The Origin of the Orphan

Here is follows A digression from our series on General Collecting. Enjoy!

An explanation of Orphans and their Origins

Once in Comic Collecting any Comic Book that had a Major Defacement, Piece missing, was Remaindered with the Logo-off, Mice chews, Large tears, and/or other Serious Problems was considered trash even if it was completely Readable!

There was No grade in the Overstreet Guide(The Most Used Guide in the Comic Book Collecting World) for these Wounded 4 Color Warriors, other then Incomplete/Ungradable. In Coins you Have Type Coins, in Stamps they are Repaired and Called Examples, in Sports cards they are called Fillers but in comics they were treated as rubbish. That is Until about 9 Years ago but not when the Market expanded with eBay but when the Bottom Feeders of Comic Collecting burst into the light of day from their former haunts at Flea Markets, Comic Shop Quarter Bins and Rummage Sales. And with those Bottom Feeders came the Dealer in the Less then Average, the guy who'd sell anything.. or at least almost anything. The Guy most Likely to Resemble the Comic Dealer off the Simpsons.. the Bottom Feeder Feeder.

I fully admit to having been not just a bottom feeder feeder.. but one of the best at it! I sold a Comic with a Bullet Hole clear through the middle, I sold comics with Mouse chews so deep into them that a full 3-5% of the book had been digested in some attic. Because of the Extremity of the deformities I handled I needed a New Grade and at that time in 1999 the DrSkull Orphan was Born. These were comics no one loved and that had been treated, in various hideous ways, so Badly that they looked like survivors from a plane crash, comics that Yellowed paper was a pipe dream because the browning had set in hard.

It's been awhile since I had the chance to sell a good batch of bad comics.. but I have sold more then my Share. To Professors and Programmers I've sold to anyone with the High Bid and the ability to pay.. Free enterprise, you've got to love it! Comics that would have found their way into Land fills or Burn barrells in the past were winging (or driving if sent media Mail) across the Country to new homes daily. As an off hand Guess I'd say between 1999 and 2003 I've sold approximately 1,000 Comic Books that were in too low a grade to actually assign a Grade as well! Great Days those, great days.

Now with the massive amount of people selling comics on ebay it's not so easy to be innovative.. every once in awhile though I see a coverless comic up, a whipped, limp, thrashed and defeated Dell or DC.. a Marvel with it's Logo long since excised.. and I think back to the Days when the Orphans ruled the Bottom feeders with fondness and Nostalgia and sometimes...not often but sometimes.. you can do a search on ebay for "Orphan Comic" and one comes up. It's sad, it's decrepit and it's for sale! Sometimes we're the sellers but sometimes we aren't, and that makes me even prouder. For Orphans have found a home in the lexicon of Comic Geeks and Four Color Nerds everywhere, No longer destined for the Garbage, Comics from the 40s, 50s and even 60s who may not Look like a Million Bucks can still be treated as Valued members of collections, After all who can Afford a Fantastic Four #1 in Near Mint? Not too many of us.. But one with an 8 inch tear in the cover, 6 pieces of tape, 2 spine tears and one staple missing? A Whole helluva lot more of us! Who wouldn't love a chance at that key book in comic history??

And the Best Part of the whole thing? You will NEVER see an Orphan getting Slabbed by CGC... and isn't reading the words and looking at the Art the REAL reason to buy Comics?
So Forego the Slabbed Investment Grade wall hangers that you can't even touch.. Buy a beaten bedraggled Orphan and rediscover the fun of Reading Comics! Save an Orphan, Buy a Comic :-)


Until Next time, Good Hunting Doc