ALL-AMERICAN COMICS #12 * CGC 5.5 * 4th Highest-Graded Copy

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Title: ALL-AMERICAN COMICS No. 12
Place Published:
Publisher:DC [Indicia: All-American Comics Inc.]
Date Published: March, 1940
Description: CGC certified: Fine- (5.5). Grader's notes: "Concentrated foxing right top of back cover; stain left center of back cover; light silverfish damage left top of back cover; moderate cover tanning." Off-white pages. Provenance: The DC UNIVERSE COLLECTION.

GPAnalysis: No reported sales in this grade. Highest-graded Universal sale is a 5.0 that sold for $500 in 12/23.

Overstreet: "Last Toonerville Folks." CGC Census: 8 graded copies (6 Universal, 2 Restored). This is the 4th highest-graded copy. Gerber's Photo-Journal Guide Scarcity Index: 5 ("Average: 1000-2000 copies").

Credits: Cover: Bill Smith and Stan Asch. Scripts: Jerry Siegel?, Al Smith, Gene Byrnes, Percy Crosby, A.W. Nugent, Edwina Dumm, Fontaine Fox, Jon Blummer, Robert Ripley, Richard Rick, Carl Claudy, Sheldon Mayer, Edwin Alger, Art Helfant. Art: Bill Smith, Stan Asch, Al Smith, Gene Byrnes, Percy Crosby, A.W. Nugent, Edwina Dumm, Fontaine Fox, Jon Blummer, Robert Ripley, Richard Rick, Ben Flinton, Sheldon Mayer, Edwin Alger, Art Helfant.Fontaine Fox's Finale: This ish features the final All-American appearance of Fontaine Fox's "Toonerville Folks," a syndicated strip that chronicled the foibles of smalltown America for over forty years. By 1940, when the strip was booted from All-American to make room for more dynamic fare, Fox's strip was a backwards-looking affair, rooted in a vision of an arcadian America that was rapidly receding into the past.

"Toonerville Folks reached the end of the line on February 9, 1955, when the seventy-year-old Fox retired to Florida. Wisely, neither the Syndicate nor Fox sought a replacement. The 'vacant lot' era of American life was disappearing. It was beaten by the population explosion of post-World War II, suburban developers, and urban blight." — Herb Galewitz, Fontaine Fox's Toonerville Trolley. Scribners: 1972, p. iv.****************************************
The DC UNIVERSE COLLECTION comprises over 40,000 comic books, encompassing every single DC comic published for retail sale from 1934 to 2014. The collection was amassed by British music producer Ian Levine over the course of several decades, and it's been hailed as the single greatest collecting accomplishment in comic book history. This collection served as the basis for former DC Comics president Paul Levitz's monumental book 75 Years of DC Comics: The Art of Modern Mythmaking, published by Taschen in 2017. PBA is proud to present this epic collection in a series of themed sales, including The DC UNIVERSE COLLECTION Part 3: The GOLDEN AGE, coming this summer. To join the DC Universe Collection notifications list, contact pba@pbagalleries.com.

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