Not another “Say It Ain’t So” so soon!?
It’s Wednesday morning and I just opened the paper to see that our good neighbors, The East End Cafe, closed their doors unexpectedly Monday night. Blame it on the economy. The owners were quoted as saying their business was done 40% in February compared to last year. I know they ended the month on a good note as I caught CUBANE there Saturday night. The place was absolutely packed! I’m sure some frottage was going on as people tried to work their way through the room. It was an electric night as the band “Better Half” (good guys – good musicians!) opened. CUBANE, as usual, gave an incredible set and accommodated the crowd with a 2 song encore. During the set, they acknowledged fan and Navy Seal, Curtis Bare, who had just returned from a stint on the hospital ship, USNS Comfort, helping with the Haiti relief. He was the person who informed us that C8H8, CUBANE’s CD, was played in the operating rooms. How cool is that? Once again, you only have one more opportunity to catch CUBANE LIVE before they take a break from gigging and work on new songs full time- Paul, Jr says they have about 30 new ones that have been rattling around in their heads and just have to be recorded! Join them on Friday, March 12th at JB McGinnes (formerly Gators) in the Basin Road Shopping Center as they do an all-night show. On a sad note, this is announced as the last show with our good friend, Tom Castiglione, on guitar. Unfortunately, Tom needs to devote more time to honing his drug dealing skills – he’s a pharmacist, people!
Back to the East End Cafe – according to the paper, the employees were only informed of the closing during that day. News spread quickly and the night ending up with many groups showing up to salute the venue. Similar to the closing of the Deer Park years ago (before it re-opened as “McGlynn’s West”), the crowd did get a little rowdy at the end as people tried to get souvenirs. We wish only the best to the owners and former employees of our neighbors for almost 22 years! Makes you stop and think – Captain Blue Hen Comics is currently in its 30th year on Main Street – probably one of the oldest “institutions” in Newark!
Not to diminish the situation next door, but you have probably heard that Peter Parker is also joining the ranks of the unemployed today! Yes, today’s issue of ASM # 623 finds J.J.J. giving him his walking papers. Let’s see how Marvel treats this subject! Grab your copy today!
I forgot to mention something I found a little interesting at the auction I reported on last time. The dealer who opened the bidding on the huge X-Men lot that I scored was at this one, also. I walked over to him and we did some discussing of how that auction was run (chaotic, without any apparent order) and he brought up the faded cover to the X-Men # 94 that is now sitting in our showcase. He believes that it is not necessarily sun-faded. He said that he remembered that a number of copies of 94 left the press in this shape. I know we have received other comics in the past with obvious printing problems/errors, including different colors; but I’m still going with my hunch of sun-bleaching and priced it low! (P.S. someone already snatched up the copy of #2.) Possibly regretting having let me take home the X-men, this same dealer outbid me on two long runs of Amazing Spider-man – one covering about #’s 140 to 270 inclusive, the other from 270 to about 420, missing only the # 300.
Another short auction story. Another dealer was also at this auction that I had seen and battled with several times before. Several auctions ago, I struck up a conversation with him even though as one auctioneer has said, “There are no ‘friends” at an auction”. Just as the auction was about to begin (it featured a lot of nice golden age comics, pulps, coins, etc), he called me aside and we stepped outside for a moment. He proposed that instead of us beating each other up (both of us would bid on anything if it was cheap enough), that maybe we would agree to not bid against each other if we could come up with separate lists that we were more interested in getting. Turns out that those lists weren’t too difficult to come up with.This auction had a nice numbered catalogue that made this easy to do and mark. I felt a little sleazy doing this, but agreed to our pact. Both of us stayed true to our word and laid off of the other’s items. Maybe, it was karma, neither of us won a darn thing! Live auctions of decent material in auction houses that promote their listings seem to do well!
On a side note, it was through Heritage Auction House that a copy of Detective #27 just beat out a similarly graded copy of Action Comics #1 at $1,075,000 for the most ever paid for a comic. Last week, Heritage also sold a 1943 penny for over $207,000! This is not a record for a 1943 “copper” cent, as this one spent some time being circulated and was only in “EF” condition. In 1943, and 1943 only, due to the war effort, the mint decided to make “steel” cents, freeing up more copper to make bullets. A few 1943′s escaped the mint that were actually punched on copper planchets. They are scarce. Nowadays, finding a “wheatie” in change, period, is unusual; but then again, they changed the design to the “memorial” reverse over 50 years ago. Last year, there were 4 different reverse designs to commemorate 100 years of the Lincoln cent. Did you see any? This year, 2010, a new “shield” reverse is out there. Again, have you seen any, yet? Not me. Tell ya what I’m going to do: starting Sunday, March 7th when I return from a short haitus at the shop due to a surgical procedure, whenever you buy one of my “green-tagged” items, you will also get a free 1943 steel penny as a curiosity piece. Going full circle, in 1944, the mint melted down those spent shell casings to make pennies!
I love the auction stories, Paul. Keep them coming, along with the associated acquisitions!
Paul’s the best blogger of us all.
Good luck with the procedure, my firend!