Doctor Tom Brent and His Flying Nurses 7 7

[Get Marwood & I]

Hello reader, and welcome to my latest pence thread 

Over the coming weeks and months I will share with you all the wonderful Silver Age pence priced Charlton books that I have discovered hiding between the years of 1960 and 1963. Charlton it seems isn’t the most admired of comic publishers but I hope you will grow to love them, as I have, if you decide to come along for the ride. Every cover that you see from me in the posts to come will be of a book that I own. I was brought up on Marvel comics, and Spidey and Hulk were always my favourites. But as I’ve grown older I’ve come to appreciate the non-super hero titles so much more, and Charlton was a great proponent of them! Romance, war, westerns, monsters, sci-fi, the medical profession: sit back and prepare for a feast of wonderful cover scans.

To be clear, the books that follow are all first printing pence priced variants of the US regular cents copies. They were printed alongside their US counterparts in the same place at the same time, much like the more widely known Marvel and DC pence copies. Not many collectors seem to know that Charlton pence versions exist, and it has been a real labour of love tracking them down over the last year or so. Our publisher friend L Miller is responsible for bringing them to the UK, so there will be some cross referencing to my Marvel Miller thread as we go.

Normally, I start my pence threads with a breakdown of what I’ve found to exist with dates, details and observations. This time I’m going to start with ‘Just Married’ #28, one of the nicest covers I think I’ve ever seen on a comic book (cover pencils by Joe Sinnott and inks by Vince Colletta according to Google):

 

Isn’t that just great?

As a kid, I wouldn’t have given this book a second glance in the newsagents, and would have homed in instead on the latest Spidey adventure. But now I can look at it with fresh, albeit older eyes, and marvel (no pun intended) at its understated splendour.

The colouring is striking. And the attention to detail is quite extraordinary when you think that these books were supposedly ‘churned out’ with, I’m told, very little care. But Joe Sinnott clearly cared. If I were responsible for that cover I would want everyone to see it. Look at the paint on her cheeks. The detail through the door way. Wonderful.

  

 

At the risk of offending the PC brigade, we have a typical woman’s approach to painting here. Never open one can of paint when three will do!

   

 

The ‘Joe’ of our cover scene looks to be a reasonable chap, and I do like the wood panelling on his car door. Quite what he has done to deserve to be called a ‘vulgar clod’ by our cover star Valerie is anyone’s guess (how cool a four letter putdown beginning with ‘c’ is clod! I guess it could have been worse though…), but I love the story that is being told here (maybe the Joe is an in joke to / from Mr Sinnott?) Either way, why would our male lead Mark want to go out with Joe when he has the lovely Valerie, with yellow paint on her cheeks, to stay home and be creative with? I know which I’d choose.

  

 

Charlton covers are packed with so much detail during this period. It’s like there was a competition on to see who could leave the least unused space every month. Just wait until we get to ‘Doctor Tom Brent, Young Intern’ and you’ll see what I mean! And I love all the wording all over the place. It seems that a Time Lord is to make an appearance inside…

 

…and we are left to ponder this time honoured question:

 

I think we all know the answer to that one, don’t we lads ;-)

On a technical point, Charlton took the unhelpful approach of not numbering their covers. You won’t find a single comic with an issue number on it among these pence copies (a handful say ‘first issue, more on that in later posts). I have to say, it made / makes collecting them very hard, as you effectively have to take a picture of what you own when you’re out hunting, rather than the usual easy number list. It adds to the fun though, and forces you to memorise each cover that you have (not easy, when there’s over 800 of them).

 Also on a technical point – and you’ll see this on every cover too – I can’t work out why the pence price is so timidly small compared to the US cents copies?

  

 

A much bigger font could easily have been used to proud effect. But I suppose it saved on ink, which I understand is what Charlton were fond of doing (they had their own printing capability which I think I saw noted somewhere was actually built to print cereal packets!)

If we look inside, we can see that the indicia tells us the title, volume, issue number, month and year. All Charltons in this period follow this format. Often the number and date are barely legible due to, shall we say, printing deficiencies, which means you’ll often see number 8 listed online as number 3 and things like that.

 

The cover paper stock is pleasingly firm and strong though, and the internal pages are just as nice as those I’ve owned in Marvel books of the same period. “Charlton comics give you more!” can usually be found at the top of the first page. I tend to agree.

 

If we jump ahead, our cover scene is reproduced inside the book, as is often the case. Here, our lovely stars Mark and Valerie have changed the colours of their shirts. And paint. And hair! Even Joe has painted the door of his car. Yellow suits Valerie I think, but I’m not sure it would have worked around the house so that probably explains the switch to orange.

 

So what becomes of our two lovers then? Is the cover an indication that all is not well in the Krueger household? Can their love survive the new paint job?

