Edgar Church Mile high penciled dates on cover. 1 1

[jimbo_7071]

On 8/24/2024 at 9:10 PM, Jayman said:

This thread now makes me wonder about my copy…

Judging from the condition, I'd say it may not be an actual Church copy, but it could be. The Unseen #9 is graded as fine in Chuck's original catalog.

https://www.milehighcomics.com/catalog/page48big.html

Edited August 25 by jimbo_7071

[MrBedrock]

On 8/22/2024 at 3:49 PM, sfcityduck said:

I am most interested in who bought the Planets from Rowell, if he had them, and what happened to them next.

Why? Because I've heard that Jerry Buss once owned them. Buss sold part of his collection at Sotheby's in 1997, but the Sotheby catalog's I own are from 1991 to 1994. So I don't know if Buss owned the Planets. I do know Buss was buying comics from Verzyl back when he was still collecting. 

A decent amount of MH Planets trickled out on Heritage between 2019 and 2023. 

If anyone knows the answer, which I ask just out of curiousity, whether Jerry Buss owned the Planets (and whether they got auctioned in 1997) I'd appreciate it. 

Burrel offered me the Planet run for $4000 in 1981. I was heading to college and couldn't afford it. He then sold them and other runs to Geppi.

[TheLexLuthorCollection]

On 8/19/2024 at 5:24 PM, Robot Man said:

I bought this one directly from Chuck at Casual Con in the early '70's when he first brought the collection out for sale. Every book he brought was the Church copy. I bought a good size stack mostly of censorship books which I was into very heavily at the time. Yeah, I was "bottom feeding" even back then...

But of note. Years ago another copy popped up graded by CGC as a Church Mile High copy. I can only vouch for this one but of course after all this time have no concrete proof. Are there any other known dupes in the collection?

I did feel better when @adamstrange visited the junk pile several years ago and gave them the once over with a sniff test to confirm this one as some others I also bought that day. He has owned or handled more of the later ones than anyone I can think of. 

I purchased several Mile Highs from Chuck when the books came out.  I still have the original invoices from Chuck/Nannette.  A few years ago, I noticed "duplicate" copies of a couple of Mile High books that were in my possession being slabbed by CGC as "Mile Highs".  When I asked CGC about this, I was told they were "likely duplicates".  However, I had my suspicions.  Wisely or not, I decided to submit my Mile Highs together with copies of the origins invoices to CGC for grading with the hope that CGC would, in the future,  pause and do more due diligence if another duplicate came across their desk.  

[Robot Man]

On 8/25/2024 at 7:51 AM, TheLexLuthorCollection said:

I purchased several Mile Highs from Chuck when the books came out.  I still have the original invoices from Chuck/Nannette.  A few years ago, I noticed "duplicate" copies of a couple of Mile High books that were in my possession being slabbed by CGC as "Mile Highs".  When I asked CGC about this, I was told they were "likely duplicates".  However, I had my suspicions.  Wisely or not, I decided to submit my Mile Highs together with copies of the origins invoices to CGC for grading with the hope that CGC would, in the future,  pause and do more due diligence if another duplicate came across their desk.  

I paid cash at CasualCon for most of mine and got no receipts. Nothing big, key or expensive at the time. I wasn’t looking for “men in tights” books just stuff I liked that were off most people’s radar. I really can’t prove their authencity, or providence. Personally, I enjoy them a lot more raw and have no intention in selling them. So I guess I won’t have to prove it to CGC.

I tend to believe that there are none or VERY few duplicates in the collection. Why would Edgar have bought dupes?

I have no idea who CGC’s pedigree expert is now. Maybe Matt? Anyone doing this would probably have to been in the hobby many years. Back in the day, I would have respected Haspel. He was VERY well versed in pedigrees. 

[sfcityduck]

On 8/25/2024 at 8:43 AM, Robot Man said:

I paid cash at CasualCon for most of mine and got no receipts. Nothing big, key or expensive at the time. I wasn’t looking for “men in tights” books just stuff I liked that were off most people’s radar. I really can’t prove their authencity, or providence. Personally, I enjoy them a lot more raw and have no intention in selling them. So I guess I won’t have to prove it to CGC.

I tend to believe that there are none or VERY few duplicates in the collection. Why would Edgar have bought dupes?

I have no idea who CGC’s pedigree expert is now. Maybe Matt? Anyone doing this would probably have to been in the hobby many years. Back in the day, I would have respected Haspel. He was VERY well versed in pedigrees. 

