Calling All Bargain Hunters!

I had some time to dither away yesterday while my wife was busy with her hobby of pottery painting. It takes a few hours, so I spent my time at the local shop checking out the Wednesday delivery.


I found a trade paper titled Golden Age Marvel Comics, part of Marvel's Masterworks collection which put into print the first issue of Marvel Comics and the subsequent three issues of Marvel Mystery Comics. While I've bought reprints of Marvel Comics a few times over (1990 and 2009)I've never had the others and it was a treat for which I was eager to pay full price.

Then I scuttled over to my new favorite story Half-Price Books and found a bunch of gems.


First I found the Dick Tracy Show, the cartoon from the 60's. This is a collection I've wanted and let slide a few times, but at the meager price of six bucks I couldn't resist. A wacky bunch of socially suspect cartoons, this huge collection has them all and threw in a tiny little reprint of the earliest Dick Tracy comic strips to boot.


I also found a copy of King of the Wild, the 1931 serial from Mascot which features Boris Karloff in one of his pre-Frankenstein roles. This vintage stuff can be a pain to watch, but fun too.

I was already quite pleased.

Then I found the real treasures.


The first is titled Art In Time and is a collection of obscure comics properties from across several decades. The clincher for me was the inclusion of Charlton Premiere #2 by Sergius O'Shaughnessy (Denny O'Neil) and Pat Boyette. That along with some choice artwork by Tony Tallarico, Pete Morisi, Sam Glanzman, Bill Everett, and more sold me on this discounted trove. I'll have more on this volume later.


The other gem was The Toon Treasury of Classic Children's Comics, a masterpiece of vintage material (mostly Golden Age) from a wide swathe of sources. There's offbeat stuff from Pogo to Scrooge McDuck, from Gerald McBoing Boing to Captain Marvel, from Dennis the Menace to Scribbly, and much much more.

I need more comics laden volumes in my house like the flu but I cannot resist these handsome packages, so full of classic goodness. As it turned out the store was having a twenty percent off sale to boot and I got all of this stuff for the full price of one of the comics volumes, a real true bargain. So if you're a bargain hunter, you might want to check out the local Half-Price Books, if you're lucky enough to have one.

So when I picked up my beloved spouse a few hours later, she was happy and she could tell by my smile that I was a happy camper too. A dandy winter day indeed!

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