"Misc. Magazine-Talk"

Found 14 misc. issues of The Good Ol' Days magazine, dating from 1978 to 1985, with one issue from '01. Most in decent enough shape; couple from the mid 80's missing front covers but otherwise complete. I always liked this magazine, and can recall buying copies of it as far back as the late 1960's.

Wanted this really for the full page vintage comic pages they reproduce, as in any issue there's 1 to 4 such pages with characters such as "Little Orphan Annie, Maggie & Jiggs, Freckles, Fritzi Ritz, Mutt & Jeff," etc., but there's lots of other interesting nostalgic stuff in them as well. Photos of towns from 100 years ago, or antique cars and the like.

The publication, like all magazines, has really escalated in cover price. The first ones I ever bought were probably fifty centers, but these ones I got here from the 1970's were already seventy-five cents, and that single one from 2001 was a whippin' $3.99(and nowhere as good in content). About like MAD Magazine. The first ones I ever bought were a quarter, then they raised their price to thirty cents around 1965, and I think they're around $3.99 a copy as well now. Been quite a while since I bought a MAD off the newstands. In fact, I may have only purchased a single issue since Warner took them over (which has now been several years).

Was going to buy the first issue of MAD For Kids, a new title they'd released, but never saw that one around here. But, of course, we have terrible distribution on anything published of 'real" interest to me. The only newstands I know of in this town are either in a grocery store or a drug store, and neither carry comics anymore. I think the last comic book I ever saw was maybe some Archie title a year or so back, and the last super-hero title was maybe THOR V2 #49 or so. I suppose there's just not enough sales to warrent carrying comics here anymore (a shame, really).

"Spinner" racks disapeared completely from this area sometime in the late 1990's. Titles such as X-Men were up to around #30 then, & Wolverine around #90, and the 1996 Supergirl title title I recall seeing on the last of such racks may have been up to about #9. Probably the last such comics were had available were in 1998 or '99.

And that's when I lost track of many titles, especially the Superman books which I had previously followed pretty close. It was right after "The Reign of Supermen" and "Superman Returns" cross-overs that they vanished from local stands.



I've been thinking about magazine-size comics I used to buy as well. And, probably when I say magazine comics most would think of Creepy, Eerie or other Warren pubs, the various 70's Marvel Dracula Lives, or Deadly Hands of Kung-Fu, or even MAD Magazine.

But I'm really thinking of those independent publishers of the 1970-80's who gave us such titles as Elfquest, A Distant Soil, The Flaming Carrot one-shot (as well as "Visions"), Thunderbunny, Particle Dreams, the Hembeck books, or Star*Reach. All of these (save MAD) have disapeared in that magazine-format, but I always enjoyed them although they were in B&W. I liked the larger artwork; showed more detail.


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(Today's blog dedicated to the memory of my daughter Alicia Donna Puckett Doan on what would have been her 33rd. Birthday. I miss you, sweetheart.)