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Howdy! I want to share a story with you today, but first I need to mention that Will Moulton busted his butters on Friday to get some really nice back issues graded and entered for you. They are listed after my (long!) Mile High Comics 53rd Anniversary story. If you want to skip past my missive and immediately start shopping, please do so! All of the comics listed ant the end of this newsletter are available to you at 60% off right now when you utilize our ongoing NEWYEAR! codeword. Only new issues, a few variants and restored comics, and our professionally-graded items are exempt. 53 Years Ago... I am feeling profoundly contemplative this morning, as I am reflecting waaay back to 53 years ago, and remembering my overwhelming visceral excitement as my mother drove me into downtown Colorado Springs. Our destination on that gray and chilly Friday evening was the beautiful art deco Colorado Springs City Auditorium, a magnificent old venue with a soaring interior that was booked (for many decades) on the first weekend of each month for the monthly Colorado Springs Antiques Fair.
In our present-day world of instant access via the Internet to an astoundingly broad spectrum of collectibles of all kinds, venues like the Antiques Fair have (at best) only a marginal reason to exist. But, in the pre-Internet years of 1969/1970, I was absolutely bedazzled when I first entered that amazingly vibrant marketplace to see well over 100 booths filled with an incredibly diverse spectrum of cool popular culture items being offered, most from the first half of the twentieth century. What made that morning's journey of particular importance was that I had just gone deeply into debt in order to purchase my first big comic book collection. To explain, two months earlier, I met a boy who was my own age (14) while wandering the aisles of the Antiques Fair. He saw me buying some older comics at a booth, and casually mentioned to me that he had a bedroom overflowing with comic books that he would very much like to sell. He said that I could have all of them for three cents each, but only if I paid him six cents each for his annuals and other double-sized issues. I took his amazing offer to my mom, and asked her if she might be willing to help me. Even though I was by all common definitions quite young, I had actually been running my own business enterprises since I was six years old, first braving Michigan's intensely bitter winters to shovel people's walks for money, and later selling fruit door-to-door from my little red wagon, and even surreptitiously netting crawdads from nearby cemetery retention ponds to sell to bait shops. No matter where I was, I always figured out some way to make money. As I hit my very early teens, I discovered the joys of trading and selling stamps, coins, and (ultimately) old comic books with my school friends. This seemingly innate transactional predisposition led to my having socked away $300 (equal to $2,400 in today's purchasing power) in US government savings bonds by the time that I was twelve, and to also have built (on a tiny allowance of only $1 per month...) a near-complete 1961-1969 Marvel Comics collection.
My earlier accomplishments not withstanding, what I viscerally hungered for in late-1969 was to join the ranks of the dealers at the Antiques Fair by renting my own 8' table, and thus creating a business out of selling my own surplus collectibles. The owners of the Antiques Fair, Harvey and Doris Black, refused my initial pleas, however, as they viewed me as being too youthful and inexperienced to take in the responsibility of running a booth at their very prestigious monthly event. The catalyst that changed their minds was my mother's fear. By the time I hit my early teens, my mother's latent PTSD (inflicted upon her as she survived the horrors of the firebombing of our entire village by the American Air Force in 1944/1945) had become increasingly obvious. She was lucid far less often, and delusional way too much. So much so that I had no choice but to avoid her whenever possible, or else find myself being forced to sit at our tiny kitchen table for many long hours, while she chain-smoked and prattled on endlessly about completely irrelevant topics, such as the longterm benefits of term life insurance. The one thing that consistently brought my mom back to reality was buying and selling her beloved coins. She began collecting rare coins in postwar Germany (1945-1948), and had built quite a personal collection (plus an inventory of extras) by the time that we emigrated to Michigan, in 1960. Her coins not only helped her to make a little side income that helped to supplement my stepfather's meager monthly pay ($275), but also provided her with some degree of personal security, as relations between her and my stepfather were frequently quite troubled. That having been said, in late-1969 my stepfather had put my mother into a massive funk of depression by demanding that she co-sign with him in purchasing a newly-built house in the subdivision of Southmoor, a low-cost tract housing development that was (literally) on the wrong side of the tracks from nearby Widefield. My mother‘s wartime experiences left her totally terrified of being in debt, so buying that house for the (seemingly) staggering sum of $17,450 paralyzed her with a fear that was so overwhelming that she told me that she actually threw up in our family car on the way home from the closing.