It seems it can:

 

And look, it wasn’t a Time Lord after all – two hearts – two people – one love. And one big envy inducing snog.

What a great ending 

So, a beautiful, beautiful cover on a beautiful, beautiful comic book. Thank you Joe, for making this book. And thank you, dear reader, if you’ve stuck with me. I hope ‘Just Married’ #28 has done enough to whet your appetite, and that you’ll keep watching. There are hundreds more lovely Charlton books to come…..

 

[Get Marwood & I]

Before we get started on the facts and figures, here’s another wonderful cover – ‘Teen-Age Love’ #30:

 

Beautiful! I do like busy split-scene cover, the red colouring and the heart shaped ‘O’:

 

I purchased this copy because I thought it was a price variant of a pence priced variant (I know, I know). Its UK price should look like this (old 9d pricing):

 

The sellers online picture was fuzzy…

 

…so I took a chance that the ‘6p’ that I could see was a printed price. Wouldn’t that have been cool! On arrival it turned out that the 6p was in fact a sticker:

 

Drat.

Unusually, the stickers background was also red, hence the appearance of a genuine ‘price variant’ in the fuzzy photo. Never mind (I’ve found other copies with the exact same sticker by the way, and will post them at a later date with my thoughts).

The good news is that I now have two copies of ‘Teen-Age Love’ #30, so I’ve taken one of them and scanned its entire contents for your reading pleasure.

Accordingly, here are the entire contents of the book. It’s a great read and includes our lovely cover star looking as stern inside the book as she does on the cover!

  

 

Have fun reading 

 

Spoiler

 

.

 

 

 

.

 

 

P.S. I have two copies of Konga #1 too, so you’ll get the full story of that book too soon 

P.P.S. There’s a post regarding genuine US price variants coming soon, so do keep watching 

[Get Marwood & I]

Hmmm. Looks like 3 pages got thrown out of the hidden sequence.

Sorry about that. I blame the balds 

 

OK, let’s get down to business.

To start, there are a number of phases which I will be covering in this post and future posts to come. The three broad phases are:

1.      Printed Cents priced comics with Thorpe & Porter distribution stamps (1959/1960)

2.      Printed Pence priced Charlton comics from L Miller (1960/1963) – the variants of this thread’s sub-title

3.      Intermittent dual Pence / Cents copies (1973/1975 and beyond)

 

This post covers the second phase, namely the Silver Age printed Pence priced Charlton comics (the only true pence ‘variants’, as will become clear if you read on)

Currently, I have documented Charlton comics with pence only printed prices published between the dates of:

• 1960 - the indicia date of the first known single 6d price printed Charlton comics

             and

• December 1963 – the last indicia month for which pence priced books have been found

As with my Marvel / DC investigations, they are summarised on a spreadsheet that looks like this......

 

 

.....and I have scans / images of every comic saved in title based folders like this:

 

 

….with individual books listed by title like this:

 

 

For every book I own personally, I record the title, issue number, volume, date and cover price under the saved cover scan image. Over time I will post a scan of every book I currently own / pick up by title.

The spreadsheet I use to track the books helps me see patterns and make observations  

Here are a few I’ve have made so far:

• My spreadsheet is titled ‘Charlton Pence Priced Variants Summary (April / July 1960, January 1961 ~ December 1963)’. The dates are recorded as such because there are only two books which were produced in 1960 (Gorgo  #1 and Konga #1), with the rest starting ‘fully’ in January 1961. To accurately determine the eligible count of comics which may have pence copies therefore, I am ignoring the 1960 dates for all titles except Gorgo and Konga.

 

• I have found 75 titles published by Charlton during the Jan 1961 to Dec 1963 indicia period and have found pence copies for all but 5 of them. A full list of titles follows below. Some of the 75 titles are ‘split titles’, e.g. where ‘High School Confidential Diary’ becomes ‘Confidential Diary’ and then becomes ‘Three Nurses’ I have counted that as 3 separate titles, not one continuous title.
• At the time of writing, I believe there are potentially 832 Charlton pence priced variants in existence if every issue / title exists between the stated dates. There do not appear to be any gaps in the date range as is the case with Marvel pence copies, so I’m confident all 832 books will materialise over time.
• I currently have photographic evidence of 361 pence issues, of which I personally own 230. The intention is to try to complete a full set and create here in this thread what will hopefully be the definitive record of Charlton pence priced copies.
• If confirmed, the 832 copies would put Charlton third in the pence variant publisher pecking order based on my current research. Marvel leads the way with 3,008 confirmed pence issues, DC has 839 and Charlton’s 832 should cement them as the third most prolific in terms of numbers (unless I subsequently find Dell or Gold Key beats them).
• As stated earlier, the first pence printed Charlton comics I have found are Konga #1 and Gorgo #1, neither of which have cover dates. I have copies of both and their indicias simply read ‘1960’ so it is difficult to determine which month to record them as being produced. I have found online sources which refer to the books as hitting the newsstand in April and July respectively, so I have recorded them as these months for now until such a time as I find more concrete / reliable data. I have found no pence printed issues dated prior to these books. Incidentally, the first Marvel comics with pence printed covers are cover dated May 1960, so it seems that the importing of ‘US’ pence priced comics started around the same time with Thorpe & Porter and L Miller bringing pence priced variant books to the UK for Marvel and Charlton at least.

