I have a number of e-mails asking me to comment on the news (as is reported here and elsewhere) that some brothers in Northern California found a copy of Superman #1> in an attic and that it was just auctioned off for $9.12 million bucks. I’m not sure what kind of comment anyone could have about this except…
“Wow! That’s a lot of money to pay for an old comic book!”
Yes, it’s a record price for a comic book…and it will continue to be a record price until someday in (probably) the near future when someone sells one for $9.13 million dollars…or maybe even $9.12 million plus a dime. It might not be another copy of Superman #1. It might be a copy of Batman #1 or Action Comics #1 or Detective Comics #27 or one of several other rare, groundbreaking issues.
It could even be this same copy of Superman #1 being sold by this buyer to another buyer for a higher price. That’s probably why the top bidder paid what he or she paid for it — so they can resell it some day for a neat ‘n’ tidy profit. You certainly don’t shell out that kind of cash because “I always wanted to read the first issue of Superman.” If you yearned to do that, there have been reprints aplenty and you can read them without risking a crease or stain on a $9.12 million dollar comic book.
One bent corner on that book could lower its value a half-million bucks…which is why it will probably never be removed from its plastic prison. That is, unless it is necessary to have an expert do that very, very carefully to certify all its pages are present, intact and up to the graded standard of condition. In many ways, it has ceased to even be a comic book. It’s an item of value like a rare painting or car or coin or trading card or postage stamp.
As immersed as I’ve been in comic books all my life — well, almost all my life — I’ve never developed any real interest in what old ones sell for except to say, as I’ve had to much of my collecting life, “I guess that one’s out of my price range!” I don’t even track the value of old comic books I own. I still see them as something to read and enjoy and in many cases, to remind me of how much I loved them when I was younger. I understand completely why, when they reach the point where someone will pay serious money for them, it’s difficult to not think of them as merchandise or investments but I’m just not there.
I do, however, have a second comment one could make about the sale. It occurred to me while I was writing the above and it goes like this…
“Boy, I wish I’d had the presence of mind to buy up a lot of those back when Cherokee Book Shop and other stores were selling them for $100!”
I go back that far…but thoughts like that are pointless. I didn’t have the presence of mind then nor did I have a couple hundred dollars. And if I had had the money and I had bought, say, a dozen copies, I might very well have sold them when someone offered a few thousand for each. I don’t know. By then, they would have been items of value, not comic books, and I’d probably have them in a vault somewhere, not in my home.
I do know that a lot of us were skeptical of many news stories back in the sixties that, shockingly, someone had paid $500!!! for a copy of Batman #1 or someone had paid $800!!!!! for a copy of Action Comics #1. There were stories in the news like that every few months and I’m reasonably certain that some of those sales were bogus. Imagine two young comic collectors (and speculators) named Tom and Jerry…
They pool their resources and buy a copy of Superman #1 for, say, $500. This was back when you could buy a copy of Superman #1 for $500 which, of course, I didn’t. Then Jerry alerts the media that he just purchased a copy of Superman #1 from Tom for the record-setting price (and therefore precedent) of $1000. That was the kind of story newspapers and local TV stations used to jump on.
And what did Tom and Jerry accomplish by this? Well, that comic they paid $500 for was now worth more than double that.
I’m not saying any particular sale of a vintage comic book was a sham and the recent headline-making Superman #1 sale certainly wasn’t. It was done through Heritage Auctions, a most-reputable establishment. But I’m pretty sure the early escalation of prices for old comics included some phony stunts like the one I described. And they needn’t have bothered because those items of value were going to be bid up to astronomical valuations just by sheer honest demand.
That escalation started with someone’s love of the contents and for what a copy of, in this case, Superman #1 meant in the history of a beloved character. But once it passed some impressive amount in the Price Guide, it became a matter of bragging rights — “Hey, look what I own!” — and what the owner thinks the next guy will pay for it…which is why maybe a change in terminology is in order. It really isn’t a comic book any longer. A comic book is something that people read.
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