Collecting comic books is a more recent hobby compared to doll and stamps collecting. The study of comics is called as panelology while the terminology coined for people who collect them are called pannapictagraphists. There are several reasons why people around the world love to collect comic books and their reason could just be plainly fascination, appreciation, and for profit. The terms comic books, comics, and comic strips became widely used in the 1900’s. The terminologies was coined from the newspapers and magazines’ printed picture strips which depicted comical images and features.
Many comic book experts credit the existence of modern comics to Rudolphe Topffer, Angelo Agostini, and Wilhelm Bush. The earliest known comic book was created by Rudolphe and it was entitled “The Adventures of Obadiah Oldbuck†in 1837. His comic book was then published in the United States in 1842 which was also credited as the first comic book ever published in the US.
Around 1859, Wilhelm Bush, a German artist and poet, created caricatures for Fliegende Blatter. This was a newspaper where his famous characters were printed. Later, he created the popular comic “Max und Moritz” in the year 1865. By 1895, Richard Outcault created “Yellow Kid” and it is often being considered as the first comic strip since he was the first comic artist to have used the balloon for the characters’ conversations. But it has always been know that there were already several comic books and strips that serve as predecessors of his comic strip.
The first comic book collector to have profited from these artwork was Harvey T. “Pop†Hollinger. He opened his mail and retail order shop in the later 1930’s. Pop was the first one to trade used comics after he retired from his teaching job in 1933. The first comic strip to have been created by a woman was entitled “Brenda Starr and it was first published in Chicago on June 19, 1940. In 1952, William Gaines published his satirical comic book called the “Mad Magazineâ€. However, the hobby of comic book collection started to take ground around the late 1960’s when novelty comic book shops were established.
DC Comics and Marvel Comics also started to publish several superhero characters in their comic books around this era. These two major comic book publishers also saw the growth of comic book specialty shops that they have created comics that were exclusively published for sale in these shops. Marvel initially created the comic book entitled “Dazzler†for this purpose and it was a craze for the public that it sold more than 400,000 copies. Consequently, comic book enthusiasts would wait for the next publication in the comic series and thousands of these collectors would line up for limited edition copies.
