What was your best comic book "find" or aqusition ever as a child?

[bminor]

Hands down it was when I acquired Avengers #1.

This story goes back to the early 1970's.

It was late winter, early spring, 30 or so miles north of Minneapolis, Minnesota, in Anoka, my home town.

The Avengers issue in question was acquired from my neighbor Steve Shannon. He was about ten years older than I and one day his Mom called me over to her house and gave me his pile of comics.

I was very happy, Our Army at War, G.I. Combat, Our Fighting Forces, and for some reason or another he had a single issue of the Avengers, and it was #1. Of the 150 comics that I had at that time it became my favorite. I did treasure that issue.

A few months or maybe a year later and our backyard would flood in the late winter when the snow would melt.(Minnesota) We always had a large pool of water 30-40 feet across back there. I was a young teenager, and for some reason or another my little brother, a year younger than I, got ticked off at me. Well, he new how much I liked comic books, and he knew how much I liked that Avengers #1. He grabbed it and ran into the backyard and chucked it out in the middle of that pool of water...







Luckily, though, it had been a cool night in that late winter or early spring when this happened and that pool of water had frozen over.  No damage done.
I am not sure what would have happened to my brother had it not been frozen over.


B.

[Yoc]

Holy crap, my heart skipped a beat there reading that B!
I thought for sure you were going to say 'and now I'm writing this from the graveside of my little brother...'


Great story!

[Yoc]

Let's see.  I don't have many stories of snagging a holy grail book or anything.

I did trade a med Byrne era X-Men (#144 maybe?) for a good condition X-Men #19 (April 1966).  We were both happy with the trade.

My only stroke of luck story is back in 1979-80 as a 12 year-old I bought my ONE and ONLY pack of NHL bubble gum cards.  I looked it over and packed it away in a box with the previous seasons.  I forgot about it for over 20 years until I saw Wayne Gretzky's rookie card on TV one day.  OMG!  I bought one pack with maybe 8 cards in it - AND I HAD THE ROOKIE CARD!

Now how is that for crazy lucky.  It's not mint, it's even printed off centre, but it's still his NHL rookie card.

[JonTheScanner]

In some sense my two best finds ever were buying THUNDER Agents #1 and Flash Gordon #1 (Al Williamson) off the stands.  Williamson instantly became my favorite artist. Tower for a short time became my favorite company. 

I did get some Golden Age Superman's (including Mr Mxyztplk (yeah that's the correct spelling for back then) meets Susie, but they weren't so special to me.

[narfstar]

At Ott's Trading Post in PA several years ago I got a Prize Frankenstein 26 and Pep 44 for a buck each

[KevinP]

It would have to be my first comic book.  For being a good boy at the dentist, my mom stopped at a drugstore and told me I could pick out any comic I wanted.  TUROK #5 was on the rack, and how could I resist DINOSAURS?

[larrytalbot]

My best comic book(s) find was a boxfull of golden age comics ... that I never got to read. 

It happened in the 4th or 5th grade at a school run by nuns.  A pal of mine had his eye on one of my favorite toys.  He knew I loved comics & made an offer I couldn't refuse: his comics collection for my toy. For some reason, rather than bringing the comics to my house, he brought them to the school for me.  I took the box to class & placed it under the desk at my feet & dreamed all period about those wonderful comics I'd rummage through when I took the box home.

Unbeknownst to me, a little brownnoser in the class had told teacher that I had the comics.  They were confiscated by the nun.  I never saw those comics again.  Tearful appeals to my parents failed - they didn't want to go against the nuns.  Now, this was the 1940s, & even before Wertham many educators - certainly the nuns - considered comic books a bad influence on kids.  But, to me & my friends comics were wonderful: they taught us to read, to appreciate art, to learn new things & to see new worlds (without the use of drugs.)

Losing that box of comics only sharpened my interest in & appreciation of comic books. And, thanks to this & other such sites, I'm able now to read many of those lost comics.

Many Thanks!

[Yoc]

Wow, Great story Larry!
It must be painful to recall but yes, I'm sure you've read many times that many here on the site.

[misappear]

Right around Christmas Day of 1962, I was in a drug store with my brother buying something or other, and I spotted a magazine rack filled with comics.  I had never been to a store that had a magazine rack of comics before, so I was quite stunned by all of the four-color goodies in front of me.  The only comics I had at home were some coverless cast-offs from my brother, which I read over and over. 

I asked if I could get a comic, and I was allowed the purchase Superman #159, an imaginary tale about Lois Lane being a super-woman on Krypton.  I say allowed because I had my own money, but in our family, you couldn't buy anything unless it was approved by a parent.  My brother didn't seem to think this was a major thing, so he let me buy the comic.  When we returned home, my mother was not pleased that I would waste my money on such a frivolous thing.  After some persuading on my part, I managed to convince my mother that I should be allowed to buy comics because they were cheap, and it was something new to read, as we didn't have a library in my neighborhood.  (side note: The possibility of my parents actually buying me a book, any book, was zero.  I never heard of The Hardy Boys or Tom Corbett, or anything like that until I was an adult!)  I was told that if I used my own money (25 cents per week allowance) I could buy comics.  Wow! I was hooked.

