Boxing Day
This may not look like a lot to you, but to me, it’s like a shady tree at the end of a long, hot, dusty road:
Boxes, right? But not just any boxes. That’s two-hundred-bucks-and-change worth of comic bags, backing boards, and various long and short boxes for comic book storage.
My intent is to replace the worn-out boxes presently containing the Longbox Graveyard collection — some of which I have hauled around for going on thirty years!
This will afford a trimmer look to my comic book Man Cave, but more importantly, it will mark the symbolic conclusion of my Longbox Graveyard project. This blog was founded to keep myself on track as I transform my comics Accumulation into a collection … and when the last of my comics go into those new boxes, that job will be largely complete.
But the joke is on me for thinking this would be the end! Instead, in these past few years, I’ve rediscovered a love of comics, and come to genuinely enjoy building Longbox Graveyard, page-by-page. My collecting odyssey may be coming toward an end, but the Longbox Graveyard will sail on, for a little bit at least … thanks to all my many readers who make this endeavor worthwhile.
Now, if you will excuse me, I have a bunch of comics to file away (finally, and forever!)
Posted on March 26, 2014, in IT COMES IN THE MAIL and tagged Collecting. Bookmark the permalink. 11 Comments.
dangvozden
Paul O'Connor
Kris (not Chris)
markginocchio
miloapama
Dean Compton
Moya
ryanmcswain
Longbox Graveyard 
Did you ever try some corrugated plastic box?
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I’ve never seen one of the plastic boxes in person, but I considered them on-line before opting for conventional cardboard. The plastic boxes are quite a bit more expensive, and I’m a cheap bastard (plus I was ordering more than a dozen boxes, which would get pricey in a hurry). Most of the time my boxes are going to sit sedately on the shelf — if I anticipated more handling and travel the plastic boxes might make sense, but for my purposes the cardboard will suffice.
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One of these days, I need to really organize my comics, as you have done. I’m glad that the blog will continue. Personally, I too have rediscovered my love of comics, as well as the fact that there are many wonderful Bronze Age comics out there that I’ve yet to read!
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I haven’t crossed the finish line yet, but thanks for the good vibes! Getting the rump end of the Accumulation bagged, boarded, and entered into the database is taking much longer than I anticipated. I’m trying to make it less of a chore by reading a comic every now and then, too. Having already done so much heavy lifting in this project, I admit some of the urgency has drained away. Still, I will feel better when it is done.
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I need to organize my comics. I want to start getting every Punisher appearance, but first I have got to figure out which ones I have in the condition I want them in! Congrats on this step, but I hope you keep this blog going long past the final comic being placed in its proper spot in its longbox!
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Recognizing that a comics “collection” was just an “accumulation” until you know what you have (and where to find it) was the major impetus in starting this blog.
I think I’m two full weekends away from being (nearly) done with organizing my Collection. Had hoped to have it done before WonderCon but it will be a close run thing. I expect the blog will continue at least another year past my 3-year anniversary in June … but in life as in baseball, everything is day-to-day, brother!
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This raises several burning questions.
#1. What made the final cut to stay in the collection but has yet to appear in a review?
#2. What bags and boards (mylar, acid free, silver age size, etc.) did you pick and why?
#3 Do you need a copy of the first and third Defenders (Marvel Feature) to patch a hole in the collection? I was just going to mail them but at this stage it seems best to check first! If you have them in FN or better then nevermind.
#4. What is in the longboxes now that still has a chance of ending up on the chopping block, and has it been reviewed here yet?
#5 Can you give us an estimate of how many books in your collection have male nipples drawn not by the artist but by Roy Thomas?
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Burning answers to burning questions!
1) Mostly it was admitting books from the 70s & 80s that had been curated out of the Collection back in. For example, I have a ton of Thor comics, but had elected to keep only the Walt Simonson run and a select few Roy Thomas/John Buscema issues. At first. Now I’ve granted a general amnesty to Thor (and many other books), admitting a swath of indifferent Keith Pollard issues, along with those overlong and continuity-heavy runs that Thomas wrote trying to bring the Eternals into the Marvel Universe, or somehow splice Thor with the Der Ring des Nibelungen.
(Hey, you asked!)
Repeat that process across all of my Marvel & DC Accumulation and you see a couple thousand books making it into the Collection, legitimized by getting a clean bag & board, and an entry into my computer database. Basically I gave up on efforts to sell them, but couldn’t bring myself to dump them, so I let the strays into the house after giving them a bath and a flea collar.
I had hoped to avoid dealing with these lesser books at all by just peremptorily excluding them from the Collection, but … I figure I can always make a renewed attempt to curate and sell select runs out of this “final” Collection, a process that will be made easier for having everything at last catalogued and organized.
(This is how I rationalized ordering another 750 bags and boards yesterday, it is a sickness).
2) According to the manufacturer: “The BCW Current Comic Bags are an acid free, archival quality product made of crystal clear polypropylene. The BCW Current Comic Backer Boards are made from a full 24 point solid bleached sulfate, coated on one side with a buffered with 3% calcium carbonate, and are precision cut to size.”
I don’t know what any of that means.
3) Sure, send ’em over, Martian care packages are always gratefully received here at Longbox Graveyard Secret HQ! A bunch of Defenders are covered by the amnesty — previously I was keeping only the Gerber and David Anthony Kraft runs — so there’s plenty of room in the halfway house — and thanks in advance!)
4) There are many, many books queued up for reviews at Longbox Graveyard … I may need to just start summarizing entire longboxes if I am to get through it before I go to that big longbox in the sky, myself. I do still have one more frightening box marked “Lot Fodder” that may end up getting harvested for organs but everything else will get reviewed, or at least receive a salute from the reviewing stand during some crazy comic book Mayday Military Parade here at the Secret HQ. (This is how the Puppetmaster got started, I am convinced of it).
5) That way lies madness. (Though I wonder if Thomas’ quest for Nipple Consistency extended to Big John’s run on Sub-Mariner? Hmm.)
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I more and more convinced that the Nipples issue is a serious matter that needs to be addressed properly.
Let’s indulge ourselves in a grand opening for the Nifty Nipples Blooming Blog!
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I expect there are already plenty of nipple blogs out there (particularly on Tumblr!)
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