golden age Archives

Hing's work on this series is an underappreciated moment from the Golden Age of comic books There are several issues of Blazing Comics featuring the Green Turtle up for auction in the 2022 May 8-9 Sunday & Monday Comic Books Select Auction #122219 at Heritage Auctions. Blazing Comics #2 featuring the Green Turtle (Rural Home, 1944). In[...]

The introduction and continuing adventures of Superboy and all of the important mythos he left in his wake was a key step towards DC Comics' Silver Age and the resultant attempts to reconcile and unify continuity across their line. Of course, Adventure Comics was also the home of Green Arrow and Aquaman from the Golden Age[...]

Al Feldstein's Sunny was a slightly racier version of the teenage drama of Archie's Riverdale that brought him to the attention of Bill Gaines

Early issues of Action Comics are foundational in importance to the Golden Age, and have been in demand for decades, and this Action Comics #39 (DC, 1941) Condition: VG up for auction in the 2022 May 8-9 Sunday & Monday Comic Books Select Auction #122219 at Heritage Auctions is an affordable example of why. Action Comics[...]

Rang-A-Tang was one of the first dog stars in Golden Age comic books, predating the likes of Green Lantern's Streak and Superboy's Krypto An important dog star key and the beginning of an important comics publishing empire, there's a Blue Ribbon Comics #1 (MLJ, 1939) Condition: FN as well as other early issues of Blue[...]

The company was also a relatively early entrant in comics' Golden Age with Jumbo Comics, which came about five months after Action Comics #1 debuted Superman for the publisher we now know as DC Comics. Based on how Fiction House reacted once the rest of the comic book industry became aware that Superman in Action Comics[...]

Many a Golden Age collector ranks this pedigree near the top, with some putting it behind only the Edgar Church/Mile High hoard And the story of the collection being brought into a show in Berkeley, California in 1973 has entered collecting lore. We have always loved Bob Overstreet's description of the significance of this book: "Simon[...]

American icon Uncle Sam became a comic book superhero in Quality Comics title National Comics, adapted for this purpose by Will Eisner.

Marvel was in the air in the second half of 1939.  Within the space of a few months, comics saw the debut of a character called Masked Marvel, the launch of the Marvel Comics title and finally the original Captain Marvel hit the newsstands in Whiz Comics right before the end of the year.  But[...]

Iconic character Doc Savage debuted in Doc Savage Magazine #1 (1933) the creation of Street & Smith Publications executive Henry Ralston, editor John Nanovic and writer Lester Dent.  The publisher intended the character to take advantage of their success with the Shadow, and in that, they certainly succeeded.  Like the the Shadow, Doc Savage became[...]

With Captain Marvel riding high as one of the top characters in comics with a popularity that rivaled Superman throughout much of the Golden Age, in 1941-1942 and again in 1947-1952 Fawcett Publications produced a number of giant, squarebound annual editions targeting the holiday and otherwise gift-giving market.  Gift Comics and Xmas Comics both topped[...]

The short-lived and obscure title Future Comics may be one of the weirdest comic book series of the Golden Age — and that's saying something.  Best known for its covers that include a strange-looking science fiction character named Rebo wearing bizarre headgear, the story behind that imagery may be even stranger than the covers implies. [...]

Whiz Comics #155 is the beginning of the end of an important chapter in American comic book history.  The Fawcett Publications title had launched one of the most important and successful characters of the Golden Age 13 years earlier with the debut of Captain Marvel in Whiz Comics #2, and its end presaged the closure[...]

Feature Book #26 from 1941 featuring Hal Foster's Prince Valiant, holds an interesting place in comic book collecting history.

The Chesler line may technically have come before the Pre-Code era, but their covers and contents makes Punch Comics impossible to ignore.

Fawcett's Wow Comics is a great Golden Age series that deserves more attention It debuted in winter 1940 and ran for 69 issues until August 1948, featuring work by CC Beck, Otto Binder, Dave Berg, and even Jack Kirby, among many others But the series really started to shine when Mary Marvel arrived, with beautiful[...]

Debuting in 1934, Mandrake the Magician has influenced countless comic book characters ranging from Zatara to Dr. Strange.

When it came to illustrating covers, there was simply no one else in Alex's league." Stan was certainly correct about that.  Alex Schomburg certainly was one of the most distinctive cover artists of the Golden Age, and his war-era covers helped define the look of American comic books during World War II.  Although his best-known work[...]

The Edgar Church / Mile High comic book pedigree is a collection of almost 15,000 comic books 1937 to 1957 amassed by Denver, Colorado commercial illustrator Edgar Church.  The collection, much of which has been preserved in incredible high grade, has become the stuff of legend since it was discovered by longtime retailer Chuck Rozanski[...]

There's a rare chance to get an early Action Comics issue from Lamont Larson's now-legendary and historic important collection.

Doing the diligence for this post, I was utterly shocked to find that the classic DC Comics character Catwoman only had about 15 appearances in the Golden Age.  By way of comparison, the Joker had over 60 appearances in the same time frame.  Green Lantern antagonist Harlequin had eight appearances in the span of a[...]

In an era where classic female comic book characters ranging from Wonder Woman to Catwoman are getting the attention that they deserve, Harvey's Black Cat seems surprisingly overlooked.  The character has been around since Pocket Comics #1, cover-dated August, 1941 — four months before the debut of Wonder Woman.  The creation of Alfred Harvey and[...]

From his debut in All-American Comics #8, Ultra-Man stands out as a fascinating product of the politics of his moment in history.

An incredibly accomplished and talented woman takes on a job in her profession that brings her into contact with one of the most famous and mysterious men in the world.  The job becomes an obsession which in turn leads her into a life as a costumed criminal so she can become closer to the legendary[...]

During the boom years of 1939 and the early 1940s of the Golden Age of American comic books, most new entrants in the field naturally had little or no experience in comics publishing.  Such was not the case for Columbia Comics Corporation, which entered the field in April 1940 with Big Shot Comics #1, a[...]

Paul.  It is the first appearance of the Golden Age Human Torch, and technically the second appearance of the Sub-Mariner, after Funnies Inc's Motion Picture Funnies Weekly #1, a planned theater giveaway that was produced in extremely limited quantity. Marvel Comics #1 Pay Copy (Marvel 1939). The sales history of this particular copy provides us with a[...]

The Golden Age comic book character Lady Luck is the creation of comics legend Will Eisner and artist Chuck Mazoujian Mazouzian made his comics debut with the cover of Marvel Mystery Comics #2, and by the next year was working on Lady Luck for Will Eisner's The Spirit newspaper sections.  That backup series was soon[...]

entered the war.  The story opens with Hitler himself assembling his top advisors to inform them that to follow up his Blitzkrieg strategy, he would take the war to America itself by fighting America's heroes with a superhuman of his own — Captain Nazi.  Bulletman crosses over into the Captain Marvel story in this issue[...]

Flash co-creator Gardner Fox was well known for his attention to detail throughout his extensive career.  "Knowledge is kind of a hobby with me," he once said, adding that, "Everything about science, nature, or unusual facts, I can go to my files or the at least 2,000 books that I have."  Going along with that,[...]

The strange, short career of Golden Age villain the Harlequin is a tale of obsession, not all that different from that of her modern namesake Harley Quinn.  Created by Robert Kanigher and Irwin Hasen, in her alter ego she is Molly Mayne, Green Lantern alter ego Alan Scott's assistant at WXYZ radio But Molly Mayne has[...]