You got credibility, you have good recollection, your stories are all consistent, and eyewitness are a type of proof. In fact, a witness may well be more persuasive than a piece of paper which can be forged. So, yeah, I think you can "prove" the provenance on your comics you recall buying from Chuck. Doesn't hurt that @adamstrange seems to think they have MH qualities, but I don't think that's essential to your case. Your case would work in the fine art world. What I would do for your kids is write down the succinct story someplace other than on this site -- an email to the kids or a written piece of paper stored behind the backing board for each relevant comic would do it. 

[Robot Man]

On 8/25/2024 at 9:05 AM, sfcityduck said:

You got credibility, you have good recollection, your stories are all consistent, and eyewitness are a type of proof. In fact, a witness may well be more persuasive than a piece of paper which can be forged. So, yeah, I think you can "prove" the provenance on your comics you recall buying from Chuck. Doesn't hurt that @adamstrange seems to think they have MH qualities, but I don't think that's essential to your case. Your case would work in the fine art world. What I would do for your kids is write down the succinct story someplace other than on this site -- an email to the kids or a written piece of paper stored behind the backing board for each relevant comic would do it. 

Thanks, I appreciate it. By now most of you folks know me pretty well. I have always strived to be truthful and as accurate as possible in my postings. These boards have been a wonderful place to me. The information I have tried to convey is nothing compared to what I have received from being here.

But at the end of the day, I’m just a little old fish in the pond of collecting. CGC doesn’t know me. I wouldn’t expect them or anyone else to accept my opinion as the truth. I’m just the temporary custodian of all this junk. Someday, it will be spread to new custodians.

And yes, I have pretty detailed notes on the backs of my boards with dates, pertinent information on things like first/origins, artists, notations of covers and yes, pedigree info. So my family and future owners can pass this this on.

[Yorick]

On 8/24/2024 at 6:10 PM, Jayman said:

This thread now makes me wonder about my copy…

If I owned that one, I'd dread February 3rd every year...

[RareHighGrade]

On 8/25/2024 at 8:43 AM, Robot Man said:

I tend to believe that there are none or VERY few duplicates in the collection. Why would Edgar have bought dupes?

There were a small number of duplicate books in the Church collection.  New Adventure 14 is an example - the MH catalog listed both a NM copy and a Fine copy.

[adamstrange]

On 8/25/2024 at 9:05 AM, sfcityduck said:

 Your case would work in the fine art world. 

Could not be further from the truth.

The art world places far more reliance on evidence of the work than on recollections.

Those wanting an introduction to how attribution is determined should check out "Fake or Fortune", a British show, episodes of which are available on youtube.

[sfcityduck]

On 8/25/2024 at 12:05 PM, adamstrange said:

Could not be further from the truth.

The art world places far more reliance on evidence of the work than on recollections.

Those wanting an introduction to how attribution is determined should check out "Fake or Fortune", a British show, episodes of which are available on youtube.

That show is generally evaluating works of art with gaps in the provenance. Here, there are living witnesses to all steps in the provenance. Chuck and RMan are both alive. Chuck's appearance at Casual Con is well-established. RMan is credible and his story holds up. In the fine art world to have an unbroken chain of provenance is pretty much all it takes.

Philip Mould is a great art detective. But he'd have no reason to question the provenance here. To the contrary, Mould specializes in trying to establish authenticity for works that have an unclear provenance. The first episode of that show is a good cautionary story (it was shown on PBS back then). Mould believed he had established the authenticity of the painting Banks of the Seine at Argenteuil which features a signature purported to be Claude Monet. His problem, he could not establish a chain of provenance for the piece from 1872 to 1918. He did have the chain after that. So he based his attribution on science and art criticism: a looks like a Monet and smells like a Monet test (similar to the "looks like a Mile High and smells like a Mile High" test) bolstered by modern imaging and chemical tests. Without provenance, to get the world of Monet collectors to accept the attribution Mould had to convince The Wildenstein Institute to accept the attribution. Worth noting the Institute was founded in 1970 by a fifth generation DEALER in art - Daniel Wildenstein. It publishes art books called "catalogue raisonnes" that purport to include every piece of art by a particular artist. That's its claim to fame. It jealously guards its reputation for being the definite source on authenticity. 

As an aside: Wildenstein views other publishers of "catalogue raisonnes" as rivals and has been known to disagree with the attributions of other institutions in order to attempt to undermine their reputations. It has suffered a bit of a black eye due to a Renoir that was authenticated by the Bernheim-Jeune Gallery included in their publication of Renoir's catalogue raisonnes. The Wildenstein Institute declined to accept the painting citing insufficient evidence. But "Fake or Fortune" publicized that in a private meeting with the head of the Wildenstein institute they were told it "would be thrilled to turn it [the Renoir] down." Fake or Fortune noted that the rivalry between the Wildenstein Institute and the Bernheim-Jeune was "now out in the open" and "ugly." 

