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Build a list of golden age publishers
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23 posts in this topic

Hi everyone,

I would like to learn more about comics, so I thought to stop by and ask you if you could help me build a list of golden and silver age publishers. I'm especially interested in not so well know publishers that still made good quality comics.

 

( I know this is not the place to post about silver age, but I didn't want to create two new threads. :) )

 

If you can, please take a moment to help me. I would really appreciate it.

 

Enrico

Edited by Enrico R.
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For years, the Overstreet price guide had a section that set forth, in chronological order, the history of early comic book publishing. It listed every publisher and when each began publishing. I don't know if the current edition still has that info, but you could get it from an older edition.

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Here's a start -

 

A.A. Wyn

Accepted

Ace Magazines

ACG

Ajax

Artful Publications

Avon

Bailey

Bell Features

Best

Centaur

Charlton

Close-Up

Columbia

Comic media

Comics Magazine

Consolidated

Continental

Crestwood

Cross Publications

Croyden

Curtis

D.S. Publishing

David McKay

Dearfield

Dell

DM Publishing

E.C.

Eastern Color

Essankay Publications

Famous Funnies

Farrell

Fawcett

Feature

Fiction House

Four Star

Fox

Gilberton

Gilmore

Harry A. Chesler

Harvey

Hawley

Headline

Hillman

Holyoke

Humor

Ken Crossen

Kirby Publications

Leading

Lev Gleason

Lloyd Jacquet

Magazine Enterprises

Mainline

McCombs

McNaught Syndicate

MLJ

National

Nesbit

Novelty Press

Orbit

P.L. Publishing

Parents' Magazine

Pines

Premier

Prize

Quality

Ribage

Ross Publications

Spark Publications

Spotlight

St. John

Standard

Stanmor

Star

Story

Street & Smith

Superior

Timely

Toby

Trojan

True Comics Press

U.S.A

Ultem

United Features Syndicate

Western

Will Eisner

Youthful

Ziff-Davis

 

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For years, the Overstreet price guide had a section that set forth, in chronological order, the history of early comic book publishing. It listed every publisher and when each began publishing. I don't know if the current edition still has that info, but you could get it from an older edition.

 

Thank you very much, I'll take a look at the Overstreet Guide. I have the one of last year, but it may contain some good information.

 

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Here's a start -

 

A.A. Wyn

Accepted

Ace Magazines

ACG

Ajax

Artful Publications

Avon

Bailey

Bell Features

Best

Centaur

Charlton

Close-Up

Columbia

Comic media

Comics Magazine

Consolidated

Continental

Crestwood

Cross Publications

Croyden

Curtis

D.S. Publishing

David McKay

Dearfield

Dell

DM Publishing

E.C.

Eastern Color

Essankay Publications

Famous Funnies

Farrell

Fawcett

Feature

Fiction House

Four Star

Fox

Gilberton

Gilmore

Harry A. Chesler

Harvey

Hawley

Headline

Hillman

Holyoke

Humor

Ken Crossen

Kirby Publications

Leading

Lev Gleason

Lloyd Jacquet

Magazine Enterprises

Mainline

McCombs

McNaught Syndicate

MLJ

National

Nesbit

Novelty Press

Orbit

P.L. Publishing

Parents' Magazine

Pines

Premier

Prize

Quality

Ribage

Ross Publications

Spark Publications

Spotlight

St. John

Standard

Stanmor

Star

Story

Street & Smith

Superior

Timely

Toby

Trojan

True Comics Press

U.S.A

Ultem

United Features Syndicate

Western

Will Eisner

Youthful

Ziff-Davis

 

What can I say? Thank you so so much. I'll check them all out. Thanks a lot for your help.

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No problem. I wasn't sure it would actually be helpful to you but that's a fairly comprehensive list from which I have tried to cull out the marginal publishers to retain most of the significant ones. Given that I am not sure which direction you wanted to take, I kept the list as long as would be manageable.

 

What I would do as a start is to go to the GCD (comics.org) and do a search by publisher and then you'll see how many books each of these companies (and imprints etc.) put out so you can get a sense of their relevance and significance. What that will get you also is a complete list of the series they put out.

 

For example, if you were to look up, say A. A. Wyn, the first company listed you'd get that I shouldn't have had it on the list as it's an imprint for Ace Magazines they used for their , for example, the one-shot Four Teeners # 34 or a lot of their romance titles (Glamorous Romance, Real Love, ..). So, it's really Ace Magazines -

 

http://www.comics.org/publisher/84/indicia_publishers/'>http://www.comics.org/publisher/84/indicia_publishers/

 

where here is the output for Ace -

 

http://www.comics.org/publisher/84/

 

This is where the fun begins. Have fun exploring their 668 comics.

