Marvel US Price Font Variations (June 1960 ~ February 1961) 3 3

[Get Marwood & I]

1 hour ago, rakehell said:

Is that like a fondant fancy that someone dropped on the floor?

When I saw the notification I thought "Great, Daphne will have something interesting to say"....

[rakehell]

1 hour ago, Get Marwood & I said:

When I saw the notification I thought "Great, Daphne will have something interesting to say"....

Interesting? On a Friday? I think you're thinking of the wrong Daphne, Velma. 

[Get Marwood & I]

1 hour ago, rakehell said:

Interesting? On a Friday? I think you're thinking of the wrong Daphne, Velma. 

Yoinks!

[rakehell]

2 hours ago, Get Marwood & I said:

Yoinks!

Jinkies!

[Get Marwood & I]

Afternoon 

I was delighted to welcome Battle #70 into the pence fold this week - you can read all about it here:

Hello Battle #70 9d

I knew a pence copy of Battle #70 would exist because of the issues US price font variation scenario:

So it was nice to be proven right for once 

I'm not expecting any more USPFs to materialise now - 13 seems to be it - and the Battle #70 concludes the pence issue possibilities.

All good fun 

 

[Pinkerton]

On 1/9/2020 at 2:08 PM, Get Marwood & I said:

Afternoon 

I was delighted to welcome Battle #70 into the pence fold this week - you can read all about it here:

Hello Battle #70 9d

I knew a pence copy of Battle #70 would exist because of the issues US price font variation scenario:

So it was nice to be proven right for once 

I'm not expecting any more USPFs to materialise now - 13 seems to be it - and the Battle #70 concludes the pence issue possibilities.

All good fun 

 

I did finish reading this very intriguing thread and am very pleased also to see that it featured in Overstreet #49. Darn right. As for many issues you are hoping for the Spartan in his 90s to wander along and say how and why things were done as they were.

It's presumably an area where simplicity, speed and economics would have been the drivers. Also it represents the early months of dual-price printing during which (as the numerous changes to indicia show) things were far from sorted out, and were being made up month to month.

I hope that someone (CGC perhaps) will provide some further information, even if it is to confirm that the explanation is ridiculous or mundane.

A couple of questions remain in my mind which I can't help feeling might be relevant. These are based entirely on your spreadsheet images, but I can only go by the sections you have provided. Also your complete sheet may have extra data now. After all absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, as your great work on the 3000+ pence copies shows so well.

1 Why is there never any variation in the font of the pence copy prices – always tall. No matter which title or issue number it is, and despite the variable cents fonts, they are always the same, within this time window (I think). This should be telling us something, but what?

2 Why are there several JIM pence/cents issues (59, 62-65) which do not have "traditional" bold cents fonts, only variant ones? Are there others too? I can understand varying a procedure for all titles within a time window, but not for all issues of just one title. That suggests there is some reason why JIM was being processed differently from the other titles, which makes little sense. But you have pointed out numerous times that JIM seems to buck trends.

No reply necessary unless someone has more information which may be relevant!

[Get Marwood & I]

18 hours ago, Pinkerton said:

I did finish reading this very intriguing thread and am very pleased also to see that it featured in Overstreet #49. Darn right.

Thanks Geoff. Near zero reaction to it though, alas, there and here. 

Quote

As for many issues you are hoping for the Spartan in his 90s to wander along and say how and why things were done as they were.

It's presumably an area where simplicity, speed and economics would have been the drivers.

Yes, I think that's likely from what I've read. And they were only kids comics don't forget.

Quote

I hope that someone (CGC perhaps) will provide some further information, even if it is to confirm that the explanation is ridiculous or mundane.

They have the connections, CGC, so you'd hope so. Matt did say he'd keep an eye out so you never know. Probably too busy grading books though I should imagine.

Quote

 

A couple of questions remain in my mind which I can't help feeling might be relevant. These are based entirely on your spreadsheet images, but I can only go by the sections you have provided. Also your complete sheet may have extra data now. After all absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, as your great work on the 3000+ pence copies shows so well.

1 Why is there never any variation in the font of the pence copy prices – always tall. No matter which title or issue number it is, and despite the variable cents fonts, they are always the same, within this time window (I think). This should be telling us something, but what?

The pence font was indeed in the same format for all of the known US price font issues. The only exception within the date window, albeit a non-price font issue, is the Kid who bucked the trend with this alternate 9d version below (#96):

Note the presence of the 9d pence version in this case means the cents copy has a 'non-standard' cents font. Based on previous issues, it should have a bold cents font reversed in white into the cover background as that was the norm (like the #94 has above there). So, again, it could indicate that the pence copy was run first otherwise you'd expect a white bold cents in the background cover and then a run of pence copies with that scratched out and replaced with a 9d circle or similar.