This gets us back to how provenance is determined because the Monet was denied authentication by the Wildenstein Institute primarily on the basis of the "connoisseurship," which means nothing more than "opinion of" someone active in the art world. This was because Daniel Wildenstein who founded the Institute in 1970 said it was not authentic back in the day. Daniel Wildenstein never considered the evidence offered by Mould.

And that's what happens when a community of collectors bows down to a private actor as the determiner of authenticity in the absence of real provenance. Mistakes are made. 

Thankfully, in RMan's case, it will never get to that. He's got a very good chain of provenance. And this is a hobby where ordinary people can develop reputations which make them trustworthy sources of provenance. No reason why RMan should be a less trustworthy source on provenance than a guy who was what, a municipal water district attorney or family law attorney (or both)? Contrary to RMan's comment, in this hobby being an ordinary collector should not hurt. Could be argued that since RMan is not trying to sell his books he has an additional indicia of honesty - lack of self-interest. 

Sadly, as the Wildenstein Institute stories show, that is not always the case for the "private company experts" we create.

 

Edited August 25 by sfcityduck

[sfcityduck]

On 8/25/2024 at 12:05 PM, adamstrange said:

Could not be further from the truth.

The art world places far more reliance on evidence of the work than on recollections.

Those wanting an introduction to how attribution is determined should check out "Fake or Fortune", a British show, episodes of which are available on youtube.

One other thing: The art world places emphasis on the evidence of the work in the form of stylistic techniques (brush strokes, under drawing, etc.) and chemical makeup of the raw resources used to make the art (pigments, paper, parchment, canvas, etc.) that fits with other authenticated works. Here, there are no scientific tests for what is a Mile High copy. Sure a possible attribute of a Mile High copy is condition and smell. But we're almost 50 years removed from the discovery of the collection. Those attributes may not be present anymore. Which does not mean they are not from that "pedigree" (just a fancy comic book community term for "original owner collection") - just that they are lesser condition copies from that pedigree. So all we've got to go on for the books that did not get buried in an immaculately stored collection is the chain of provenance. And, again, its a lot easier to believe a chain that goes from Edgar Church to Chuck Rozanzki to Robot Man than just about any other chain of provenance I can think of.  The provenance on the MH Action 1 has at least one extra step over the chain for Robot Man.

The question of duplicates interests me. I'm sure there are some duplicate books just because of the sheer size of the collection and the fact he was trying to buy a lot of books without keeping any records or organizational scheme that I've heard of. What makes the Fiction House duplicates interesting is it makes me wonder: If I'm Rowe and I have a limited number of books I can buy and I want a complete set of various Fiction House titles, do I tell Chuck keep the dupe and I'll take just the best copy? If its me - that's what I'd do.

[batman_fan]

Watch "Made You Look". Good art scam selling "newly discovered piece"

[Griff]

On 8/24/2024 at 10:21 AM, walclark said:

This is quite the interesting discussion about pedigrees that are either fake, missed, or mislabeled.

I bought this from Heritage. It is labeled as the Church copy by CGC. I saw the "real" Church copy (complete with coding) in Verzyl's booth in Chicago the next year. Unfortunately, I paid up for my copy, and while it is possible that there were two copies of this book in the collection, I think it is more likely that my copy is mislabeled. Thankfully, paying the premium for a Church copy of a random Don Winslow doesn't cost too much. Not a well-loved title.

Not well loved by many I think you and I are the only ones collecting them, and I'm coming back from a 10 year break from actively picking up books. I'm Jealous of your DWotN collection

[TheLexLuthorCollection]

On 8/25/2024 at 8:43 AM, Robot Man said:

I paid cash at CasualCon for most of mine and got no receipts. Nothing big, key or expensive at the time. I wasn’t looking for “men in tights” books just stuff I liked that were off most people’s radar. I really can’t prove their authencity, or providence. Personally, I enjoy them a lot more raw and have no intention in selling them. So I guess I won’t have to prove it to CGC.

I tend to believe that there are none or VERY few duplicates in the collection. Why would Edgar have bought dupes?

I have no idea who CGC’s pedigree expert is now. Maybe Matt? Anyone doing this would probably have to been in the hobby many years. Back in the day, I would have respected Haspel. He was VERY well versed in pedigrees. 

 

On 8/25/2024 at 8:43 AM, Robot Man said:

I paid cash at CasualCon for most of mine and got no receipts. Nothing big, key or expensive at the time. I wasn’t looking for “men in tights” books just stuff I liked that were off most people’s radar. I really can’t prove their authencity, or providence. Personally, I enjoy them a lot more raw and have no intention in selling them. So I guess I won’t have to prove it to CGC.