     

 

 

• The joint third pence printed Charlton comics are Atomic Mouse #40 and Sheriff of Tombstone #13 indicia dated January 1961. I’m not sure if these are the only two pence books which were dated January 1961 as there are a number of titles with a comic produced for this month – others may turn up.
• From February / March 1961 (note all Charltons are bi-monthly titles), pence copies commence / continue for all 75 titles except:

Pence copies for these titles may turn up at some point – it would be great if every book and title in the date range existed as a pence copy.

• The last pence printed Charlton comics are indicia dated December 1963. From January 1964, all copies revert to single US pricing (until 1973 when some dual cents/pence priced books appear - I will cover this phase in a separate post later).
• Unlike Marvel and DC books, which were all distributed by Thorpe & Porter (with the exception of four Marvel western titles distributed by L Miller for one year), all Charlton pence copies were distributed by L Miller and all copies carry the ‘LM’ publisher logo alongside their price (see pictures below).
• All copies between the dates of April 1960 and April 1962 are priced at 6d (except Reptisaurus #4, dated April 1962 which is the first book to be priced at 9d).
• All copies between the dates of May 1962 and December 1963 are priced at 9d.
• There are no other pence prices known – 6d and 9d are the only ones I have found (unlike Marvel pence books which had multiple prices and price changes based on book size).
• No Charlton annual titles exist that I have found (cents or pence – Charlton did not seem to go in for these).
• I have found no double / non-regular sized issues (cents or pence) during the period.
• With one or two specific exceptions where titles have copies in sequential months (although never more than two), all titles are bi-monthly.
• All titles experience a two month gap on or in the early months following January 1962.
• The cover price box contents are the only difference between the cents and pence copies (see below). This is true of all copies found so far – there are no other differences.
• No Charlton comics in this period have issue numbers on the covers (apart from a handful of copies which say ‘first edition’ where applicable). Only price and month appear on the cover. The indicia shows the publication date, month and issue number.

 

Here is a list of all 75 titles produced by Charlton during the period, including the number ranges of the pence copies which should exist / do exist (hope it comes out OK):

 

