes a leap of faith. There are a lot of dealers out there that say SF, Church etc without absolute proof. The Promise collection will have NO DOUBTS. That is a factor in this new value. In addition, the special certificates issued by HA on resale (90% including BP) is unprecedented.

  Unlike 40 years ago, we now have the opportunity to take a mega OO Pedigree 5000+ book collection and entirely document every comic  book image front and back , every grade, every flaw and  all of that information will  be available on the internet instantaneously world wide for the ENTIRE collection going forward. This is unprecedented in our GA comic book world and the resulting prices will reflect that now and in the future. Yes RHG, there is a difference here. I do not believe any one collector can take over this collection, this is going to be very spread out initially among different collecting groups rather than a "dentist" cherry picking the collection. Sure some smart investor/dealers are going to go after the "impossible" 9.8 books as well as real TCBC's. So be it. But the fact that his collection and bidders are equal in terms of being able to get ALL the books, rather than it is who you know in the old day GA dealer mode, that accessibility coupled with a simply amazing website to navigate thru, rather within waiting one hour to see the final result for one book like other auction houses, is going to result in a different outcome compared to SF and Chuck both at the time of sale and in the future. That is why, RareHighGrade  the values appeared to be viewed differently than a few months ago and will be going forward. This is new territory for GA comic book collectors and your recognition  of that change is very perceptive.

 

Appreciate your insight here, but it seems the entire focus of your post is about: (a) confirmation that these books are from a CGG-proclaimed pedigree and that this should mean something, and (b) assuming they have the same status as established pedigrees, and using this as a springboard to extrapolate their future value and status. Not sure any of this has much to do with the core question being raised - why the price explosion here, given the well-established and well-known scarcity of very high-grade GA books. 
 

Not to challenge anything you’ve said, but the fact is, the reason the Church and Reilly (and some others) books continue to command a premium is because of hobby acceptance.  With the Promise books, what’s evident so far is that, in a surreal point in our history, where people have more disposable income and collectible comic books are already generally selling at unprecedented or inexplicable prices, the Promise collection (so far) has been entirely consistent with this trend and in some cases even exceeded recent sale extremes.  This dynamic alone doesn’t necessarily cement that this collection will, over time, be given the same status as the Church or Reilly collections.  It also doesn’t mean that the craziness we just saw in the recent Signature auction will sustain after the world gets back to normal.  Or that the over-graded books will be deemed on par with the non-over-graded Church and SF examples.  
 

What we do know is that everyone already knows how scarce a GA 9.6 and 9.8 are and, on this basis, these rarities will likely continue to sell at reflective prices, regardless of whether the books have a designer pedigree label attached to them by a third-party grading company that’s supposed to be in the business of grading, not marketing ... or were originally available to a dentist, a baker, a candlestick maker, or the general populace.  
 

 

 

[batman_fan]

11 hours ago, bpc3qh said:

I'll be very interested in this book. I consider it a hugely underrated D.C. key, and Two-Face is, to my mind, #3 on the list of Batman's villains (behind only the Joker and Ra's al Ghul. Of course it won't come near the highest prices for the other Promise Detective books, but I'm very curious nonetheless to see how it does.

Looks like CGCs in-house pressers are doing the work on the promise collection.

[batman_fan]

11 hours ago, tth2 said:

Unless Heritage know exactly which model of computer or screen you're using, and the settings you've got, how could they possibly ensure that?

couldn't they send a technician to all of our houses to calibrate our monitors?  

[D84]

52 minutes ago, batman_fan said:

Looks like CGCs in-house pressers are doing the work on the promise collection.

I'm sure they are. At this point, I assume every book in a slab has been manipulated for maximum sale price.

[batman_fan]

Just now, D84 said:

I'm sure they are. At this point, I assume every book in a slab has been manipulated for maximum sale price.

For some reason CGCs in-house pressers seem to have more depressed staples than others pressing books.

[D84]

3 minutes ago, batman_fan said:

For some reason CGCs in-house pressers seem to have more depressed staples than others pressing books.

CCS has gone downhill since Matt no longer runs it.

[lou_fine]

3 minutes ago, batman_fan said:

4 minutes ago, D84 said:

I'm sure they are. At this point, I assume every book in a slab has been manipulated for maximum sale price.

For some reason CGCs in-house pressers seem to have more depressed staples than others pressing books.

That's because they don't have much time to do the pressing job properly and with the necessary due care because of the huge backlog that they have. 

And it supposedly doesn't really matter in the end anyways in terms of the grading because the CGC graders apparently know that this kind of defect is due to their own in-house partner pressing company, and as a result, don't really take this particular defect into account when it comes to the determination of the final grade for the book.  

Although some would call this an obvious conflict of interest, in the corporate business world, they simply call it the realization of business synergies in a vertically integrated industry.  

[lou_fine]

8 minutes ago, D84 said:

12 minutes ago, batman_fan said:

For some reason CGCs in-house pressers seem to have more depressed staples than others pressing books.

CCS has gone downhill since Matt no longer runs it.

This is most definitely true and sad to say, but a clear and classic example of the Peter Principle in play here.    

[Cat-Man_America]

6 hours ago, batman_fan said:

couldn't they send a technician to all of our houses to calibrate our monitors?  

Heck, just inform them you have a bunch of ungraded books that might be the next Promise Collection.  I bet they'd send a lot more than a technician down to help you calibrate.