The Distribution of US Published Comics in the UK (1959~1982) 15 15

[Get Marwood & I]

I added the ten UKPV gap issues (#59-68) for Tales of Suspense this morning:

 

I couldn't find a single stamped #59 but found many multiples for the others:

 

Here's how they plot (click to enlarge / zoom in).

In the eighth cycle, Noah must have piloted the boat as many of the issues arrived 'two by two'. There is a clear pattern here for the three plotted Marvel titles developing - two consecutive issues for each title in the 5, 6 and 8 stamp slots, no books in the 7 and 9:

 

That increases to three or more consecutive issues for some titles in the 2 and 4 stamp slot of cycle nine (although the TOS #67 in the two slot might belong in the tenth cycle, a scenario potentially applicable to every plotted book when you think about it):

 

For me, this bunching of issues indicates that the stamp numbers - if all pertaining to the same calendar month / delivery - could not realistically have been used by newsagents as a returns process guide. Bringing it to life, there were four consecutive issues of TOS stamped '4' in the 9th cycle. I don't see a newsagent putting all four issues out and then removing all four in line with some noted T&P invoice / instruction even taking into account the suggested lack of chronological observance of the time. And, again, I couldn't read a large proportion of the stamped copies that I found online. What a headache that would have been.

We have another of those 'number-only ten stamps' too, in this run:

They get about don't they.

One other observation - for these three Marvel titles that I have plotted, there is not one stamped copy for any book preceding or following the UKPV issue gap. Not one. So this process of filling the UKPV gaps with stamped cents copies was - based on this limited sample at least - surprisingly precise.

[Get Marwood & I]

One more Marvel title for today - this time the nine first hiatus UKPV gap issues (#62-70) for Tales to Astonish:

 

First up, once again, no T&P stamped issues are to be found where a UKPV exists. And, as with the other three Marvel titles, very few or no examples of the first issue can be found, in this case for TTA, issue #62.

Again, we have Noah's two consecutive issues for the 8 stamp. I plan to add a few more DC titles now, to see if I can find an 8 stamped example to sit alongside the Marvels:

 

In the ninth cycle, one TTA joins the one ASM in the stamp '1' slot, one issue in the '3' slot and then all the final non-UKPV issues - 68, 69 and 70 - turn up as now expected in the 4 slot:

 

That's four Marvel titles now that refuse to extend beyond the 4 slot - a pattern begins to cement.....

This solitary find of a TTA #69 with an unnumbered new format 10d stamp bucks the trend, almost certainly a book that found its way into the mix in a later cycle:

 

I mentioned earlier seeing stamps that looked like they were unnumbered by design - here's an example:

 

I've seen quite a few like it and on closer inspection it looks like there is a rectangle embedded in the top half that normally would bear the number:

I'll try to find some more / better examples - like a plonker, I didn't save them when I spotted them before. Maybe that was a deliberate addition to the stamp to remove any number.

If any of you guys reading has a stamped TOS #59 or a TTA #62, dive in eh (with a picture if possible)? 

[Kevin.J]

4 minutes ago, Get Marwood & I said:

If any of you guys reading has a stamped TOS #59 or a TTA #62, dive in eh?

Just speed read the above, will read it properly later when I have more time, so apologizes if I missed the point.

My TTA #62 is a cents but I have a stamped copy of TOS #59........I guess it proves that it exists but not much else due to those pesky kids and their felt tip pens  

 

[Get Marwood & I]

1 minute ago, Kevin.J said:

Just speed read the above, will read it properly later when I have more time, so apologizes if I missed the point.

My TTA #62 is a cents but I have a stamped copy of TOS #59........I guess it proves that it exists but not much else due to those pesky kids and their felt tip pens  

It's a 9d stamp though, which fits the 'first issue to be stamped' pattern 

[Garystar]

My TTA #62 is unstamped cents also. When I did Marvel spreadsheet I couldn’t find a stamped copy either.

TOS #59 - nice clear 5. I have a nice unstamped one so this copy is in the pile to sell for charity. 

[Get Marwood & I]

57 minutes ago, Garystar said:

My TTA #62 is unstamped cents also. When I did Marvel spreadsheet I couldn’t find a stamped copy either.

TOS #59 - nice clear 5. I have a nice unstamped one so this copy is in the pile to sell for charity. 

Still a 9d stamp Gary, thanks, and in keeping with the 'firsts':

One observation though - if the first non-UKPV ASM (#18) arrived in the '4' slot, I can see how that would be stamped with a 9d stamp as per all the DCs that it presumably arrived with.

In the '5' slot though, and again assuming that they all arrived together as a shipment, why would all the DCs be stamped 10d, four of the Marvels the same, but two Marvels as a 9d? That would suggest that - and we're in full speculation mode here taking a lot of things for granted - that the '5' shipment would have arrived and then, as T&P began the stamping process, they would have switched from 9d to 10d stamps mid-way. I probably need to add a lot more titles to see how that 9d to 10d pattern goes I suppose, but it seems that that '5' stamp delivery was the stamp switch period and that the switch happened mid-shipment.