Imagine the frustration of standing in front of a comic rack every week and trying to decide which two to buy.  Expecially in the early 60's when so much stuff was coming out! 


This porbably explains my obsessive desire to buy books to this day.  Crazy stuff

[jfglade]

 In my case, the question covers a lot of area. I have a much older brother, so when he was in high school in the early fifties, I was learning to read and one of the tools my parents used were his comic books. The "Detective Chimp" series in "Rex the Wonder Dog" was something I found fascinating and was an early favorite. While I was in first grade, Ace the Bat-Hound was introduced which may not seem like a milestone now, but it was certainly a marker even for me at the age of six. I have vague recollections of the furor that led up to the comics code, and I remember being told that I wasn't allowed to look at horror comics or any of the "crime comics" which I think only amounted to "Crime does not Pay." I had to look at those when no one was looking at me, and didn manage to talk my brother into reading the text of the more puzzling and disturbing books to me. I remember a few stories from various EC books clearly and there are a few involving vampires with wings and shrunken heads (not in the same story) that I'm still trying to locate. I've also located a few stories in the collection here that I remembered, mainly from "Chamber of Chills," "The Thing," "This Magazine is Haunted," and "Adventures into the Unknown."


 A few marker events I do remember are: early "Manhunter from Mars" stories, Showcase #4, Space Cabbie stories, Dick Tracy comics from Harvey, Superboy Meeting Superman (a book someone brought me while I was in the hospital in second grade with what turned out to be the "Asiatic flu"), my first glimpse of the War Wheel in an issue of Blackhawk, the first issue of Fighting American with an origin story I found more disturbing than almost anything from horror comics, the first Batgirl story, issues of  Uncle Scrooge which made me want to get my hands on a Junior Woodchuck manual, the "Mole" story from an early issue of "Mad" before it went to magazine format, the strange locic of  Dick Briefer's "Frankenstine" which fascinated me, Ghost Rider which was simultanously a western and a horror comic. the first issue of Mad as a magazine, O.G. Wottaschnozzel stories in the back of Popeye Comics, Spooky the tough little ghost, Mary Jane and Sniffles in issues of Little Lulu, the first issue of Showcase featuring the Challengers of the Unknown,  and many others.
 
 "The Brave and the Bold" #28 was a big marker event, as was "The Flash of Two Worlds" story, and the reintrocuction of the Justice Society of America in a Flash story. In hindsight it was the first two part "Crisis" story in Justice Society of America which changed me from someone who read and traded comic books into a comic fan who collected comics.

[BobS]

1) Back in the mid-1960s I found X-Men 1-6 in 3 for a quarter comic packs at 7/11.
2) Back in the mid-1960s I traded a DC war comic to a classmate of my brother for Showcase 4.
3) I bought the ME Ghost Rider issue with Frazetta cover and other very nice / very nice condition early 1950s high demand comics for $1 each in the early '70s.
4) I bought Brave & Bold 28, 29, Showcase 25, 26, Flash 105, Green Lantern 1 and the 1st Showcase Green Lantern issue, etc. off the newstand, 10 cent each.
5) Back in my home town of Hopewell VA, in the mid 1960s I used to frequently see a particular older kid at the newstand buying all the super hero comics. I had hopes that he'd quit collecting and somehow I'd get his collection. Circa 1970, I met and became friends with a younger hometown comic collector and he told me that the older collector gave his entire collection to another kid who was selling the comics for 10 each. From those 2 guys, I got all the early JLA issues in excellent condition, also one Flash Showcase, all Challengers Showcase issues, Adam Strange Showcase, Space Ranger Showcase, and 100s of other 1950s - mid-1960s DC and Marvel comics.
6) I bought the 1st Space Adventures Captain Atom and several others off the newstand, 10 cents each. (I became a Ditko fan way back then.)
7) A older comic collector friend, with who I had traded comics circa 1960, gave me his collection including early Magnus Robot Fighter issues I didn't have.
A schoolteacher neighbor gave me the Cocomalt Buck Rogers BLB and a couple other BLBs -- all were in fantastic condition.
9) I have found several copies of the 1940s Barnaby hardback, cheap (50 cents maybe) at used book stores.
10) One of my uncles gave me a stack of (mostly) Dell westerns circa 1960. (Unfortunately, I was into Superman, Batman, Blackhawks, and other DC superheroes back then and I don't know what happened to the westerns.)
11) Circa mid-1960s. I bought a bunch of Golden Age comics for 50 cents to a dollar from a RB/CC ad. Among the comics I got were a half dozen or so early 1950s Captain Marvel, a mid-run Jumbo Comics, etc.
12) At a local con, early 1970s, I bought Marvel original art pages for 10 dollars per page, including a Kirby JIM (non-Thor) page, a Joe Sinnott JIM Thor page, and a non-superhero 'Ditko' page. (I'm less than satisfied with the 'Ditko' page -- it looks like Roussos inked it or maybe ghosted it entirely.)
13) At a local con, early 1970s, I bought a page of Kirby-Coletta (with Superman face by Murphy Anderson) Jimmy Olsen original art for 25 dollars.