I mention my mother's trauma and aversion to debt to provide some measure of context to her helping me to get started. Simply put, my asking her to borrow money could not have come at a worse time. The down payment on the house in Southmoor had required all of her savings but about $200. The collection that I was buying was (depending on the final count) was going to cost me at least $100, and perhaps more. It ended up being $140. By loaning me that huge sums of money she was depleting almost her entire margin of safety, which constituted all of the liquid assets that she had remaining in the world. Wow. Making matters even worse (for her) was my insistence that we absolutely HAD to drive to that kid's house early on that Sunday morning, January 4th, 1970. That was right after our chance Saturday meeting at the Antiques Fair, during which I had eagerly chatted with the seller about buying his comics. I have no idea why, but I had a terrifying premonition that Saturday evening that this awesome collection would be purchased by someone else, and that I would thus be left with nothing. Suffice it to say, that dismal thought totally freaked me out. That having been said, I was typically a fairly obedient son, but on that particular Sunday morning I was beyond pushy, totally insisting that my mom drive us ten miles to Colorado Springs in our ancient 1959 Chevy Bel Air sedan (with balding tires) through a sometimes blinding snowstorm/ice storm in order for me to acquire that eagerly-anticipated comics collection. Really and truly, greater love has no mother than to give up the very last of her life savings, and then to also tremulously drive down an icy highway, solely to satisfy her son's insane passion for old comic books. Long story made a bit shorter, we managed to get safely to that boy's house on that snowy Sunday morning, and I then filled our old Chevy with many (many!) boxes, containing (in total) 3,500+ Silver Age comics. My mother gave the seller's mom her precious $140, and she then drove us the ten miles back to our home. Three afterthoughts. First, my mom was all business, so she required that I actually sign a one-year promissory note to her guaranteeing repayment of the $140 (with interest), and forced me to post with her my saving bonds as collateral. Second, she then went to Harvey and Doris Black and insisted that they rent me a booth at their February, 1970 Antiques Fair. She did this specifically so that I would be able to generate cash flow in order to start paying her back.
The Blacks were still highly dubious of my maturity and skills, but my mother was an impossible force to be deflected (especially when her life savings were on the line...), so they grudgingly agreed to give me a try-out with a 4-foot half table. I did a great job at the February, 1970 show, and was subsequently rewarded with an 8-foot full booth. I kept that booth for the following three years, using it to totally repay my wonderful mother, and also to purchase dozens of additional collections. The final, and truly the most important point of all, was that I discovered 30 years (!) later that my terrifying premonition of that Saturday night was absolutely correct. It was when I was at San Diego Comic-Con (in about the year 2005) when I was delighted to be approached by one of my very first comic book clients from my youthful endeavors in Colorado Springs. He told me that in January of 1970, he, too, was an aspiring comic book dealer. At that very same January, 1870 Antiques Fair where I discussed buying that boy's collection, he had had a very similar discussion with him. The snowstorm forced him to postpone their planned next-day meeting, however, which as it turned out was the only reason why I was able to swoop in and score my awesome first collection. While certainly enlightening, what I found most interesting (and actually quite depressing) was that this man was still bedeviled (even 30 years later) by having lost out on that one great collection. He had been secretly following my career for that entire 30 years, and thus knew full and well that those 3,500 comics that I purchased on that snowy day became the core foundation inventory for Mile High Comics. And he also was aware that from that tiniest of seeds did my amazing worldwide comic book empire eventually grow. In the meantime, after suffering the crushing emotional blow of missing out on that epic comic book collection, he had voluntarily ceded the Colorado Springs comic book market to me throughout that period of the early 1970's, and had instead enlisted in the US Navy right out of high school. We met that day by sheer happenstance, as he was in San Diego on