I tend to believe that there are none or VERY few duplicates in the collection. Why would Edgar have bought dupes?

I have no idea who CGC’s pedigree expert is now. Maybe Matt? Anyone doing this would probably have to been in the hobby many years. Back in the day, I would have respected Haspel. He was VERY well versed in pedigrees. 

I agree that there were very few duplicates in the Mile High collection.  I still have a copy of Chuck's original ad in the Comic Book Buyers' Guide (TPG) for the Mile Highs and for the titles that I collect. I saw zero duplicates.  Perhaps duplicate copies were sold through private sale before the ad came out???  Anyway, since then, I have seen a few books for the titles that I collect, put up for  auction that were certified by CGC as Mile Highs.  I found this odd since the Mile Highs were in my possession and I had purchased my books from Chuck when the TBG ad came out.  About 8 years ago, I decided to submit my Mile Highs along with their provenance documentation to CGC for grading and pedigree certification.  Since then, I have not seen duplicate Mile High copies of the books that I had certified.  At the end of the day,  determining if an item is a "pedigree" without provenance, is risky and challenging.  It would be interesting to see a CGC census of pedigree books to gauge how pervasive duplicates are.

[buttock]

On 9/1/2024 at 9:35 AM, TheLexLuthorCollection said:

 

I agree that there were very few duplicates in the Mile High collection.  I still have a copy of Chuck's original ad in the Comic Book Buyers' Guide (TPG) for the Mile Highs and for the titles that I collect. I saw zero duplicates.  Perhaps duplicate copies were sold through private sale before the ad came out???  Anyway, since then, I have seen a few books for the titles that I collect, put up for  auction that were certified by CGC as Mile Highs.  I found this odd since the Mile Highs were in my possession and I had purchased my books from Chuck when the TBG ad came out.  About 8 years ago, I decided to submit my Mile Highs along with their provenance documentation to CGC for grading and pedigree certification.  Since then, I have not seen duplicate Mile High copies of the books that I had certified.  At the end of the day,  determining if an item is a "pedigree" without provenance, is risky and challenging.  It would be interesting to see a CGC census of pedigree books to gauge how pervasive duplicates are.

Out of curiosity, were yours coded and the supposed duplicates not coded?  

[TheLexLuthorCollection]

On 9/1/2024 at 11:42 AM, buttock said:

Out of curiosity, were yours coded and the supposed duplicates not coded?  

Not sure what you mean by coded?  Do you mean the pencil marks written on the books by the retailer to identify the distributor, etc.?

[buttock]

On 9/4/2024 at 7:13 AM, TheLexLuthorCollection said:

Not sure what you mean by coded?  Do you mean the pencil marks written on the books by the retailer to identify the distributor, etc.?

Yes

[TheLexLuthorCollection]

On 9/4/2024 at 7:01 AM, buttock said:

Yes

For some reason, my Mile Highs from Rozanski do not have the pencil codes.  They (DC's) are mainly from the mid-forties and up.  Almost all are 9.6 or 9.8's.  I don't know if Church started going to a different retailer who did not code his books or the retailer stopped coding the books.  Nevertheless, I still have the original invoices from Mile High which were hand written (presumably by Chuck or Nannette) which I submitted to CGC as proof of provenance.  Oddly enough, there is one book that I purchased at San Diego CC a few years back that was certified by CGC as a Mile High from this period.   That book has a "D" squiggled in pencil on the cover.  I now believe that book is a fake since it was graded a 9.4 but in Chuck's original ad in the TBG, it was no better than a VF.

[adamstrange]

On 9/4/2024 at 7:15 PM, TheLexLuthorCollection said:

They (DC's) are mainly from the mid-forties and up.  

Won't typically have a code until some in the 1950s.

On 9/4/2024 at 7:15 PM, TheLexLuthorCollection said:

Almost all are 9.6 or 9.8's.

Cool.

On 9/4/2024 at 7:15 PM, TheLexLuthorCollection said:

I now believe that book is a fake since it was graded a 9.4 but in Chuck's original ad in the TBG, it was no better than a VF.

Could have been pressed or a missed grade by Chucky.

[RareHighGrade]

On 9/4/2024 at 4:15 PM, TheLexLuthorCollection said:

Oddly enough, there is one book that I purchased at San Diego CC a few years back that was certified by CGC as a Mile High from this period.   That book has a "D" squiggled in pencil on the cover.  I now believe that book is a fake since it was graded a 9.4 but in Chuck's original ad in the TBG, it was no better than a VF.

 

On 9/4/2024 at 4:58 PM, adamstrange said:

Could have been pressed or a missed grade by Chucky.

I've seen several examples of CGC giving a Church book a higher grade than it was given in the MH catalog.