Expert: Chris Brown - 10/21/2003

Question
hello, and nice to talk to you. I have been an avid horror movie memorabilia collecter for a little while and want to start a collection of horror comics(preferably 50-70's). I just love the cover art work. I know very little about horror comics. do you have any advice on what to look for? what comics you think are the most overlooked at this time? And books published on the horror genre only? I prefer to start my collection with prices ranging from $10-$40 per comic, or even better some nice ones for less than that. Any help or tips would be appreciated.

Thank you

Jeff Woods

Answer
Hi Jeff

I am actually a 50s horror collector myself.  I will throw out a few ideas and you can see what may interest you.

Are you familiar with the history of comics?  I will give a brief overview, as it is relevant to horror comics.  The introduction of Superman in 1938 led more than anything to a huge expansion in popularity in sales of comic books, which previously had been primarily comic strip reprints from the Sunday papers.  Many publishers sprung up and created many different superheroes.  However, between about the end of WWII and 1948, interest waned and most superhero comics were discontinued.  Publishers tried out many different genres to replace them, including horror comics.  

Earlier comics had the occasional horror story, but the first all horror comic, a one-shot, was published in 1947.  The first comic title with multiple issues started in 1948.  They became the most popular comics in the 1951 to 1954 period.  Some horror comics were truly grisly and didn't hesitate to show decaptitation, dismemberment, cannibalism, etc.  Many people felt they were a bad influence on children.  There were actually hearings before a Senate subcommittee on the subject.  As a result, the comics publishers banded together and developed a self-regulating "Comics Code" that prohibited violent conduct in comics.  Thus 50s horror comics effectively ended in 1955 with the introduction of the Comics Code.

Various mystery titles were published in the later 50s and 60s which toyed with horror themes but were nowhere near as violent as the earlier comics.  There were also some comics with huge monsters wreaking destruction in the Godzilla mold.

In the mid to late 60s, a few publishers put out black and white comics with color covers in a magazine format, thereby evading the comics code.  The most famous are Warren's Creepy, Eerie, and Vampirella.  These had some striking covers and were often as violent as the precode horror.  The code also loosened up a little in the late 60s and 70s, so that horror themes could be more violent than they had been in the earlier postcode years, although still nothing like the precode issues.  Marvel Comics even produced some horror series, such as Dracula, Werewolf by Night, Ghost Rider and Man-Thing.  DC Comics put out Swamp-Thing as well as anthology titles with no continuing characters: House of Mystery, House of Secrets and Tales of the Unexpected.

A good book to provide a more in-depth overview of this history is "Illustrated History of Horror Comics" by Mike Benton (1991).  Another invaluable reference is the first two volumes of Ernst Gerber's "Photojournal Guide to Comic Books" which will set you back at least $100 but features pictures of the covers of many of the great horror comics of the 50s.

Now to the question of what to collect.  A lot depends on whether you want to read the comics, to just admire the covers, or to buy comics for investment potential.  Of course you will ultimately have to just find what suits your fancy in terms of the many options out there.  eBay is invaluable as a place to see lots of comic covers and get a sense of prices.  If you're not familiar with eBay, from the home page you can go the category Collectibles, then the category Comics.  Choose Golden Age on the left and you will find a subcategory for Horror.  Silver Age also has a Horror subcategory.  There are probably comic conventions in your area as well that would provide the opportunity to see lots of comics at once (although smaller conventions may have few if any 50s horror comics).  The $10 to $40 price range will allow you to get some pretty nice 50s precode comics, although not the very high grade comics generally recommended for "investment" purchasing.  The stuff I described from the 60s and 70s can often be bought for less than $10/issue, again in lesser condition.

If you let me know what might grab your interest from this long and rambling reply, I can try to make some more specific recommendations.  It would take another 10 or 15 paragraphs to tell you what to look for in each time period I described.  Hope this helps you and feel free to ask more questions!

Chris