One question, as I pause before doing any more - why are we doing this?  

[Get Marwood & I]

2 hours ago, Get Marwood & I said:

If any of you guys reading has a stamped TOS #59 or a TTA #62, dive in eh (with a picture if possible)? 

Just remembered, @Albert Tatlock, didn't you say TTA#62 didn't come over?

[themagicrobot]

With your fascination for the T&P stamps it would be interesting to discover HOW they were stamped. I imagine a long bench with a bunch of people (if I say women am I not being PC?) with hand held stamps and little ink pads. Considerable hand-to-eye co-ordination would be required to consistently place the stamp on the moon/superman's face. How many people? How many comics per hour? All day long? Were they "careful" not to crease the comics knowing that 50 years later someone might be grading them?

When they got bored with stamping were they given the "interesting" task of tearing off comic covers ready to be bound in the Double Double books? Did they take those discarded covers home for their kids to pin on their bedroom walls? I would have done.

Or was there a Jetsons-style robot arm sticking out of a wall stamping away. Comics were slid underneath to hopefully stamp in the best place on the cover? Which reminds me of my favourite Jetsons scene. George has been working at the Sprocket factory for years. His job is to continually press a button to stamp out the sprockets. One day it is announced that he is being laid off. His replacement is a robot arm with a gloved hand that presses the button instead (and doesn't need toilet breaks).

[Albert Tatlock]

8 minutes ago, Get Marwood & I said:

TTA#62 didn't come over?

Was not to be found anywhere, pence or cents.

It was still on many peoples wants list years later.

The bundle I found in Tel Aviv in 1972 found customers straight away.

As late as 1983, Alan Austin's price guide has it listed as 'Rare', so even after nearly 20 years, only a few copies from the States had dribbled in. Should be common enough by now, though.

I think he should have listed it as ND.

Unlikely, I think, to find a stamped copy. T & P probably never received any.

[Get Marwood & I]

3 minutes ago, themagicrobot said:

With your fascination for the T&P stamps it would be interesting to discover HOW they were stamped. I imagine a long bench with a bunch of people (if I say women am I not being PC?) with hand held stamps and little ink pads. Considerable hand-to-eye co-ordination would be required to consistently place the stamp on the moon/superman's face. How many people? How many comics per hour? All day long? Were they "careful" not to crease the comics knowing that 50 years later someone might be grading them?

When they got bored with stamping were they given the "interesting" task of tearing off comic covers ready to be bound in the Double Double books? Did they take those discarded covers home for their kids to pin on their bedroom walls? I would have done.

In the absence of being able to find any information myself - and I have tried - my strategy is to post a lot about things in the hope that someone who knows finally gets wind and joins in (no fart jokes please). It's quite remarkable that there is nothing to be found online about this, what the actual operating model was. No blog or forum comments that Google can detect, or articles to be found anywhere from someone whose Mum / Dad / Robot Arm used to work at T&P in the stamping department.

What a job that must have been. 

Left a bit....right a bit....up a bit...

 

[Garystar]

4 hours ago, Get Marwood & I said:

for these three Marvel titles that I have plotted, there is not one stamped copy for any book preceding or following the UKPV issue gap. Not one. So this process of filling the UKPV gaps with stamped cents copies was - based on this limited sample at least - surprisingly precise.

I did find a few Marvels that were UKPV and stamped but these were very rare(until the final late 60s run after which no more T&P). One of mine;

 

[Get Marwood & I]

Just now, Albert Tatlock said:

Was not to be found anywhere, pence or cents.

It was still on many peoples wants list years later.

The bundle I found in Tel Aviv in 1972 found customers straight away.

As late as 1983, Alan Austin's price guide has it listed as 'Rare', so even after nearly 20 years, only a few copies from the States had dribbled in. Should be common enough by now, though.

I think he should have listed it as ND.

Unlikely, I think, to find a stamped copy. T & P probably never received any.

Yes, I remember you saying this before now Albert - looks like we won't be adding a 9d stamp to the 4 or 5 slot anytime soon then for TTA#62...

[Get Marwood & I]

Just now, Garystar said:

I did find a few Marvels that were UKPV and stamped but these were very rare(until the final late 60s run after which no more T&P). One of mine;

....confirming one of the regular features of my research into pence stuff down the years - there is always an exception!

[Garystar]

4 minutes ago, Get Marwood & I said:

Look at the lovely big white area - I think the stamper missed a trick here. I bet the popular book centre would have gone to town on this. 

[Get Marwood & I]

2 minutes ago, Garystar said:

Look at the lovely big white area - I think the stamper missed a trick here. I bet the popular book centre would have gone to town on this. 

They'd have stamped it at least five times too  

[Kevin.J]

Checking my 71 for a pence & pence stamp (cents  ) but found this one

Edited November 30, 2020 by Kevin.J

[Get Marwood & I]

8 hours ago, Kevin.J said:

Checking my 71 for a pence & pence stamp (cents  ) but found his one

His one? Who's he? 

