SA Collecting

[Silver Surfer]

Might have to break up that Thor run soon.

[october]

Post deleted by r1970d

 

I'm no longer a completionist - I buy on a whim, and I look for the best athlete available at any given purchasing moment . . .

 

 

[paperheart]

those early showcases in 9.2 and better should be no problem

 

whoops, typo- that should have read showcase 34-86. but i will take zaid's #4 9.2 when he has a 50% off sale.

[the blob]

pretty much anything in any grade if the price is right.

 

except perhaps heroes inc.

[uclapeterg]

Might have to break up that Thor run soon.

 

[arexcrooke]

Might have to break up that Thor run soon.

[That Ron Dude]

I started by completing the Strange Tales comic from 101 to 169. I already had many of them and the rest didn't cost much. I then filled the FF's down to the low twenties. Again, I had many of them already. Filling them down to #1 was expensive but with my low end wheeling and dealing I did it. I am now 32 comics short of a full Marvel silver age. About twenty of these will cost me significant dough ($50 to $500) and the rest will be in the $10 range. Though I am in excellent health and only in my early '50's I may still die before getting them all. I have instructed my wife to write on the tombstone "All but Six" should I die with the collection incomplete.

[tth2]

I have instructed my wife to write on the tombstone "All but Six" should I die with the collection incomplete.

 

Which books are you still missing? You should post the list here, it worked for Ian Levine and his collection.

[arexcrooke]

I have instructed my wife to write on the tombstone "All but Six" should I die with the collection incomplete.

 

Which books are you still missing? You should post the list here, it worked for Ian Levine and his collection.

The Wheels are in motion again.

[tth2]

I have instructed my wife to write on the tombstone "All but Six" should I die with the collection incomplete.

 

Which books are you still missing? You should post the list here, it worked for Ian Levine and his collection.

The Wheels are in motion again.

I can't see any SA Marvel being hard enough to find (assuming grade is not an issue) that it would generate that kind of controversy.

[Red Hook]

I have instructed my wife to write on the tombstone "All but Six" should I die with the collection incomplete.

 

Funny, I thought John Wayne Bobbit had already reserved that particular epitaph.

[That Ron Dude]

Thanks for the feedback.

 

The main block in finishing my collection is not finding the books but paying for them.

 

My main sources of funding are two-fold-- selling out the books that I swear I will never look at again even if I live to be one hundred, and by creating logos for various businesses. All the money I make at my day job goes to household expenses. (I must add that this is my choice, not my wife's). In the last year I sold about $2000 in comics, mostly in the $1 to $10 range. I hope to have similar luck in the approaching year. In the past year I also did logos for a woman's health club, a computer firm, a charitable foundation and a restaurant.

 

I am currently looking for an Amazing Spider-man #3 or #4 on Ebay in about 2 to 2.5. I think that I will be able to target an X-Men #2 after that. By that point I will be down to about $150 American in the contingency fund which will sit there until something comes up that I can't say no to.

 

Last weekend I scored Amazing Spider-Man 59, X-Men 9, X-Men 28 and X-Men 55.

 

The ones that I still need that will really cost me are Spiderman 3,4,6,8,9,12,and 13 X-Men 1,2,3,5,8 Tales of Suspense 39,40,41 and Journey into Mystery 84, 86.

 

Ron

[runningman]

I have instructed my wife to write on the tombstone "All but Six" should I die with the collection incomplete.

 

Funny, I thought John Wayne Bobbit had already reserved that particular epitaph.

 

 

[followtheleader]

Wow,

 

Seriously an impressive task. I'd be happy to finish even one of my titles. Let alone every Marvel Silver Age book!!!!

 

How did you already have a lot of these? From your childhood? Or collecting throughout the years?

 

Pat

[That Ron Dude]

When I was a young man of about 20 I was deeply embarrassed that I still collected comics while all the other guys were going out with girls. I was also broke, pursuing a Fine Arts degree in university. These two factors combined to get me to sell off Amazing Fantasy #15, Amazing Spider-man from 1 to 75, the first 25 Avengers, all six Hulks and many other key issues for very little money. I also sold off the common books of the day which weren't very good, like Iron Man #1 and Sub-Mariner #1 for about a dime a piece. I think I got a twenty bucks for a box of these late silver age Marvels (not a comic box though, they hadn't been invented yet).

 

What I kept, were the comics that were worthless but of high quality. I held on to my Silver Surfers, the F.F.'s in the 40's and 50's, Steranko stuff, Adams X-Men and Green Lantern/Green Arrow, Dan Adkins books, Colan Dr. Strange, Wrightsonjonesandkaluta stuff, Warren stuff, Spanish stuff-- I'm sure you get the idea. I kept a hundred or so comics.

 

I continued to accumulate though I would rarely pay more than face value for a comic book. I bought back issues in used bookstores and in Toronto area comic shops. A few years later I began to make money lettering comic books. I lettered a lot of black and white comics in the 80's for between $10 and $30 dollars a page. Sometimes when the publisher was truly broke I would accept payment in comics. This did a lot to fill out my Marvel's.

 

Then, one fateful day, I got FF's 25 and 26 for my birthday. Those were the first comics I ever got that cost much-- $43 between them, now that I think of it. As time went on, people kept buying me comics as special occasion gifts.

 

I really wanted an FF1. My wife had taken my original Wally Wood off the wall and I hadn't even noticed for two years. So I sold it on ebay and it payed for the FF1. I then did a couple of logos for a friend's businesses for free. He conspired with my wife to get me an Am.Fan.#15. I'd fill in other issues using money from commerical art sales, focus group participation and birthdays. I rarely used family income from my day job.

 

The key moment was the purchase of FF's 25 and 26. That was almost exactly 10 years ago. That started me buying.

 

My first complete run was Strange Tales from 101 to 169. It was inexpensive to put together. Even 101 only cost me $42.50 at a local comic store-- (about $30 Am. at the time). My next run was the Fantastic Four 1-416. I got most of the ones after 110 from quarter bins, which back in the 20th Century were very much like dollar bins are today.

 

Between 1970 and 2005 I never parted with a comic. I didn't want to repeat my folly of ditching the comics that could again mean so much to me.

 

Anyway, in the last year I was able to look at my accumulation of comics and finally say to myself that it is not like 1970 anymore. The market had completely changed. What's more I had thousands of comics that I would never look at again even if I lived to be 100. I began selling them and I have made a couple of thousand dollars this way, about half locally and about half through the mails. All that has been returned to other comic people as I have moved to complete the Marvel collection.

 

After buying a comic, and reading it of course, I slap a sticker on the back indicating what I paid for the comic and the year I acquired it. When the collection is complete I will ad up the total cost. Even recently, I checked out some of the prices on the comics and found the cost of my purchases to be surprisingly low, especially when comparing them to the enjoyment I have gotten from the comics themselves. I mean, if I go out to a medium priced restaurant with my wife and another couple and pick up the bill, the cost is usually about the same as my Amazing Spider-man 5, CGC'd at around good. I'll forget the meal in a day or two but a comic high seams to last me for months.