 

 

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No problem. I wasn't sure it would actually be helpful to you but that's a fairly comprehensive list from which I have tried to cull out the marginal publishers to retain most of the significant ones. Given that I am not sure which direction you wanted to take, I kept the list as long as would be manageable.

 

What I would do as a start is to go to the GCD (comics.org) and do a search by publisher and then you'll see how many books each of these companies (and imprints etc.) put out so you can get a sense of their relevance and significance. What that will get you also is a complete list of the series they put out.

 

For example, if you were to look up, say A. A. Wyn, the first company listed you'd get that I shouldn't have had it on the list as it's an imprint for Ace Magazines they used for their , for example, the one-shot Four Teeners # 34 or a lot of their romance titles (Glamorous Romance, Real Love, ..). So, it's really Ace Magazines -

 

http://www.comics.org/publisher/84/indicia_publishers/'>http://www.comics.org/publisher/84/indicia_publishers/

 

where here is the output for Ace -

 

http://www.comics.org/publisher/84/

 

This is where the fun begins. Have fun exploring their 668 comics.

 

 

That's exactly what I was looking for. :) I will search the publishers you listed on comics.org and write down some titles I may be interested. I'll have a lot of fun and hopefully I'll soon have some new comics to read. Thank you.

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I think Better is normally considered the same as Standard, and Minoan is associated with Toby.

 

Similar to Timely/ Marvel/ Atlas.

 

Then again, sometimes sorting out what is what borders on the impossible. Trying to sort out Four Star and Superior can be messy, and they're not even based in the same country for the most part!

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I think Better is normally considered the same as Standard, and Minoan is associated with Toby.

 

Similar to Timely/ Marvel/ Atlas.

 

Then again, sometimes sorting out what is what borders on the impossible. Trying to sort out Four Star and Superior can be messy, and they're not even based in the same country for the most part!

 

Good to know. How about Universal Phoenix and Flying Stories? I didn't see Nedor as well.

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For years, the Overstreet price guide had a section that set forth, in chronological order, the history of early comic book publishing. It listed every publisher and when each began publishing. I don't know if the current edition still has that info, but you could get it from an older edition.

 

Here's one with their most significant books

 

comics%20chronology%20MASTER1_zpshs50wvco.jpg

 

comics%20chronology%20MASTER2_zpspwdkjh9h.jpg

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Is Better Publications another one?

Nedor/Better/Standard are the same company.

Thank you.

 

Some others I'm not sure about:

 

Pentagon

Ace Periodicals

Realistic Comics

Leader Enterprises

I.C. Publishing

 

Ace is on the list I posted and Realistic is an imprint of Avon.

 

Since he wanted only the start-up package, I "only" gave him 88 publisher names. I have another 100 I didn't post. Didn't seem relevant as most publishers with output noticeable should be on the initial list I posted.

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Is Better Publications another one?

Nedor/Better/Standard are the same company.

Thank you.

 

Some others I'm not sure about:

 

Pentagon

Ace Periodicals

Realistic Comics

Leader Enterprises

I.C. Publishing

 

Ace is on the list I posted and Realistic is an imprint of Avon.

 

Since he wanted only the start-up package, I "only" gave him 88 publisher names. I have another 100 I didn't post. Didn't seem relevant as most publishers with output noticeable should be on the initial list I posted.

 

Thanks for the info. I really didn't know how it worked myself.

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It gets really confusing as posted above.

 

Try and look at the publishing history of Cat-Man. Not only does it switch publisher but the numbering is confusing as heck -

 

Cat-Man starts with Temerson / Helnit / Continental then goes to Holyoke then back to Temerson?

 

Here's the lovely note concerning this mess in the GCD - http://www.comics.org/series/61787/

 

There are two distinct sets of tracking links:

 

* By title, as it crosses back and forth between publishers:

Cat-Man: v1#6 - v1#10 (Temerson) => v1#11 - v3#7 (Holyoke) => v3#8 - #32 (Temerson)

 

* By number, with two distinct sequences appearing in this title:

Crash Comics Adventures #1 - #5 => Cat-Man v1#6 - v3#8 => Captain Aero v3#9 - #24

Green Hornet Comics #1 - #6 => Captain Aero v1#7 - v2#4 => Cat-Man v2#6 - 32

 