Title				Title Range	Potential Pence Number Range	Confirmed Pence Numbers	Total
Army War Heroes				1-38	1	0	0
Atomic Mouse				1-52	40-52	40-45, 48, 49	8
Attack				1-3	1-2	2	1
Battlefield Action				16-89	34-50	34-37, 42, 44-46, 49	9
Billy the Kid				9-153	26-43	27-30, 35-39, 41	10
Black Fury				1-58	28-45	30, 32, 33, 35, 37, 39, 43, 45	8
Brides in Love				1-48	22-39	23-25, 37	4
Caroline Kennedy				1	1	0	0
Cheyenne Kid				8-99	26-43	27, 29, 31-33-37, 39, 40, 43	12
Confidential Diary				12-17	12-17	12-14, 17	4
Cynthia Doyle, Nurse in Love				66-74	66-73	66, 67, 72	3
D-Day				1-6	1	1	1
Doctor Tom Brent, Young Intern				1-5	1-5	1, 4, 5	3
Drag-Strip Hotrodders				1-16	1	1	1
Emergency Doctor				1	1	1	1
Fightin' Air Force				3-53	25-41	25, 30, 33, 35	4
Fightin' Army				16-172	39-55	44, 47, 48, 50, 51, 55	6
Fightin' Marines				14-176	39-56	41, 42, 44, 45, 47, 48, 55	7
Fightin' Navy				74-133	96-113	97, 98, 100, 102, 105, 107, 112	7
First Kiss				1-40	18-35	20, 31, 34	3
Freddy				12-47	26-43	27-29, 37	4
Gorgo				1-23	1-16	1-8, 10, 11-15	14
Gorgo's Revenge				1	1	1	1
Green Planet				1	1	1	1
High School Confidential Diary				1-11	5-11	10	1
Hot Rods and Racing Cars				1-120	50-66	51, 52, 54, 56-58, 61, 63-65	10
Hunk				1-11	1-11	1, 2, 7, 10	4
I Love You				7-130	32-49	34, 39, 43, 46, 48	5
Just Married				1-114	17-34	23, 25, 28, 34	4
Kid Montana				9-50	27-43	29, 32, 36, 38, 42, 43	6
Konga				1-23	1-15	1, 3, 4, 5, 7-10, 12, 13, 15	11
Konga's Revenge				2-3	2	2	1
Lash Larue Western				47-84	82-84	82, 83	2
Li'I Genius				6-53	31-47	32-36, 39, 41, 42, 44, 47	10
Love Diary				1-102	14-30	15, 17, 24, 27, 30	5
Marco Polo				1	1	1	1
Masked Raider				14-30	28-30	28-30	3
My Little Margie				1-54	34-50	34-36, 41, 44	5
My Secret Life				19-47	38-47	41	1
Mysteries of Unexplored Worlds				1-48	22-39	24-28, 31, 32, 33, 36, 37, 38	11
Nurse Betsy Crane				14-25	14-25	12, 16-17, 22-23	5
Outlaws of the West				11-88	29-46	30-32, 34, 35, 37, 41, 42	8
Registered Nurse				1	1	1	1
Reptilicus				1-2	1-2	1	1
Reptisaurus				3-8	3-8	3-8	6
Reptisaurus Special Edition				1	1	1	1
Return of Gorgo				2-3	2	2	1
Return of Konga				1	1	1	1
Romantic Secrets				5-52	31-47	33, 45	2
Romantic Story				23-130	53-69	53, 61, 68, 69	4
Secrets of Love and Marriage				1-25	23-25	0	0
Secrets of Young Brides				5-44	23-40	27, 28, 34, 35, 38	5
Sheriff of Tombstone				1-17	13-17	13, 16	2
Six-Gun Heroes				24-83	61-77	61, 63, 65, 66, 68-71, 73, 74, 77	11
Space Adventures				23-59	38-54	40, 43-49, 51, 54	10
Space War				1-34	9-25	9-14, 17, 19, 21, 23, 24	11
Strange Suspense Stories				27-77	51-68	52-62, 64, 66, 67	14
Submarine Attack				11-54	26-42	26, 28, 30-32, 36, 38, 39, 41, 42	10
Sue and Sally Smith, Flying Nurses				48-54	48-54	48-50, 53, 54	5
Sweetheart Diary				32-65	56-65	57, 64,	2
Sweethearts				22-137	58-74	59, 60, 63, 66, 71, 74	6
Teen Confessions				1-97	9-26	11, 25	2
Teen Secret Diary				1-11	9-11	0	0
Teen-Age Confidential Confessions				1-22	5-21	6, 15, 21	3
Teenage Hotrodders				1-24	1-5	0	0
Teen-Age Love				1-96	18-35	21, 22, 29, 30	4
Texas Rangers in Action				1-79	26-42	27, 28, 31, 32, 35, 36, 38	7
Three Nurses				18-23	18-21	21	1
Timmy the Timid Ghost				1-45	25-41	25-29, 31, 37, 38	8
U.S. Air Force				1-37	14-30	15, 17, 19, 23, 24, 26, 27	7
Unusual Tales				1-49	26-42	26-31, 33-35, 36, 38, 40-42	14
War at Sea				22-42	40-42	40	1
War Heroes				1-27	1-6	3-5	3
Wyatt Earp, Frontier Marshal				12-72	34-51	35, 37-40, 42, 45-47	9
Young Doctors				1-6	1-6	1, 3, 5, 6	4
Updated	3-Mar-18					Pence Total:	361

 

If anyone spots a missing title or a pence issue that I have not recorded, please do let me know.

As noted above, the contents of the cover price box are the only difference between the cents and pence copies. In contrast with Marvel pence variants, everything else is the same, including the indicias. This is odd, given that L Miller added additional indicia wording to the early Marvel titles they imported – see my L Miller thread for more details

Every one of the Charlton pence copies has a price box format as follows:

The early pence copies all have ‘LM 6d’ floating or in circles on the cover as opposed to the 10c pricing of the US copies:

 

Then we have ‘LM 6d’ in the familiar offset rectangle boxes like so:

This then changes to 9d (at the same time as the cents copies changed from 10c to 12c):

Before changing to an ‘LM 9d’ in a red box like so:

 

We then have the occasional lone ‘LM 9d’ in the colouring of a cover where no price box is used:

  

 

To conclude this post, these are the facts I have gathered so far. I’ve not found one single meaningful reference to the existence of these pence copies anywhere else online or otherwise so I hope this thread will stand as the definitive (only!?) record of these lovely underappreciated books. Indeed, even the UK dealers I have spoken to who have been in the industry all their lives have expressed surprise when I’ve pointed the pence copies out to them. Such, alas, is the lack of love for Charlton books that they appear to have escaped virtually unnoticed.

Until now that is! I’m going to champion them, because I think they rock.

As noted above, my expectation is that all 832 copies within the stated date ranges are likely to exist. At the time of writing, I have 230 of them myself and pictorial evidence of a further 131 making 361 confirmed copies overall. It is my intention to collect them all, so this thread will keep going until I find them all or keel over – whichever comes first!