Maybe!

Quote

2 Why are there several JIM pence/cents issues (59, 62-65) which do not have "traditional" bold cents fonts, only variant ones? Are there others too? I can understand varying a procedure for all titles within a time window, but not for all issues of just one title. That suggests there is some reason why JIM was being processed differently from the other titles, which makes little sense. But you have pointed out numerous times that JIM seems to buck trends.

It's a question I've posed several times, yes, and there is no answer that I'm aware of. Until pence copies were introduced, the cents font was always the same. So it's reasonable to assume that the introduction of the pence priced copies are the reason for the presence of different cents font types which, until then, had never been seen. 

[Get Marwood & I]

 

13 14 Confirmed US Price Font Issues

 

 

 

[Get Marwood & I]

New number 4 

 

 

 

Gutted that no one is interested enough to comment or even like it 

[Get Marwood & I]

Number 20, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 21, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 22, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 23, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 24, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 25, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 26, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 27, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 28, Bold 10 Cents and no Pence Copy...

Number 29, Bold-oh. Hang on 

 

 

 

 

 

[Get Marwood & I]

Morning 

Haven't been here for a while.

I was thinking about mistakes yesterday, and how they manifest in comics. Mistakes happen in every walk of life, every industry. People are fallible - some, habitually.

It is because of human error, and operational mistakes, that we have green Spider-Men...

 

...no Marvel Team-Up #81 pence copy...

 

....Thorpe spelled 'Thorp'....

 

....and, still on indicias, US priced cents copies with Thorpe & Porter UK distribution data:

 

Returning to the US price font variations of the thread title, we know they exist because I've documented 14 examples out of an eligible 91 comics in the applicable date range. If we look at Kid Colt #91, we have these three versions in existence:

  

As my earlier less than subtle Wyatt Earp post illustrates, the printers had a simple task up until the pence copies were introduced. Every comic needed to be run off with the same 10c price slug, hence them being all the same, to one set volume. We know the covers and innards were printed separately making an easy scenario for the foreman (if that was his title) to manage - print 300K innards and 300K covers, priced 10c.

Then the pence copies come along and the foreman has to make a calculation. Let's say that the instruction was "I want 300K Kid Colt #91's with 5% pence copies - the pence price is 9d". OK, thinks the foreman. He tells the chap who does the covers, and the chap who does the innards. The chap who does the innards thinks "5% of 300K = 15K so I'll print 315K innards". The chap who does the covers thinks "5% of 300K is 15K so I'll print 15K pence and 285K cents". Classic misunderstanding.

When the covers come to be matched to the innards, the stapler man (I know all the industry terms) finds he's got 15K extra innards with no covers to put on them. "Dang" says the foreman, when he's told. So he tells the cover chap to print another 15K cents covers to satisfy the contractual obligation. Now the covers chap tells his plate making guy "I want another 15K of these, in cents" and hands him a pence copy. The plate guy thinks "OK", goes and retrieves the pence plate (they were printed second), scratches off the 9d (thin font) and replaces it with a 10c (thin font) equivalent. 

So we end up with 285K of these: 

                                15K of these: 

                         And 15K of these: 

Now there could be a host of permutations and alternative possibilities in that theory but the central premise - it was a cock up - remains.

This happens a mere 14 times over the period until someone decides to introduce an operational safeguard and then it never happens again. Not once.

There would have had to be an error on top of an error for the four RK #17's of course (three cents versions), but how many times do you see that in life - someone makes a mistake, is asked to correct it, and they then make another.

So my theory is that the US price font variations exist first and foremost because the pence copies were introduced - up until then it was the same print volume, the same 10c price slug, day in day out. The introduction of pence copies to the run changed the process, volumes, and cover price. And this generated a mistake or fourteen, until a regular systematic approach was adopted and everyone got the hang of print runs comprising different prices.

Without going into too much detail, my research shows a greater % of 'original' bold 10c fonts vs the slim 10c fonts existing for some copies, and this strengthens my theory, I think.

What do you think? Nothing mysterious - just a mistake. There are some holes you could pick, given the examples I've posted, but put it this way - can you think of a better reason why the variations exist? 

Hmmm 

[Get Marwood & I]

Two speculative scenarios, in consideration of the above 'mistake' theory:

Strange Tales #75:

1. Cents printed first - hence a standard white 10c font set against a coloured background, the usual approach
2. Pence printed second - the cents plate has the price scratched out and a 9d slug is added (hence a 9d in a white box)
3. Additional cents compliment run next (re volumes mistake) hence 10c in white box

  

That sort of works / makes sense.