(v2#5 in the 2nd numbering sequence doesn't exist, but there's a gap in its schedule corresponding to v3#8 in the other sequence that would fit perfectly)

 

See the series notes for full details including an explanation of v3#13 and other oddities.

numbering continues from Crash Comics Adventures (Temerson / Helnit / Continental, 1940 series) #5

numbering continues after #v1#10 (5) with Cat-Man Comics (Holyoke, 1942 series) #v1#11 (6)

numbering continues with #v3#8 (18) from Cat-Man Comics (Holyoke, 1942 series) #v3#7 (17)

numbering continues after #v3#8 (18) with Captain Aero Comics (Temerson / Helnit / Continental, 1941 series) #v3#9 (11)

Note:

Cat-Man and Captain Aero swapped numbers

numbering continues with #v2#6 (19) from Captain Aero Comics (Holyoke, 1942 series) #v2#4 (10)

Note:

There is a gap in Captain Aero's schedule corresponding to Cat-Man v3#8 that is theorized to account for a never-published v2#5

Notes

Formerly listed as "Catman Comics" (with no hyphen). Indicia title is "Cat-Man Comics" from #v1#6 (1) to #30, and "Catman Comics" for issues #31 and #32.

 

This series has a complicated numbering scheme which has been further complicated by a number of long-repeated errors and omissions. However, the numbering becomes more clear when set next to other comics being published by the same company at the same time, in particular Captain Aero Comics. Looking only at the indicia numbers, they can be explained (mostly) as follows:

 

v1#6 picks up the numbering of Crash Comics Adventures which was published by Tem Publications, Inc. (a predecessor of initial Cat-Man publisher Helnit Publications, Inc.) and ended with issue v1#5. Cover numbers start here with #1.

 

Indicia numbering continues under v1 up through issue #12 (not issue #10 as often reported), and then switches to v2 without interrupting the issue numbers which continue with #13-15. One might speculate that this was done after issue 12 as it would normally be a year's worth of monthly issues and rolling the volume forward after a year was fairly common, with or without resetting the issue number.

 

After #v2#15, the volume moved to v3 and this time the issue number reset to #1. This seems random, but Henry Andrews observes that this was done the same cover month that Holyoke Publishing Co., Inc. (which had taken over with #v1#11) began publishing Blue Beetle, formerly a Fox Publications, Inc. title. Holyoke's other title at the time, Captain Aero Comics, would go to #v2#1 the next cover month. While this is entirely speculation, one might think that Holyoke was marking a fresh start. There is absolutely no concrete evidence for this, though.

 

Cat-Man's v3 continues through the end of Holyoke's publication tenure. When Et-Es-Go Magazines, Inc. (owned, as Helnit and Tem were, by Frank Z. Temerson) resumes publication, an issue of Cat-Man is its first issue and resumes with v3#8, the next number in the sequence. The following issue is one of the more puzzling changes, though, moving *backwards* to v2#6.

 

Frank Motler observes that the issue of Captain Aero Comics published the same month as Cat-Man's v2#6 is in fact v3#9, the next Cat-Man number. The last Captain Aero published by Holyoke Publishing, Inc. was v2#4. There was no Captain Aero published at the same time as Cat-Man's v3#8, but if one assigns the number v2#5 to that space, then Cat-Man's v2#6 would be the next number in that sequence. So essentially, what happened is that Cat-Man and Captain Aero switched indicia numbering.

 

Cat-Man continues with the v2 numbering until the last Et-Es-Go Magazines, Inc. issue, which is v3#13, again apparently at random. However, Henry observes that Frank's "switch with Captain Aero" theory applies here as well. The prior issue of Captain Aero was v3#12, making this issue of Cat-Man the next in that sequence. Captain Aero would publish its own v3#13 issue the following month (also its final Et-Es-Go issue). Both of these v3#13 issues are also the first issues in the series with no cover number.

 

The first Continental Magazines, Inc. issue of Cat-Man is v2#12, resuming the v2 numbering but still with no cover number (v3#13 should have been v2#11). After that it goes to v3#1 and v3#2, still with no cover number. This might be a "renumber after 12 issues" or a slightly belated renumbering for the new publisher (pure speculation either way).

 

Finally, there is a four month gap in publication and the volume-based indicia numbering disappears altogether. Cover numbers return and now match the indicia numbers, but are off by one (#27 when it should be #28). No theory has yet explained this. It may be a simple miscounting (not unheard of), but Captain Aero's switch to whole numbering is much farther off (#21 instead of #18), suggesting that there may have been some other source explaining both unexpected numbers.

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