Next up, a beauty parade of some of my favourite covers and titles, and then a post on some genuine US cents price variants. Stay tuned! 

 

 

 

[Get Marwood & I]

One of the things I love about sixties Charlton comics are the titles.

We have the ‘named medical profession protagonist’ book titles like:

Cynthia Doyle, Nurse in Love

 

Doctor Tom Brent, Young Intern

 

Sue and Sally Smith, Flying Nurses

 

and Nurse Betsy Crane

 

Then we have the ‘unnamed medical profession protagonist’ book titles like:

Emergency Doctor

 

Registered Nurse (I love this cover )

 

Young Doctors

 

and Three Nurses

Drat. Don't have one of these yet 

 

We then have the ‘confessions / secrets’ book titles like:

Teen Confessions

 

Teen-Age Confidential Confessions

 

and Secrets of Young Brides

 

....the ‘fightin’’ book titles like:

Fightin’ Air Force

 

Fightin’ Army

 

Fightin’ Marines

 

Fightin’ Navy

 

and Fightin’ Nurses

OK, no fightin’ nurses. 

 

We have the ‘monsters that are similar to other well known monster’ book titles like:

Reptilicus

 

Reptisaurus

 

Gorgo

 

Konga

 

and of course, Gonga

 

The absence of super hero books is actually quite refreshing.

As I pointed out in an earlier post, some of the covers are fabulously detailed. Look back at Tom Brent. Is there an inch of space left on that cover? I love fabulously detailed covers and Tom Brent gives real value for money in that (ER) department. A single striking image can of course be powerful, but you can’t beat an artist intent on giving value for money. Look again at Secrets of Young Brides 35 here:

 

You couldn’t fit a gnat’s backside on that cover!

Great, great books with great, great titles.

That’s just a snippet of them. In future posts I will show off every book I have collected so far, title by title. There are 75 titles, so it’s going to take a while. But when the books look this good, and the titles are this cool, who cares! 

 

 

 

 

 

[Get Marwood & I]

In an earlier post I mentioned the three broad ‘UK’ phases I intended to cover in this thread as being:

1.      Printed Cents priced comics with Thorpe & Porter distribution stamps (1959/1960)

2.      Printed Pence priced Charlton comics from L Miller (1960/1963) – the variants of this thread’s sub-title

3.      Intermittent dual Pence / Cents copies (1973/1975 and beyond)

 

Phase 1 - Thorpe & Porter Stamped Cents Copies

In respect of the first phase, I’ve found many examples of cents priced Charlton books dated prior to the L Miller pence printed phase which have Thorpe & Porter price stamps on them. The books date around 1959 to 1960 so it seems that Thorpe & Porter were importing cents copies to the UK for Marvel, DC and Charlton during the 1959/1960 period. I'll go into more detail on this and post some examples later

Phase 2 - Printed Pence Priced Variants

My earlier post details what Charlton pence books exists in this phase. In respect of the general history for the top three of Marvel, DC and Charlton, in 1960, Thorpe & Porter take hold of Marvel and solicit books with pence printed prices but stick with importing cents priced stamped copies for DC. I’m not sure why we have to wait until 1971 for DC to get actual pence printed copies, but there you go (see my DC pence thread for more details). L Miller take over Charlton books from 1960 for 3 years, and also a few Western Marvel titles for one year (see my L Miller thread).

It would be interesting to know how the US comic importing empire was carved up during this time by the UK based publishers, and how it came to pass that Thorpe & Porter got Marvel and DC, and L Miller got Charlton and a few Marvels. Either way, it all seemed to happen around the same time and it would be great to hear the story from someone who was around at the time (if they’re still alive / reading this!).

 Phase 3 - Dual Cents/Pence Pricing

As well as the genuine 1960-1963 pence priced variants documented in phase 2, Charlton also played around with dual cents/pence pricing from April 1973 onwards.

If we look at the summary I put together here…

…we can see that from January 1964 through to March 1973 there were no Charlton pence priced issues – everything had a printed cents price only (I’ve found a few books from 1964 with an ‘R.V. 9d’ pence price stamp on them and are investigating these for a later post).

In March 1973, Charlton produced 20 titles, all with 20c prices. In the next month, April, three dual cents/pence priced issues appear (Beetle Bailey, The Phantom and Popeye). Quite why they only did these 3 is anyone’s guess but from May 1974 through to February 1974 we had a mixture of titles with cents only prices and titles with dual cents/pence prices.

To be clear, there are no variants here. Where the book is cents only priced, every copy is cents only priced. Where the book is dual priced, every book is dual priced. The dates which individual titles begin dual pricing differ, so there is no real pattern or logic to it and none of the titles are obvious pence / UK audience contenders (Beetle Bailey who?).

