'Antiques Roadshow' guests stunned that comic books they collected for 45 years are worth a fortune
Collecting comic books was just a hobby for teenagers decades back, but as time went by, Marvel and DC comics, action figures and other merchandise related to superheroes started gaining big appraisals on "Antiques Roadshow." Two brothers who collected Marvel's Silver Age comics for 45 years got an astounding valuation from the show's expert, Travis Landry. While they knew their collection was valuable, Landry valued it at $60,000 to $90,000, which was way beyond their expectations.
In the episode, the brothers shared how casually they got into the habit of collecting comics and how it stuck with them for decades. "Well, we started doing this about 45 years ago. It started out very simply. He was actually in the Air Force, and one year, he came up for Christmas. I was a young teenager, and he bought me a box of comics. Well, then the next year, he bought a second box. And we put them together, and we thought, well, let's see if we can start filling in some of these numbers that we're missing," one of the brothers said on PBS.
They explained that the hobby and the collection just kept growing from there on, and they probably paid less than $100 for any of the comics that were on the table. Landry then took over to examine some of the comic books that were in the collection. He noted that the best of the lot was the "Fantastic Four #1," which marked the birth of the Silver Age of Marvel comics.
"Everything shown is between 1961 and 1966, the number one grail of the Silver Age of comics. Amazing Fantasy 15, 1962. The first true appearance of Spider-Man. Early Silver Age comics are known for Marvel chipping," he explained. He noted that the books weren't in the best condition, but that didn't impact the value a whole lot. "Yeah. The condition is terrible. I mean, numerically speaking, it's gonna be a 1.0, but as it sits, prior to grading, I would say this comic alone is gonna be in that $10,000 to $15,000 range," Landry said, pointing at the 'Amazing Fantasy' comic book.
He went on to share a $4,000 to $6,000 appraisal for the "Incredible Hulk #1," comic, a $7,000 to $10,000 estimate for the 'X-Men #1' comic book, and the same for the 'Amazing Fantasy #15' and the 'Hulk #1.' Coming to the collective appraisal, Landry estimated that the lot would be worth $60,000 to $90,000 at auction. "Wow. Okay. Nice!" the guests exclaimed.
In their interview, the owners shared that they always kept their collection showcased in their home, but the expensive ones were locked in the safe. They added that despite the massive appraisal, they intend to never sell their prized collection.
"Yeah, well, we plan on probably keeping them and then sealed. We never collected these with the intention of selling them. We collect them for fun. We don't like to care about selling them and making money. We're just gonna go ahead and give them to his kids probably," one of the brothers shared.