[narfstar]

So do you still have the books Bob or like many of us let them go somewhere along the way?

[BobS]

So do you still have the books Bob or like many of us let them go somewhere along the way?

I have most of them as scans.

I sold most of the early Silver Age DC comics and bought my first PC.
I sold most of my Golden Age comics (many Police Comics and a few other Quality comics, early Batman including #6, 16, and 19, a few Flash Comics, Green Lantern, and All-American Comics, some WDC&S and Uncle Scrooge, etc.) to a friend after he took me to a topless bar and plied me with beer -- a couple beers is all it takes for me. <grin>
I sold my Showcase 4 (vg condition) at a local con circa 1980, for $125 and 5 or 10 Golden Age DC comics in partial trade.
I still have 2  copies of the 1940s Barnaby hardback. Are you a Barnaby fan too, Narf?
I still have all the 10 cent Space Adventures with Captain Atom, and most of the 12 cent Charlton 'action heroes' comics edited by Dick Giordano.
I still have my complete Gold Key Russ Manning Magnus Robot Fighter comics and about half the Dell and Gold Key Tarzans.
I still have a small collection of original art including the Kirby, Sinnott, and Ditko(?)/Roussos(?) pages -- and a Nick Cardy Aquaman page, a Sal Buscema Human Torch - Spiderman teamup page, a Boris magic marker sketch of a Conanesque barbarian, a Marie Severin Dr. Strange page,  a Sekowsky/Roussos Metal Men page, an Archie's Madhouse complete Capt. Sprocket story, a large page of C.C. Beck drawings that he did for FCA/SOB fanzine on the Mr. Mind serial, maybe 30 pieces of original comic strip art, and original drawings by Biljo White, Ronn Foss, Alan Hanley, Grass Green, and other fan artists, approx. 100 cels and corresponding pencil drawings from a Shamus Culhane Noah's Ark cartoon from the 1970s, a VIP panel cartoon (I became a VIP fan reading the panel cartoons in my dad's True magazines circa 1960), a Whitney Darrow New Yorker panel cartoon (not ABSOLUTELY POSITIVE that it is an original), a Jack Gauguin (Ace sf paperbacks artist) sketch, a Kelly Freas drawing of a woman with a big butt (he didn't like it and tried to persuade me into buying a different drawing instead -- but I liked it), a sketch by Andy Warhol's nephew in a children's book (Bubba the Cowboy Prince) he (James Warhola) illustrated. Etc.
I think I have the Buck Rogers Cocomalt BLB, and a Kayo (from Moon Mullins) Cocomalt BLB the school teacher also gave me. I also have a nice Tarzan BLB, and maybe a dozen or so other 1930s and 1940s BLBs, a few of 'em incomplete.
I still have a couple boxes of 1960s fanzines, a few more boxes of graphic novels, etc.
I still have a few Golden age comics, mostly coverless, or centerfold missing. I have a damaged GA Green Lantern 10. I have a very few $100 range Superman, Batman, World's Finest, etc.
I have a Buccaneers Sylvania TV giveaway comic (actually it supposedly cost 10 cents even tho it has a paper cover and is only 16 pages), which I'd scan and post, only I'd scan it as nom 'Free Palestine' and I'm not allowed to mention such here there and elsewhere, so I'm not motivated to scan it.  I also have a circa 1960 Buccaneers BLB, which I got back then when I was in the hospital with a swollen gland in my neck (caused by abscessed tooth, only the docs thought I had leukemia). I also got the larger Disney Zorro book while I was in the hospital then -- still have it and I really liked the story.
And blah blah blah... I tend to digress endlessly.

Thanks for replying to my post, Narf!

Best,
Bob the political Tourette Syndrome disorderly

PS. I also have a 1930s(?) Skippy giveaway semi-comic book (its mostly text with drawings rather than panels), a 1950s (?) Jewish Bible stories comic book (panels with text rather than word balloons) and probably a few other old comic book oddities I could scan for here but you folks have been so INCREDIBLY INIMICABLE to me due to my politics that I'm not motivated to scan and share 'em.

(I've scanned a couple old 'Tijuana bibles' but haven't posted 'em because of the ANIMOSITY displayed to me by someone here who BANNED me from another scanned comics site, where I would have posted links to them. I also have some 1960s-early 1970s unscanned 'underground' comix that I could scan.... Bud Plant/JVJ's Promethean Enterprises SHOULD be scanned. I have issue #5.)

[Yoc]

Knock it off Bob.
Play nice or you will be banned.
Fair warning.

[narfstar]

Promethean is copyright Bob so should not be scanned and distributed. The same for most of the other undergrounds. 1960's fanzines without copyright are fair game but it would be courtesy to ask the original publisher, if they can be located, for permission.