his last assignment before retiring after his 30 years in the Navy. He decided that day that he just had to come to the convention to (finally) empty the wellspring of bitterness from his soul by revealing to me just how much that I had totally changed the course of his life by getting to that wonderful collection ahead of him. It was a sad and bittersweet moment, one filled with gut-wrenching emotion, as this middle-aged man told me that he had never stopped thinking about, or blaming himself, for not driving through the snow that day. Such is the staggering degree of caprice that is inherent in our lives, and such are the blessings the incredibly kind blessings that Providence has showered upon me. Happy collecting!
Chuck Rozanski/Bettie Pages,
MARVEL
ALPHA FLIGHT (1983) (#1-130) #25 NEWS JEWEL Very Good
AVENGERS (1963) (#1-402) (MARVEL) #196 NEWSSTAND Very Good
CAPTAIN AMERICA (1968) (#100-454) (MARVEL) #307 NEWS JEWEL Good
CAPTAIN MARVEL GIANT-SIZE (1975) #1 Good
CLOAK AND DAGGER (1985) (#1-11) (MARVEL) #8 NEWS JEWEL Very Good
D.P. 7 (1986) #3 NEWS JEWEL Very Good
DAREDEVIL (1964) (#1-380) (MAN WITHOUT FEAR) (MARVEL) #9 Very Good
DAREDEVIL ANNUAL (1967) #1 Fine
DAZZLER (1981) #38 NEWS JEWEL Very Good
DEFENDERS (1972) (#1-152) (MARVEL) #146 NEWS JEWEL Good
DOCTOR STRANGE (1974) (#1-81) (MARVEL) (DR. STRANGE) #43 NEWS JEWEL Very Good
DOCTOR STRANGE (1974) (#1-81) (MARVEL) (DR. STRANGE) #66 NEWS JEWEL Near Mint/Mint
ETERNALS (1976) (#1-19) (MARVEL) (JACK KIRBY) #1 Fair
FANTASTIC FOUR (1961) (#1-416) (MARVEL) #288 NEWS JEWEL Very Fine
FANTASTIC FOUR: THE WAY IT BEGAN B&R SET (PR-13) (1974) #1 Good
FEAR (ADVENTURE INTO...) (1970) #20 Fair
GHOST RIDER (1973) (#1-81) (MARVEL) #81 NEWS JEWEL Very Fine
GHOST RIDER (1990) (#1-94) (MARVEL) #1 NEWSSTAND Very Good
GODZILLA (1977) (#1-24) (MARVEL) #2 Fair
HULK (1962) (#1-6, #102-474, #600-635)(INCREDIBLE)(MV) #282 NEWS JEWEL Very Fine
IRON MAN (1968) (#1-332) (INVINCIBLE IRON MAN)(MARVEL) #5 Very Good
IRON MAN & SUB-MARINER (1968) #1 Good
MARVEL PREMIERE (1972) #50 NEWSSTAND Fair
MARVEL SUPER SPECIAL (1977) #1 Very Good
MICRONAUTS (1979) (#1-59) (MARVEL) #34 NEWS JEWEL Fair
MICRONAUTS (1984) (#1-20) (MARVEL) (THE NEW VOYAGES) #10 NEWS JEWEL Good
MS. MARVEL (1977) (#1-23) (MARVEL) (CAROL DANVERS) #7 Very Good
NEW MUTANTS (1983) (#1-100) (MARVEL) #29 NEWS JEWEL Good
NEW MUTANTS (1983) (#1-100) (MARVEL) #42 NEWS JEWEL Very Good
PETER PARKER (1976) (#1-263) (SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN) #1 Good
SECRET WARS (1984) (#1-12) (LIMTED SERIES) (MARVEL) #4 NEWS JEWEL Near Mint/Mint
SPIDER-MAN (1963) (AMAZING SPIDER-MAN) (#1-441) #42 Good
SPIDER-MAN ANNUAL (1964) (#1-28) (MARVEL) #21 NEWS Good
SPIDER-WOMAN (1978) (#1-50) (JESSICA DREW) (MARVEL) #48 NEWS JEWEL Very Fine
STAR WARS (1977) (#1-107) (MARVEL) #69 NEWS JEWEL Near Mint/Mint
TALES OF JUSTICE (1955) #63 (Marvel Atlas Titles) Very Good
WEREWOLF BY NIGHT (1972) (#1-43) (MARVEL) #33 Good
WOLVERINE (1982) (#1-4) (MARVEL LIMITED SERIES) #1 Very Good
DC
ATOM (DC) (JUSTICE LEAGUE) (1962) #15 Good
BATMAN (1940) (#0-713) (DC) #252 Fair
BATMAN (1940) (#0-713) (DC) #290 Very Good
BATMAN FAMILY (1975) #6 Good
BEWARE THE CREEPER (1968) #1 Fine
BLUE DEVIL (1984) #19 NEWS JEWEL Fine
BRAVE AND THE BOLD (1955) #57 Good
CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS (1985) #8 NEWS JEWEL Very Good
DC SUPER-STARS (1976) #11 Good
DETECTIVE COMICS (1937) (#0-881) (DC) #415 Good
DETECTIVE COMICS (1937) (#0-881) (DC) #447 Fair
DOOM PATROL (1964) (#86-124) (DC) #120 Fair
FIRESTORM (1982) (#1-100) #48 NEWS JEWEL Fine
HAWK AND DOVE (#1-6) (1968) #1 Fair
HOUSE OF MYSTERY (1951) #308 NEWSSTAND Good
PREZ (1973) #1 Fair
SANDMAN (1988) (#1-75) (DC/VERTIGO) #6 (DC: Vertigo Press) Very Fine
SHAZAM! (1973) (#1-35) (WITH ONE MAGIC WORD...) #25 Very Good
SHAZAM! (1973) (#1-35) (WITH ONE MAGIC WORD...) #28 Very Good
SHAZAM! (1987) (#1-4) (THE NEW BEGINNING) #1 Fine
SHOWCASE (1956) (#1-104) (SHOWCASE PRESENTS...) (DC) #41 Good
SPECTRE (1967) (#1-10) (DC) #6 Fine
SUICIDE SQUAD: KING SHARK (2021) #1 Near Mint/Mint
SUPERBOY (1949) (#1-258) (DC) #197 Fair
SUPERMAN FAMILY (1974) #174 Good
SUPERMAN: MAN OF STEEL (1991) #32 DCUNIVERSE Good
SWAMP THING, SAGA OF (1982) #21 (DC: Vertigo Press) Fine
TEEN TITANS (1966) (#1-53) (DC) #2 Fair
WONDER WOMAN (1942) (#1-329) (DC) #153 Good
INDEPENDENTS
1776 (CHARLTON CLASSICS LIBRARY) (1973) #1 (Charlton) Good
FAMOUS FUNNIES (1934) #136 (FAMOUS FUNNIES PUBLICATION) Good
GRIPS (SILVERWOLF) (1986) #1 (Silverwolf Comics) Very Fine
ROCKET'S BLAST COMICOLLECTOR MAGAZINE #127 (James Van Hise) Good
ZOOT (FOX) (1946) #15 (FOX FEATURE SYND.) Very Good
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