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21 February 2026

Heritage auctions - London, part 1

Here's a few images from the recent event (11th Feb 2026) at the Heritage Auctions gallery in central London. Event seemed to go well - they've promised to organise more! 

Art is up for auction at either auction 7461 (here) or 7462 (here) at the end of Feb/start of March. Good luck if you bid!

Judge Dredd megazine cover by Dean Ormston


John Byrne Superman / Joker cover


Lee Elias cover art for 'Chamber of Chills'



John Bolton 






20 February 2026

UPDATED: Old Boys Books - bibliographies etc

I really, really don't need to start another collection...BUT I am prepared to give room on the blog for a listing of bibliographical material related to the 'Old Boys Book' genre. These were text based rather than comic strip based so I've never collected the original material or the many fanzines that the genre spawned.

I don't pretend that this is any way a complete listing, it's just stuff I've come across recently on eBay and you've got to start somewhere. I'll add more titles as I go along. For this update it's some Frank Richards material...

UPDATE: all updates highlighted in red

Nelson Lee library - 7 pages, dated July 1961

Letters to a friend from Frank Richards (published by Museum Press)
one day I'll have enough time to look properly at all the book published by Museum Press. But not today.


The letters of Frank Richards

Sexton Blake catalogue (1966) - according to this source


supplement to the Sexton Blake catalogue (1971) - according to this source


the same Wikipedia page also lists a 2nd edition of the catalogue as having been published in 1993


The Nelson Lee library - Edwy Searles Brooks
the seller notes that this is 116 pages long and minutely detailed

This (below) look like the first edition of the above book. Described thus...
Published by the Old Boys' Book Club with an introduction by Bob Blythe, who seemed to run the club at the time, or at least heavily involved. The guide has orange card covers and approx 60 pages inside, packed with information on Nelson Lee. 

90 glorious years
A celebration of 90 years of the GEM and the MAGNET and a tribute to the life & works of Eric Fayne, the editor of Story Paper Collectors' Digest from 1959 to 1987. A great, profusely illustrated B&W 200 page book


John Nix Pentelow, 1872-1931
a relatively scarce fanzine for the Magnet Library. Printed in 1976 by the 'Cambridge Old Boys Book Club' and focusses on the life of John Nix Pentelow. Contributions from Jack Overhill, Bill Lofts, Deryck Harvey, Danny Posner, W.J.A. Hubbard and W.H. Broster

19 February 2026

Boys' World - promotional poster

A shout out for ace ebayer philcomics and this lovely Boys' World item that was up for sale recently (sold price was £32.88). This is how the item was described...

It's a fold out leaflet / flyer that promotes the launch of Boys' World comic in Jan 1963 was was aimed at wholesalers and newsagents. 

Published by Longacre Press, Boys' World was a comic magazine and the first three three issues came with free gifts. This describes the paper as "outstanding", "exciting free gifts" and having a "hard-hitting publicity campaign" which "all add up to big big big sales so order order order!". 

The comic was promoted on TV as well as in the press, like most comic launches back in the 1950s to 1980s. 

This full colour, double sided flyer opens from a folded up form to produce a 22 x 15 inch (56 x 38 cm) sheet of thin card. 










18 February 2026

Terrific #43 - pay copy

A recent ebay sale was a pay copy of issue 43 of Terrific - I've featured pay copies of comics in the past because they're so rare. Anyway, one for you Marvel fans out there...






17 February 2026

UPDATED: Asterix calendars

A well overdue update to my guide to collecting Asterix calendars - hope you managed to get one of these to hang on your wall, I didn't!

now updated with calendars for 2026 - highlighted thus

Asterix calendar 2026

Asterix calendar 2025

Asterix calendar 2024

Asterix calendar 2023


A chance find at a bookshop in December 2019 has meant that, happily, an Asterix calendar has been hanging on my wall this year. 

2022 appears looks set to be a bumper year for Asterix calendars with these two calendars currently available on Amazon...


Working out a gift list for last Christmas inspired me to see if a calendar has been produced for...and, good news, it has been...and it's been on my wall all year


 
the calendar previously on my wall...



...I then started wondering if there had been calendars for other years...so far I've found just this one


A quick bit of googling brings up plenty of 'kalendars' for the German market but few others - or maybe they've just dropped the word 'kalendar' from the title (so that it can be sold more widely).

Anyway if you know of any other Asterix calendars do let me know - thanks.

Asterix calendar 1991

Asterix calendar 1996



If you're interested in comic calendars then you can check out my previous posts on the subject...

1). Beano & Dandy calendars are here
2). Commando calendars are here
3). Judge Dredd calendars are here
4). Broons calendars are herehere and here
5). Oor Wullie is here
6). Dan Dare calendar is here
7). Miscellaneous calendars are here
8). Viz calendars are here

16 February 2026

Get Along Gang - collected comics

One day there's a cover gallery to be done for Marvel UK's Get Along Gang comics. Today is not that day. There are 93 issues of the regular comic to collect and, the reason we're here today, at least 1 issue of "collected comics". Not sure which issues were collected or if there were further issues. Any assistance gratefully received.


The special must have quite a few pages - compared to the regular comics it looks pretty chunky. Perfect bound rather than stapled.


15 February 2026

Lawless 2025 - the signatures

Here - for posterity - are the signatures that I got at Lawless 2025 convention. Hopefully you can read / understand them all...


...if not then here's my guide to artist signatures...

left hand page (from top to bottom) has...
John Wagner
Ben Willsher
Alan Davis
Johh Higgins
Brian Bolland
Dylan Teague
Cliny Langley
D'Israeli
Patrick Goddard
Simon Bisley
Sally Jane Hurst
Colin MacNeil
Ally Fell
Henry Flint
Ant Williams
Glenn Fabry
Dave Kendall
Ant Williams
Boo Cook

...and the right hand page...
Doug Braithwaite
Deborah Tate
Dan Cornwell
Robbie Morrisson
Hunt Emerson
David Roach
Steve MacManus
Ian Edgington
Steve Austin
Andy Ewington
Neil Roberts
Lee Carter

14 February 2026

Cheeky weekly - the dummy issue

At the time of typing there's a rare opportunity here to acquire a rare copy of the dummy issue of Cheeky weekly. 

I've saved the images here for posterity.



Here's one version...


and here's another version...


As the seller notes...
This dummy copy of the first issue of Cheeky Weekly reveals whole page changes and the total redo of the 2 page chilling adventure story Fangs of Fear.