Set Description:
Synopsis: Our set contains 98 of the 100 books in this set with a minimum grade of 9.2. Seventy-six of our books are highest graded examples, with 18 holding that distinction alone.
Background: Detective Comics is an anthology comic featuring detective characters, both superhero and civilian. The longest-lasting character in Detective Comics was Batman, as from the time of his debut (#27, May 1939), the Caped Crusader was almost always the star of the cover and lead story.
Detective Comics has remained in publication longer than any other DC Comics title, and indeed, the very name DC was taken from its initials. In March 2019, Detective became only the third American comic book in history-after Action and the Four Color series of the 1930s-60s by Dell Comics-to publish a 1,000th issue.
Since there is not currently a Detective set that precisely covers the Silver Age period, we are currently trying to complete two Detective sets, #201-#300 and #301-#400. This set begins in March 1962 with Issue #301 and continues through Issue #400, which is dated June 1970. It thus covers about 70% of the Silver Age. Of the two Detective sets we are currently collecting, it is the much easier of the two to find high-grade examples. It is in fact possible to achieve a 9.4 minimum grade with this set, while an 8.5 would be about the best possible bar for the earlier set with 8.0 being much more realistic.
Our Collection: Detective Comics is a very long run and one we did not collect when we started actively pursuing this hobby again 20 years ago. But I have long admired many of the covers and started buying some in the range of this set when several big collections started appearing at auction. Until recently, we only acquired those covers we particularly liked and have passed on others.
It was probably the sale of the Alfred Pennyworth books on Heritage, which motivated us to expand this collection, as many were Pedigreed or single highest graded or both. We did not get nearly as many as we would have liked because of financial constraints, but at least it formed a decent base for our set on which we have continued to build.
While this set trails the other Batman related sets we collect in terms of registry points, it is the closest to completion-not counting World’s Finest, which is a Superman/Batman team-up book, one set of which we have now completed.
2024 Update: Well, this set has now joined our other Batman related sets atop the census as more Alfred Pennyworth books have been registered. We also finally decided to buy a few third highest graded books in an effort to finish this one, which will lower our bar to 9.2 for this set. It will probably end up making the set a little more expensive in the long-run, but we just wanted to make a little progress towards finishing this one.
2026 Update: Two steps forward and one step back, or is it the other way around LOL. We filled two slots this past year and upgraded three more, but we lost two single highest graded books, while just acquiring one, reducing that number for this set to just 18, the fewest of all our Batman family sets. The goal remains to complete the set with a 9.4 minimum and all books at least second highest graded examples. To achieve it we will need to fill two slots with books graded at least 9.6 and upgrade our two 9.2s in this set to at least 9.4s. I am not sure if that goal will be achievable in the upcoming year or not, but at least we can see it from here
Current Stats:
98/100. Books
18 Single Highest Graded
76 Highest Graded
20 Second Highest Graded
2 Third Highest Graded
21 Pedigrees
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