How about this one though?

Strange Tales #81:

1. Pence printed first
2. Cents second - Pence plate scratched out / 10c slug added (hence white box)
3. Additional cents compliment run (re volumes mistake) hence 10c in white box

 

There aren't any cents copies of ST #81 with a standard white 10c set against a coloured background which was the norm. I don't think there are any examples of a cents price set in a white box against a background colour prior to the arrival of pence copies.

So the pence being printed first could indicate why there wouldn't be one for ST #81. But the fly in the ointment - why two different cents fonts? If they were made second and third, then there would have been no need to amend the first use of the cents plate as it would have been already cents.

But then look closely at the pence copy - you can see what looks like the ghost of a white circle which the pence price oblong overprinted, perhaps indicating it was itself an adjusted plate:

So maybe the cents was first which would explain the second cents font if the pence was in the middle and the mistake I outlined was applicable?

Did that make sense?

Head scratcher isn't it 

 

[Pantodude]

Interesting stuff!  Didn't know.  Thank you.  

Edited June 27, 2021 by Pantodude

[Get Marwood & I]

2 minutes ago, Pantodude said:

Interesting stuff!  Didn't know.  Thank you.  

You're welcome Panto. I like the notion that the pence copies are the reason why the cents copies went loopy for a bit. Upset the apple cart. 

You've got t love pence copies, haven't you 

[Get Marwood & I]

22 hours ago, Get Marwood & I said:

You've got t love pence copies, haven't you 

Or not... 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 6/27/2021 at 10:53 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

The plate guy thinks "OK", goes and retrieves the pence plate (they were printed second), scratches off the 9d (thin font) and replaces it with a 10c (thin font) equivalent. 

So we end up with 285K of these: 

                                15K of these: 

                         And 15K of these: 

If anyone was thinking "why not use the usual bold 10c font, if that is what they were used to using" on the second cents version of KCO #91, that would indeed be a reasonable question. We wouldn't be here if they had. Look at these five sequential Tales of Suspense pence copies though (30-34, images in order):

No consistency is there - four different font types over five consecutive issues. My point being, consistency may not have been a significant preoccupation of the chap who made up the further cents price slugs on the 14 font variants.

I'll leave it at that now.

 

[Tghutcn]

5 hours ago, Get Marwood & I said:

If anyone was thinking "why not use the usual bold 10c font, if that is what they were used to using" on the second cents version of KCO #91, that would indeed be a reasonable question. We wouldn't be here if they had. Look at these five sequential Tales of Suspense pence copies though (30-34, images in order):

No consistency is there - four different font types over five consecutive issues. My point being, consistency may not have been a significant preoccupation of the chap who made up the further cents price slugs on the 14 font variants.

I'll leave it at that now.

 

Unless for some reason they always had someone making up the prices on the cover I can’t any other reason  why they kept on changing fonts

[Get Marwood & I]

10 hours ago, Tghutcn said:

Unless for some reason they always had someone making up the prices on the cover I can’t any other reason  why they kept on changing fonts

Yes, they always used this same 'bold' US 10c font -   - up until the arrival of the pence copies.

For whatever reason, it took them a while to settle on a consistent pence font and, in the process, it clearly brought additional cents fonts into the mix. Wrong year of course, but I blame the chap with the pipe:

(A pipe...in a paper factory...?! )

 

[Get Marwood & I]

My review crossed over into the Marvel UKPV thread, regarding the order of printing, but here is a post which shows that one of the Price Font variation issues has a UK Thorpe & Porter indicia in both cents versions:

4 minutes ago, Get Marwood & I said:

For those that are following this, I checked the second applicable US Price Font book - JIM #65 - and all three copies have a UK Thorpe & Porter indicia:

9d Copy: 
 

Version A 10c Copy:
 

Version B 10c Copy:
 

Which doesn't help much with my order of priority theory.

See ya!

I'll make a point of checking the others in time, to see if there are any surprises.

[Tghutcn]

On 6/29/2021 at 9:29 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

Yes, they always used this same 'bold' US 10c font -   - up until the arrival of the pence copies.

For whatever reason, it took them a while to settle on a consistent pence font and, in the process, it clearly brought additional cents fonts into the mix. Wrong year of course, but I blame the chap with the pipe:

(A pipe...in a paper factory...?! )

 

If the isn’t a definitive answer for something blame the chap with a pipe definitely when they’re smoking a pipe next to paper