Currently processing a nice collection of books, ranging from the Golden Age into the mid-1980s. Highlight of the collection so far (though I don't see much surpassing this): a couple hundred original E.C. comics, including full runs of Weird Science, Weird Fantasy, Shock Suspenstories, and the 3-D books (all two of them), and near-full runs of Tales from the Crypt, Haunt of Fear, and Vault of Horror...plus a handful of Mads and other random E.C.s. I'll let you folks know when they're available for sale.
However, what I'm most excited about in this collection are the issues of Nancy & Sluggo and Fox and the Crow. I'm not letting you know when these are available for sale, because I'm keeping them. So there.
(I should also make up some kind of "pedigree" name for this collection, like the, I don't know, "Seaside Funnybooks in Cardboard Boxes Collection," and price them accordingly. Plus, I can tell exciting stories about how the collection was acquired: "Well, one day, a guy called and asked if we wanted to buy his comics, and we said 'sure, let us take a look at 'em,' and we saw he had some pretty good stuff, so we bought them. The end.")
When we were kids, my brother acquired a modest collection of old comics--already old in 1981 or so--that sat around upstairs til my parents finally moved this summer, 2002. (I salvaged one or two of them.) There were two Archie books, I think, and one Richie Rich; one Incredible Hulk collection, one compelling Batman story in six issues, one dark and enthralling issue of the X-Men, and the first fifteen or so issues of Spider-Man in three volumes. Oh, I forget, there were also some DC collections: a collection of magical sports stories, a collection of team-ups involving Superman and the standard rotation of allied heroes, and one collection of villain-origin stories; all stuff from the fifties and sixties, I'd guess. All these, I read so many times I could probably reconstruct their stories and much of their dialogue with fair accuracy.
Hello Bryan...I was googling around and did a search for my own name (Roy Bishop) in Hamilton, Ontario. To my surprise I stumbled onto your website.
Years ago when I was about 12 I joined the Archie Fan Club. I wrote to them and gave them a short blurb of how much I liked their TV show on saturday mornings. They published my comments in one of their comic books and I won a cash prize of $1.00...yee ha! Well, jump ahead about 38 years to now. I still have the letter and envelope they sent to me and my original copy of Archie #191. It's one of my childhood joys.
They also spelled my street address incorrectly but no problem. Even today my brother and his wife live at [the same address]. I am still in Hamilton about 5 minutes from the home I grew up in.
I wrote to a pen pal who lived in England because of my mention in that comic. We wrote letters for a few years afterwards.
Bryan, Thanks a bunch for putting my name and address on your webpage. It brings back many good memories.
Have a great day. Roy Bishop.
1) Brainiac
In April 1958 a storyline began involving an alien named Romado, who is clearly a prototype for Brainiac, who would first appear in Action Comics #242 (July 1958). Romado has a computer-enhanced mind, and collects miniature cities in bottles from around the galaxy. He has the shrunken Kryptonian city of Dur-el-va, which he traps Superman in.
2) Bizarro
Bizarro appears in the strips in September of 1958. Though Superboy #68 (cover date of October 1958) hit the stands earlier, this story was actually written first. In this early version, Bizarro has a "B" on his chest. What is creepy is that Superman convinces Lois to betray Bizarro and trick him into getting exposed to his version of kryptonite, which "kills" him. (Though as Superman says, how can you kill a shadow...)
3) Metallo
December 15, 1958 begins a new story of Professor Vale saving a patient from a horrible accident, and having to put in a mechanical heart, etc. to save him. He is powered by uranium pellets, with the possibility of some other rare mineral....I haven't read much of the story yet, as the year ends, but it is clearly the first Metallo story. This is winter 1958. In the comics, he first appears in Action Comics #252 (May 1959)
"You are too overwhelming, too much like a bomb. I think you must be one of these Supermen one reads about. You would want your own way and nothing but your own way. I expect it's through having to be constantly moving people on out in Hong Kong, and all that sort of thing. Now Freddie will roll through hoops and sham dead, and we shall be the happiest pair in the world. I am much too placid and mild to make you happy. You want someone who would stand up to you."___
Dear Editor: I really enjoy your letter column, but the Legion Outpost picture is out of date. Colossal Boy is shown wearing a red suit instead of a green one and Light Lass has the insignia she used when she was Light Lass.
David Ouellette
Essex, Ontario
Dear Editor: If Perry White sent Clark Kent to a foreign country, such as Canada, on an assignment, how could Clark get a passport, inasmuch as he has no birth certificate, not having been born on this planet? I know he could fly across the border as Superman, but wouldn't that be too risky?
Edward Katz
Quebec
Alex Fedyk
Vancouver, B.C.
Roma Pohorecky
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Kevin Ferris
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Another habit: collecting names and addresses of Canadians who wrote to comic books in the 1950s and 60s.
The Canadian Comic Fan Project, Part One
If you are out there please contact me! From Betty and Veronica Summer Fun, 1967.
Eileen Boutcher
194 Pelham St
Lunenberg, Nova Scotia
age 11 & 1/2
David Zuckerman
2278 Noel St
Montreal 9, PO
age 12
"It's both heart-rending and nauseating that the national impulse would be to seek solace and reinforcement at this moment, in, for instance, Superman as a representation of moral action. I can't claim to be an expert on the cast of Marvel Comics, or, in fact, to know much of anything about any of them, but nonetheless, they're present even in my inhospitable consciousness. So it seems that they must perfectly express something about our culture.
And I suppose that what it is they so perfectly express is our desire to understand our disproportionate power as power that's unambiguously and inevitably used for the benefit of humanity. Even in regard to the Unites States of the Second World War, this view might have merited a raised eyebrow or two, but now it's shockingly self-deceiving at the least, and pretty brutal. It seems to me that not only is there an enormous longing for what we imagine to have been a time of innocence in our recent history, but that there's also a sort of willful childishness, or, to put it another way, a self-congratulatory coyness in the way imagination is collecting around these figures now. Even the nostalgia doesn't seem quite authentic. It's as if there were something endearing, something loveable, about trying to maintain this view of ourselves as childishly innocent and good even though we know very well that it's not accurate – something gallant and charming. This is a form of bullying, in my opinion; a demonstration that we can afford (temporarily, anyhow) to hold on to these consoling charades of power-with-integrity, however degraded, even laughable,we understand them to be.
"It's the super-hero syndrome, exactly. [...] It's out of our power to solve. It's defeatism --you can do nothing about it. It's like "I surrender." The only way I can solve my problem is with a super-hero, or an astronaut, or somebody from outer space, or God helping me. And this is like throwing your gloves on the floor. When you have to fight, then you think you have a solution, but when you don't want to fight any more, that's when you go to total despair and then you go looking for some super-heroes to solve your problems. Which is very bad. I don't think those movies give any good messages. That the only love you find is with mermaids or with things from outer space. No! No! No! Reality is what can save you."