During March and April 1974, Charlton down tools and produce no titles at all. When they return in May 1974, with higher cents prices, every title is dual cents/pence priced but the pence price stays at 6p. This goes on up to August 1974.

From September 1974, we’re back to a mixture of cents only and dual cents/pence issues and then from February 1975 every title reverts to cents only pricing.

In March 1976 (not shown on the graph above) the dual prices actually crop up again, from May 1976 all copies are dual, etc etc etc all the way through to Charlton’s demise in December 1984

I don’t mean that last bit to sound flippant but Charlton really couldn’t seem to make their minds up which titles they wanted UK pricing on, for which months, and when. It’s all over the place.

The key point to understand here is this – don’t confuse any Charlton books with pence prices on them from April 1973 onwards as variants. They are not, as every copy is the same when dual pricing occurs. The only true Charlton pence priced variants are those I’ve documented earlier from the 1960 to December 1963 phase 2 period. Unless I’ve missed something during my research of course - I’m always happy to be proven wrong, as it means people are interested / paying attention!

As an aside, to me, the quality of the Charlton books flagged significantly during the 1973 onwards phase. They don’t look anywhere near as good as the 1960’s books and I suspect the reason Charlton is less loved than say Marvel or DC is largely down to the quality of their output from the seventies onwards. So it’s back to those sixties books in the next post.

 

 

[Get Marwood & I]

 Charlton 15 Cent Price Variants (March / April 1962) 

In an earlier post I promised you some genuine USD price variants. The focus of this thread is pence books of course, but when you’re doing your research things sometimes crop up which you can’t ignore.

Whilst scouring the web for pence copies of Timmy the Timid Ghost, I spotted this cents copy of #31 which I duly purchased:

 

As you can see, it has a printed 15c price. All other copies (except for our 9d copies of course) have 10c prices (10c image courtesy of eBore):

 

Here's my pence copy's price while we're at it:

 

So why does this 15c version exist I thought? After finding no information online, my first consideration was that it might be a Canadian copy. So I searched eBay.ca but I couldn’t find another one like. If it were a Canadian, you’d have thought there would be another example to be found given that there were 75 Charlton titles running around the time. So probably not a Canadian then.

Timmy the Timid Ghost #31 is the last 10c issue. #32 is the first 12c issue. So my next thought was that it might be an error, or perhaps a price test variant.

Then one night I was Googling away and found this website which had previously eluded me….

https://jonmcclurescomics.com/history.html

 

It contained the following comments:

Charlton Publications (See King Features and Modern Promotions)

 Texas Rangers in Action #32(3/62) exists as a Type 1 Test Market 15 cent Cover Price Variant. All comic publishers considered raising prices in 1961, and by mid 1962 all standard comics cost between 12 and 15 cents each. The following 16 issues from March 1962 may exist as Type 1 Test Market Price Variants: Brides in Love #29, Fightin Air Force #31, Fightin Army #45, High-School Confidential Diary #11, Hot Rods and Racing Cars #56, Konga #5, Lil Genius #37, Love Diary #20, My Little Margie #40, Nurse Betsy Crane #15, Romantic Story #59, Six-Gun Heroes #67, Space War #15, Submarine Attack #32, Teen Confessions #16, and Timmy the Timid Ghost #31. Earlier and later examples may exist. Type 1a Canadian Price Variants exist from for all books cover dated 2/83 to 8/84. Some Charlton comics with cover dates from at least 5/61 through 11/63 exist as Type 1a Pence Cover Price Variants, as do sme issues with cover dates from at least 10/73 through 5/76. 1957 saw some test market experimentation with funny animal, romance, and war titles, but these were regular editions stamped with a pence price. Haunted #62(7/82) exists as a Type 10b Variant with inverted contents.

Sixteen different Type 1 Charlton 15 cent test market cover price variants from March 1962 may be out there, but currently Space War #15(3/62) and Texas Rangers #32(3/62) are the only two examples confirmed to exist. Such 15 cent variants are so scarce and unknown to collectors that no sales have ever been reported, and only four total copies are confirmed to exist(three #32s and one #15). No additional 15 cent variants surfaced in the last year, and real value is difficult to judge without any money changing hands. I find such cusp era variants interesting and hope collectors will share acquisitions with me and/or the Guide so I can disseminate the information

 

The author, Jon McClure, wrote a variant article for Overstreet and lays claim to having discovered the Marvel 30/35 cent variants. Whether this is true I don’t know, but his article was admirably detailed, open and must have taken many years to research.

