For those who fear the demise of the collectibles market may be near...

[JamesGallo]

Originally Posted by terjung

Interesting point. I always thought it was a bit weird to have a book slabbed in that you couldn't see the interior pages, but only thought about the lack of being able to read it and hadn't considered the TPG portion of it. With our beloved baseball cards, we often judge and opine as to whether something is accurately graded and sometimes even have "guess the grade" threads. With comics, you truly can't do much judging of the interior pages - except possibly count the number of pages from the edge (not sure how possible that even is). I wonder how stringently the interior pages are graded. For example, we know that SGC is tough on paper loss on the cards. I wonder how printing dots or registration issues (for example) may affect the grading if it were only present on the interior pages. Once it is slabbed, you may not even know the reason for the downgrade. A pristine front and back cover and binding could potentially deserve a much lower grade based on interior pages and you'd never know it unless it were specifically delineated or cracked out of its slab.

All that to say this... I think it may be tougher to "buy the comic not the slab" in that world due to this issue. Perhaps I am wrong though and will be enlightened.

I have collected comics for 20+ years and was doing it before SGC was even around so I think I am qualified to comment on this thread.

The Action #1 was sold by Steven Fishler's company Metropolis Comics. Fishler is considered the biggest comic dealer in the world. He has a huge inventory and he personally has a large movie poster, original art and comic collection. I have dealt with him in the past and consider him a straight shooter. This issue was one of the best in the world and as we all know the best brings is way more money then anything else. Just compare prices on high grade Wagner's, has any other one gotten even close to half of the trimmed card?

The other important aspect is this book is unrestored. That makes a HUGE difference in a golden age (1930's-40's) comic.

This book much like it's character has become iconic. The cover has been ripped off many times and is widely reprinted. I would say it compares somewhat to Babe Ruth, but is rarer then any Ruth card and likely has higher demand since there is only one 1st issue and there are several early/rookie Ruth cards (depending on your point of view).

As for the pages, a comic is looked at differently then a card. The pages are graded on quality from white-brittle. As noted later in this thread CGC will note any tears, writing or missing pages on the label. As for as printing registry that is not someone I have seen ever talked about for the pages. On the covers there are some people that won't care about a book that has a slight diamond cut, others like myself hate the diamond cut. Regardless CGC does not deduct for this (which I think is BS).

People like slabs on comics even most so to protect the book. As for reading it, most extremely popular key books have been reprinted many times, and lower grade copies are mostly available. That being said I am not sure too many people are worried about reading their high grade Action 1 as what would be the point since any tiny stress could bring the grade down a full point and greatly impact the price.

So I have no doubt that the Action #1 sold, and if this isn't enough information then I would say you can't prove any sale unless you see it happen or have a email from both parties saying it happened.

As there are plenty of opinions on Heritage I will not comment on the sale of the Detective #27.

James G