Most of us have seen ‘Back to the Future’, and can remember Marty McFly’s incredulity when he visits the 1950s version of his home town. If you could jump onto Doc Brown’s time travelling Delorean and travel back in time to January of 1952, you’d arrive to a place that’s similar yet very different from our world today. In this post I’ll look at the four comics you’d want to buy off the newsstand in January of 1952.
We know that comics were much more tightly interwoven into the fabric of American society during the Golden Age. There was also a great deal of diversity in the titles available during this period; probably more at any other time in the hobby before today. Throughout the Golden Age as a whole however i.e. between 1938-1955, there were high and low points regarding the number of titles published. The highest point of saturation for comic titles in the Golden Age was 1952.
The total number of titles released in 1952, by all publishers, was 2824.
Comparing this number with previous years shows that this was a moment of peak saturation (a great website with the data allowing you to determine that, can be found
here- Shout out to Mike for the great work he’s done making this available!).
If we go all the way back to 1938, the very beginning of the so-called ‘Golden Age’, the number of published titles for that year was a mere 218.
The number of titles gradually increases throughout the 30s and early 1940s, but sees its first decline in 1944 when the number of titles published drops from 1004 (in 1943) to 995, probably due to war time paper rationing. The following year 1945, saw an even further decline, this time down to 970 titles. However, by 1946, numbers were up again (1341), and would increase incrementally until 1952.
By December of 1950 there were a total of 2070 titles published. A fair number, but more than 700 less than were published in 1952. At the end of 1951, there were already 2295 published in total; jump ahead to 1953 and that number stands at 2551.
Throughout 1952 the top publishers were Atlas/Timely who produced 408 titles, Dell comics – with 309 titles, DC with 295 titles published, Harvey with 184 titles, Archie comics: 64 different titles and Charlton Comics with 39 titles published.
Okay, so the Delorean has taken us back in time and we have only 4 dimes to spend.
Walking into various grocery and convenience stores, and browsing the newsstands at the beginning of the big 1952 spike, you would spot the following titles:
Atlas/Timely would already overwhelm you with its selection. Still your 21st century eyes would recognize the burgeoning Marvel brand in titles like Patsy Walker #40 (April 1952 cover date) and Kid Colt Outlaw #20 (April 1952) [an 8.5 sold for $310.70 on Heritage Auction, 01/24/2010]. There would also be a wide selection of Crime, Romance, War and pre-code Horror titles. Books like Spellbound #2 (March 1952), would jump out at you [an 8.0 sold on eBay for $382.97 on 05/02/2011] and would look like keepers. In reality the Atlas comic to seek out and drop your first dime on would be the following: Mystery Tales #2 (April 1952) – Bill Everett Cover
An 8.0 copy sold on ComicConnect for $4, 240.00 on 06/14/2018, this is Golden Age horror done right.
National/DC. Now we spot the DC offerings. DC would be represented by titles like: Adventure Comics #174 [an 8.0 of which sold on ComicConnect for $240.00 on 12/12/2016], Superman #75 [a 7.0 sold on ComicLink in on May 3, 2019 for $458.00], Wonder Woman #52 [an 8.5 sold on eBay for $515.00 on 06/24/2019], Tomahawk #10 [a 9.0 sold on Heritage 08/07/2007 for $239.00], and various Romance, Funny Animal and Western titles. The best DC titles were actually released later that year, include the first Star Spangled War Stories (numbered #131) with a July cover date; but the first time the title changed from Star Spangled Comics. The first issue of G.I. Combat was also published later that year (October of 52 cover date) [today a 4.0 is worth about $400.00 and a 9.8 would be worth many times more (hypothetically, since no known copies exist]. But in January of 1952, you would have wanted to pick up a high grade copy of: Action Comics #166 (March 1952) – Wayne Boring and Curt Swan art. This is classic Superman and an 8.5 sold on ComicConnect for $725.00 on 03/24/2015.
Archie Comics. Regarding the remaining comic publishers, Archie would have had seven titles on the newsstand in January of 1952 [April-March cover dates]. These included: Archie Comics #55, Archie’s Girls #5, Archie’s Rival Reggie #5, Ginger #2, Katy Keene #5, Pep Comics #90, Sam Hill Private Eye #5. And the comic to buy would be: Archie Comics #55 (1952) – Innuendo Cover. An 8.5 copy sold on Heritage Auction for $1, 680.00 on 10/28/2018. That’s the kind of Golden Age Archie everybody likes.
Dell. Dell Comics had a corner on the market in 1952, mostly due to sales of their Disney Comics. Walking into a grocery store in January of 1952 however, you might have spotted a familiar pulp fiction hero gracing the cover of a comic book for the first time. With a March-May 1952 cover date, Dell's Four Color #375 is the first appearance of John Carter of Mars in comics. Four Color #375 (March-May 1952) – First John Carter in Comics; Origin of John Carter, a 7.0 copy of this comic sold in a Heritage Auction for $478.00 back in 06/17/2007.
There were many more great comics available, even more valuable titles would be released as the year went on. The first ever issue of Mad Magazine for example, would be available around July of 1952 (with a September 1952 cover date), but from the above thought experiment you can get the general idea of how significant 1952 was for comic book history.
