Set Description:
Synopsis: Our set is currently 93% complete with the vast majority of our books 9.8s (68) and 75 books topping the census. Moreover, 33 of our books come from Pedigree Collections, including 14 from the Pacific Coast Collection. The highlight of this set are Issues #1-4, which all come from the Pacific Coast Collection and are all highest graded examples, with #1 and #3 being single highest graded and #2 being 1 of 2. As of June 2023,16 of our books are single highest graded examples. But, and in this case it’s a big BUT, we still lack six books and are struggling to find even second highest graded copies for some of those empty slots. Who knows, it may he left to my son to finish this one.
Background: This is a mixed set including books from 11 different DC titles plus the 15-issue 80-page DC Giant run from 1964-1965.
Our Collection: This is a really really hard set to complete because the books come from so many different titles. We originally just acquired the Giant Flashes as past of that set. We later added the Giant JLAs and the Giant World’s Finests, but only as parts of those collections. It was not until my friend Mark in England decided to break up and sell his award winning set of Gorgeous Giants, which were auctioned off on Heritage in August 2019, that we started buying additional books. We have been fortunate enough the last couple of years to pick up a number of these books, but this set still has a very long ways to go with seven empty slots.
The problem with collecting these books on any semblance of a budget is that many of the books are seemingly impossible to find in high grade unless they come up all at once. Twice we could have pretty much finished this set by buying every book in an auction, but finances did not permit buying so many books at once. Moreover, since all the books fit into other sets, some like the Batmans, which are more heavily collected, are far harder to find than others.
On the plus side, it seems that a large percentage of my friend Mark’s (Colmoreman’s) Gorgeous Giants set were acquired by one collector, who decided to sell them on Heritage in late 2021 giving us a second shot at many of those books. We did not get them all by any means, but we were able to grab enough to jumpstart this set with a couple of dozen high-grade books. We have also started to just fill some slots with 9.6s rather than waiting for highest-graded examples to come on the market.
While finishing this set has become more of a priority for us, most of the missing issues remain difficult to find, at least in 9.6/9.8. If we ever finish this one with 9.6/9.8s, it better win a Best Silver Age Award, it’s a bear.
Current Stats:
85/90 Books
68 9.8s-All Highest Graded
16 9.6s-5 Highest Graded
1 9.4-Highest Graded
48 WP
34 OW/W
2 OW
1 Cr/OW
16 Single Highest Graded
74 Highest Graded
11 Second Highest Graded
33 Pedigrees
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