With his info in mind, I dug around some more and managed to find a further three examples which I purchased as follows:

Sweethearts #64

 

Li’l Genius #37

 

and I love You #39

 

Li’l Genius is a good one, as the price appears on the cover twice:

    

 

Given how carefree Charlton allegedly were as a publisher, it would have been funny if they had forgotten the bottom one wouldn’t it?! A book with two different prices on it would have confused everyone very nicely. I wish they’d done it on purpose 

For all four books that I have, the cover price is the only difference between the 10c / 15c copies – the indicia (when you can read it!) and everything else appears identical:

 

Even though these aren’t pence related as I’ve said, I still think they’re extremely cool and I may try to complete a set as a side project. It looks like they exist for the months of March and April 1962 and, if so, and notwithstanding what Jon McClure wrote, these are the issues that may therefore exist based on my research:

 

March 1962 (3 of 20 Confirmed)

Fightin’ Air force #31

Fightin’ Army #45

High School Confidential Diary #11

Hot Rods and Racing Cars #56

Hunk #4

Just Married #24

Konga #5

Li’l Genius #37 – CONFIRMED 

Love Diary #20

My Little Margie #40

Nurse Betsy Crane #15

Romantic Secrets #37

Romantic Story #59

Six Gun Heroes #67

Space War #15 – Noted online as existing but no pictorial evidence

Submarine Attack #32

Sweethearts #64 – CONFIRMED 

Texas Rangers in Action #32 – Noted online as existing but no pictorial evidence

Timmy the Timid Ghost #31 – CONFIRMED 

U.S. Air Force #20

 

April 1962 (1 of 21 Confirmed)

Atomic Mouse #47

Billy the Kid #33

Black Fury #35

Brides in Love #29

Cheyenne Kid #33

Fightin’ Marines #46

Fightin’ Navy #103

First Kiss #25

Freddy #33

Gorgo #6

I Love You #39 – CONFIRMED 

Mysteries of Unexplored Worlds #29

Outlaws of the West #36

Reptisaurus #4

Secrets of Young Brides #30

Strange Suspense Stories #58

Sweetheart Diary #63

Teen Confessions #16

Teen-Age Confidential Diary #11

Teen-Age Love #25

Wyatt Earp, Frontier Marshall #41

 

It actually makes sense for them to exist for 2 months, March and April, as Charlton published bi-monthly so covering two months would have ensured that all titles were included in the market test prior to the formal switch from 10c to 12c.

So, 41 possible issues of which I have 4 confirmed and a further two noted by Jon McClure as existing. If anyone has any more examples, or any other info on these to share, please dive in. If I get any more, I’ll post them.

 

[Get Marwood & I]

Sometimes when you start out on a new project you find a bit of information online, forget to save it, and then can’t find it again. It’s a schoolboy error - always save / bookmark your information! 

In the early days of my research I remember finding reference to Charlton ‘no price’ variants. Try as I might, I can’t find again online what it was that I originally found, but I did recently find this reference on a Charlton related blog:

 

So unless my memory has cheated me, that makes two separate references to the same thing and, therefore, something to follow up on / explore 

Here’s the picture of the Atomic Mouse #44 lifted from the Charlton blog I found:

 

Sure enough, it looks like there is 'no price'. Here’s a copy with a US price for comparison:

 

Could it be that the price was removed and the pence price wasn’t applied? Or is it just a sticker? I found a copy online, ordered it and here it is:

 

It’s a sticker 

 

Obviously, the book is a pence copy as you’d be able to see the cents price given its size relative to the sticker. And anyway, you can see the pence price when you hold my copy up to the light. So at least I know a pence copy exists (I haven’t found one without a sticker yet).

The image from the Charlton blog looks like a different book to my one. Could there be multiples with a sticker? Then I noted that the owner of the blog 'manipulates' his images to make them look better. So the likelihood is that he has manipulated the picture that was used by the seller of my copy for his site!

So, probably just the one copy, and probably no ‘no price variants’ exist after all 

 

 

Or do they….. 

 

Flipping stickers! 

 

 

Spoiler

 

[Get Marwood & I]

Charlton seems to suffer from a perception that everything they did as a publisher was done ‘on the cheap’. It’s not a perception I share I have to say. I think they rock, warts and all 

They have their share of printing related issues of course, most notably in my experience the failure to use enough ink when printing the internal indicia details. They didn’t put the issue number on the covers in the early years, so running out of ink on the indicia was a masterstroke to further hamper the would be researcher.

How things were printed has always interested me (hence my Marvel Price Font thread and my ‘which came first – pence or cents’ price pontifications) and I like all the little unexplained nuances that you can find.

Take these two copies of Gorgo #6 that I picked up for example (Gorgo....):

  

 

How is that the placement of the ‘LM 6d’ price differs on each book? One is very clearly further right to the other. How does this happen if the books are part of the same run? Does the plate slip? If so, wouldn’t all of it slip? Odd.

  

 

And while we’re at it, what is Gorgo doing with those crabs? They’re pretty freaking big crabs, I have to say, so maybe he’s bashing them together to be free of them rather than do what the rest of us do and pop to the chemist for some cream.

