CBR: Shelf Life - Aug 25, 2011

[CBR News]

Ron Marz discusses the spinner racks of his youth and the mystery and allure of the Quarter Bin, praising the journey of finding new books. Plus a special tease regarding "Voodoo" #1.


Full article here.

[Spaced]

I doubt I'll be picking up Voodoo (sorry) but that is a mighty fine haul of books. I bought all but two of them for cover price on release, just goes to show what back issues are worth nowadays.

[profhaley]

Ahhh...the joys and memories of collecting comics as a young child. I just turned 56 this week, so it's nice to go through the good memories. I started collecting in 1963 and had three local drugstores and a small grocery store to get my comics from the small Iowa town that I grew up in...I also have fond memories of the spinner racks. I would love to find one of the original racks for my comic room at home.
I also remember the hit and miss of getting comics. I owned Fantastic Four #42 and #44 (the first and third part of a story arc about the Frightful Four), but it took me over 12 years to find the middle part at the first comic store that I found in Iowa City.
It was after I moved to Nebraska in the late seventies that I found my first quarter bin(s) at a shop in Omaha called Dragon's Lair if I remember correctly. I bought almost all of the Martian Manhunter appearances in the House of Mystery comic and many 70's Marvel westerns and monster comics.
Thanks for bringing these memories back to the forefront of my thinking today!!!

profhaley

[ggersten]

I loved the spinner racks at a local Thrifty Drug - we would take empty soda bottles to the store and with the return deposit buy as many comics as we could. I used to value comics by the number of bottles it took to purchase one.

But, the irritating device were the vending machines. You could see the front comic, but not what was behind it. And there were times when I had the front comic, but thought the one right behind it was one I wanted. The local drugstore (Willowbrook Pharmacy - long gone) would occasionally open the machine, but then I had to buy the one behind it, no matter what it was. That drugstore then had the strangest arrangement. Comics would come in and they wouldn't put them out. They'd just return them. But, if I showed up when the comics came in, they'd open the packs and let me pick out what to buy. But they never put them on display.

First comic I recall buying was from a vending machine - Worlds Finest 189 - a 2 parter!

Man, I hated multiple part stories, because I never knew if I could get the next issue. That was one of the reasons I liked DC over Marvel - to understand Marvel, you had to get all sorts of comics that you'd never have been able to find. And many multiple part stories... I viewed multiple part stories as just a way to get me to buy the next issue (which of course was true!) and I kind of resented it at the time. I particularly didn't like it when there was a series of Action Comics where first the Superman story was a two part story, and then when that concluded, the back-up story was a new two-parter! ARRGH!