Oh, John Barnes!

Who knew that he was distributing comics whilst advertising Lucozade isotonic sport back in the day (it got to your tirst - tarst!)

[Get Marwood & I]

So, boys, I'm in reflective mood this morning.

We're 46 pages and 917 posts into this 'brief' review. What have we learnt? Or more clearly established, if we already kind of knew it.

In no particular order, just off the top of my head:

• We've proven which US publishers comics came to the UK systematically, as a result of systematic extant stamped copies that we've found and filed
• We've proven who distributed many of them, and the periods they did so (e.g. T&P and Miller passing the baton for Archie and Charlton, Miller distributing Harvey etc)
• We've shown all the T&P stamp types and the prices they used
• We've proven that the T&P stamp numbers are sequential and that they broadly follow cover months
• We've proven for Marvel that the UKPV gaps were replaced by stamped T&P cents copies
• We've proven that in the second Marvel UKPV hiatus, someone else (possibly Gold Start) took over distribution using oblong and circular stamps for two months
• We've shown that shipping strikes probably were not the cause of Marvel UKPV gaps, given the continuation of imported DC books and the T&P stamped Marvels
• We've shown that books - Marvel especially - arrived in bunches of consecutive issues, all with the same stamp and in line with collectors recollections
• We've proven that it was not uncommon for the same issue of a title to appear in three successive stamping periods
• We've shown that our DC books were predominantly made up of unsold US returns
• Subject to our 6 / 8 stamp conundrum, we have a summary of the DC titles and issues that we believe were the 'first to be distributed' in the UK
• We've proven that T&P used their stamps on other non-comic publications prior to their use on comics (hence the comics starting with the 6 or 8 stamp)
• We've shown that there are stamped Charlton comics that predate the earliest DC examples by cover date - some as far back as 1958 - and that the possibility remains that they may have been the first comics top arrive in the UK (although the 1958 books are likely to have been stamped as later arrivals)
• We've shown that UK distributors used a wide variety of stamps and stickers on the books they imported
• For T&P, we've shown when the stamps were changed as the UK prices increased and we know when the last stamps were used (1979)
• We've proven that other companies distributed comics systematically alongside T&P and L Miller but don't as yet know who they were (e.g. 'RV')
• We've shown that the distribution agreements for Marvel and DC were different - DC being made up of unsold returns, Marvel having printed priced copies solicited (other than the earlier mentioned gaps, filled by stamped cents copies)

And for the first time (to my knowledge) we have some visual tables which show us the make up of deliveries by cover stamp in the early 1-9 cycles and the ability to broadly predict the actual calendar month that they would have gone on sale.

That's not bad for a 'brief' review is it.

Is there anything else that we can work on to 'prove' or clarify here? I could plot titles all day long for a year and probably not complete the tables and, even if I did, there would be so many entries if I were to add all publishers that it would be impossible to present the findings without reams and reams of data.

Is there anything else you guys would like to see / explore before I decide what to do next?

 

[themagicrobot]

We've shown that the distribution agreements for Marvel and DC were different - DC being made up of unsold returns

So. are we saying that all 1960s DCs visited a spinner rack Stateside for a month, were handled numerous times. Shipped over here on a slow boat, handled again by T&P to stamp them, placed into spinner racks here and yet still looked pretty good and shiny when I purchased them? I'm not convinced about that.

Or were the comics maybe part of item F in the Statement of Ownership: Office use, left over, Unaccounted, spoiled after printing which would explain why they continued to print twice as many issues as they sold. Otherwise they would look at the figures and the following month amend the production run to be more in line with US requirements. Would comics destined for here cost T&P the same price as charged in the States or would they be even cheaper as they were either returns, left over or just simply out of date?

 

 

 

[Get Marwood & I]

40 minutes ago, themagicrobot said:

We've shown that the distribution agreements for Marvel and DC were different - DC being made up of unsold returns

So. are we saying that all 1960s DCs visited a spinner rack Stateside for a month, were handled numerous times. Shipped over here on a slow boat, handled again by T&P to stamp them, placed into spinner racks here and yet still looked pretty good and shiny when I purchased them? I'm not convinced about that.

Or were the comics maybe part of item F in the Statement of Ownership: Office use, left over, Unaccounted, spoiled after printing which would explain why they continued to print twice as many issues as they sold. Otherwise they would look at the figures and the following month amend the production run to be more in line with US requirements. Would comics destined for here cost T&P the same price as charged in the States or would they be even cheaper as they were either returns, left over or just simply out of date?

That's a good point Robot - we don't know for sure about that bit but all the anecdotal evidence certainly points to it - the testimony from those at the time, snippets from fanzines of the time, the presence of date stamped copies, the time lag to take account of them being on sale in the slots we've tabled - all these things point to that being the case. So I really should say 'likely' being made up of unsold returns.

But it's a fair point - how so many made that alleged journey without being battered. And I have never understood why so many were printed for 'office use' etc. If there was a long standing arrangement to print copies for distribution in the UK, why not record it as such? Unless.....