Still on Gorgo, here’s a nicely miscut #14 with a nice big white stripe across the top:

 

And something has clearly gone wrong with this Submarine Attack #39:

 

Abort mission!

There are some cents copies out there with blank interiors that I have seen but I’ve yet to find a pence copy (eBore example below).

Every time I receive a new book in the post I cross my fingers for a blankety blank. Maybe one day…

 

[Get Marwood & I]

One of the fun things that can happen during collecting is finding the notes and comments of former owners in with your newly received books.

Take a look at the notes on this backing board that came with my pence copy of Unusual Tales #33:

 

Isn’t it great to see how much thought went into the appraisal of this book by its former owner? It’s not in that great a shape, but the love that comes through is heart-warming. Whoever he or she was, they clearly loved their books and they had a great approach to documenting them.

As they say, “Great comic!”

I salute them, whoever they were and will be keeping this board with the comic in its new mylar sleeve

Brilliant. 

[Get Marwood & I]

Any excuse to post pretty pence pictures. Look at the cool ‘Miller’s’ stamp on the back of this copy of Unexplored World #27:

 

Presumably we’re talking L Miller?

Well placed stamps are great aren’t they. They add character 

[Get Marwood & I]

Last Charlton post for today - hope you've enjoyed it so far.

I’m not sure if anyone else has noticed this, but is there a reason why Charlton medical staff always seem to be standing in doorways?

Answers on a postcard please (or I could just ask Quincy. He always knew what was going on, and which corporate bully had been poisoning the water supply etc)... 

     

[1950's war comics]

WOW ! Charlton art is just amazing !!  i used to think charlton was DREK... now i can appreciate it , i only read partway through the thread so far  ....

[1950's war comics]

I want a "Just Married #28" now ... the attention to detail by Joe Sinnott paid to the scenery outside the couples door is intricate and amazing......

[AJD]

Love your dedication to the arcana of pence copies.  

And I would totally buy "Fightin' Nurses".

[Glassman10]

what a great rabbit hole to invite us all down!

I like the first example with the paintbrush and the car outside which then is later reused and the paint colors on everything have changed but the drawing is the same. I had some romance comics where the ads were for "Get rid of those skinny Legs" or "Get rid of those fat legs", or "Become popular, amaze your friends! Learn to play the... Piano."

But it takes a special attitude. 

[Get Marwood & I]

1 hour ago, 1950's war comics said:

WOW ! Charlton art is just amazing !!  i used to think charlton was DREK... now i can appreciate it , i only read partway through the thread so far  ....

Drek? DREK! 

Spoiler

1 hour ago, 1950's war comics said:

I want a "Just Married #28" now ... the attention to detail by Joe Sinnott paid to the scenery outside the couples door is intricate and amazing......

That's more like it Craig 

1 hour ago, AJD said:

Love your dedication to the arcana of pence copies.  

And I would totally buy "Fightin' Nurses".

Cheers AJD, coming from a dedicated pence price person (albeit disguised as AUS schillings) that's some compliment  Can 'Fightin' Nurses' the Movie be far off do you think? 

22 minutes ago, Glassman10 said:

what a great rabbit hole to invite us all down!

I like the first example with the paintbrush and the car outside which then is later reused and the paint colors on everything have changed but the drawing is the same. I had some romance comics where the ads were for "Get rid of those skinny Legs" or "Get rid of those fat legs", or "Become popular, amaze your friends! Learn to play the... Piano."

But it takes a special attitude. 

....and Charlton have that attitude in bucket loads! Well, paint pot loads. Maybe rabbit hole loads. I'll shut up now. 

[1950's war comics]

I need to start collecting Charlton romance like i need a hole in my head , but this thread is so concise and persuasive that i am definitely going to keep an eye

out for a couple of the better issues for my collection !! thanks @Get Marwood & I

 

PS:  NICE AVATAR 

[Get Marwood & I]

2 minutes ago, 1950's war comics said:

I need to start collecting Charlton romance like i need a hole in my head , but this thread is so concise and persuasive that i am definitely going to keep an eye

out for a couple of the better issues for my collection !! thanks @Get Marwood & I

 

PS:  NICE AVATAR 

Cheers Craig. Don't buy any pence copies from under me though will you, or I'll have to set Reptisaurus onto you. And trust me, you'll definitely have a 'saurus' after he's finished with you 

[1950's war comics]

3 minutes ago, Get Marwood & I said:

Don't buy any pence copies

Haha ,..no no just US copies   and i have a couple "Submarine Attack" issues and maybe a few more war Charltons ,... but i never realized how nice their romance covers were !

[Glassman10]

I think it would be criminal to slab any of these. This material cries out to be read (while lying on a bed sobbing into a pillow in profusely illustrated detail).